Editor’s note: This is the third post in a series about implementing PeopleSoft projects. The second post on initial considerations for PeopleSoft implementations can be found here. 

It’s no accident that there are two processes in Project Initiation and twenty in Project Planning according to the Project Management Institute.  Many organizations make the costly mistake of diving right in because there is “no time to plan”.  On the contrary, most projects fail in the beginning as planning efforts are sacrificed for “action”.

In spite of the organization’s impatience, it’s your responsibility as the Project Manager to educate senior management in the advantages of compiling a thoughtful and reasonable plan before jumping into project execution.  

What are the key points to consider when planning a PeopleSoft implementation? Here are some factors to consider: 

1. Scope Definition:  Even if the organization compiled the world’s best Request for Proposal for a suite of software, the process of reviewing and verifying those requirements (and discovering new ones in the process) is absolutely essential for the proper scope definition of a PeopleSoft project. Especially if more than one module is to be implemented, requirements must be considered in light of a tightly integrated system. For example, configuration of the budget and general ledger modules can have a substantial and often irreversible impact on the sub-modules of Accounts Payable and Accounts Receivable. It may be worth dedicated PeopleSoft training for the project team and subject matter experts to increase their understanding of the system in order to articulate those requirements more definitively. 

2. Work Breakdown Structure:  Once the requirements are fully understood and gaps between what is and what should be are clearly identified by your seasoned PeopleSoft integrator, the WBS can be crafted with a solid foundation. However, software configuration and modifications to bridge gaps are only two out of potentially hundreds of other work packages including the elements of communications, stakeholder management, quality, risk management, hardware procurement and set up, testing, and training. 

3. Project Schedule:  Once scope is fully defined and a solid WBS is in place, employ the best possible experts to define, sequence and estimate required resources and time for each work package. When you develop it to your satisfaction and present it to management, resist the temptation to meet their often unrealistic expectations to implement such a game-changing system within their timeframes. If the timeframe doesn’t meet with their approval, craft at a scope that will. Even though the notion of the Triple Constraint (Time, Scope and Cost) is losing favor according to PMI, it is still true in concept. Something’s gotta give!

If the above considerations aren’t daunting in and of themselves, that’s not all. There are seventeen additional processes (according to PMI, that is) that the PM should at least consider before Execution begins in earnest.  Again, it is your duty to lead your organization through these processes even while senior management is questioning what your team is doing all this time.

How will you convince your senior management to invest serious time and effort in the planning process?

I’m sure it’s been quite a while since many of us who have earned PMP certification actually studied the PMBOK in preparation for the exam.  It is not surprising, then, that we move forward in our careers as project managers utilizing our own style.  Some of that style may be based upon selective PMBOK concepts tailored to our unique personalities and skills sets.  But more than likely, much of what we do as project managers is based upon the corporate culture in which we find ourselves, particularly in larger organizations which develop their own sets of tools and techniques.  Nevertheless, having a point of reference, such as the PMBOK, is useful, if not comforting, because it attempts to foster continuity and standards within our profession. 

To refresh my memory, I recently reviewed old notes taken while attending a PMP boot camp several years ago.  The exam questions were based upon the following areas of project management knowledge: Initiating, Planning, Executing, Monitoring/Controlling, Closing and finally Professional/Social Responsibility.  Specific topics found within these areas include project charters, scope management, work breakdown structures, team organizational structures, cost control, quality control, risk management… well, you get the idea.  The list goes on and on.  And although these topics are presented in a generic, project-agnostic format, each is addressed in significant detail.  So much detail, in fact, that sometimes we may lose sight of one of the main roles of the project manager – looking at the larger picture and taking a reality check.  Allow me to explain.

I often work on innovative pilot projects that are proof of concept endeavors with specific objectives, deliverables and relatively brief timelines.  Accordingly, these projects have limited resources, not only in dollars, but also limited in scope, time and particularly limited in staff.  That last point should be underscored, because limitations in staff resources require the project manager to assume many roles and wear many hats.  Sometimes we might act as a second set of eyes for quality assurance.  Other times, we may get involved with finding technical solutions to specific problems.  And of course, we are always managing the project sponsor’s expectations.  So viewing the project from a larger perspective and applying proactive, commonsense judgment is a critical PM talent.  Yes, the templates, methodologies and concepts presented in the PMBOK are important, but remember that these are simply tools to be used at the discretion of the PM.  Projects are comprised of a unique mix of cultures, personalities, objectives and constraints that often cannot be approached mechanically in a “paint by numbers” fashion. 

To illustrate, I once worked on an innovation project sponsored by a rather large healthcare organization.  The vendor selected to provide the technology was a relatively small company with limited staff.  So limited in fact, that many of the vendor’s employees had roles and responsibilities that were somewhat blurred and interchangeable.  That said, it was not surprising that this vendor had some weaknesses in areas of quality control.  So I took it upon myself to act as an impartial Q/A analyst, if only for a few days.  By temporarily offering my services as a pinch-hitter, we were able to identify three or four critical errors in workflow and functionality prior to implementation. It was a reality check utilizing common sense in a proactive fashion appropriate for the scope and limitations of this particular project.  It could be argued that the responsibility for quality assurance belonged to the vendor, but in reality they had their plates full with too many competing tasks.  Only the PM had the larger perspective to assess the Q/A situation and identify the weakness.  And the temporary role assigned to myself spared the project for failure and also saved the healthcare organization from embarrassment.  The reality check allowed me to identify a need that might have been missed under a template approach with tasks checked off.

So make it a practice to take a reality check at least once a week.  Use your unique perspective as PM to ensure that issues are identified and resolved before they become someone else’s headache after implementation.  Don’t get lured into repetitive, templated motion.  In contrast, take time for some serious, objective assessment of the project’s status and health.  This habit requires insight and judgment, but then again, but that’s why project managers are put in charge.  That’s reality.

How do you remember to take a step back and give your project a reality check? How often do you do that?

I had a boss once who loved to draw on the white board. It became something of a joke on his team, that at the beginning of a meeting we would hide the dry erase markers before he came into the room. It never stopped him; he started carrying them around. Only recently do I truly appreciate his approach.

Sidebar for a personal story: My daughter’s soccer team recently ended their season and part of my end of season gift was a coloring book and crayons and the missive that it was something to help me reduce my stress (something of a gag gift). At home after the party, I sat down with the coloring book and colored a picture. I took the time to work slowly and carefully, experimenting with different colors and used shading to highlight areas. It took me back to a calmer time: I worked on the image for me, not for my boss, or my kids, or for the executive committee – just for me. I loved it.

I am known among my peers as the visual learning guy. I push hard on the team to use fewer words and more pictures in both the training materials we produce and the presentations we create. If an image is worth a thousand words then we should we be creating voluminous training in images, not pages of text. Too often, the push back is, “I can’t draw” or “I’m not creative.” Let me say now that everyone can take this approach given some processes and tools.

1. Take some time to tap into your creative side. A quick search on Google yields a plethora of sites on coloring to relieve stress. I’m not saying you should make it a daily habit, but why not take a few minutes once in a while to doodle? It unlocks a thinking habit that thrives on free association and random connections that you might not have considered. Those links are the foundations of innovation and might lead to bigger and better ideas.
2. Incorporate a process for thinking differently. The Six Thinking Hats framework developed by Edward de Bono is a wonderful starting point for organizing meetings and encouraging a style of thinking. Assign the role of Green Hat to various team members and have them work at being the creative, “blue sky” thinker. By assigning the role to a person you give permission for ideas to flow and remove limitations.
3. Encourage mind-mapping as a technique for organizing information. On many occasions I find myself in meetings struggling to grasp how all the parts of a program or initiative are tied together. The various stakeholders have input into the problem and the resulting maelstrom can be hard to decode. A mind map can help illustrate the interconnectedness of all the ideas and make concrete the linkages that the entire team needs to see.
4. Seek out visual representations of complex ideas. I have two sites I visit regularly to keep my mindset firmly planted in a visual approach. One is the RSA.org channel on YouTube. This British think tank does a fabulous job of linking thought leaders to artistic displays of the concepts. The images drawn in the videos make the presentations so much more vivid. Another is visual.ly a web site that shows how information can be presented visually and, in my opinion, more memorable.

Finally, let me say that visuals don’t have to be high end art work to be effective. A very simple visual can speak volumes to the reader and communicate at more levels than a paragraph of text. Visuals are great for learning, meeting management, brainstorming, even project management (what’s a WBS but a visual of all the tasks in a project?). Don’t fear the creative side, embrace it and take your projects and work into a different, better, more holistic place.

How are you using visuals and creativity to work more efficiently in your role? If you aren’t using them now, how could you?

While talking with the team, we thought it would be fun to share some of the recent books that we have been reading and hear from you what you find interesting and relevant now. There is never a shortage of professional (and fun) books, so together, hopefully we’ll all find something new to read and enjoy!

Recent books from Vicki:

Books that I have recently completed and have enjoyed are as follows. Note: I listen to more books than I read, and not only are these good books, they are also well-narrated.

• On Second Thought: Outsmarting Your Mind’s Hardwired Habits by Wray Herbert – Interesting list of the shortcuts and biases that our brains use and how to become aware of them so we can enjoy the positive aspects and avoid the negative consequences of each. These biases include why 99.9% of the citizens of France but only 28% of Americans are organ donors, why people who are hungry for lunch donate less money to charity and why early birds serving jury duty are more likely to give in to racial stereotypes when the day gets late.

 

• If You Ask Me (And of Course You Won’t) by Betty White – this is a fun, light-hearted read. I listened to this in audiobook form and it was wonderful hearing Betty White read the book. Listening to her talk was like sitting down with a good friend and learning from her 7-decade career.

 

• The Steve Jobs’ Way: iLeadership For a New Generation by Jay Elliot, William L. Simon – read Vicki’s review of this book here. Listening to Jay Elliot, Sr. VP at Apple and one of Steve’s early employees, read this book and tell the story makes you feel like you were there.

Recent books and suggestions from Jerry:

Books that I have recently completed and have enjoyed are as follows. (This book’s theme parallels the book Vicki mentions, On Second Thought, which I can’t wait to read.)

• Thinking on Purpose for Project Managers: Outsmarting Evolution by Bill Richardson – If you’ve ever wondered why so many poor decisions are made on projects, this book identifies why, and what can be done about making better ones. In clear, no-nonsense writing, the author provides the background for why we make decisions the way we do, what is sometimes (often it turns out) wrong with the way we make them, and how to make better decisions through what he defines as thinking-on-purpose. A major problem in projects, Richardson says we’re often thinking on autopilot, which he defines as reacting to events as they occur using quick-and-dirty or good-enough solutions. He takes the reader through a series of simple steps to help recognize ineffective patterns of thinking, biases, emotions, and blind spots that cause these problems, and he describes how to improve awareness of them—how to think about what you think about.

 

• It’s Your Ship: Management Techniques From the Best Damn Ship in the Navy by Naval Captain Michael Abrashoff – read Jerry’s review of this book here.

What books have you recently read?

Editor’s note: This is the second post in a series about implementing PeopleSoft projects. The first post on whether PeopleSoft is right for your organization can be found here.

Your organization just purchased over $1 million worth of PeopleSoft software licenses and, even if it’s never implemented, contractually owes Oracle for hundreds of thousands of dollars in maintenance fees annually. 

NOW WHAT?

As we discussed in the previous blog, any single suite of PeopleSoft (two examples are Supplier Chain Management or Human Capital Management) is a monstrous challenge to implement. And implementing more than one is the definition of an extremely complex project. Talk about replacing all your current systems with PeopleSoft is just crazy talk. 

There are important decisions to ponder and determine before cracking the shrink wrap on the software and diving in: 

1. Hardware infrastructure and software architecture

• How many servers of what size(s) does the organization require to offer the type of performance necessary?
• How many end-users will there be, how many batch processes, how many and what type of transactions? 
• What about redundancy? Need 100% uptime? Automatic failover?  Disaster recovery plans?

Fortunately, Oracle has an entire department dedicated to assisting organizations in sizing their hardware systems for optimum performance. Take advantage of them. Do not underestimate the need for an extremely large and robust infrastructure. 

2. Project model

What type of resources and how many are required for the project? It’s a safe bet that, even if your organization has several competent Oracle database administrators and an overabundance of programmers (yeah, right), the organization doesn’t already employ experienced PeopleSoft implementers. That means a competitive bid for outside systems integrators if you’re in the public sector and some heavy duty due diligence about who to hire even if you’re not. Some of the categories of resources necessary are: 

• Systems engineers
• PeopleSoft functional implementers
• PeopleSoft programmers
• PeopleSoft security experts
• PeopleSoft integrators
• Business analysts
• Organizational subject matter experts for each functional area to be implemented
• Testing experts
• Project managers
• Training and communication staff

And that is just the beginning.

3. Project Methodology

All the PeopleSoft implementers use basically the same project life cycle methodology – they just give it their own special brand name in order to differentiate them from their competitors.  The organization should thoroughly understand the project life cycle and the inputs, strategies and outputs of each and every step along the way. Then and only then will the organization and not the contractor be in charge of the project and its processes. If the project management maturity of the organization is relatively low, the very best strategy is to hire a seasoned project manager early in the process.

Conclusion

These are only three out of dozens of potential challenges and questions to be considered. 

What will be your organization’s first steps now?

I recently read two articles by Roger Connors regarding how to increase accountability on our teams. (1-Accountability Leads To Greater Influence and 2-Uncontrollables?) While he is working with large organizations on complex projects, the principles offered apply to small teams as well. One of the complaints I hear from senior management is lack of proactive action by their employees or project teams. What I hear them talking about is accountability. In classes, I will often ask if participants have noticed that there are those managers or project managers who are able to get the better resources, more budget when needed, better management support and who tend to deliver more successfully? What do they do differently?

They act accountable for delivering results rather than sitting back and letting things happen to them. They are more proactive in a way that Connors offers as a simple thing to do. When working with a team, they often ask, “What else can I do?” This question posed to the team brings out new ideas, gets the team used to hearing the question and possibly thinking in these terms themselves. It is what allows teams to deliver more quickly by fixing inefficiencies or finding more creative solutions. It is what allows teams to deliver on budget when it seems that is not possible. It is what allows teams to discover new uses for either existing products or new products being created. It is what allows teams to educate the end user so the new process or the new product being developed is accepted, used or followed.

The other point made in these articles is that there is more in our control than most people initially believe. I often bring this point up when discussing risk with teams, and discussing steps that can be taken to prevent a threat or enhance an opportunity. We may not have final say in many matters (FDA approval, economic conditions, management priorities, etc.) but we can influence them to some extent, and often to a greater extent than we initially believe. Many people do not want to believe this, but again I will ask if you have seen someone who is able to influence more things than the average worker. Often, these people are not those high up in the org chart, but instead those who are proactive and willing to take accountability. To support this idea, Connors provides an example of a team who increased the speed of government approval tremendously, a process that many believe is out of their control.

What do you think? Do you believe we can influence accountability for ourselves and our teams? How have you done it?

While listening to podcasts and reading articles that I enjoy, I thought that if we all share our favorite business blogs and podcasts, we might find a few gems to brighten our weeks. Below are some suggestions. What are your favorite podcasts?

From Vicki:

The podcasts I enjoy listening to are:

• Get it Done Guy’s Quick and Dirty Tips to Work Less and Do More podcast by Stever Robbins provides good tips for professionals.

• TED Talks – available in hi-def video or audio only, TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is a non-profit organization devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. Topics include business, environment, technology, engineering, science.  The podcast can be found at http://feeds.feedburner.com/tedtalks_video.

• To The Best of Our Knowledge (TTBOOK) by PRI and Wisconsin Public Radio. I have subscribed to this podcast for years, both through audible.com as well as directly from their site. I am a fan of this show, its wide (huge) variety of topics, and its excellent interviewers. I have enjoyed shows on topics I would never have thought about or taken the time to look into.

From Rob :

I admit to not listening to many podcasts as I tend to be more of a visual learner. I enjoy a series by RSA called RSAnimate.  You can find them on YouTube for free here:

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=rsa+animate&aq=0&oq=rsa

RSA creates videos from audio tracks of famous authors talking about their works and matches it up to video of an artist sketching the concepts. Fun and educational for the auditory and visual learner. It includes summaries from Daniel Pink (Drive), Sir Ken Robinson (on education), and many other thought leaders. It’s fascinating to listen to the summaries while the artist expresses the content visually.

If you have taken the time to stop and read this article, then it’s probably safe to assume that you might be a project manager.  But to narrow the readership further proves difficult, because project managers come from a variety of disciplines and backgrounds.  Some have technical expertise.  Others may have experience in sales or marketing.  Still others may have backgrounds in finance.  So when you’re speaking of project managers as an aggregate, it can be a rather eclectic mix of varied skills and personalities, which then translate into projects that may be run quite differently depending upon who is assigned the responsibility. 

The “PM” title, however, also has a set of consistent expectations.  Project management is defined around a core set of principles, tools and techniques that transcend organizations and objectives.  For example, most projects have some type of scheduling and budget constraints.  All projects require some form of communication among stakeholders.  And many projects, hopefully, have some type of deliverables, objectives and/or accountabilities.  So when thinking along those lines, project managers may tend to view life in terms of definitions, agreements and expectations.  We move along a path that might be considered a straight line, from the point of origin to the point of destination.  We find ways around obstacles and try to keep our eyes focused upon one or more objectives.  Of course, there are times when some flexibility is required, but a project’s success depends upon a reasonably thorough definition and vision of what is to be accomplished followed by managing the expectations of stakeholders.

It’s probably not surprising, then, that many of us can fall into a “project oriented” pattern of thinking when managing our own personal lives.  So allow me a moment to offer my perspective, one based more on feeling than fact.  It is a perspective that is certainly not meant to paint every PM with the same brush, because as mentioned, we are all unique as individuals, even if we share project management as an occupation. Still, I suspect that some of us tend to think of our lives as “projects”.  We look to the future and try to plan accordingly along a perceived path or “straight line”.  That is the mind set of many PMs. There’s just one problem.  Life really doesn’t work that way.  None of us knows with any certainty what the future holds next week, let alone next year.  And it can be a future full of promise that may go unrecognized if our focus is too restricted.  Because real opportunities continually present themselves without much fanfare or notice.  Look straight ahead and you may miss them.

There was an article published by Reader’s Digest a few years back expressing a very profound concept that underscores my assertion regarding limitations of “project oriented” thinking in our personal lives.  The author tried to determine the attributes of perceived “lucky” people versus “unlucky” people.  As you may have already guessed, the “unlucky” people were the ones who limited their goals and aspiratiosn along a single line.  In striking contrast, the “lucky” people were the ones who headed in the general direction, but were able to recognize opportunity, even if it appeared only in their peripheral vision.  And once opportunities were identified, they were actively pursued, often requiring a change in direction, a departure from the stright line.  So it could be argued that looking at life along a perceived straight line path may not be the best strategy for personal growth and fulfillment.  It limits our ability to recognize and take advantage of the best opportunities that life has to offer.  It can also color our perspective, causing us to view certain events and circumstances as a negative, impeding progress on our straight line, when in fact, the same circumstances and events may actually be a positive if we choose to modify our trajectory.  So lately I’ve chosen to scan  the horizon in order to take advantage of the opportunities that may appear in the periphery.  In some cases, these opportunities may be much better than what I can envision on the line straight ahead.

Remember that life is not a project.  It is a journey.

It’s soccer season again and I’m reminded how culture and fit impact performance. Your organization depends on both elements to be successful. If you ignore the impact of culture and fit, you are doomed to fail. In this post, I’ll be discussing a bit of both.

I was reminded of fit this evening after speaking to a parent who wants to pull her child from my team of eight year old soccer players. She has some very compelling arguments as to why he should no longer play, the main reason being that he has never played the sport. Imagine being dropped into the design and development space at Valve computer games directed to code the next great game and you have no experience coding! Granted, my boys’ team isn’t World Cup caliber, but they have played for a few years and at least know the basics. In recreational soccer, I don’t have the luxury of “Hiring for Fit”; I play the hand I get dealt and we do the best we can. At the same time, soccer is the beautiful game and a ripe ground for creating a space in which youngsters can learn some basic skills and then should be innovative and creative about using those skills to achieve a common objective, namely, scoring more goals.

In your organization you do have the luxury of hiring for fit. In fact, it should be a priority. There is plenty of research out there that says if you do it, it results in a happier, more productive work force. Your people will have a sense of belonging and that makes them more likely to be successful. If they don’t “fit” they will consistently struggle to perform the basic functions of the organization. Making sure a hire is a fit in the organization means defining the culture.

In a post I wrote some time ago, I reflected on how coaching soccer can be compared to creating a culture of learning and development. It involves a lot of trial and error, awareness of what works and what doesn’t and plenty of positive reinforcement. I started wondering if my team culture was driving that behavior or driving it to extinction. After a hard look in the mirror, I started questioning my performance as a leader of culture.

Culture can be defined a few different ways and has been in plenty of literature. You can start at Wikipedia and continue your research from there. I recently facilitated a workshop in which I presented several elements of culture, namely: Symbols, Stories, Relationships and Rituals. Without exposing too much information, let’s just say that after quick reflection, I don’t think I’m creating the best culture for brand new players to join my team! Luckily, I have the insight (from my recent workshop) to know what my options are. I can either:

1. Change the objectives. Kind of difficult. We do want to win games but I could take some emphasis off that point.
2. Change the culture. That’s a tough one. It means changing my behavior which will require tremendous effort.
3. Prepare to fail. Okay, #2 is looking more realistic. I don’t want to fail as a coach or leader of a team.

You can look at your organization in a similar light. If the culture clashes with the objectives of the organization, then the culture will undermine your efforts. It is usually easier to modify your goals to fit your culture than change the entire culture. I’m not proposing you abandon them. I am saying you tweak them to fit the culture. In my case, my goal might shift from “Win as many games as possible” to “Demonstrate learning the game of soccer every time we play”. I think I can live with this, since we all get trophies regardless of how we perform (that’s a post for another day). Furthermore, I can change the culture of my team by working on my behavior during practice and during games.

You have a choice in your organization – define your culture and leverage it to be successful or be ignorant of the impact on performance and muddle through as you always have. Culture can be defined at the level of the organization all the way down to the business unit or work team. First, take some time to examine your culture and the fit of the team. Second, develop a plan to adapt for maximum success.

I’d love to hear what you think. How is the culture of your organization driving your business results?

I have been involved in PeopleSoft implementations for over 10 years – before the product was web-enabled, in fact. Overall, the product is extremely robust and offers literally thousands of functional threads to its customers. Some of the business areas addressed by PeopleSoft applications include: 

• Financials
• Human Capital Management (read Human Resources)
• Payroll
• Customer Relationship Management
• Campus Solutions

Each of these major areas are comprised of several sub-modules (e.g., Financials = General Ledger, Budget, Accounts Payable, Accounts Receivable, etc.)  that are so complex that sales reps, sales support associates, and implementers generally specialize in one sub-module. Herein lies one of the biggest challenges of selecting this software. It can be so overwhelming as to render mere sales calls and demos practically useless since these discussions barely scrape the surface of what is really happening within the software. Given that fact, it can be difficult to determine the real effort behind an implementation and how your company’s business processes and employees will be impacted.

Having said that, how does an organization know if PeopleSoft is right for their corporation and their culture? What are the key factors and business drivers leading an organization to the purchase and implementation of one of the most powerful software suites in the world?

For simplicity’s sake, let’s go with one suite and say a mid-size company is going to replace its backend financials system. The old system was “home grown” and has evolved over the last 25 years. There are no labor unions and the corporate culture is fairly agile.

Some of the questions to be answered include: 

1. Is there a strategic plan for the company? If so, and if the plan necessitates new systems to support the future initiatives, are the projects prioritized and budgeted? Is there an Enterprise Technical Architecture Plan? How do the two relate? Technology for technology’s sake alone is rarely the right path to follow.
2. What is the maturity level of project resources, especially project management, in the organization? Even if the company is capable of paying substantial sums for an outsourced project team, there is no success factor more critical than having an in-house project manager (and, preferably, team) who know the business and can successfully support the project throughout its life cycle.
3. What technical resources does the organization already have? Is there a robust network, experienced database administrators (preferably familiar with Oracle), programmers, and skilled business analysts?
4. Can the organization afford to allow the most knowledgeable staff (who know the business processes and the current systems) to work on what is sure to be a multi-year project (in spite of what the Oracle sales team is telling you)?
5. What business sector does the organization inhabit…public, private, not-for profit? Once upon a time, PeopleSoft offered a public sector product and a commercial sector product. Over the years, these two products have morphed together. Many public sector organizations conduct their accounting on a cash basis (PeopleSoft doesn’t) and fund accounting (with a lot of attention paid to configuring the General Ledger (GL), this can be done).
6. Does the chart of accounts need to be re-defined? This is a major undertaking even before any technical consideration can be given to the GL. However, even though project team members may understand the business’ accounting and financials, they also need to have a deep understanding of PeopleSoft General Ledger and Commitment Control (budgeting) or most attempts to define a new chart of accounts and properly define budgets takes several months up to years.
7. What is the status of the current data in the financial system? Does it need substantial clean up before conversion can be defined? If so, this is also a parallel, separate project that will absorb project resources.
8. What is the company’s readiness quotient to re-engineer business processes? It surely doesn’t pay to undergo what could be a $20-50M project just to offer a web-enabled version of the existing financial system.

The above represent a tiny fraction of the questions that organizations should be asking themselves as they contemplate a PeopleSoft implementation. Frank, open answers to the questions and a realistic approach can only be advantages going forward. 

In addition to formal due diligence, one of the best ways for an organization to thoroughly understand the road map ahead is to connect with similar organizations that have completed an implementation. Oracle may not be the best place to get candid conversation; however, there are several active user groups and Oracle hosts a convention every fall where users congregate and are only too happy to relate their stories, good and bad. It is absolutely essential to mine these resources for lessons learned. 

How will you assess your organization and connect with other users?