ERP Hosting, Finally! Why Didn't We Do This Sooner? (212808211)

8/12/2019 ERP Hosting, Finally! Why Didn't We Do This Sooner? (212808211)

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Steve Reinhardt• Associate Director, Build

• CWRU• Central ITS division

• Almost 20 years in IT

• Father of three, all Legofans

Presenters

Colleen Nagy• Senior Director, Design & Build

• CWRU• Central ITS division

• 30 years in IT

• Lego fan



Lessons Learned

1. Remain committed, but listen openly to constituents

2. Remember what the key objectives are throughout

3. Quantify, quantify, quantify

4. Engage experts when group realizes limitations

5. Communicate often with stakeholders at all levels



• Deferred maintenance

• Staffing issues

• Budget constraints

• Contract process• End user concerns

Other Challenges



The Master Builders

There are a lot of great people to help you solve yourproblem…in ways you might not expect



2010

• Oracle presented proposal on hosting approach

2011

• Formed steering committee with higher ed consultant

• Committee defines four objectives of the initiative

2012

• Release RFP to six vendors (March)

• Compared responses and narrowed to two (May)

• Committee reviewed solutions, costs (July-December)

• Data Center visits with vendors (December)

2013

• Selected final vendor (March)

• Engaged contract specialist (March)

• Contract negotiations (April – June)

• Executive final recommendation (June)

• Board of Trustees presentation (September)

Initiative Timeline



Master Builder / Micromanager?



Hosting Services

Infrastructure & non-application support, plusD/R and backups

Production SupportBreak-fix, service request and interfaces

Maintenance

Application and database patching, bundles,

regulatory releases and feature packs,including PeopleTools

Application Development

Cost of one full-time developer for 1800 hours

RFP Split in Four Parts



Vendor RFP Scorecards



How We Compared RFPsHosting Services Weight

Data Center details, including security, power, D/R site 3

Company's three-year capital strategy 2

Security - certifications 3

Security - monitoring and monitoring tools 3

Security - compliance, including FISMA, FERPA, HIPAA 3

Security - D/R test procedures 3

Security - access procedures for Tier 2 and Tier 3 access 3

Architecture - hardware of the environment, what is provided 3

Architecture - Capacity of servers, including scalability 2

Architecture - interfaces and secure file transfer 3

Architecture - fees for additional modules 3

Network - network solution 3

Network - network management including detection 3

Transition - proposed strategy & roadmap, + 11gR2 upgrade 2

Hosting Services Fee Structure 3



Key Objectives

1. Improve Service and Raise Performance Levels

2. Reduce Risk

3. Enhance Business Continuity

4. Shift Resources to University Priorities



1. Improve Service

Current Issue Benefit of Hosting to University Cost Avoided by University

Limited PeopleSoftskillset

• Technical resources with deep technicalknowledge, current with new releases

• Leverage core competency of Vendor

Additional training dollars

Case is a “small fish”to Oracle

• AT&T is a Platinum partner, which willspeed our time to resolve (avg. duration is>25% shorter)

• Vendor can leverage experience with similarOracle issues (avg. number of ticketsexpected to be >20% reduced)

Staff time managing tickets(605 over 5 years) with averagetime to close of 56 days

Cost of inexperience

in performance tuning

Gain resources for performance tuning Spent $37K to tune CS for 1500

students registering concurrentlyHerculean efforts aremade to keep aginginfrastructure stable

• AT&T’s Infrastructure is totally new • Ability to scale in critical computing times

• Increased staff time foremergency incidents

• Increased HW repair costs• Increased production delays



2. Reduce Risk


Hiring and retainingstaff with PeopleSofttechnical knowledge($$$)

Stable/flexible pool of technicalresources for PeopleSoft andinfrastructure

• Lost six key staff personnel over thelast two years

• As of 7/2012: 20-25 PeopleSofttechnical positions open in the state ofOhio (careerboard.com)

• Ohio PS developer salary gap:$99,598-$85,408 = $14,000 1

End of life forhardware andstorage limitation

• Upgraded infrastructure includingscalable storage capacity

• Best practice data management• Better server redundancy

$600,000 over two years to replace oldservers

CWRU Data Centersare below bestpractice standards 2

• Data Center with highest industrycertifications (Tier 3, SSAE 16 & ISO)

• Reduce CWRU energy consumption• Return space to library

Approximately $13,000/year is spent onelectricity supporting the ERP servers

1 indeed.com data 7/20132 2013 IBM Data Center assessment



3. Enhance Business Continuity


Lack of offsiteDisaster Recovery

• Full Disaster Recovery Solutionincluded in cost

• Also includes one annual DR test

$122,000/year to have single testretainer. No real disaster site usage.

A disaster for bothdata centers couldtake weeks to restore

• Restoration time improved to lessthan 48 hours with no more than 24hour of data loss

• AT&T staff in multiple locations awayfrom data centers

Time to restore in a catastrophe iscurrently measured in days or weeks,not hours.

CWRU data centersare located only 1000

feet apart

Enhance reliability with physicaldiversity (NJ & CA)

Data Centers are located in differentareas of the country. Quantified it would

cost CWRU $4.5 million to build andmaintain comparable capability.



4. Realign to CWRU Priorities


Unable to focus ITresources on themission of the

university (Teaching,Learning, Research)

Redirect IT staff to focus on universitypriorities versus writing computerprograms

Need to move realigned ITS staff backto ERP support:• Faculty Lifecycle Initiative architect

• Document Mgt. service owner• Document Mgt. developer

Ability to fluctuatecorrect amount ofresources just-in-timeduring developmentpeaks and valleys

Vendor resources allow us to not haveto staff and stage equipment for peakdemand. We would be able to usefewer people during valleys in demandand more during peaks.

3 FTE dedicated to supporting ERPenvironments, and no easy ability toreassign them in slow periods or bringnew staff on during peak demand

IT departmentsacross all industriesare expected to domore with less

Leverage vendor to help reduce costs Budget cut over the last two years was$1.6M with the elimination of fourpositions. Rehiring retired resourcescould redirect funds from priorities.



One More: Cost Neutral

• Spent significant time building costcomparison models

• Used 5-year, then 10-year, TCO

• We found the cost stayed same, butservices and reliability significantlyimproved.

• Value add, not cost add

• Resonated most with seniorexecutives



Not all ideas seem good

• Had our differences on the final approach

• agreed to keep listening



Points of Pride

• According to Oracle, first AAU schoolto move from PS self-hosted tovendor-hosted

• CWRU Legal reported contract ismost university-fair they haveencountered

• Negotiations were very even fromboth sides



Lessons Learned

1. Remain committed, but listen openlyto constituents

2. Remember what the key objectives

are throughout3. Quantify, quantify, quantify

4. Engage experts when group realizeslimitations

• Communicate often with stakeholdersat all levels



Next Steps

• Started transition in September 2013

• Joint project management

• Completed first migration, Phire, inFebruary

• Lots of work, especially testing

• HCM, SIS & FIN cutover in May, Julyand finally September

• FIN and HCM upgrades going toRFP for 2015 completion



Questions?



Colleen Nagy• E-mail: [email protected]

• Phone: 216-368-8593

Steve Reinhardt• E-mail: [email protected]

• Phone: 216-368-0404

Contact

Vendor RFP Scorecard template.xls

Documents

ERP Hosting, Finally! Why Didn't We Do This Sooner? (212808211)