the ace in the hole accepting the change evolution to ... _accepting... · change evolution to...

The ACE in the Hole - Accepting the Change Evolution to Positively Impact

Your ERP Implementation By: Fatima Beach

VP, Human Resources

AST Corporation

March 15, 2014

Specialized. Recognized. Preferred. The right partner makes all

the difference.

1755 Park Street, Suite 100 | Naperville, Illinois 60563 | 1.888.278.0002 | www.astcorporation.com

A p p l i c a t i o n s S o f t w a r e T e c h n o l o g y C o r p o r a t i o n

The ACE in the Hole - Accepting the Change Evolution to Positively Impact your ERP Implementation Page ii

Contents

INTRODUCTION ...................................................................... 1

HISTORY AND EVOLUTION OF CHANGE MANAGEMENT .......... 1

WHEN DID IT ALL BEGIN? ...................................................... 1

WHEN DID IT BEGIN IN BUSINESS? ....................................... 2

EARLY LEADERS ..................................................................... 2

CHANGE MANAGEMENT MODELS ........................................... 3

ERP IMPLEMENTATION CASE STUDY ....................................... 3

BACKGROUND ....................................................................... 4

COUNTY BACKGROUND ........................................................ 4

PROJECT BACKGROUND ........................................................ 4

SITUATION ............................................................................. 5

BUSINESS SITUATION ........................................................... 5

TECHNICAL SITUATION ......................................................... 6

STRATEGY AND PLAN ............................................................ 7

GOAL 7

CHANGE MANAGEMENT ....................................................... 7

THE THREE STATES OF CHANGE ............................................ 8

NEEDED FOR PROJECT SUCCESS ............................................ 9

CHANGE MANAGEMENT TEAM RESPONSIBILITIES ............... 9

CHANGE MANAGEMENT STRATEGY ..................................... 9

TRAINING.............................................................................. 10

TRAINING TEAM RESPONSIBILITIES ..................................... 10

TRAINING STRATEGY ........................................................... 10

TRAINING NEEDS ANALYSIS ................................................. 11

TRAINING NEEDS ANALYSIS QUESTIONNAIRE RESULTS ...... 11

ISSUES 12

LOCATION ............................................................................ 12

AUDIENCE ............................................................................ 12

DELIVERY METHODS ............................................................ 13

KEY ASPECTS ........................................................................ 13

TOOLS ................................................................................... 14

CHANGE MANAGEMENT ..................................................... 14

TRAINING ............................................................................. 14

ORACLE’S USER PRODUCTIVITY KIT....................................... 15

COURSEWARE DEVELOPMENT ............................................. 16

The ACE in the Hole - Accepting the Change Evolution to Positively Impact your ERP Implementation Page iii

ROLLOUT .............................................................................. 20

CHANGE MANAGEMENT ROLLOUT ..................................... 20

TRAINING ROLLOUT ............................................................ 21

TRAINING DELIVERY AND SCHEDULE ..................................... 22

GO‐LIVE ................................................................................ 23

FOLLOW UP .......................................................................... 23

OUTCOME ............................................................................. 23

LESSONS LEARNED ................................................................ 23

CONCLUSION ........................................................................ 24

The ACE in the Hole - Accepting the Change Evolution to Positively Impact your ERP Implementation Page 1

Introduction

This paper discusses change management history, change management principles/methodologies and the process. As well as the impact change management has made to ERP implementations and why it is important to have a solid plan. A case study analyses on a multi-year large public sector ERP implementation will be presented. The main lesson will show the fundamental challenge was not the implementation but the organizational and human changes that were involved in the process.

The objectives of this paper are to learn about the evolution and history of change management; to understand the impact and importance of change management in ERP implementation; and to study how change management affected a multi-year public sector ERP implementation.

History and Evolution of Change Management

WHEN DID IT ALL BEGIN?

One would be surprised by when change management started. Many organizational specialists and business professionals may say that this is a new process that evolved as business needs changed in the past few decades. They may be right. The formal process and theories have been created and put into process since the 1980s, but in my opinion, the earliest adoption of change management occurred not a few decades ago, but millions of years ago.

Humans without a doubt are the smartest animals on Earth. Yet, we are definitely unmistakably tied to our origins: the apes. We were apes millions of years ago. So how did we go from apes to the humans we are today? What helped us walk down the path to humanity?

We literally took our first step towards separating ourselves from our ancestral apes about 6 million years ago, when apes stood up and started walking on two legs. This change in walking on our two legs would be followed by a change in our brains. Over time, they would become who we are today.

Then, 3 million years ago, the roots of our big brain started to take hold in a creature who was more like a chimp than a human. This chimp held secrets of our past and scientists are able to see that the natural evolution was starting. Follow this to 2 million years ago, when homo habilis was around and started making tools. For years, the brain flat-lined and did not evolve as much, but about 2 million years ago, many of the bipedal creatures started evolving again. There were several that were in existence at this time.


Why am I discussing evolution right now? The reason for using this as a foundation, is that this was the period when the process of change management started. No, there were no business analysts around putting together a plan and conducting workshops to help these early humans survive change. It was a natural process.

The other bi-pedal creatures that could not adapt to the varying degrees of climate change during that time were wiped out of existence. The bi-pedal homo habilis were better problem solvers and were able to adapt to the unpredictable and dramatic climate changes. And so, the idea that we've come up with is that variability itself was the driving force of human evolution, and that our ancestors were adapted to change itself. Thus, this is the earliest one can consider that change management was put into place.

WHEN DID IT BEGIN IN BUSINESS?

During the heyday of the industrial revolution and post-World War I, we see the emergence of the importance of industrial psychology. Fast forward to the 1980s, we see the emergence of both process and consulting models. Incredible progress was made to understand organizations, to understand how they are managed. This progress established the foundation of change management processes known today.

In the 1960s, many professionals such as managers did not pay attention to external factors that included clients, competitors, and the market. Then technology, innovation and deregulation emerged that unsettled many industries. The unsettling environment aided the implementation of change management in the 1970s because the leaders wanted to see how they could improve their companies. In the mid-1980s, organizations started to concentrate on productivity improvement, restructuring, downsizing, diversification, quality improvement, etc. Finally, in the past couple of decades, as the business organizations understood the importance of change management, came the advancement of reengineering, information technology, Enterprise Resource Planning, Customer Relationship Management, etc.

EARLY LEADERS

The Change Management profession began in the early 1980s. Linda Ackerman co-authored “Beyond Change Management.” This was one of the first published books that described how, in the late 80s and early 90s, leaders were becoming dissatisfied with the failures of creating and implementing changes.

Julian Phillips publicized her report, “State of the Change Management Industry,” in the Consultants’ News. This was unofficially the beginning of the change management industry. As the change management


industry was evolving, the Big 6 Consulting firms started to create their own practice that branded their reengineering services groups as change management services.

Change Management Models

It is a simple but revolutionary idea that human evolution is nature's experiment with versatility. We're not adapted to any one environment or climate, but to many; we are creatures of climate change. Therefore, there are various change management models that are utilized in the differing industries. The following table illustrates some change management models and walks through the different aspects of each of the models.

ERP Implementation Case Study

Applications Software Technology Corporation, (AST) was chosen as the systems integrator for Pinellas County, Florida’s multi-year Oracle Applications implementation. In this paper, the first phase of the project will be discussed.

Pinellas County had a big challenge rolling out a live open enrollment for 3,500+ users, which ranged from beginners to advanced users. Users


located in various County locations may not have access to a computer or computer terminals, let alone a central location to check e-mail. The change from their Old System kept many users on the fence. These challenges during the Oracle Self-Service Benefits implementation were alleviated by rolling out an effective change management/training plan utilizing Oracle’s User Productivity Kit (UPK).

The objectives for the change management/training plan were as follows:

To show the challenges faced during the Phase 1a of the project: Self-Service Open Enrollment rollout.

To discuss the change management and training strategy before the rollout.

To show how change management, training and the utilization of UPK was used in the rollout.

To discuss outcome and lessons learned.

BACKGROUND

County Background

AST was on the verge of a large Oracle EBS R12 implementation project in Pinellas County, Florida (aka: County). It was the largest project the County had undertaken but planned for a long time.

To understand the background, County geographical and demographical information needed to be understood. The County from tip to tip is 39 miles long and 15 miles wide. It was originally part of Hillsborough County.

The County is the second smallest county in Florida but the most densely populated (3,372 people per square mile). Half of the County is unincorporated.

The County consisted of 25 government bodies, one for each of the 24 cities/municipalities and one for the unincorporated area.

Project Background

AST and the County started the R12 EBS implementation project in January 2010. The team created one unified team and named it the Oracle Project Unified Solutions (OPUS) team. The project consisted of the implementation of Oracle E-Business Suite (EBS), OBIEE and Hyperion Budgeting.

Previously, the County implemented a limited number of Oracle EBS modules but the rest of the front-end and back-end applications were different software providers.

The project would span more than 2 years and be broken up in 4 separate phases and affect 11 appointing authorities in the County.


Project Timeline

In the above illustration, the phases were broken up into:

Phase 1a – Core Human Resources, Advanced Benefits and Chart of Accounts

Phase 1b – Payroll, Time and Labor, Self-Service Human Resources, Learning Management

Phase 2a – Financials, Projects, Assets, Procurement

Phase 2b – Hyperion, Advanced Procurement, Performance Scorecard, OBIEE, Reporting

This paper concentrates on Phase 1a, specifically the Self Service Benefits rollout.

SITUATION

Business Situation

Phase 1a started in January 2010. Phase 1a consisted of the implementation of Oracle Core Human Resources, Advanced Benefits, Chart of Accounts and Self Service Benefits. The last part, Self Service Benefits, would have the greatest impact on the County’s employee community.

There were approximately 3,500+ employees and 500 retirees that would be directly and indirectly affected by the project, especially during the first phase of the project. Furthermore, the project started at a time when


the County was planning a reduction-in-force. The timing of this was not ideal and made for a bit of an unreceptive end-user community.

The OPUS implementation team started the project by discovering the AS-IS process.

The AS-IS open enrollment process consisted of 4 steps:

1. Employee completed the enrollment form.

2. The enrollment information was entered manually into the existing Benefits Application.

3. The benefits information was submitted to the existing carriers.

4. The enrollment information was entered into the existing Oracle Human Resources application.

The implementation of Oracle Self Service Benefits would streamline the TO-BE process.

The TO-BE streamlined open enrollment process consisted of 3 steps:

1. The employee would enter his/her enrollment choices through Oracle’s Self Service Benefits application.

2. The information submitted would move to Oracle Advanced Benefits application.

3. The information that moved to Oracle Advanced Benefits would house the same information in a table(s) shared with Oracle Human Resources (core) and the information would be sent through an interface to the existing carriers.

The benefits of the TO-BE process were the opportunity to update annual benefit elections once by the end-user and the elections would be fully integrated with Oracle Human Resources and Payroll. More importantly, this would reduce data entry errors because there would no longer be handwritten (unreadable) forms, human error data entry errors, and double keying information.

Technical Situation

The current technical environment had different departments and appointing authorities using different software applications. So there were many systems talking to one another and at times, double entering information in multiple applications.

There were employees and retirees that did not have access to a computer. Some had little or no computer experience, while others were very proficient. In previous years, County employees would receive information in a webinar and the end-users completed their benefit enrollment manually through paper forms.


STRATEGY AND PLAN

Goal

The OPUS’s Change Management and Training (Team) team goals were:

Establish a strong change management and training strategy.

Create a diverse plan to appeal to different users.

Effectively rollout Self-Service Benefits Enrollment training to 3,500+ end-users so they would be ready for Go-Live in October.

Change Management

Change Management is “the process, tools and techniques to manage the people-side of change to achieve the required business results.”

The Team was fortunate in that the County knew the value of having a strong change management and training strategy. There are many firms that take on implementation projects without realizing the consequences that may occur without a strong strategy in place.

Some of the consequences of not having a strong change management and training strategy are:

Lower productivity.

Passive resistance.

Active resistance.

Turnover of valued employees.

Disinterest in the current or future state.

Arguing about the need for change.

More people taking sick days or not showing up.

Changes not fully implemented.

People finding a work-around.

People revert to the old way of doing things.

The change being totally scrapped.

Divides are created between employees and management.

The Team wanted to avoid these negative consequences by positioning a strong strategy and plan in place. To fully understand why the Team needed to put a strong strategy and plan in place, the “Three States of Change” will be discussed. It helped the Team understand why this had to be done and started in the beginning of the project.


THE THREE STATES OF CHANGE

To understand the undertaking of this project, the Team had to understand what Change meant and what the different states of Change were. The three states of change include; Current, Transition and Future. The viewpoints differ between the organization and individual. The Team had to account for both the organization and individual states of change in their approach for the rollout.

Organizational States of Change

Current: How things are done today?

Transition: How to move from current to future?

Future: How things will be done tomorrow?

Individual States of Change

Current: How I do my job today?

Transition: How am I to move from what I do today to the future?

Future: How I will do my job after the change is implemented?

Understanding the three states of Change from the organizational view versus the individual view was very important. As an organization, the County knew that this change needed and the buy-in was there because they approved the engagement of the project.

The view of the individual was more important to tackle. The number one reason that an implementation project fails is not because of the software application. The number one reason is the buy-in and use by the end-user. If neither occurs, it does not matter if an application works, end-users do not care for it and will not use it.

So the Team had to make sure that they addressed all three states of the Change for the individual and that all three states were answered and fully communicated to the end-users. The Team’s goal was to ensure that the County employees:

Were aware of the changes that were to be made.

Received constant communication on “What’s In It For Me” (WIIFM) and the benefits of this change in process and applications so that in this transition, they may have desire to work with the change.

Received the knowledge to be able to use the new application by giving them diverse methods to understand and sharpen their skills in the use of the new application.

Accepted the change because this is what is going to be in place going forward and that it was to their benefit of making their work responsibilities easier and streamlined.

Were reassured and knowledge reinforced by multiple methods before, during and after the change was completed.


NEEDED FOR PROJECT SUCCESS

The Team also accounted for other major pieces for the success of this first rollout. There were three important roles needed:

1. Leadership/Sponsorship – Strong sponsor(s) provides guidance and governance throughout the project.

2. Project Management – Strong project manager from both the client and system integrator side gives structure to the technical side of the change.

3. Change Management – Strong change management team supports the people side of the change.

The undertaking of the project could only be successful if all three members worked as a unified team and set an example for the rest of the County.

CHANGE MANAGEMENT TEAM RESPONSIBILITIES

Change management responsibilities need to be shared by both the client and system integrator. Some of the responsibilities were led, shared or supported by the County and AST.

Group Task/Activity AST County

CM Change Management Strategy Lead Participated

Communication strategy & plan Lead Assist

Change management & communications plan execution

Shared Shared

Change management evaluation Shared Shared

CHANGE MANAGEMENT STRATEGY

There were 4 essential elements to the Team’s Change Management Strategy:

1. Leadership Alignment – The executives, Oracle Business Applications Executive Committee/Project Sponsors (OBAEC), Project Managers, Change Management Team were created to have a cohesive team to lead and support the project through all of the project’s phases.

2. Communication Plan – A solid and diverse communication plan had to be created and delivered. The main message that needed to be delivered and to help the end-user community understand was “What’s In It For Me?”


3. Readiness Assessment and Change Impact Analysis – These surveys were essential to help the Team understand and gauge how well the strategy was being implemented and how the Team may have to adjust to make sure the message was coming through.

4. Training and Transition – Knowledge transfer was the most important piece in the strategy. The only way that the implementation of the Oracle Self Service Benefits application was going to be a success was if the County’s end-user community was trained successfully, in time and prepared to enroll in the County’s benefit plans.

The Team had to make sure that all of these elements worked in tandem with one another and that there was constant contact and communication throughout this phase.

Training

TRAINING TEAM RESPONSIBILITIES

Training team responsibilities need to be shared by both the client and system integrator. Some of the responsibilities were led, shared or supported by the County and AST.

Group Task/Activity AST County

Training Project Team Delivery Lead Participated

Technical Team Training Gap Analysis Lead Assisted

Develop end‐user training strategy Lead Assisted

Train‐the‐trainer course development Lead Assisted

Train‐the‐trainer delivery Lead Assisted

End‐user training development Lead Assisted

End‐user training delivery Shared Shared

Knowledge transfer Lead Assisted

Logistics and training administration Assisted Lead

TRAINING STRATEGY

There were 5 essential elements to the Team’s Training Strategy:

1. Training Needs Analysis – A questionnaire to discover the end-user community’s computer proficiency.

2. Knowing the Audience – Discover the type of audience that the Team had to develop and facilitate the training material for.


3. Training Administration – County support in assisting the Team with training class communication and scheduling.

4. Delivery Methods – Decision on the types of delivery methods that the Team would use to facilitate the end-user training.

5. Key Training Aspects – Answering all of the important training plan elements including: logistics, schedule, audience, support, etc.

The Team had to make sure that all of these elements worked in tandem with one another and that these elements were laid out in a methodical way to ensure the successful rollout of training.

TRAINING NEEDS ANALYSIS

The training questionnaire was sent out to all of the County employees. The topic areas covered overall computer literacy, Internet literacy and Oracle Applications literacy. Employees had to assess their knowledge based on how often they used the computer, Internet and Oracle Applications:

Daily: 2

Occasionally: 1

Never: 0

The competency ranges were as follows:

Beginner: 0.00 – 0.75

Intermediate: 0.76 – 1.25

Expert: 1.26 – 2.00

The Team also received information on each of the employees if they had a designated work computer.

The goal from the training questionnaire was to use the information that was received to establish the type of training audience the Team would train, appropriate training methods to develop, cross-reference for active employees with no computer, and to get 100% feedback.

TRAINING NEEDS ANALYSIS QUESTIONNAIRE

RESULTS

100% of the training questionnaires were completed and returned on-time. The results were:

Beginner: 142

Intermediate: 468

Expert: 2,589

No computer: 77


ISSUES

The issues that the Team faced were as follows:

1. Logistics – Were there enough locations to conduct training for all the active employees and retirees?

2. Coordination – How was the Team going to coordinate and schedule training within 2 weeks for 3,500+ active employees that were located in different areas of the County and 500+ retirees that may or may not live in the area?

3. Different Computer Literacy – How could the Team address the different computer literacy backgrounds?

4. Retiree Enrollment – How were we going to handle retiree enrollment?

5. Field Workers – How were we going to handle the employees that had no access to work computers?

6. Meaningful Courseware and Training Delivery – What would the Team use to make sure that meaningful courseware was developed and diverse methods were created to address facilitation options?

7. Resistant to Changes – How was the Team going to address end-users that were resistant to change? How could the Team hopefully get buy-in down the road?

8. The Effect on the Remaining Phases – How will this affect the remaining phased rollouts?

These issues had to be addressed and resolved with a strong strategy and plan in place. But the Team had to get certain key pieces of information in place to assess the right steps and recommendations for the rollout to the different audience type, delivery methods and key aspects that would address training locations, software/hardware requirements, etc.

LOCATION

The Team worked with the County to reserve several training locations throughout the County in the beginning of the project. This ensured the Team that when the number of required locations was determined, that the Team already had the facilities ready to house the training sessions. The Team confirmed all the information needed (# of seats, # of computers, hardware and software, projector, etc).

AUDIENCE

Base on the training questionnaires, the Team had to consider three different types of end-users: beginners, intermediate and experts. Also the Team had to take into consideration employees that did not have


access to a computer in the workplace.

A decision was made that the end-user community would only consist of active County employees only. The County retirees were opted out of the process and would continue with the existing manual form processing.

DELIVERY METHODS

The Team decided, because of the diverse backgrounds of the end-users, that there would be a different delivery methods developed:

Instructor-led

On-the-job

Train-the-trainer

Web-based training

Presentation

Quick reference cards

Workshops

KEY ASPECTS

Some of the key aspects that the Team had to consider:

What other individuals were needed to include in the Team. Aside from the Change Management Lead and Training Lead; was there a need to assign County Training Administrators and/or County Training Facilitators?)

How was the Team going to make sure it had enough locations to deliver the training?

How was the Team going to make sure to develop the right type of courseware and that the facilitation of the courseware would appeal to the diverse audience?

Did the facilities have the right hardware requirements to house the training and the software?

Would there be enough County support to make sure that the training administration (scheduling and coordination) was seamless?


Tools

CHANGE MANAGEMENT

The Team made sure that the Change Management Strategy and Plan was successful by putting into place the following tools:

1. Change Agents – Champions of the proposed change. These were individuals in each of the different departments that were appointed by the County Sponsors to serve as the liaison between the various departments and the Change Management Team. They participated in various meetings, workshops and brainstorming sessions to make sure that the end-user community was prepared for the all of the phases of the implementation project.

2. Communication Methods – The Team also had to ensure that there were diverse communication methods to inform the Change Agents and the County end-users. It was taken into consideration that using too much of one type of communication channel would not appeal to the end-user community at large. So several types of communication methods were used: County Intranet, E-mail, Newsletters, forums as well as Change Agent meetings with end-users.

3. Surveys – Surveys were also created and sent out to Change Agents and/or the end-user community. The surveys were:

o Readiness Assessment: How ready is the County to use the system?

o Change Impacts: What types of impact this change would bring?

o Communication Evaluation: How well was the project information communicated to the County end-user community?

TRAINING

The tools the Team used to make sure that the Training Strategy and Plan was successfully put into place included the following:

1. Training Coordinators – The administrative support of the training plan. These were individuals from different departments which supported the Training Team in scheduling, re-scheduling, sending reminders, etc. to their department end-users of the Self-Service Benefits Open Enrollment training.

2. Training Facilitators – The individuals that were going to be trained to facilitate the training workshops. These were County employees that had a training background and/or advanced computer


literacy that were appointed to facilitate the workshops to the County end-users.

3. Questionnaire – The training questionnaire that was distributed to the County active and retired employee community to assess their computer literacy.

4. Oracle User Productivity Kit Application – The Oracle application used to develop the training courseware.

Oracle’s User Productivity Kit

Oracle’s User Productivity Kit (UPK) was the application chosen to develop end-user courseware for the entire implementation project. UPK is an application agnostic (Can be used with any software application, not just Oracle) software tool that allows the developer to create materials throughout the course of a project that can be used out-of-the-box with core ERP applications. UPK can create:

Test scripts

System process documents

Interactive simulations

Job aids

Instructor manuals

Presentations

In-application support

A single, authorizing session (recording navigation steps) can be synchronized to create all of the above mentioned materials. Creating the multiple learning methods made life easier for the Team. It usually takes 200 development hours to create a single web based training session. UPK, on an average, can allow a developer that had no programming experience to create an entire course in less than a week.

The Training Lead created courseware material, job aids and interactive simulations. The UPK interactive simulations are called:

See It! The end‐user can see the step‐by‐step navigation simulation.

Try It!: The end‐user can use keyboard or mouse to navigate through the simulation as if the end‐user is in the actual application (there are instructions that the end‐user may follow).

Know It?: The end‐user can be tested on his/her knowledge by navigating through the simulation without instruction. The end‐user may be scored at the end of the test.

Do It.: The end‐user can access the simulation while he/she is in the live application.

In‐Application Support:

The end‐user can access the interactive simulation from the Help menu in the live application.


UPK Lifecycle

It is ideal to utilize UPK throughout the lifecycle of a project. By utilizing UPK in the beginning, the system integrator can record the navigation steps and create the Process Guides and User Acceptance Test Scripts. Since the recordings have been made, the Training team can then take the same recordings and tweak them with possibly more instructional information to create the web-based training (interactive simulations), the Instructor-Led courseware (both student and instructor manuals) and Job Aids. After go-live, the simulations, materials and job aids can still be accessed through Online Help.

In this Phase, the Team used UPK for the creation of the courseware and interactive simulations only.

Courseware Development

The Team worked closely with AST’s functional leads and the County HR leads to record and create the content. The courseware concentrated on the Self Service Benefits navigation and not on the HR policies or health plan information. The courseware would only address the technical aspects and the County’s HR department would handle the HR policies and health plan information education.

The UPK Developer screen shots below illustrates the first and second frames of the Open Enrollment topic recording. The first frame shows the outline of the courseware and informs the end-user that this was a simulated exercise of the Self Service Open Enrollment process that would help the end-user for Open Enrollment. The second frame shows the first step of accessing the Self Service Benefits applications.


UPK Developer – Topic Frame 1

UPK Developer – Topic Frame 2

The Team created the recording of the navigations steps first. Then the Team and the County HR leads worked in several work sessions to tweak the recordings and instructional information. By working together in these work sessions, the updates were done more efficiently and there were not any communication gaps from the County’s goals for training


and what the final product was. Any adjustments that were made were made quickly because the Team and the County HR leads worked well together.

The next screen shot below was taken from the actual UPK Player interactive simulation. The UPK Player appears once the end-user accesses the web based training through a link provided in training. This is where the end-user can select a topic and click on See It!, Try It!, Know It?, Do It! or Print It! mode.

UPK Player

The two screen shots below illustrate what would appear when the end user clicks on one of these buttons. The end-user sees the same Frames from the UPK Developer recording previously shown


UPK Player – Try It! Mode: Frame 1

UPK Player – Try It! Mode: Frame 2


The next screen shot below illustrates the Job Aid an end-user would have access to in the interactive simulation above by clicking on the Print It! Button. The UPK developer can record the topic once and then create various training related mediums. In this example, the Team created the interactive simulation and the Job Aid from one recording.

UPK Player – Print It! Mode: Job Aid

Notice that Step 1 on the Job Aid mirrors the Topic Frame 2 of the UPK Developer which is also Frame 2 of the UPK Player.

The UPK developer application is so streamlined and straightforward to use, that hours are cut from courseware development time. No programming is needed whatsoever. The application does it all for the courseware developer.

Rollout

CHANGE MANAGEMENT ROLLOUT

The change management rollout included:

1. Road Show – The County Executives and Change Management Team delivered a road show in the beginning for the kick-off of the project. The Team traveled to different County locations to deliver the first presentation to the County employees and answer any preliminary questions.


2. Change Agent Workshops – There were several workshops and meetings conducted with the County Change Agents. This venue was used to make sure that information was getting to all the different departments through the change agents and to also ensure that the change agents became the champions for the project.

3. Readiness Assessments and Change Impacts Surveys – Evaluations were sent out throughout the project and before training development to make sure the Team addressed any issues that were raised from these evaluations.

4. Sandbox Environment – A sandbox environment was created for SMEs and Change Agents to play with so that they had exposure to the application. This would help communicate to the County end-user community what to expect, and also gave them the chance to give some input on the rollout.

TRAINING ROLLOUT

Base on the end-user audience, three different types of training delivery were created:

1. Workshop – This workshop was directed to the Beginner end-users. There would be more handholding during this workshop as the end-users went through the UPK Computer-Based Training (CBT) interactive simulations.

2. Workshop/CBT – This workshop/CBT was directed to Intermediate end-users. The facilitators would be there just to answer and guide the end-users as they worked through the interactive simulations.

3. CBT – The Expert end-users would be given access to the CBT on their work computers through the County’s intranet.

The training courseware would only address the application navigation steps. It would not address or answer County benefit plans. There would be links to County HR information but the County benefit plans would be addressed directly by the County HR department through County-wide webinars.

Certain County employees were appointed as Instructors/Facilitators for the training sessions. The Team trained the County Facilitators during several Train-the-Trainer (TTT) sessions on the web-based training simulations. Also, subject matter experts were assigned in each department for other employees to ask for navigation guidance during the live open enrollment.

The Help Desk answered technical related issues during the training rollout. During the live enrollment rollout, the Help Desk also answered benefit related questions.


Training Delivery and Schedule

There were three different types of training provided to the County; including Workshop, Workshop/CBT and CBT.

The Team had to make sure to deliver the appropriate type of training to the three different types of audience. The adjustment of the number of end-users that were scheduled to attend/complete the Intermediate and Expert training sessions is shown below.

Training Delivery Class Makeup

The end-user attendees were adjusted to accommodate the end-users that did not have access to work computers.

There were various training sessions that lasted 2 hours and ran simultaneously throughout the County. The Team trimmed down the number of training locations from what was reserved in the beginning of the project. The end-user numbers that needed more hand holding decreased because of the outcome of the training questionnaire.

The Beginner class received the workshops that required a little more handholding and guidance by Instructors while the end-users went through the web based training (interactive simulations). The Intermediate class received the same workshop but Instructors were there mainly to answer navigation questions and facilitate the class. The Intermediate class also included Expert end-users that did not have access to a work computer. The Expert end-users accessed the web based training from their own work computers via the County’s intranet.

After the training sessions, all end-users then had access to the web-based training throughout the 2 weeks prior to go-live and through the following 2 weeks after go-live.

Training was scheduled to start on September 27, 2010 and finish on October 12, 2010, in time for the go-live date of October 18, 2010. Based on the results of the training questionnaire, the courseware development and the diverse training delivery methods, concurrent sessions were going to be facilitated throughout the County within the timeframe scheduled.


Go‐Live

After training was completed, the UPK web training sessions continued to be available on the County’s intranet. Also, webinars were conducted by the County to go over benefit plans information.

Go-live was on October 18, 2010 and for 2 weeks, the County’s employees had their chance to complete their benefits enrollment via Oracle’s Self-Service Benefits application.

During these two weeks, kiosks were available for employees in the field that did not have access to a computer. Other employees that did not have computers shared department computers to enroll. On-site coaches were available in the different departments throughout the County for navigation guidance and the Help Desk was available for questions the navigation and the benefits plans.

Follow Up

The change management and training team sent out questionnaires and received verbal feedback. Based on the verbal feedback, adjustments were made quickly in time for the online enrollment. The feedback was mostly positive.

Outcome

The change management plan was effective and the training rollout was successful. 100% of the enrollment was completed by the active employees on-line and on time. There were no major issues or concerns. The majority of the Help Desk calls were regarding questions on the County’s benefit plans.

The training methods and sessions had enough meaningful information to help the end-users enroll in their benefits. Any courseware, interactive simulations and training facilitation adjustments that occurred were updated quickly behind the scenes and did not delay the training delivery or enrollment process.

Lessons Learned

It was a great and successful experience, but there were lessons to be learned. The following were adjustments that were able to be made before Phase 1a rollout and for the other phases of the project:


1. Training Questionnaire – This is definitely a judgment call for anyone depending on how large the end-user audience is. In this project, it was a good decision to move forward with the training questionnaire. It allowed the team to plan accordingly for both the type of training to rollout and the logistical planning.

2. Using User Productivity Kit – It is highly suggested to use UPK through all the different phases of the project. This helps streamline set-up document for training documentation down the line.

3. Know It? – Know It! was not highly received. It felt counterproductive to the end-user community and was quickly dropped after one day of training. This should be considered by each project team to see if their end-user community would accept this and if this would positively or negatively impact the rollout. In this situation, the Team felt it was a negative and the Team was able to make the adjustments quickly and upload the CBT without the Know It? Simulation.

4. UPK developer recording – Change the screen resolution of the computer/laptop used for recording steps to 600 x 800. This will allow for any end-user to use the recordings on any size screen.

5. SharePoint/Email – Must have a FTP or cloud type environment to upload/download recordings. The files were too large to Email or save in SharePoint.

6. Two Monitors – Must instruct end-users that use two monitors to use their main monitor when accessing the UPK player package recording.

7. Train-The-Trainer – The team needs to vet the right trainer(s) to facilitate the workshops.

8. Change Agents – The team needs to vet and choose the right change agents.

Conclusion

It was a challenging first phase of the project. The County was experiencing a reduction-in-force and the new implementation project. Buy-in by the County employees was badly needed to ensure the success of the project. The County executives and sponsors knew the importance of delivering a strong change management and training plan.

The Team created a strong change management and training strategy and rollout. The utilization of Oracle’s User Productivity Kit created meaningful courseware and interactive simulations. The development was straightforward and time consuming at first. The work sessions between the Team and the County were very productive and helped with the adjustments that needed to be made before, during and after the training sessions.


Despite some of the challenges with the end-users that were resistant to the changes and to the project, all of the current County employees completed their open benefits enrollment online with no huge issues. Most of the Help Desk questions concentrated on benefits related questions. The Phase 1a rollout was a success and it definitely helped set a positive tone for the rest of the phased project rollouts.

The ACE in the Hole - Accepting the Change Evolution to Positively Impact your ERP Implementation March 15, 2014 AST Corporation 1755 Park Street, Suite 100 Naperville, Illinois 60563 Phone: 888-278-0002 Fax: 630-778-1179 www.astcorporation.com Copyright © 2014 AST Corporation AST Corporation is a privately held company founded in 1995 to serve commercial and public sector organizations in utilizing the full potential of their investment in Oracle Applications and Technologies. We have built our practice by providing top quality full life cycle and turn-key consulting services for Oracle Applications implementation and upgrade projects, among other specific services. Our mission is to insure that you, as a valued client, receive the highest level of expertise and personalized service for your Enterprise Applications. We endeavor to help you realize the full benefit from your investment in software applications and integrate them seamlessly to your business processes.

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