10 th anniversary 1999 - 2009 making banner your own! - jeff montgomery & bill balint, iup
TRANSCRIPT
10th Anniversary 1999 - 2009
Making Banner Your Own!
- Jeff Montgomery & Bill Balint, IUP
General Announcements:
Please turn off all cell phones/pagers If you must leave the session early, please
do so as discreetly as possible Please avoid side conversations during the
session Questions will be answered …..
Thank you for your cooperation
Problem Statement
The base Banner product suite could not solve all of the information system requirements at our university – forcing us to “buy, build, work around or do without”.
In many situations, the ‘build’ option provided the best outcome when all factors were considered – so we needed a method to do this without hurting ourselves.
Resolution
Create a methodology that would permit us to enhance Banner functionality within the project management, technical and functional constraints of our university as well as our overall commitment to Banner as our ERP.
Indiana University of Pennsylvania Indiana, PA Public, Doctoral I 14,638 students Member, 14-university system (PASSHE) Two regional campuses One center and one culinary arts academy Four 501c(3) affiliates
About Us
Banner Environment Implemented 1998-2000 Version 8.x Five base modules, three self-service
products Document Management, FSAatlas Dell Linux and Dell Windows servers Hundreds of custom-built enhancements Heavy use of third-party products (parking,
facilities, Id Card, judicial, etc.)
About Us (cont.)
Banner Enhancement Challenges
Sungard-delivered upgrades Five major releases since 2001
Uniformity with Sungard-supplied solution Authentication, look-and-feel, documentation
No new technical staffing Limit variety of technologies
Enhancement Challenges (cont.)
Must ensure scarce resources are deployed appropriately
Tight, but versatile and flexible governance
Production support/daily operations cannot be compromised
R&D must be maintained and funded
Meeting The Challenges
Get Production Support in Order
Get Technology Stack in Order
Get Project Management Structure in Place
Production Support
Build a formal support model for IT Staff “Who supports what” “Not everybody can be responsible for
everything” Upgrade/patch support
Cross training/back ups
User Education Reduce amount of support required
Technology Stack
Enhance functionality without modifying Banner
Both an interactive and batch environment needed
Version control and QA methodology are critical
Project Management
IT Project Governance Prioritization method
“What constitutes a project?” Planning Escalations Specification concepts FTE splits Obligation of the end-user Progress reports Flexibility, versatility, unplanned user needs
Project Management (cont.)
IT Project Governance http://www.iup.edu/page.aspx?id=61681
Results - Personnel
Application Development Group Coordinator
Supervisor of all group members Senior Systems Analyst
Group technical lead Application Administrators/DBAs
Middleware, patches, upgrades Systems Analysts (7)
One per module/sub-module Cross-trained backups, ancillaries
Results – Personnel (cont.)
Technical Services Group Systems and Network Admin. Hardware, base level security
User Services Group First-level customer care Banner navigation and ad-hoc reporting Desktop issues (ODBC, Oracle, etc.)
Governance Document Requests accepted from all – triage
immediate Non-IT Services requests routed to correct
location Production failures ‘all hands on deck’ Two-day-and-under queue is FIFO Remainder placed into a project priority
queue
Project Prioritization
Project Priority Queues
Five ‘standard’ project priority queues One for each VP and one for President Reviewed four times a year, VP sets
priorities for their queue Typically considers recommendations from
divisional IT committee
Two special queues Council of Deans annual projects Internal IT projects (CIO)
Current Technology Stack
Batch: Pro*C (Banner Job Submission)
Interactive: Web Tailor and Web PL/SQL
“Environment”: Oracle Portal, Discover, Java/JSP, etc. from campus license
Version Control: MS Visual Source Safe
Lessons Learned
Governance message must be consistent Get new employees acquainted quickly
Limit spec. work until project is prioritized
Keep focus 9-18 months into the future to ease transitions (upgrade testing, new technologies)
Lessons Learned (cont.)
Allow executive users to set priorities – keep the target off your back
Confirm user availability before starting a project – reward those who plan effectively
Advocate for creation of IT-related functional planning committees (problem resolution, escalations)
Lessons Learned – IT
Employ a ‘specialist plus back up’ support model
Create ‘teaching’ web pages where you can drive users and build their skills/knowledge
Instruct users on the web page during training
Maintain a vibrant test/development environment – regular refresh of data
Lessons Learned – IT (cont.)
Use version control software actively
Invest in your people User conferences, training, books, R&D
Be an asset – not a liability! Ensure your efforts map to the mission of
the institution and of your customer Limit time spent on efforts that do not meet
this criteria
Enhancement Model – Next Steps
Monitor the evolving Sungard HE technology stack carefully and be ready to adjust quickly
Flex, AJAX, Cognos, LifeRay, SOA, etc.
Ensure that our project governance and execution model is supported by new call-tracking system or find alternative
Open to the Floor
Questions Comments
Jeff Montgomery
Bill Balint