This month, and in the months to come, hundreds of staff members campus-wide will receive invitations to take part in a training program that is the most extensive ever offered by the University.
By the time the training is completed -- approximately 16 months from now -- some 500 business managers, department heads and other staff will have learned new ways of doing their jobs more efficiently.
The training program is part of Project X, the University's comprehensive initiative to modernize its financial and human resources systems. Announced last fall by Provost Alison F. Richard and Vice President for Administration and Finance Joseph P. Mullinix, the project will make Yale's administrative computer systems year-2000 compatible and, at the same time, update outmoded business and financial processes.
Because many of the ways offices and departments currently conduct business will be changed, virtually every area of the campus will be affected by the modernization, says Steve Sunderland, project manager. Therefore, the training program has been designed to accommodate everyone from business managers to faculty members and administrators, and to cover a wide variety of topics. These range from more general themes, such as how to prepare for change, to more task-specific subjects, such as how to prepare office or departmental budgets using the new computer software.
According to Peter Vallone, associate vice president for administration, the training program "is unprecedented in terms of size, scope and the amount of resources."
"Never before has Yale committed itself to such a massive undertaking, designed to change the entire business culture at the University and how we fundamentally think of doing business," he says. "Hundreds of staff, supervisors and upper management personnel have already received training in business process redesign, team building, project management and strategic planning. Our goal is for all levels of the University to eventually have a grasp of these concepts as we begin to re-engineer procedures and to implement and test the preliminary designs of the new Oracle applications."
The Oracle software, designed specifically for financial and human resources management, includes a standard set of tools that will help the University streamline all of its functions in those areas. The increased automation of tasks and transactions -- from accounting transfers and expense reports to payroll and purchasing -- will assist staff in achieving the four main objectives of Project X, according to Dean Plummer, who is co-coordinator of the overall functional aspects of the project. Those four goals are improving management and planning at all University levels; providing higher- quality administrative services to faculty, students, staff, alumni, donors and sponsors; improving revenues; and reducing risk through more reliable business support systems.
The ways in which administrative and financial functions can be streamlined to achieve those goals will be explored in a full-day workshop in March for business managers and the heads of central administrative units. The Business Redesign Workshop, which will be offered in separate sessions to small groups of no more than 20 people, will provide an overview of business process redesign concepts and change management issues, among other topics.
"We'll look at what business process redesign is, why large organizations do it and how business processes, large and small, can be improved to maximize the value they create for the customer -- which in our setting includes faculty, students, staff, donors and sponsors," explains Mr. Plummer.
Other upcoming training sessions include an "Executive Briefing," a two- to three-hour meeting in April of department chairs, administrative deans, business managers and others. This session will provide an overview of the modernization project and an update on its implementation schedule, and will include discussion of the technical tools that will be available. In addition, participants will learn how the project will provide benefits and opportunities to their individual departments or offices.
"There's a whole host of benefits that the modernization brings to entire schools or departments in terms of their transactions with central University offices, but these then go down the line to benefit an individual faculty member as well," says Mr. Plummer. "Purchasing is a good example of that: Not only will business managers have standard online tools with which to buy departmental supplies, but these tools can also be used directly by faculty members or medical researchers to order needed items. So one focus of the Executive Briefing will be on how the larger benefits create opportunities at an individual level."
In May, financial managers from all schools and departments will be invited to in-depth sessions examining how the University's chart of accounts and budget preparation process will change in late 1997. Around the same time, members of the Project X team will test some of the new software tools and applications they have developed, and will invite business managers from diverse sections of the campus to try out these preliminary designs. These briefing sessions will be followed during the months of June and July with a three-part Implementation Planning Workshop designed to help business managers prepare for the introduction of the new financial management and budgeting tools.
Hands-on, computer classroom instruction for these tools will be scheduled for August and September, during which staff members will also learn about new ways to access information on the new Data Warehouse. The Data Warehouse is an electronic repository of Yale financial information that is being greatly enhanced through Project X. Implementation of the new budget preparation financial reporting tools is targeted for October 1997.
For other aspects of Project X, implementation planning and training sessions will continue through the early summer of 1998. Future sessions will cover such topics as the new on-line financial statements, grant and project accounting, purchasing and accounts payable, human resources and payroll. Managers will also take part in in-depth workshops to develop individualized plans for implementing technological or procedural changes in their offices and departments, and will have opportunities to discuss particular problems and concerns. Implementation of these additional modules is targeted for July 1998.
Throughout the training process, class sizes are being kept small to allow participants time to ask questions about every step of the modernization, Mr. Plummer emphasizes. Many of the classes will be held in the new Project X office on the ninth floor of One Century Tower, at the corner of Whitney Avenue and Grove Street. A training room was recently set up in the new office that is equipped with computers for group sessions.
"A lot of assistance is going to be provided along the way," Mr. Plummer says. "There will also be both field and telephone support for people who need help as they begin to utilize the new applications and processes. We certainly expect that there will be many questions as these are rolled out, particularly as managers do the transactions for the first time."
"All of this training activity is focused on the final objective of improving our access to and analysis of business information," adds Mr. Vallone. "The end result will be better decisions and more productive business processes."