Juggling the books, printing weekly paychecks, overseeing the employment records of thousands of employees, as well as the academic records of even a greater numbers of students; all these tasks are paramount to keeping the University humming efficiently.
Behind these administrative services are computer systems that are powerful, complex, and sophisticated. And “disparate” too, as far as Victor Simon, vice-president, resources is concerned. He points out that isolated databases of one sort or another have become commonplace in various departments or faculties, creating “silos” that can hamper the flow of information.
“We don’t get the whole University view with these kinds of systems,” he says. “As a result, decision-making is sometimes more difficult than it has to be. We need to have a more comprehensive view of the business, and right now, that is difficult to achieve.”
The good news is that software firms have developed an outstanding expertise in this field. Their products are tailored to meet the needs of post-secondary educational institutions, consolidating the operation of closely related activities such as finance, payroll management, and human resources while also supporting the institution’s core student service processes.
For Simon, selecting the best of those products is essential to helping everyone at the University get on with their business.
Foremost, those end-users are some 32,000 students now on campus, whose expectations for services climb higher every year. If the University is to appeal to them with easy-to-use, self-service options such as online course registration, the systems supporting those services must remain on the cutting edge.
That goal has defined Project Fusion, also known as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), and has been one of Simon’s top priorities since joining the University last year. ERP seeks to link various core administrative activities as closely as possible.
The University asked commercial ERP software vendors to submit packages designed to achieve this end. Project manager Dan Begin has spent much of the past year overseeing the short list, a detailed evaluation of two ERP systems. That list now consists of one system, which Begin and his teams are analysing to ensure that it can be incorporated into the University with a minimum of expense and disruption to existing operations while achieving the maximum benefits offered by the system.
Once that analysis is completed in December, Simon will present the proposed system to the administrative committee and to the Board of Governors for their approval.
