How Quick can Oracle’s PeopleSoft be Implemented
Peoplesoft like any other ERP implementation involves huge and concerted effort and intricate planning from Project initiation to Go Live. Implementation in Less time translates to Less Cost for the customer. This assumes more significance in these times of recession where customers are seeking for more value for money and quick returns on investment.
At Infosys, best practices in Package implementation methodologies have been sanctified in 'InTrak' which lays guidelines for all activities distinctly identified under Strategic and Project Tracks.
The strategic track is divided into the following phases
- Planning
- Package Evaluation
- Organizing
The Project track divided into the following phases
- Project Scoping
- Requirement Gathering
- To-Be-Design
- Configuration and Development
- Testing and Deployment
- Cut-over and Support
A few of the foundations that can be built to ensure minimal delays and gaps–
- Orientation of the Implementation Team and Team Building with System Integration/ IT team (customer or external vendor), End users, Project Sponsors, Change Management and Communication teams is essential for common understanding of project scope, objectives and goals.
- Establishment of protocols for communication during the project, phase completion criteria and documentation and signoff through the Project Charter.
- Regular tracking of the project plan and plan for additional resources and skill sets required and also considering the business complexity and the team capabilities.
- Clear definition of scope of activities and identification of deliverables.
- Defining Hardware and Software requirements for the Project including Server Capacity Planning
- Deciding on the PeopleSoft instances available during the implementation
Implementation time depends upon the number of modules, extent of industry specific or customer specific customisations, functionalities required to be implemented, number of reports, interfaces and conversions. Estimation can be made using Function Points or Package points as spoken about in another blog titled "Are you still using function points for estimating the size of Package Implementation?".
Extensive preparations need to be made prior to beginning of the project to ensure time can be crashed in each of the implementation phases. Reusable Tools/accelarators and techniques, templates, standard configuration documents, knowledge articles and standard process documents are some of the resources that help in reducing overall timelines of implementation.
In the coming weeks, lets discuss the accelerators which reduce overall implementation times in each of these phases. Also lets think of ideal timelines for plain vanilla implementations of different module mixes and increased implementation times required to implement add-ons.
