Beyond the blog… A quarterly newsletter about the ctcLink project • June 2014 Thank you FirstLink SMEs!
Implementing a new administrative and student
information system is not easy. Just ask the
ctcLink leadership and subject matter experts
(SMEs) at the FirstLink colleges. They’ve been
working with the ctcLink project team for
months, all while keeping their colleges up and
running on the existing system, serving
thousands of students, and collectively
graduating thousands of them too!
FirstLink project managers Andy Duckworth
(Tacoma) and Dick Hol (Spokane) can’t be
thanked enough for their strong leadership and
sheer tenacity to get the job done but, true to
form, they wanted to take this moment to thank
their SMEs.
Tacoma Community College SMEs
So much on their plates, yet they are all still smiling! (not all TCC
SMEs were available for this photo).
“Every morning when I come to work I am
grateful to have such a wonderful team to work with. Everyone is extremely dedicated to serving faculty, staff and students as
well as to the success of the project. It is the collected effort of each individual that makes my role, as project manager, much
easier than I expected it to be. Everyone is looking forward to completing conversion/validation, user acceptance testing and
training so they can start using the system they have all been working so hard on.” ~ Andy Duckworth, Tacoma Community
College
“As ctcLink project manager I continue to be amazed by the knowledge, commitment and passion that our subject matter
experts (SMEs) demonstrate in serving our students, faculty and staff. They are the real ‘rock stars’ along with the dedication
and commitment of the SBCTC
ctcLink project team. To say
this project is the most
humbling, challenging and
growing experience for all
members of the Spokane
project team is an
understatement, but they
continue to remain focused and
anxious to implement the
system to ultimately improve
the student's learning
experience. We are on the home
stretch as our lead SMEs focus
on completing data conversion/
Spokane SMEs love ctcLink!
validation, participate in user
Community Colleges of Spokane SMEs collaborate often on ctcLink
acceptance testing and engage in
implementation planning, as these SMEs were doing here during a recent work
system training.”
session. You can’t see the banner they are holding up in the back of the room, so
~ Dick Hol, Community
we’ve included it here in the forefront.
Colleges of Spokane.
Striving for unforgettable
A message from Mike Scroggins, SBCTC CIO
In 1885, German psychologist Herman Ebbinghaus conducted a study and coined the term
"forgetting curve." He found that when people are exposed to an idea one time, after 30
days they retain only about 20 percent of what they learned. This is a good reminder as we
embark on training strategies and timing for ctcLink.
In much more recent findings, Gartner, Inc.(a world leader in information technology
research and an IT advisory company) has research findings that show training users too
early on a new ERP system, like ctcLink, simply doesn't stick. Users attending pre-go-live training usually have little or no
prior experience with the new user interfaces and processes and have little time to practice what they've learned.
However, reinforcement training after “go-live” to augment the pre-go-live training greatly improves retention.
FirstLink colleges (Tacoma and Spokane) have a unique challenge because some elements of the new system will be
configured and tested right up to their pre-go-live training. That can be daunting since there won’t be much of a preview
prior to training. If we keep Gartner’s research in mind, FirstLink colleges can find some comfort in knowing it’s the justin-time training that will be the most important, and will actually be remembered.
A well thought out and delivered training program will be key to the successful implementation of ctcLink at each college.
For FirstLink colleges and the subsequent waves, the timing and sequencing of the training will be based on ERP best
practices.
Update from the Project Director
It’s ctcLink crunch time! We are just months away from our planned Go-Live date for
FirstLink colleges and everyone is working harder than ever to stay on track. As hard
as everyone is working, we find ourselves behind schedule in the Testing phase.
Why is testing not on schedule? It’s mainly due to one acronym and three words:
CEMLIs and the corresponding Functional/Technical Design Documents
(FTDDs). These—and all the activities leading up to this phase—have taken longer
than expected and, as with any project of this scope and complexity, if one thing slips,
it affects everything around it.
Barbara Martin
CEMLI stands for Conversions, Extensions, Modifications, Linkages and Interfaces. For
Project Director
ctcLink, we have nothing in the Linkages category, but we have added a Reports
category for nearly 100 reports to be designed. Basically, these CEMLIs are changes or
additions to the purchased out-of-the-box software. The Design Documents are simply that—the design of how CEMLIs
will be built into ctcLink. That delays Testing since we can’t test what doesn’t yet exist. As we move forward, the ctcLink,
Ciber and FirstLink college teams have been in constant communication and collaboration to find ways to close the gap
and get back on track. We’ll keep working toward that goal.
The project team and FirstLink colleges have also been hard at work with Data Conversion. We knew converting data
from our legacy system into PeopleSoft wouldn’t be easy. We’ve heard from similar projects that conversion is usually the
toughest part. Apparently, we were not to be outdone in that category. As we work through the process, we are learning
some of the ways we handled data in legacy as a system—and individually by college—simply doesn’t work in PeopleSoft.
As each issue reveals itself, the project team sets out to find a solution, oftentimes with the input of our system-wide
college SMEs (especially FirstLink SMEs) and support from the legacy system team in Bellevue. It truly is a group effort
and will remain as such all the way to FirstLink Go-Live and the subsequent wave implementations. I appreciate all of
you for all you’ve done to get us to this point in the project. We will continue the hard work and we appreciate yours.
SBCTC Bellevue Legacy Staff Appreciation Day
On May 9, a huge crowd of SBCTC staff gathered to recognize the team at SBCTC Bellevue that supports the legacy
administrative systems, which we will continue to use until ctcLink is fully implemented across all colleges and SBCTC.
SBCTC Customer Services Director Juanita Morgan (who oversees the legacy systems support team in Bellevue) called the
legacy staff simply “incredible and dedicated.” She commended them for taking on additional responsibilities after many who
had been members of the team moved over to the ctcLink project.
Betsy Abts, ctcLink’s Student and Academic Lead, agreed. “Juanita and her team have been invaluable to the Campus
Solutions team during data conversion,” she said. “I have recognized my CS team as ‘the biggest sucker of legacy team blood’
because we have relied on them countless times as we work through the Legacy-to-PeopleSoft conversion process.”
SBCTC Executive Director Marty Brown thanked the entire Bellevue crew and specifically called out the staff supporting the
legacy administrative system. “You are keeping our current system running smoothly, while also helping out with ctcLink.
That’s quite impressive. The State Board and all 34 colleges recognize and appreciate your hard work.”
Front row: Pamela Hruska, Administrative Assistant; (front) Joni Reichmann, Financial Aid Functional Analyst; (behind) Debbie
Towers, PPMS Support Consultant; Sarah Whetzel, Service Desk Coordinator; Jackie Thoms, FMS Support Consultant; Melinda
Houghtaling, Microsoft Systems Administrator; Guy Hollingbury, Enterprise Services Director; Joyce Nakamura, Lead FMS/
PPMS Support Analyst; and Tom Rocamora, Computer Operations Supervisor.
Back row: David Stark, Computer Operator Lead; Dave McKay, Support Analyst; Juanita Morgan, Customer Services Director;
Paul Kreemer, Senior Application Developer; Anne Sinnes, HR Functional Analyst; Sandy Cox, Test Lead; Kelly Hewitt,
Product Manager; Jay Gallagher, Senior FMS/PPMS Support Analyst; Julie Sharp, SMS Support Consultant; Wilson Wong,
AMXW System Administrator; and Laura Stern, Lead Development Analyst.
“Werecognizeand
appreciateyourhardwork.
Thanksforallyoudotokeep
ourcurrentsystemsrunning
smoothly.”
~SBCTCExecutiveDirector
MartyBrown
Is this thing working? Let’s test it and find out.
Testing is a critical piece of implementing any large project like ctcLink. It provides the opportunity to ensure
all components work as needed and that all of our college system’s business and technical requirements are
met. Through testing, all aspects of the system are validated, including integration between end-to-end
business processes to ensure we have continuity of business during implementation. The ultimate goal is
business acceptance of the functionality of the entire system, including security, usability, accessibility, and
performance. Testing also gives many end-users their first opportunity to interact with the new system,
although, as ctcLink Testing Lead Maureen Avery often says, “Testing is not training.” This is good to keep in
mind since the testing environment does not represent the final product.
Testing consists of two phases of System Integration Testing (SIT) before reaching the final, most important
testing phase: User Acceptance Testing (UAT). Through UAT, we verify that the system supports our
business requirements and determine that we are ready to move the tested end-to-end business processes into
our new production system. Production security controls, and single sign-on from Portal to Canvas and other
third-party vendors will all be incorporated into this final stage of testing.
Example of a partial test script for “Creating a Prospect Record”
At left is an example of a
test script used during
testing. A defect means
something went wrong
while testing. In this
example, the process
failed at step 5,
therefore a defect was
logged by the tester. In
troubleshooting the
defect, it was
discovered there were
two checkboxes not
checked on the web
prospect setup page
(see below). To fix the
problem, the boxes were
checked, the script retested, and it successfully passed. To ensure the defect doesn’t appear again, a Gold Change
Request (GCR) was completed to make the same change in the ctcLink ‘gold’ environment, which ensures all
fixes will be captured in production (since “gold” is the final source).
SIT is underway now and UAT is currently
scheduled to start in late June. UAT will involve
FirstLink colleges as well as some volunteers from
Wave 1 colleges. There will be about 2,500 test
scripts to get through, and many iterations of each
one, so be sure to thank and hug a tester today!
“Every day we test is a day closer to
‘go-live’.” ~ Maureen Avery, ctcLink Testing Lead
Questions about ctcLink? Ask at askctclink@sbctc.edu
State Board for Community and Technical Colleges, ctcLink Project Office
3101 Northup Way, Bellevue, WA 98004 | 425-803-5360 | Web: ctclink.sbctc.edu | Blog: ctcLink.wordpress.com