STATE OF CONNECTICUT Core-CT Project

STATE OF CONNECTICUTCore-CT Project EPM User Group MeetingJanuary 2004

Agenda • Introduction Jeanne Skellett • System Issues Mark Malcolm • System Enhancements/Updates Frank Scalia • Agency Report Demonstration Jennifer Traynor • BREAK • EPM Training Steve Perkins • User Comments/Issues/Request Frank Scalia • Next Meeting Jeanne Skellett

Reporting Team Structure Jeanne Skellett – State Dave LaPierre – State Mark Malcolm - Accenture Janet Knopf - State Frank Scalia – State Roger Sherman – State Mary Yabrosky - State Scott Hagberg – Accenture Patrick Dwyer – Accenture TBD –State Agency

EPM User Group Purpose Provide a forum for end users and the EPM team to: • Review and receive updates on EPM issues • Exchange ideas • Present EPM enhancements • Host Agency to Agency presentations on EPM uses

Agency Concerns The Top Three User Concerns are: Concern Description Understanding Information on the Tables Users need help in understanding the information in the reporting tables. Data Refresh Reporting table data refresh has been inconsistent Performance Queries are executed but they take a long time to complete

EPM Fundamentals • Security Principles • Refresh Rate • EPM Help Process • Efficient Help Ticket Resolution • Views versus Tables

Security Principles General Security Guidelines • Your role in the HRMS or Financials system will determine the EPM reporting tables to which you have access • Your query result sets are restricted either by the departments or business units to which you have access • In general, if you can see it in the transactional system you should be able to query it in EPM

Refresh Rate The refresh goal: • Our batch schedule updates the EPM tables on a nightly basis • Updates made in the transactional system should be available for reporting the following day. The refresh realities: • The EPM batch schedule is dependent on HRMS and Financials batch schedule • Processing errors do occur. Attempts to fix occur during the night. Refresh exceptions: • CT_DET_PAYROLL – Refreshed after payroll is distributed • CT_LEAVE_PLAN – Refreshed after leave accrual processing

Refresh Rate (continued) Updates appear on CORE-CT homepage when data is not refreshed

EPM Help Process Users should follow the following process for obtaining help Job Aids Data Dictionary Agency Superuser Help Desk WLA Labs

Efficient Impact Ticket Resolution • When contacting the help desk about a reporting problem communicating the type of report you are trying to create will assist the help desk in identifying the best resource for resolving the ticket For example: Reports generated via EPM Reporting Tools will be resolved more quickly if routed to the EPM team All other reports should be routed to either the Financials or HRMS teams for timely resolution

Views versus Tables What is a view? Views are subsets of data from one or more tables What are views used for in EPM? Views are being used to secure sensitive data • Example: Address information for certain employee groups Views are being used to segment table data to simplify reporting • Example: Specific ledger groups like allotments and appropriations How does querying from a view differ from a table? To the user there is no difference between query from a view or table

Open Issues Issue Efforts / Solutions

System Enhancements/Updates • Capability to Schedule Queries • Chart of Account Trees – Enabling ‘in tree’ • New EPM Reporting Tables/Queries • Prompt Table Edits

Scheduled Queries Benefits of scheduling queries: • Allows access to full result set • Distribution of report results to any EPM user • Schedule Query to run on a recurring basis • Enhance Performance by running outside the Application When to schedule a query: • When a query returns the error “Query Result Set too Large.” • When a query is run on a recurring basis.

Chart of Account Trees Benefits of ‘in tree’: • Enable user to report based on a series of Accounts, DeptID’s, Sid’s, Fund’s, etc. • Enables user to subtotal base upon the respective tree hierarchy Who will benefit from ‘in tree’ querying? • Primarily financial reporting users • Agencies with a complex hierarchy of accounts, Sid’s, and Fund’s • Agencies with a complex department structure

New EPM Tables New Reporting Tables being developed for Financials:

New EPM Tables New Reporting Tables being developed for HR:

Prompt Table Edits Added Why are prompt table edits important? • They provide users with valid listing of values • They assist users in creating criteria for queries The following fields now have Prompt Table Edits: • Business Unit • Account • Department • Fund • SID • Program • Project • Chartfield 1 • Chartfield 2

Prompt Table Edits Example

Job Aids Location Job Aids can be found at the following location: http://www.core-ct.state.ct.us/epm/

EPM End User Demonstration Situation:Delivered payroll register not sorted or summed in the way DEP needed Query Name: DEP Paycheck Details Summary Description: DEP Payroll Register Alpha by employee name. (Subtotals on each transaction / deduction type).

DEP Paycheck Details Summary Steps followed to create report: • Identified an existing query that was useful • Modified its Fields • Modified the Criteria and Prompts • Used the Sum function • Using Reorder/Sort

End User Demo Other helpful uses of EPM • Data clean-up example - • Personnel Director’s Manager Listing

In Tree: Constraint Type What is a Tree? • The graphical hierarchy in PeopleSoft systems that displays the relationship between items in a group. • Trees add a convenient graphical layer that displays the relationships between chartfield values. Benefits in EPM: • Trees allow a user to restrict a query result set to only those rows of data which have values that exist in a tree node.

Expressions What is an Expression? • Expressions are calculations that PeopleSoft Query performs as part of the query. • They can be used to compare values. Uses: • Numerical Manipulation. • Substring. • Concatenate. • Decode (IF)

Discussion User Comments / Issues / Request?

Closing Thank You for your participation today. We look forward to continuing our work together to improve and make EPM a Success! • Feed Back Forms • Look for this presentation and meeting Q & A’son the Core-CT Website (http://www.core-ct.state.ct.us/) • Next Meeting – March 2004101 E. River Drive, Room 1002 A&B • AR/GL/Reporting Meeting - January 26, 2004101 E. River Drive, Room 1002 A&B

STATE OF CONNECTICUT Core-CT Project