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August 2018

Changes Coming to Financial Applications Web Page

August 16, 2018

On August 20, the Financial Systems Solutions (FSS) Applications web page that many of you use to access finance and reporting applications will be automatically redirected to a new—but very similar—Harvard University IT (HUIT) financial systems application page at  huit.harvard.edu/apps/finance.

Many across the University rely on this portal page, and every effort will be made to redirect visitors automatically and ensure a smooth transition. At your convenience, please update any links and bookmarks you may have to the new URL:https://huit.harvard.edu/apps/finance.

This consolidation is the first step of a larger effort to make it easier to find and access widely-used University applications, resources, and knowledge online. As part of this effort, financial systems online content will be integrated into Harvard University IT, and the FSS website will be eventually retired.

Thank you to those who provided early feedback on the applications page and voiced the continuing need to have a simple, single page with links to the applications they use most. We welcome additional feedback at any time. For questions or concerns, please submit a ticket through IT Help and it will be routed to the appropriate service team for response.

Improved Onboarding for New Hires

August 16, 2018

You can now get a HUID before the I9 process is completed and new hires can claim their HarvardKey in advance, so that you can start provisioning earlier.

A reminder that as of May 2018, the quick hire form was enhanced to include “Assign ID” functionality designed to make provisioning possible earlier in the hiring process. This functionality allows the quick hire user to generate an ID number for an individual prior to submitting the form to the database. For more information on the Assign ID functionality, please refer to the Quick Hire Job Aids in the Harvard Training Portal.

  • As of July 2018, an 'Onboarding' (ONBD) email address can be entered on the PeopleSoft Quick Hire form to facilitate the ability of the employee to claim his/her HarvardKey. If an Onboarding email is entered onto the form, it will be transmitted to IAM when the "Incoming Employee" role is assigned and/or when "Submit to Database" is clicked. The Onboarding email type can also be entered on the delivered Personal Data pages (Add and Modify a Person) and will be transmitted to IAM upon Save.... Read more about Improved Onboarding for New Hires

Preparing to Track Positions in PeopleSoft

August 16, 2018

As of September 17, 2018 (PeopleSoft Release 51), a “Position NBR” field will be added to the Quick Hire and Job Data Change Forms. This field will not be used or drive any functionality until the Position Tracking & Reporting (PTR) Implementation goes live near the end of FY19. More details on how this field will be used will come as the go-live date approaches.

Standardizing Student Appointments in PeopleSoft

August 16, 2018

With the newly formed union for student workers (HGSU-UAW), it is important that we standardize student appointments by using the Business Title field to identify students who are employed in either teaching or research roles. Teaching roles are those with substantial instructional duties. These teaching roles do not include graders or tutors. Research roles are those providing research assistance or support for a member of the faculty or as part of a lab, as either an hourly-paid student employee or as a monthly paid graduate student.

Teaching and Research job titles could include Research Assistant, Teaching Fellow, Teaching Assistant, or Course Assistant.

Job Code and Business Title Guidance

For weekly paid students – graduates and undergraduates, use job code 700030. The business title will default to Temporary Harv Student OT Elig, but please override the default with a descriptive business title that includes the title of Course Assistant or Research Assistant as well as the course name and PI/professor name. For example:

  • “Course Assistant CS 50”
  • “Research Assistant Prof. Jones”

For monthly paid graduate students, you will have more job codes to select from but we recommend:

  • Fellow, Teaching 000902
  • Research Asst Grad Student 061202

Again, please use a descriptive business title that includes the job being performed (teaching, research), and professor/PI.... Read more about Standardizing Student Appointments in PeopleSoft

FY20-24 Multi-Year Capital Plan (MYCP)

August 16, 2018

Here are some Multi-Year Capital Plan (MYCP) highlights:

  • The FY20-24 multi-year capital plans should be submitted in CPATH by August 30th; the data from the August 30th MYCP submission will be pre-populated in the Multi-Year Financial Plans (MYFP) by OFSP. Adjustments can be made through October 5th; however, the final capital spending amount reported in CPATH as of October 5th must agree with the amounts in the MYFP.
  • Please ensure the out years of the MYCP (FY23 and FY24) reflect anticipated spending; if projects are not yet identified, it is recommended that placeholders be used.
  • MYCP narratives are due to CAPS by October 12th. Narrative templates are available on the CAPS website. Click here.
  • FY20-24 Capital Plan Guidelines are available on CAPS website: https://wiki.harvard.edu/confluence/display/hppmcaps/Capital+Planning

Please contact a member of the FAD Capital Panning and Project Services team with any questions or send an email to the CAPS Office (caps@harvard.edu).

OBIEE Update

August 16, 2018

This update relates to the non-student Accounts Receivables, CAPS, Cash Management, Chart of Accounts, CSMA, Financials, Grants Management, Procure to Pay, Travel & Expense, and User Security folders.

OBI "By the Numbers" for July 2018

  • 99.1%: Percentage of queries that completed in 1 minute or under
  • 1,395: Number of distinct users in OBI for ALL subject areas
  • 264,441: Number of distinct requests made in ALL subject areas (up ~60,000 queries since June!)
    • The "Transaction Listing All" dashboard alone continues to make up half of all the requests at the university (130,211 requests)

Monthly OBI Release

The next monthly OBI release will begin on Thursday, August 30th at 6 p.m.  All changes will be implemented and the release complete by 9 a.m. on Friday, August 31st.  Check out the newly updated OBI 3 Month Release Plan and Backlog wiki page for details of the dashboard changes in this release.

Update on Service Unavailable Error Messages

OBI users of the non-student Accounts Receivables, CAPS, Cash Management, Chart of Accounts, CSMA, Financials, Grants Management, Procure to Pay, Travel & Expense, and User Security folders have been receiving Service Unavailable messages.  Data Management Services (DMS) continues to work with Oracle to identify the root cause and to resolve the issue.  DMS made a configuration change on the evening of Wednesday, August 8th which will reduce the number of errors received over the next month.... Read more about OBIEE Update

DMS Cloud Migration Project Update

August 16, 2018

The Harvard Data Warehouse is migrating to Amazon Web Services (otherwise known as AWS or the Cloud) and is on track for cutover to production to be completed by the end of September 2018.

 

As part of this effort, we have asked our impacted stakeholders to validate and transition from the On Premises databases to AWS. Participation in the testing cycles is critical to ensure that there will be no service interruptions after the migration. Systems-to-systems testing and validation is currently in progress, and we will soon be engaging with Direct Database Users (DDUs) across the University. DMS is establishing local “office hours” to support DDUs as they update their connections to AWS databases.  Please watch out for our targeted communications coming in mid-September.

 

Click here for additional information.  Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions or concerns.

Ad-Hoc Reporting Project Update

August 16, 2018

Data Management Services is working with representation from around the university on the Ad-Hoc Reporting Project (ARP).  The ARP’s mission is to improve the ad-hoc reporting capabilities for Harvard data citizens by providing a tool option(s) and a migration strategy for BRIO / Hyperion IR users. 

The identification of the tools occurs in Phase 1, which runs from February 2018 through March 2019.  Needs Assessment sessions were held in April to determine the functionality important to Harvard’s ad-hoc reporting community.  The project team and Ad-Hoc Reporting Project Focus Group then narrowed down the tools/vendors to a final four: Microsoft Power BI, Oracle, Qlik, and Tableau.  Currently the project team is working with the vendors on several “use cases,” actual ad-hoc queries that cover the most important functionalities identified in the Needs Assessment.  From mid-August through early November, the project team will be holding a “bake-off” for the four final vendors to show how they would address the use cases.  Based on input from the project team, Focus Group, and participants across the university during that “bake-off”, the project team will identify the tool(s) to replace BRIO / Hyperion IR.

Phase 2 will include the implementation of the tool(s) across Harvard and the training on those tool(s).

For more information about the project including the timeline, updates on deliverables, please visit the Ad-Hoc Reporting Project wiki page or contact Kathy Genovese, Peter Bristol, or Alison Wellman Smith.

Nonresident Alien Tax Compliance - Administrators Session for Onboarding Foreign Payees

August 16, 2018

The Nonresident Alien Tax Compliance Office will host an information session for Harvard Administrators on Tuesday, August 21 from 10:30 - 11:30 a.m., Room B-30 (Level B) at Lamont Library.

This session is suggested for administrators who onboard and make payments to foreign individuals. This session will include an overview of the onboarding processes in PeopleSoft and Oracle, review of the “BER- Foreign Individual” Vendor Type, a brief overview of the GLACIER online tax compliance system, federal compliance considerations, helpful tips, and Q&A.

To attend, please send an email to natasha_rivera@harvard.edu with the words “registration 8/21” in the subject line. This session is open to all; please feel free to forward this invitation to others who may be interested.