We received the ITCRB approval to begin working on the PeopleSoft 9.2 Upgrade. We are starting the planning phase in September and are targeting to complete the entire Upgrade by May 2017. Although the new version may not bring significant visible changes to the system, upgrading has several benefits, including:
- Taking advantage of the new continuous delivery of functionality and improvements. Starting with version 9.2, Oracle will deliver new functionality on an ongoing basis as opposed to bundling it all into a new version and requiring a full upgrade.
- Taking advantage of an enhanced user experience, as version 9.2 provides:
- Improved navigation using global search, similar to the navigation in other internet sites such as Amazon.
- Activity Guides to guide employees through a step-by-step process via self-service.
- Mobile pages for key self-service pages.
- Allowing us an opportunity to take a closer look at our existing customizations and potentially retire some
- Exploring moving the current hardware to either a vendor hosted platform or to the cloud
- Allowing us to stay on vendor supported platform
As with prior upgrades, we will stop making enhancements to the system approximately one year before the deployment of the new version, except for compliance changes and critical fixes. This allows us to ensure that the upgrade does not break any existing functionality, by doing extensive testing and comparing the current version to the new version. Therefore, April 2016 will be the last release before the code freeze is in place in PeopleSoft. If you are planning to request any enhancements to the system, please let your PeopleSoft contact know ASAP.
Stay tuned for more updates in the coming months.