Penn State Workflow Project

1. Penn State Workflow Project

2. Key Issues • Why Workflow? • AIS Subcommittee Representation • Business Drivers and Expectations • Workflow Risk Factors • New Roles and Terms • Organizational Structures • Activities and Opportunities • Application Development & Demo • Business Direction and Strategy

3. Why Workflow? • The need for a Workflow system is user driven. • AIS Advisory Committee created a Workflow subcommittee to focus on PSU workflow needs and provide recommendation • Workflow initiative was included in the 2004 AIS Strategic Plan • Purchased Fujitsu iBPM Advanced Edition workflow engine • Workflow project structure was created in 2005 • Penn State Workflow received, and continues to receive executive level support.

4. University Libraries Auxiliary and Business Services Outreach Office of Physical Plant University Controller Human Resources Administrative Information Systems College of Engineering AIS Subcommittee Representation

5. Key high-level business drivers: • Improve business/academic process effectiveness and efficiency • Improve customer service • Reduce costs • Improve process control • Increase flexibility • Facilitate process change • Consistent user interface and experience

6. Implementing: - Role-based approval significantly reduces maintenance as employee changes are made - System agility to respond to changing business rules and demonstrate compliance with policy regulations - Enable imaged or electronic supporting documentation to be attached to process vs. campus mail - Standardized approval processes Not Implementing: - Ongoing maintenance of 7900+ EASY approval paths - Process automation left up to Colleges and Departments - Unable to meet needs and expectations in today’s competitive business market - Continued use of 3270 (green screen) mainframe system for financial and limited student processes Workflow Risk Factors

7. Business Process Business Process Analyst Process Process Design Team Process Steward Role-based Approval Role Steward Role Assigner Workflow Workflow Application Worklist New Roles and Terms See glossary for definitions

8. Security & LDAP Open Standards Development Group Policy and Roles EASY Re-engineering Infrastructure Workflow Project Organizational Structure AIS Senior Management Workflow ProjectManagement • Implement & support security architecture • Integrate roles and attributes with PSU LDAP server • Develop Web interface to assign and manage roles • Implement hardware & software infrastructure • Install and manage Workflow-related software, databases and processes • Develop policy for official University processes • Identify and define central, policy-based roles and attributes • Ensure policy meets auditing requirements • Establish a plan for re-engineering and streamlining business processes found in existing EASY forms • Oversee migration from EASY to Workflow • Collaborate with stakeholders to develop Workflow processes and forms • Build workflow applications using JAVA & JSP

9. Policy Governance Process Design Teams • Provide guidelines to distinguish central vs. departmental process • Review and act upon requests for new or revised central roles Additional Organizational Structure (Some Not Yet Formed) Project Management Standards User Feedback Participants • Develop user interface standards • Identify and define common features, i.e. browse, inquiry for all processes • Establish naming conventions • Identify Process and Role Stewards • Approve functional & detail design docs • Coordinate development, review and implementation schedules • Test and provide feedback on usability • Review products for consistency, functional completeness & accuracy • Review documentation & help material • Prepare functional & detail design documents • Organize & coordinate Ad Hoc review groups • Review prototypes for adherence to design docs & standards

10. Business Direction and Strategy • Multi-year project • Re-engineer existing Financial and OHR EASY forms • Automate academic processes • Solidify Workflow Organizational structure • Continue JAVA training for additional developers and increase number of Workflow development resources • Identify Workflow training needs and develop training programs

11. Activities & Opportunities • Learning and understanding new technologies • Integrating components / central systems • Architecture, design, development • Establishing PSU Workflow Policy • Re-engineer 20 year old processes • Introduction of new ‘Roles’ • Asking people to change the way they do business • Developing more effective processes

12. OSD Team Application Development Initial, low-stakes, paper-based processes: • Undergraduate Education Research Travel Request (ready for test deployment) • Sabbatical • Workflow Role Authorization Process (currently paper signature cards, required for financial)

13. Application Development(cont.) Initial, less-complex EASY processes to be re-engineered: • APCA/UPCA (purchasing card authorization) • Supplemental Compensation Initial, complex EASY process to be re-engineered: • HR Termination* *Note: Termination process is being re-engineered and developed by OHR development team. OSD is serving as Workflow development consultants. Model for future development partnerships.

14. Process Flow in Workflow Engine

15. Demonstration ofUndergraduate EducationTravel Request Process(recorded by Rich Dumm)

16. Workflow Contacts and Information Beth Hayes, Project Manager bah1@psu.edu, 863-3514 Rich Dumm, Manager, Open Standards Development Group rdd4@psu.edu, 865-1754 Workflow Web site: http://ais.its.psu.edu/workflow

17. Glossary Business Process -- A set of one or more linked procedures or activities which collectively realize a business objective or policy goal, normally within the context of an organizational structure defining functional roles and relationships. Business Process Analyst -- deals with the more-tactical aspects of discovering, validating, documenting and communicating business-process-related knowledge through modeling, simulating and analyzing current and future states. Focus is on business outcomes versus technical ‘how to’. Process -- A formalized view of a business process, represented as a coordinated (parallel and/or serial) set of process activities that are connected in order to achieve a common goal.

18. Glossary (cont.) Process Design Team – Established for each Workflow process. Membership includes Process Steward, business rules experts, stakeholders, users and Workflow application developer. Process Steward (Owner) – is responsible for overseeing the business rules associated with the process to ensure adherence to University policy. Participates on Process Design Team. Role-based Approval – utilizes an approval path based on roles (Dean, Budget Admin, Financial Officer, etc.) that are required by policy for the approval of financial, academic and administrative processes. Role Steward -- oversees and maintains central, policy-based roles and associated attributes for financial, academic and administrative areas within their authority. Designate and authorize Role Assigners.

19. Glossary (cont.) Role Assigner – Identifies and assigns approval roles and authority to PSU employees for processes for which they will serve as an approver within their area of authority. Workflow -- The automation of a business process, in whole or part, during which documents, information or tasks are passed from one participant to another for action, according to a set of procedural rules. Workflow Application -- A general term for a software program that interacts with a workflow enactment service, handling part of the processing required to support a particular activity (or activities). Worklist -- A list of work items associated with a Workflow user who serves in an approval role. The worklist is displayed upon login to the Workflow system via a Web browser.