It’s been two years since the launch of a program set to upgrade U of T’s Administrative Management Systems and transform the future for more than 33,000 staff and faculty. So how much progress has the U of T’s Enterprise Modernization Program made since its debut and what’s in store for the future?

Using the latest SAP technology to upgrade all systems, the goal of the program is to provide a consistent, intuitive and streamlined user experience. The project is currently transforming the entire HR Talent Management Suite and the core HR, Research and Finance systems.

“The pandemic has exposed many financial and human resources processes that can be reimagined such as employee on-boarding, electronic funds transfer for payments, and use of electronic signatures for critical business processes” says Cathy Eberts, Director, Enterprise Applications and Deputy CIO.

To date, Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI) has completed a massive infrastructure update, which has set the stage for all other future updates. In November 2020, EASI also upgraded U of T’s Financial Information System to a highly responsive transactional and reporting system. This upgrade improved speed and reporting for all Administrative Systems, including the Human Resources Information System and Research Information System.

EASI also launched SuccessFactors Learning Management System, Performance and Goals, and Recruitment as part of the Human Resources Information System.

Let’s see what projects have launched recently and what’s next for the program.

Fiori Launchpad Reporting
In March 2021, the EASI team leveraged the power of SAP’s latest and greatest web-based user experience offering using the Fiori Launchpad. Fiori Launchpad Reporting was the first of many applications to be launched on the new platform. Fiori Launchpad Reporting is a reporting solution within AMS that is available 24/7 during scheduled AMS lockouts. It provides reporting functionality on live AMS data during scheduled AMS downtimes, including holiday shut down, fiscal year end, fiscal month end and pay runs. This application provides an improved user interface as well as enhanced analytics and better insights into reporting. Since its implementation, the 24 Fiori Launchpad reports have been used more than 5,000 times by over 400 users.

Updated Expense Reimbursement Direct Deposit (ERDD) Web Application
More recently, EASI launched an updated version of ERDD in June 2021 using SAP’s new interface design principles. The new ERDD-web application provides an updated user interface with improved usability and accessibility. The modernized and simplified user interface displays all claims on the homepage for easy tracking, and provides better search functionality, with the option to search by audit number, FI document number, claim name, personnel number, claimant name and status. The application also offers an improved layout of expense categories, helping users to select only those expenses that are important to their claims.

What’s next for the Modernization Program?

Employee Central – Human Resources Information System
Employee Central, a new platform hosted in SuccessFactors, will provide users with all Employee Self-Service and Manager Self-Service Human Resources functions – from hire to retire. It will help to consolidate complex processes and will allow users to see the workflow and next steps. For example, a manager will be able to initiate the recruitment process through Employee Central, track where the position is in the recruitment process and easily provide approvals. It will also automate many of the previous manual processes and will be accessible on mobile devices, increasing accessibility of the applications.

My Research Applications & Agreements (MRA) System
EASI and the Division of the Vice-President, Research & Innovation are also hard at work updating the My Research Applications & Agreements (MRA) system. This system is being rebuilt to better serve the U of T research and innovation community. MRA is the University of Toronto’s online system for researchers to secure the institutional endorsement and approval of their research grants, applications, and non-funded agreements. These changes will better support the U of T research and innovation community through a modernized and user-friendly experience to submitting research funding applications. The renewed MRA is scheduled to launch in late summer 2021.

These projects require a university-wide effort and close collaborations with departments, including Financial Services, Human Resources & Equity, Procurement Services, Facilities & Services, and the Division of the Vice-President, Research & Innovation. They also require consultation from divisions, local IT administrators, Information Security, Enterprise Infrastructure Solutions.

Thank you to the U of T community for the success of this program to date, and please stay tuned for more updates!

Website and security updates, extensive testing and monitoring – these are just some of the ingredients that led to yet another successful year for U of T’s student enrolment. This massive undertaking involved 15 major enrolment days and culminated in peak enrolment day on July 30.

Similar to previous years, the system handled a large number of logins in ACORN for all enrolment days and the Faculty of Arts & Science “priority removal” enrolment period.

“Leading up to the month-long enrolment period, we test all of our systems and ensure they are able to handle the load. We also work with other groups, including Information Security, the Registrar’s offices, our communications team,” says Laurel Williams, an Information Technology Analyst with Enterprise Applications & Solutions Integration (EASI). “We monitor all of the large enrolment days for U of T’s three campuses to make sure we’re on track and we make improvements on the fly to ensure that everything goes smoothly on peak enrolment day.”

The first round of enrolment at 9 a.m. had a peak of 1,980 students and the second round at 10 a.m. had close to 2,600. The third round had a peak of over 3,300 students and the fourth had over 3,000.

An upgrade to the Student Information Systems completed three years ago, and subsequent improvements, have led to a faster, more reliable system. During the first two minutes of the first enrolment, over 1,500 students had already added over 3,300 courses.

“Since we’ve upgraded to the distributed architecture, we have more computing power at our disposal. On the flip side, there are more systems to monitor,” says Haroon Rafique, DevOps Manager with EASI. “As a result of fine tuning the various components of the architecture, when thousands of students are logging in, the system can easily handle the load and students can enrol in record time.”

On July 30, 20 per cent of all course enrolment transactions that occurred on that day, including course adds, drops and waitlists, were completed within the first minute of each enrolment window; on the same priority removal day back in August 2018, only 1 per cent of enrolments occurred in that first minute. In terms of the number of students, about 40 per cent were able to log in and enroll in the courses they wanted during the first minute in 2021 compared to 3 per cent in 2018.

This year, a significant system improvement included moving the ACORN launchpad, the website leading to the ACORN application, from an on-premises solution to the Azure Cloud.

“During the first few enrolment days this year we closely monitored the launchpad to see how it would deal with multiple simultaneous users. By observing how the launchpad performed during the days leading up to peak enrolment, we could sort out any issues and maximize efficiencies, in advance,” says Rafique.

With this upgrade, the launchpad now has autoscaling capabilities that decrease the hosting costs for U of T. The site can scale up for specific days, allowing for more flexibility compared to a static hosting solution for the site. For many of the larger enrolment days, the launchpad plays a crucial role as it acts as a holding area for students before logging into ACORN.

Beyond testing the ACORN launchpad, the team also tested the ACORN application by simulating thousands of students logging into the system at the same time.

“We use a script to mimic the process of many users logging in, loading the dashboard, adding and dropping a course and logging out,” says Mike Wyers, a Test Coordinator with EASI. “We try to push the system to the max to fix any bottlenecks and make sure our enrolment days run smoothly.”

In addition, the team also ensures the systems are up to date throughout the year.

“We have a renewed focus on security and conduct quarterly outages of our systems to perform necessary updates. It’s not only important for security but we want our systems running at their top performance,” says Rafique.

This year, the upgrades, testing and extensive preparation clearly paid off.

“We realize this is an important time of the year for everyone,” says Williams.” We try to make sure everything is in order well in advance in case there are any issues. We’re pleased that this day was seamless, and we look forward to the same outcome for next year’s enrolment!”