UVAFinance

Tuesday, June 29, 2021

FST Update June 28, 2021

Want to listen to this update instead of reading it? Click here to tune into the WFST Broadcast!
No time to read paragraphs? Check out "Five Things to Know about WFST"

Customer Confirmation Sessions, Round 2

Customer Confirmation sessions wrapped up earlier this month. At the end of each session, participants were asked to complete a survey to gauge their satisfaction – overall, 91% were satisfied or extremely satisfied, while 8% were noncommittal, and 1% were dissatisfied. The FST team is already incorporating attendees’ feedback from these sessions as work starts on the next build.

Related News:

See slides and pre-read materials from the sessions in the Online Community
Read more on CCS2 and see what's next
Check out what's new on the FST website in Workday Words and FAQs

FDM/Chart of Accounts

As we near the year-out threshold from Workday Financials go live on July 1, 2022, our future Foundation Data Model, or FDM, is solidifying. Schools and units are preparing for mapping, and the FST team is preparing workshops and office hours to help schools and units do the mapping.

Check out this video from AVP of Finance Augie Maurelli, where he gives us a bit of a “level set” on the FDM work leading up to this really important time of work.

Maurelli has also written a Workflow Controls and Approvals update that you can find in this week’s blog digest. In this post, he talks about our quest to get front end approvals, what’s happening with Recon@, and the proposed way UVA might handle real-time approval of transactions in the future state, through the addition of a few specific roles.

Related News:

Transformations in Progress: From improving payment processing and procurement marketplace access to Optical
Character recognition for invoices and workflow
controls, there are lots of transformations in progress.
UVAFinance/FST Website Reorganization: This summer and early fall, you may notice a
difference in how the VP Finance site and the FST site are organized. We’re reorganizing the content of all the
Finance sites into a single site that’s more focused on you as a
stakeholder. This website redesign is another one of those “transformations in
progress"! Read more.

Want to listen to this update instead of reading it? Click here to tune into the WFST Broadcast!
No time to read paragraphs? Check out "Five Things to Know about WFST"

Customer Confirmation Sessions, Round 2

Related News:

See slides and pre-read materials from the sessions in the Online Community
Read more on CCS2 and see what's next
Check out what's new on the FST website in Workday Words and FAQs

FDM/Chart of Accounts

Check out this video from AVP of Finance Augie Maurelli, where he gives us a bit of a “level set” on the FDM work leading up to this really important time of work.

Related News:

Transformations in Progress: From improving payment processing and procurement marketplace access to Optical Character recognition for invoices and workflow controls, there are lots of transformations in progress.
UVAFinance/FST Website Reorganization: This summer and early fall, you may notice a difference in how the VP Finance site and the FST site are organized. We’re reorganizing the content of all the Finance sites into a single site that’s more focused on you as a stakeholder. This website redesign is another one of those “transformations in progress"! Read more.

1. 96% of UVA schools and units were involved in Customer Confirmation Sessions Round 2, which ended earlier this month. CCS sessions showcase the current build of the Workday Financials tenant, demonstrating key functionality in the system. 91% of attendees were pleased with the sessions. As with the first round of Customer Confirmation Sessions, we'll make videos of the content available to our Change Leaders to share with their stakeholders. Read more about CCS2.

2. As schools and units prepare to map to the new FDM / Chart of Accounts, the FST team is preparing workshops and office hours to support this effort. Check out this video from AVP of Finance Augie Maurelli to get us all on the same page before mapping begins.

3. Finance Strategic Transformation isn't just a Workday Financials implementation! There are many changes taking place surrounding FST, focused on continuous improvement, enhanced reporting and analytics, and adoption of Adaptive Planning. See some of the transformations in progress.

4. Update on FST Workflow Controls and Approvals: We not only had Augie Maurelli making videos, but we also had him writing updates! Check out his piece describing the shift toward a more holistic approach to approvals.

5. We are ONE YEAR OUT from go-live of Workday Financials! While everyone's effort seems to be focused on the July 1, 2022 date, know that members of the FST team are also working on the training plan to support Workday users after go-live, as well as a plan to reorganize the Finance websites to better support our stakeholders.

As we near the year-out threshold from Workday Financials go-live on July 1, 2022, our future Foundation Data Model (FDM, Workday's term for chart of accounts) design is solidifying, and schools and units are preparing for mapping. Review the FDM information and resources gathered below to learn more.

Level-Setting Video: Whether you've been an active participant in FDM conversations for a while or you're just starting to think about it now, this video will ground you in the most up-to-date information. Watch the 17-minute FDM video here in the online Community.

Resource Page in the online Community: Access files with mapping information, showing the relationship between elements in our current chart of accounts and their future iterations. This page is the current FDM hub on the Community and will continue to be updated with resources.

FST Team Mapping Tool: The tool that will assist in mapping our current chart of accounts info to the new FDM will be ready within the next month. It's important to note that the tool will only be used by FST team members. Mapping collaborators in the schools and units will work from outputs from the tool during the iterative mapping process. Sample outputs will be ready to share in the first half of August.

Workshop: In August, the FST team will host a workshop to share the latest information and resources to help schools and units with FDM mapping. More information coming soon!

You’ve Got That Right: FST Workflow Controls and Approvals Update

Contributed by Augie Maurelli

While the implementation of Workday Financials is an essential component of finance transformation, there’s more to the FST project than that. It’s also about continuous improvement and changing the way we work, both in the tool and outside our technology platform.

UVA financial leaders see this time as an opportunity to move toward a more holistic approach to approvals that is consistent with leading practices. This means an emphasis on getting things right on the front-end, using real-time transaction approvals when appropriate. Doing so would be a culture shift from the current heavy reliance on detailed post-transaction reconciliation, voluminous cost transfer activity, and detailed monitoring.

While this change in emphasis may take some getting used to, the benefits far outweigh any short-term impacts to our business processes and their owners.

Front-end approvals, when warranted, enhance future-state operations in a couple of ways:

Improve transaction accuracy from the onset through enhanced internal controls, reducing the need for corrections after money has already gone out the door
Eliminate potential business risks, in doing so, and aid in policy adherence
Provide access to more accurate real-time financial data within the system, which leads to better reporting and overall data integrity
Reduce the time and effort required for lengthy detailed month-end reconciliation and additional monitoring activity

The fate of Recon@ as an attestation tool also plays into the approvals transformation and overall controls framework. The intention is to migrate post-transaction review and attestation to another tool, ideally within Workday. Such a transformation means that the FST team must ensure all of the approvals, controls, reconciliations, and policies are aligned and designed for accurate and effective business processing.

The decision about Recon@’s fate won’t be finalized until the team is confident that we improve our current state holistically. Here are just some examples of how we might be able to improve our operations by replacing the Recon@ functionality with improved methods:

Create Workday/UBI reports that enable financial staff and principal investigators to review their accounts’ status periodically, and determine a method of attestation
Streamline the financial confirmation process for financial managers to certify role assignments periodically and financial reporting
Reduce post-transactional review to be for only certain types of high-risk transactions or those that may not require upfront approvals
Update policies/procedures that refer to post-transaction review to reflect new procedures to better align with leading practices
Review a sample of transactions for compliance as part of central quality assurance processes

As these considerations illustrate, the net work should be less—however, it’s a shift in mindset and expectations as you move to change in philosophy. Wise CEO Dinesh Paliwal once said, “Every good business story has a conflict and triumph at the core and a turning point where a transformation takes place." This change in mindset and practices is UVA’s turning point.

To make this work in the future state, a minimum of three new proposed departmental roles would be created to monitor and approve transactions in real-time: Cost Center Manager, Project Manager, and Grant Manager. These roles would be used instead of the current Fiscal Contact, who is doing detailed reconciliation and corrections. These broad-based roles provide the general framework to build out and refine our approvals processes and ultimately align with the overall controls framework at UVA.See the image below for more detail (click to enlarge).

There's new content on the FST website! As changes are made and new material becomes available, the FST Team constantly updates the website to keep stakeholders informed.

Here's a list of sections that were recently updated:

Frequently Asked Questions

During the first round of Customer Confirmation Sessions, lots of questions were posed by stakeholders. Some of these were addressed in recent blog posts, but the FST Team also answered many of them in the second round of Customer Confirmation Sessions that took place earlier this month. You can find the new FAQs here.

Workday Words Dictionary

This section update is also a result of CCS. Most sessions included a list of relevant terms before diving into more details. You can view all Workday Words and legacy terms here. If you know of any terms not on this list, please send suggestions to financetransformation@virginia.edu or by commenting on this thread in the Community.

The Decision Log

Though there has been a lot of focus on CCS lately, that doesn't mean work in other areas of the project has stopped. Decisions were still presented to governance groups for input this month and a few final decisions were also made. Make sure to check out the Decision Log to see what's new.

Round 2 of CCS is Done! What Did People Think?

The second round of Customer Confirmation Sessions (CCS) finished up last week, and the FST team is already incorporating attendees' feedback as work starts on the next build. So much was accomplished during these sessions, and so many stakeholders from across the University were able to attend.

At the end of each session, participants were asked to complete a survey to gauge their satisfaction. Overall, 91% said they were satisfied or extremely satisfied, 8% responded neither satisfied nor dissatisfied, and 1% said they were dissatisfied. Participants were also able to offer feedback and provide explanations for the satisfaction rating they chose.

Additionally, during this month's Steering Committee Meeting Chrissie Holt-Hull, from the School of Architecture shared her opinions on CCS round 2.

Here's a bit of what she had to say:

Chrissie: "The materials were very organized, visually appealing, and easy to follow. The demos have been great. I like how key decisions have been provided up front, time alotted for on-the-spot Q&A and that there is an emphasis on getting it right the first time.

There is huge value in continuing these sessions in whatever way. They build on your knowledge and comfort with the new tool and ease the transition anxiety from Oracle to Workday."

It's great to see such positive responses to these sessions! Make sure to keep an eye on this space to find out what's next for FST.

Round 2 of CCS is Done! What Did People Think?

Additionally, during this month's Steering Committee Meeting Chrissie Holt-Hull, from the School of Architecture shared her opinions on CCS round 2.

Here's a bit of what she had to say:

Chrissie: "The materials were very organized, visually appealing, and easy to follow. The demos have been great. I like how key decisions have been provided up front, time alotted for on-the-spot Q&A and that there is an emphasis on getting it right the first time.

There is huge value in continuing these sessions in whatever way. They build on your knowledge and comfort with the new tool and ease the transition anxiety from Oracle to Workday."

It's great to see such positive responses to these sessions! Make sure to keep an eye on this space to find out what's next for FST.

Contributed by Linda Leshowitz

Buddha bowls are a healthy and delicious option for putting together a quick dinner. There are so many possibilities for creating bowls. This Buddha Bowl, from the Minimalist Baker, combines roasted sweet potatoes, broccolini, and kale with seasoned chickpeas (a.k.a. garbanzo beans) topped with a tahini sauce! It’s full of flavor plus phytonutrients, fiber, and protein.

Find the whole recipe HERE as well as links to other bowl recipes.

Dear Team,

As vaccines are becoming prevalent, I wanted to pass along initial guidance regarding remote vs. in-person work with UVAFinance, with a focus over the summer months. While we are still waiting for official UVA guidance, we expect flexibility will be provided to departments and schools to determine the best way forward.

We know that some employees have really grown to like remote work, while others are eager to return back to “normal” and in-person interactions. We know that there are some great benefits to remote work (no commute!), but we aren’t clear on the long-term impact on effective onboarding, mentoring, professional development, and employee satisfaction.

Check it out: Melody recorded a video version of this edition of From Melody's Desk!

For years it has been reported on Gallup surveys that the happiest employees have a “best friend” at work. How does that shift when random interactions in the hallway, the pre-and post-meeting conversations in Carr-1 and Carr-2, grabbing lunch or coffee at Greenberry’s or Zoe’s are gone and it is harder to make those connections? How do we replace impromptu brainstorming sessions? Do we need to?

The work with Bird Guess and the Racial Equity Group has helped us to understand the positive impact that working, talking with, having lunch with a diverse group of work colleagues can have in improving racial equity. How will a more long-term shift to more remote work impact the racial equity efforts that we are working hard to advance?

Since many of these questions remain unresolved, I do see that our initial approach for this summer and the next year as an ongoing experiment to make sure that we strike the right balance. For now, this is the approach we will take (click to read more after the jump):

1. We will extend telework agreements through Aug 31 for anyone who desires to work from home for the summer, understanding there will be childcare needs until school resumes in August. We are still determining the best way to do this formally, but for now, consider it informally in place.
2. We will work with anyone ready to return to the office, for the summer, on a full or part-time basis. As a reminder of University guidance regarding vaccines and masking/social distancing: for vaccinated individuals (including contractors), restrictions have been lifted. However, for those who are not vaccinated and on-grounds, masking/distancing restrictions will still be in force; unvaccinated employees who come on-grounds will be required to document their vaccination in Workday and take weekly saliva testing. To come back to Grounds, just let your manager know so that we can coordinate with the Business Services group on the return. We do miss your smiling faces. :-)
3. We will continue to offer remote options for all meetings at least through the summer, but will begin to have in-person options as well. Zoom will be the meeting standard for hybrid meetings, as the Carruthers Hall conference rooms have been set up as Zoom rooms. Thanks to the Business Services team on this!
4. We are working on a building access plan as well.

We will continue to develop a plan for fall and beyond. This will likely be determined on a case-by-case basis, related to work requirements and assignments. While the past year of remote work has been unavoidable and emergency response to the pandemic, ongoing remote work will include standards and requirements that weren’t in place during the pandemic/emergency remote work situation. For example, remote work will likely require the following in order to have consistent availability and engagement between those who are remote and those who are in the office:

a. If an employee is working remotely for a majority of the time, the office space on grounds will be hoteling. There will need to be a conversion of some current office space and, perhaps, a reservation system.
b. Stable, reliable, and secure internet access is a job requirement for us all. If there are consistent issues with internet reliability that do not allow an employee to fully engage and work, there may be an expectation that the primary place of work is on-grounds. If there is a temporary internet issue, there would be an expectation that the employee can find a place with secure and stable service (in Carruthers, etc. ) or take a vacation day
c. For a full-time employee, it is not possible to also be a full-time caregiver.
d. For hybrid meetings, employees will have cameras on and be visibly engaged in meetings. This is similar to if you were in person attending a meeting in a conference room.
e. Zoom will be the standard tool for meetings of more than 2 people to provide flexibility of hybrid meetings, utilizing our Carruthers conference rooms.
f. MSTeams should be up and running for a response unless an employee is at lunch or on a break. This is similar to being available in your office for someone to stop by to ask a quick question. MSTeams can also be used for 1:1 meetings if preferred.
g. Outlook Calendar will be the standard for indicating in/out of office, in meeting/unavailable, etc. Calendar details should be available to office colleagues, but you can always use the “private” function for personal meetings.
h. While an employee is away from the office, his/her office phone should be forwarded to a phone (cell, home, or other) that you will access regularly while working off-site.
i. While remote work can provide greater flexibility on standard working hours, significant deviations from the normal workday should be discussed and approved by the manager.
j. There may be occasional all-hands meetings, retreats, or celebrations where we ask employees to attend in person. Some departments may establish a regular in-person meeting schedule.

We will continue to learn and adapt to a new working environment, so these initial items may be adjusted, improved, or supplemented. This and other guidance (such as the provision of University purchased and owned equipment) will be further adjusted as more is distributed by UVA HR.

I hope this information is helpful as we move back to “normal.” Again – I am so in awe of and appreciative of every adjustment and flexibility that each of you has endured over this past year. THANK YOU!!! and I hope to see you all soon!

Best,

You might be surprised to know that UVAFinance has a total of 14 active websites that represent our varied departments and functions. Less surprising to you might be the challenges our many sites present to our customers when they're looking for information and assistance. Questions of which department handles what task and how processes flow between departments can make for a frustrating stakeholder experience.

The Finance Engagement Team has begun a number of projects aimed at improving service to our external and internal customers (you've read about the implementation of Salesforce here on the UVAFinance blog, for instance).

The next project for Finance Engagement is a redesign of the UVAFinance web presence that will ultimately bring our 14 sites into one, with content organized by task instead of by department. The team is planning on an agile rollout that begins this summer and brings in all UVAFinance departments over the next several months into early 2022.

Watch the UVAFinance blog for more information about the web project in the coming weeks. In the meantime, if you have questions or concerns, please contact Scott Adams or Brandi Van Ormer.

Contributed by Patty Marbury

I hope all the recent blog pieces we've been doing about Workday Financials Training have been helpful to you (for a recap of what's come before, see below). Today I thought we could discuss some methods of support our team is planning to deliver after we go live with Workday Financials in July 2022.

First, we’ll provide ways that you can get Self-initiated assistance – all the ways you can help yourself while you're working in the system. This includes step-by-step instructions available with Workday Digital Assistant (WDA). We’ll do a deeper dive into what you can expect from WDA in a future blog digest. We will also provide short videos and job aids with step-by-step instructions to guide you through processes and transactions. You’ll be able to easily access online training and other materials.

Second, we’ll provide In-person/Virtual Assistance, including office hours, subject matter expert availability, a change network (similar ExpenseUVA Ambassadors), and assistance from trainers.

We’re in the process of discussing other ways to provide assistance, including providing a way for you to practice what you learned in training, and live, chat, and email support. Look for more information to come on this.

The key thing to remember is that we won't leave you high and dry after go-live! Our goal is to make sure you have what you need in order to complete the necessary tasks for your role and to continually build your capabilities.

As always, reach out to me if you have questions or concerns.

___________________________________________________________________________

Read more about Workday Financials Training on the blog:

The FST Training Team prepares to deliver

Training Team is busy behind the scenes

The Guiding Principles of Training

Training Timeline

A Blended Learning Approach

Summer Book Club: Join us for Caste

On July 8, we’ll start our review and discussion of Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson. The section to focus on for this discussion is the opening through Part One: Toxins in the Permafrost and Heat Rising All Around (ending on page 35).

As you are reading, prepare for the discussion by considering the following questions:

Wilkerson begins the book with an image of one lone dissenter amidst a crowd of Germans giving the Nazi salute. What would it mean—and what would it take—to be this man today?
At the beginning of Caste, author Isabel Wilkerson compares American racial hierarchy to a dormant Siberian virus. What are the strengths of this metaphor? How does this comparison help combat the pervasive myth that racism has been eradicated in America?
Wilkerson uses many different metaphors to explain and help us visualize the concept of the American caste system: the bones inside a body, the beams inside a house, even the computer program in the 1999 film The Matrix. Which of these metaphors helped the concept click for you? Why was it successful? What did you think of the analogy of America being like an old house built on unstable ground with issues lurking, just hidden from sight?
What are some of the elements required for a caste system to succeed? Do you agree with Wilkerson’s argument that the US has a racial caste system? Why or why not? What makes it similar or different to India’s caste system?
You could argue that every society in the history of the world has some form of social hierarchy, even if not as brutal and damaging as the American system of chattel slavery, or as rigid and pervasive as the Indian caste system. Is hierarchy inevitable? Can you think of any exceptions?
What did you think of Wilkerson’s definitions of casteism vs racism? Do you like this concept of two definitions rather than simply calling both racism? Do you think there’s a danger in re-labeling / softening the emotive term “racism” that we sidestep it / absolve ourselves of it?

Visit the VP Finance site for the full schedule of our discussions and suggested questions: https://vpfinance.virginia.edu/resources-dei

If you are unable to read the book (or haven’t started), please still join us. You will still be able to contribute to and learn from the discussions without reading it. We really hope you will join us for this discussion, and please share the invitation with another UVA colleagues. These sessions are open to anyone who is interested!

The zoom link for all of the discussions is: https://virginia.zoom.us/j/95163051737?pwd=TlZ0WVF4VUl4cnpyZ3dTRVl6U2w3dz09. If you have any questions regarding the Sprint discussions, please contact Patty Marbury or ToShun Campbell.

The Finance Leadership Team recently discussed Continuous Improvement in action around the University. The team broke out into groups and answered two questions:

1. What are some specific CI behaviors or results you’ve observed on your individual team?

2. In what ways could you be more intentional in encouraging CI behaviors?

Here’s a look at what they had to say regarding observed CI behaviors:

Increased flexibility and creativity.
Moving in-person training to online. This has been well received and participation has increased.
Persistence in encouraging one another to use new resources and tools.
Creating consistency in new initiatives.
Technological innovations for reception and hosting spaces.
Salesforce.
Communication: being aware of who is on your team and what they can do; capitalizing on peoples’ skills.
Building repeatable processes: don’t just respond to immediate requests/problems, figure out a way to prevent them in the future.
Getting better at documenting processes and storing that documentation so that the whole team can easily access it.

When asked for ways to be more intentional in encouraging CI behaviors, the Leadership Team offered the following suggestions:

Constantly evaluate how your team can make customers' lives easier.
Never stop asking questions about current processes (e.g. Why do we do that? What is the value of this process?)
Set aside time to celebrate improvements.
Champion new efforts and ideas.

How have you seen Continuous Improvement in action within your department or unit? If you can think of anything not on this list, please feel free to share it with us in the comments or post about it on the CI Community Hub.

The Finance Leadership Team recently discussed Continuous Improvement in action around the University. The team broke out into groups and answered two questions:

1. What are some specific CI behaviors or results you’ve observed on your individual team?

2. In what ways could you be more intentional in encouraging CI behaviors?

Here’s a look at what they had to say regarding observed CI behaviors:

Increased flexibility and creativity.
Moving in-person training to online. This has been well received and participation has increased.
Persistence in encouraging one another to use new resources and tools.
Creating consistency in new initiatives.
Technological innovations for reception and hosting spaces.
Salesforce.
Communication: being aware of who is on your team and what they can do; capitalizing on peoples’ skills.
Building repeatable processes: don’t just respond to immediate requests/problems, figure out a way to prevent them in the future.
Getting better at documenting processes and storing that documentation so that the whole team can easily access it.

When asked for ways to be more intentional in encouraging CI behaviors, the Leadership Team offered the following suggestions:

Constantly evaluate how your team can make customers' lives easier.
Never stop asking questions about current processes (e.g. Why do we do that? What is the value of this process?)
Set aside time to celebrate improvements.
Champion new efforts and ideas.

Required: Proof of Vaccination for Academic Division

All faculty and staff working on Grounds are now required to provide proof of COVID-19 vaccination prior to the start of the Fall 2021 semester. See the Proof of Vaccination webpage for instructions and more information.

For more information, contact the HRSC at askhr@virginia.edu

Logan Hobbs

Logan Hobbs of Financial Reporting & Operations recently began a new role on that team as University Tax Manager. Hobbs, who has been in UVAFinance since 2019 as an international tax analyst, also served in HR Compliance and Immigration.

_________________________________________________________________

When you think about what Finance Strategic Transformation involves, you probably think about the Workday Financials implementation, and that makes sense! After all, it's the thing you probably hear about most often.

But it's not just our financial system that's transforming; in addition to the implementation of Workday Financials, the four parts of FST include adopting Adaptive Planning (Workday's budgeting and planning tool), enhanced reporting and analytics, and continuous improvement.

At a recent Steering Committee meeting, the project team highlighted some of the big transformations being driven by FST that highlight the innovation and continuous improvement sparked by the project. You can see those slides in the Community, but we'll also highlight those Transformations in Progress here in the blog, in a three-part series.

Here's our first round-up of examples of how changes are taking place surrounding FST:

FDM/Data Architecture: Streamlining UVA's current dual ledger system into a one-ledger system and gaining more higher-quality descriptive attributes is a huge change! This shift will radically improve reporting and provide greater insights into financial performance.
Workflow Controls and Approvals: We're working with partners across Grounds to redesign UVA's internal controls framework and shift from an "after the fact" compensatory control environment to a proactive one, by introducing upfront approvals where it makes sense. This reduces risk and should eliminate a large number of cost transfers.
Cross-Platform Support Model: We're working with UVAHR to establish a coordinated approach to living in the Workday platform together (HR and Finance) so that we can provide the best experience to our users.
Improving Payment Processing: Streamlining the foreign wire process by integrating it into Workday, and reducing the risk of fraud through the adoption of PaymentWorks.
Shifting Toward Payroll Certification from Effort Reporting: Adopting payroll certification as a policy in lieu of effort reporting for sponsored programs, thus reducing the administrative burden for researchers.
OCR Automation for Invoice Capture: We'll significantly reduce manual data entry by leveraging optical character recognition technology for invoices.
Procurement Marketplace Access: We're working on how to open access to UVA's marketplaces to all users while still minimizing the risk and burden on authorized purchasers.

Again, you can see all of the "Transformation in Progress" examples in the Steering Slides, and we'll see you in the next two blog digests with rounds 2 and 3!

Five Things to Know about FST: June 10, 2021

1. Customer Confirmation Sessions, Round 2 are ongoing. We're about halfway through the sessions, which continue next week. If you'd like to see materials from all sessions, visit the Online Community. Please alert Brandi Van Ormer if you have any issues accessing Community materials.

2. Foundation Data Model: An overview of where things currently stand with the FDM (our chart of accounts for Workday) was part of Customer Confirmation Sessions. We've summed things up in a blog post.

3. Budgeting in the future state: The Adaptive Team is preparing for the build of Adaptive 3.0 (that will integrate w/Workday Financials at go-live). You'll be able to see the annual budget and actuals in both Adaptive and Workday. More on what will appear where in the blog.

4. Get an inside look at what Reporting will look like in Workday Financials: The FST team has put together a short video to show you the basics of Reporting. Check it out in the Online Community.

5. Revenue in Workday Financials: We're moving to a ledger/sub-ledger system in Workday Financials, and that means we need to think about revenue a little differently. Check out this explanatory piece from Danielle Hancock, Josh Breeden, and Lisa Shuler when you have some time, and don't forget: Go Live is July 1, 2022!

FST Updates: June 10, 2021

Want to listen to this update instead of reading it? Click here to tune into the WFST Broadcast!
No time to read paragraphs? Check out "Five Things to Know about WFST"

Customer Confirmation Sessions, Round 2

The project team and stakeholders alike have been incredibly busy the past couple of weeks with Round two of Customer Confirmation Sessions. As of the time of this post, we’ve had eight out of the twelve scheduled sessions, and the difference between these sessions and what we saw in the first round is really notable. The demos the team has shared reflect improvements made on the Workday Financials tenant since the first round – those are improvements based on questions and suggestions that our stakeholders had in the first round of sessions and afterward, too, when our Change Leaders shared the basics of the sessions with their teams. Once this latest round of Customer Confirmation Sessions has wrapped, we’ll be providing videos for Change Leaders to do road shows with their teams.

You can see slides from the sessions, as well as the pre-read materials for each session, out on the Community. We’ll keep adding to that page as the sessions progress, including the addition of survey data that captured the feedback of attendees immediately after each session. The Community behind NetBadge; if you have any trouble accessing the link, contact Brandi Van Ormer and she'll be happy to get you right in!

Visit the Community to see CCS #2 materials.

FDM Insight

The first CCS session was “Cross-Functional Topics,” and it focused pretty heavily on an overview of the FDM as it stands right now. Highlights of FDM info in that session include key decisions that have already been made, such as our current department assignments in HCM being replaced by Cost Center org assignments for all UVA employees, and the fact that the program and activity worktags will be optional segments available to schools and units for internal reporting purposes.

We've summed up FDM info as it stands right now; see this blog post for more info.

Budgeting in the Future State

The Adaptive Team has been working hard to get ready this summer to build the third version of Adaptive Planning; this is the one that will integrate with Workday Financials when we go live next year. The team has gathered 378 user stories from the UVA community to help them shape Adaptive to fit UVA’s needs. You may be wondering what the difference is between the budget you’ll see in Workday vs. the budget you’d see in Adaptive Planning? The difference is that Workday will have only the annual budget, while Adaptive will have multiple versions of the budget that you can compare/contrast. Workday is where you’ll go for day to day operational activities, and will be the source for transactional details – while adaptive will be the source for past, current, and future budget
data. Read more on the blog.

Reporting in Workday Financials

The FST team has put together a video that gives you insight into reporting functionality in Workday. In the online community, you can see this short video that walks you through some of the future reports. It’s only twelve minutes -- check it out!

Training Update

We have a fresh training update for you, as well! This update breaks down the different ways we’ll deliver Workday Financials training. The Training Team is planning everything from online courses and quick reference guides, to classroom and zoom training, to office hours and beyond. Learn more in this post on the blog.

Want to listen to this update instead of reading it? Click here to tune into the WFST Broadcast!
No time to read paragraphs? Check out "Five Things to Know about WFST"

Customer Confirmation Sessions, Round 2

Visit the Community to see CCS #2 materials.

FDM Insight

We've summed up FDM info as it stands right now; see this blog post for more info.

Budgeting in the Future State

Reporting in Workday Financials

Training Update

Summer Sprint Discussions: Join us to talk about Caste!

This summer, over a series of Sprint discussions beginning on June 17, we will review and discuss the bestselling book Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson. We will discuss a section of the book during each sprint, using discussion questions to guide our conversations. Visit the VP Finance site for a schedule of our discussions and suggested questions: https://vpfinance.virginia.edu/resources-dei

If you are unable to read the book, please still join us. You will still be able to contribute to and learn from the discussions without reading it. In addition, before each discussion, the IE team will send the questions and additional resources for that week’s sprint conversation.

We really hope you will join us for some or all of the sessions, and please share the invitation with another UVA colleagues. These sessions are open to anyone who is interested, and we’ve already started expanding our group beyond UVAFinance, which is very exciting!

The zoom link for all of the discussions is:

https://virginia.zoom.us/j/95163051737pwd=TlZ0WVF4VUl4cnpyZ3dTRVl6U2w3dz09

If you have any questions regarding the Sprint discussions, please contact Patty Marbury or ToShun Campbell.

Sneak Peek FAQs, Volume 3

After the first round of Customer Confirmation sessions, Change Leaders from across Grounds hosted "sneak peek" sessions in their areas so that more people could get a glimpse of the first build of UVA's Workday Financials tenant.

The result was lots of great questions (244 to be exact). Many of those questions could be answered during the sneak peek sessions, but about 35% are still yet to be addressed. The Change Management Team is working on getting answers to those and on sharing answers to the most commonly-asked questions.

NEW: This week's questions and answers come from our Customer Confirmation Sessions, Round 2! You can see more answered questions in the slides from CCS sessions on the Community: Click here to visit!

Previous Sneak Peek blog pieces:

Sneak Peek V. 1
Sneak Peek V. 2

We need to be able to enter transactions in bulk, not line by line. Is there bulk upload capability in Workday?

Yes, we have developed an ISD Integration packet and have been meeting with units to discuss the file layout. Many Internal Service Provider areas and contacts are also included in the System Remediation Network.

Where are we going to do budget vs. actuals analysis? Will we still be able to compare against the original budget?

Budget vs. actuals reporting will be available in both workday and Adaptive Planning an will depend on the user and use case. Comparison against the original budget will be available. See this blog post for more details on budgeting in the future state.

Is fiscal year carryforward an automatic or manual process?

The FST team is still working through a solution to SG/LG carryforward; otherwise, if you own the funding source, fund balances will flow through the system and be visible to the user.

As part the second round of Customer Confirmation Sessions (CCSs), continuing through June 17, the Finance Strategic Transformation (FST) team provided an overview of where things currently stand with the Foundation Data Model (FDM), the Workday Financials term for chart of accounts.

Read on to see finalized/pending decisions and a sample FDM string.

Key Decisions

Cost Center to Replace Department: Department org assignments in HR Workday will be replaced by Cost Center org assignments for all UVA workers. Workers’ supervisory org assignments will be unaffected.
Program and Activity Worktags: The Program and Activity Workday worktags will be optional, available to schools/units for internal reporting purposes.

Open Items

Project Worktag and Multi-funding Source Functionality: Workday Financials multi-funding source functionality provides a highly dynamic way for expenses to be allocated to FDM strings based on predefined parameters. This functionality for on non-capital project scenarios, including tracking start up packages.
Function Worktag on Transactions: The FST Team is currently testing scenarios for how the function worktag will be derived on a transaction. The Worktag could potentially be related from a single Worktag or based on the single Worktag, a user is provided a list of allowed values.
Cost Share Setup: The FST Team is currently testing scenarios for how cost share on grants will be set up and how they will function as companions within the grant application while utilizing a non-research funding source.
Required Worktags for ISPs: The FST Team is currently testing scenarios to determine what worktags ISPs will be required to collect when a school/unit initiates a transaction with an Internal Service Provider (i.e. FM, Copy Services, Bookstore, etc.)

Sample FDM String

Click on image to enlarge.

FDM Worktag Definitions and Other Info

Click here for current details about the FDM worktags, including definitions, naming conventions, maximum field length, and more.

Read on to see finalized/pending decisions and a sample FDM string.

Key Decisions

Cost Center to Replace Department: Department org assignments in HR Workday will be replaced by Cost Center org assignments for all UVA workers. Workers’ supervisory org assignments will be unaffected.
Program and Activity Worktags: The Program and Activity Workday worktags will be optional, available to schools/units for internal reporting purposes.

Open Items

Project Worktag and Multi-funding Source Functionality: Workday Financials multi-funding source functionality provides a highly dynamic way for expenses to be allocated to FDM strings based on predefined parameters. This functionality for on non-capital project scenarios, including tracking start up packages.
Function Worktag on Transactions: The FST Team is currently testing scenarios for how the function worktag will be derived on a transaction. The Worktag could potentially be related from a single Worktag or based on the single Worktag, a user is provided a list of allowed values.
Cost Share Setup: The FST Team is currently testing scenarios for how cost share on grants will be set up and how they will function as companions within the grant application while utilizing a non-research funding source.
Required Worktags for ISPs: The FST Team is currently testing scenarios to determine what worktags ISPs will be required to collect when a school/unit initiates a transaction with an Internal Service Provider (i.e. FM, Copy Services, Bookstore, etc.)

Sample FDM String

Click on image to enlarge.

FDM Worktag Definitions and Other Info

Click here for current details about the FDM worktags, including definitions, naming conventions, maximum field length, and more.

Tuesday, June 29, 2021

FST Update June 28, 2021

FST Update June 28, 2021

Five Things to Know about FST: June 28, 2021

FDM Roundup: All the News in One Place

Monday, June 28, 2021

You’ve Got That Right: FST Workflow Controls and Approvals Update

FST Website: New FAQs, Workday Words, and More

Round 2 of CCS is Done! What Did People Think?

Round 2 of CCS is Done! What Did People Think?

Recipe Inspiration: Sweet Potato Chickpea Buddha Bowl

From Melody's Desk

Reframing the UVAFinance Web Presence

Training Update: Support after Go-Live

Sunday, June 27, 2021

Summer Book Club: Join us for Caste

The Finance Leadership Team Examines Continuous Improvement Across the University

The Finance Leadership Team Examines Continuous Improvement Across the University

Monday, June 21, 2021

Required: Proof of Vaccination for Academic Division

Logan Hobbs is new University Tax Manager

Not just a tech implementation: FST transformations in progress (Volume One)

Thursday, June 10, 2021

Five Things to Know about FST: June 10, 2021

Wednesday, June 9, 2021

FST Updates: June 10, 2021

FST Updates: June 10, 2021

Summer Sprint Discussions: Join us to talk about Caste!

Tuesday, June 8, 2021

Sneak Peek FAQs, Volume 3

Foundation Data Model: Current Overview

Key Decisions

Open Items

Sample FDM String

FDM Worktag Definitions and Other Info

Foundation Data Model: Current Overview

Key Decisions

Open Items

Sample FDM String

FDM Worktag Definitions and Other Info