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special conference issue

Spring 2014

10

Features
10 Implementation of a Global HRMS Utilizing Multiple Languages

In 2011, Boeing subsidiary Jeppesen began a year-long effort to implement a global

18

HRMS system. Learn how they were able to implement the first phase of the project
on time and within budget with the help of a strong steering committee, an expert
implementation partner and no security breaches. by Laura Reynolds

18 Success and Lessons Learned in a Complex Subledger

Accounting Deployment
With Oracle Subledger Accounting (SLA), Sandia Corp. was able to produce the

accounting for a secondary ledger (required for government accounting) at the
same time as their primary (company) ledger, reduce the custom lines of code by
more than ninety percent and significantly simplify the coding. This article covers the
implementation of SLA and lessons learned. by Bill Klein

25

OAUGleadership
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4
6
8

OAUG2014 Star Partners

OAUG2014 Board of Directors
Presidents Perspective
OAUG Viewpoint

OAUGConferences
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COLLABORATE 14: Technology and

Applications Forum for the Oracle Community

41

Education Tracks & Session Highlights

oaug g e o s & s i g s
46 SIG Update
48 Geo Update

Oracle Sales
Cloud

global s o l u t i o n s
25 Our Sales Cloud Journey
WhiteLight Group is one of the first 100 Oracle customers on Oracle
Sales Cloud. Share their journey to success and what they believe
would be key reasons why other customers should consider adopting
Oracle Sales Cloud. by Trudy Sturino and David Ghaowi

30 Top 10 Tips and Tricks for Oracle Business Intelligence

This article provides Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition
(OBIEE) 11g implementation tips and tricks, providing context and
highlighting the value around the related 11g product features and
capabilities. by Patrick Callahan

36 Lessons on Hyperion EPM Implementations

global u s e r s
52 OAUG Member Snapshot: New Board Members
54 New and Returning Members

Discover some best practices for enabling Hyperion EPM technology

into business processes that will allow you to enjoy success both
during and after implementation. by Arthur Forbus and Tammy Norton

56 Vendor Corner: Smarter Database Partitioning

Gives Leading Enterprises an Edge with
O A U G M e mb e r B e n e f i t
Oracle E-Business Suite
50 Tune in to the OAUG for Education
Find out how two companies leveraged a new approach for managing

ora
cledirections
59

Closer to Home by Laura Schaulat

T A B L E O F CONTENTS

their Oracle E-Business Suite data based on Oracle database

partitioning with Informatica to improve performance while lowering
infrastructure costs and simplifying DBA operations.

oaug.org

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oaug board of directors

A Publication of the
Oracle Applications Users Group
3525 Piedmont Road, Building Five,
Suite 300, Atlanta, GA 30305
phone: +1 404.240.0897, fax: +1 404.240.0998
email: membership@oaug.com, oaug.org
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To contribute to OAUG Insight, send letters to the
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3525 Piedmont Road, Building Five,
Suite 300, Atlanta,GA 30305
cforce@oaug.com
Photographs appearing throughout OAUG Insight
courtesy ofMeeting Expectations.

2014 Oracle Applications Users Group (OAUG) Board of Directors. First row (seated):
Joe Imbimbo, Patricia Dues, Donna Rosentrater, Alyssa Johnson, Melissa English, Peter
Gee, Dana Bartolf, Ketan Thanki. Second row (standing): Karen Brownfield, Tammy
Norton, Daniel McGarry, Steven Hughes, Rob Tudor, Mark Clark, John Bushell, Margaret
Wright. Not pictured: Karl Kirsch.
Alyssa Johnson,
OAUG President
ROLTA
Melissa English,
OAUG President Elect
Alticor
Peter Gee,
OAUG Treasurer
Ryerson University
Donna Rosentrater,
OAUG Secretary
Cobham plc

Steven R. Hughes
Executive Director

Joseph Imbimbo
PPG Industries, Inc.

Karl Kirsch, CAE

Chief Operating
Officer

Daniel McGarry
Parsons Brinckerhoff

Dana Bartolf
CH2M Hill
Corporation

Tammy Norton
Alvarez & Marsal
Business Consulting
LLC

Karen Brownfield
Infosemantics, Inc.

Ketan Thanki
Geokinetics, Inc.

John Bushell
JT&M Bushell

Rob Tudor
Individual Associate
Member

Mark C. Clark
O2Works
Dr. Patricia Dues
City of Las Vegas

4 4

OAUG leadership

Margaret Wright
Southern Company

OAUG Insight is designed to provide members of the

Oracle Applications Users Group with organizational
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published herein are not necessarily those of OAUG.
OAUG, its article writers, directors, officers, employees,
agents, and members and Oracle Corp. make no
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the source for

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2013 Edition

presidents perspective

Steady Climb
A new year often brings a
refreshed enthusiasm for
existing projects as well as
excitement for new pursuits.

However, this year, the process was broadened

to include the greater Oracle Applications users
community members and non-members and
to make a more targeted, in-depth inquiry into
the types of challenges you face, the information
you need, the services you want and your preferred

During our first meeting in 2014, the OAUG

methods of engagement. Thank you to everyone

Board of Directors reaffirmed its dedication to the

who completed the assessment. Your feedback

OAUGs mission of providing education, networking

is pivotal to the OAUGs future plans for

and influence to Oracle for members of the Oracle

innovation and involvement, and I look forward

Applications users community. We also have an

eagerness to create new ways to deliver on that mission.

With a focus on innovation and involvement,

the board set a course to improve and develop

programs that will
Alyssa Johnson

further engage the

OAUG President

user community.

ajohnson@oaug.com

With the support of

Twitt er: @alyssaEBS

the OAUG standing

committees and

volunteers, this course is a work in progress for the

remainder of this year and beyond a steady climb.

Aligned with this strategy, I am pleased to

As Im writing this article, the OAUG is in the

midst of conducting an extensive needs

assessment. As many of you know, the OAUG

O A U G l e a d e r s h i p

With an educational agenda highlighting users

real-world experiences with Oracle products
and unparalleled peer-to-peer networking
opportunities, COLLABORATE is one of the
most anticipated conferences of the year. Even
within an established, successful program like
COLLABORATE, innovation is possible. The
new COLLABORATE 14 Web and mobile
app allows attendees to search for sessions,
build an agenda, network with each other and
communicate via social media. Get the full
on page 38 in this issue of OAUG Insight.

announcements and projects.

conducts yearly member satisfaction surveys.

overview of COLLABORATE 14, beginning

say that we started the year with some exciting

to sharing the results with you later in the year.

l The

OAUG eNews monthly newsletter

got a new-year makeover. The attractive new

design is contemporary, inviting and optimized
for viewing on various mobile devices. See
the new OAUG eNews at enews.oaug.org.

You dont have to invest a lot of

time and energy to increase the benefits
of your OAUG involvement.

The new OAUG Conference Paper

Database is now more convenient and user

friendly. Enhanced features make it easier to
find information and answers from thousands of
conference white papers and presentations from
OAUG events dating back to COLLABORATE
2009. I encourage you to spend some time
browsing this rich resource. You can find

the biggest gains can come from what may be simple,

seemingly insignificant adjustments to business as
usual. From wherever you are, you can engage with
other users or access valuable content in ways that fit
your schedule and level of interest. For example, if you

the Conference Paper Database under the

found the article Which Oracle E-Business Suite Release

Education and Events tab on oaug.org.

l

OAUG Connection Point AppsTech

takes place in Pittsburgh, PA, July 22-23,

Should You Target: 12.1 or 12.2? in the winter 2013

issue of OAUG Insight magazine to be informative,
you could amplify the value of that article by:

2014. Designed specifically for technologists

that support the Oracle E-Business Suite,

demographic that the OAUG had not previously

served. The response was fantastic, and this

Listening to one of the recorded sessions from

the Focus on Oracle E-Business Suite OAUG

the inaugural event in 2013 engaged a user

eLearning Series.
l

Or finding a related white paper in the new

OAUG Conference Paper Database.

years event will be bigger and better. The call

l

Or attending an Upgrade SIG meeting.

Details are available at connectionpoint.oaug.org.

You dont have to invest a lot of time and energy

The OAUG is working on a number

to increase the benefits of your OAUG involvement.

for presentation proposals is open until April 20.

of other initiatives involving educational

programming, community outreach, networking

suggestions for increasing involvement with me

and technology. Watch for announcements and

by email at ajohnson@oaug.com or on Twitter

updates about those initiatives later this year.

@alyssaEBS. I look forward to hearing from you.

spring 2014

oaug insight

Increasing users involvement with the OAUG,

Please share your innovative ideas or

with each other and with Oracle makes the entire

community stronger. I encourage you to become
more involved in the OAUG this year. This does not

Alyssa Johnson

have to be an overwhelming undertaking. Some of

oaug.org

oaug viewpoint

COLLABORATE Watch

Its that time of year:

awards season. And while
the COLLABORATE 14
conference may not get
the same coverage as the
Academy Awards, there
are some spectacular
performance categories.
Here
is my watch list:

Best Education Developed by users for users,

COLLABORATE 14 education delivers the latest

information and practical tips from presenters with realworld experience
Steven R. Hughes
OAUGExecutive Director
shughes@oaug.com

using Oracle
Applications.

The OAUGs Geographic (Geo) and Special Interest

Groups (SIGs) will host more than 60 meetings.
These meetings are open to everyone and are a
great venue for connecting with like-minded peers.

The Meeting of the OAUG Members and the

opening Welcome Reception on Monday evening,
April 7, kicks off the week with a little bit of
OAUG business on the front end followed by
a fun evening at the Dal Toro Restaurant and
Exotic Car Museum located at the Venetian.
All OAUG members are invited to attend.

Networking Icon Buttons are back and give

attendees a fun, visual way to signify to other
attendees their interest areas. These colorful buttons
depict product- or process-related interests, such
as CRM, EPM, Fusion, Reporting and Upgrade.
Pick up one or more buttons to wear all week.

Many of the

Best Influence to Oracle The OAUG

sessions feature

Customer Support Council is one of the OAUGs

real customer

strongest advocacy groups, representing OAUG

success stories, lessons learned from challenging

members interests to Oracle Support and

projects, product-specific instruction and how-to

working cooperatively with Oracle to develop and

recommendations.

implement tools, resources and policies. Members

Best Networking The entire week at

COLLABORATE 14 is full of opportunities
to meet other Oracle customers to exchange
knowledge and build professional connections.

of the Customer Support Council will be staffing

booth #1059 in the Exhibitor Showcase. Stop
by to discuss your support-related questions or
suggestions. Lend your voice to the conversation.

From spontaneous conversations to scheduled

Best Collaboration Three users groups, serving

receptions, this conference is the place to meet

customers that use different Oracle Applications

and greet. Some of my favorites include:

and Technology products, come together to host the

OAUG leadership

oaug insight

spring 2014

An Excel Front End to

E-Business Suite Data
annual COLLABORATE conference. While each
users group has a specific area of focus, their members
often need information and education that spans
multiple applications and technologies. The combined
educational content of the three groups gives attendees
a targeted yet comprehensive agenda from which to
build a unique personal conference schedule. Attendees
have access to all of the sessions presented by all
three groups, and with more than 1400 sessions in 23

Save your finance users 3-4 days

per month with GL Wand

educational tracks, there is something for everyone.

Best Technology COLLABORATE 14s

new Web and mobile app makes it easy to access
the best of the conference from your computer
or mobile device. Its fast, easy and fun to search
for sessions, build an agenda, network with other

Learn More go.excel4apps.com/insight14

attendees, post comments and photos, ask questions

and connect with Facebook and Twitter.

Best Exhibit Hall RadiOAUG returns to the

OAUG membership booth in the Exhibitor Showcase
with live broadcasts by session presenters, product
specialists, OAUG leaders and Oracle executives.
Stop by to play Name That Tune and compete to
win a prize. The Exhibitor Showcase also includes
more than 200 solutions providers. Visit them to

will present numerous educational sessions. The popular

Meet the Experts, Oracle Roadmaps Sessions and HandsOn Usability Labs return to the lineup. New this year, the
Cloud Odyssey Program explores the journey to the cloud.

These are all winners in my book. I hope to see you

at COLLABORATE.

Regards,

Steven R. Hughes

find out whats new and what you can use in your
organization to improve efficiency and results.

Best Interaction to Oracle In addition

to learning from fellow Oracle customers,
COLLABORATE attendees value the opportunity to
interact with Oracle representatives. Oracle employees

oaug.org

oaug feature

Implementation of a
Global HRMS Utilizing
Multiple Languages
By Laura Reynolds, Jeppesen

For nearly 80 years, Jeppesen has made it possible for pilots and their passengers to safely
and efficiently reach their destinations. Today, this pioneering spirit continues as Jeppesen
delivers transformative information and optimization solutions to improve the efficiency
of air and sea operations around the globe. Jeppesen is a Boeing subsidiary and part of the
Digital Aviation business unit within Boeing Commercial Aviation Services. Boeing offers
the industrys largest portfolio of services, support and solutions, collectively known as
the Boeing Edge, providing customers a competitive advantage by solving real operational
problems, enabling better decisions, maximizing efficiency and improving environmental
performance intelligent information solutions across the entire aviation ecosystem.

10

O A U G FEATURE

oaug insight

In 2011, Jeppesen began a year-long effort to
implement a global HRMS system. The functionality
included Core HR, HR Self-Service (for managers and
employees), Compensation, Learning Management and
Performance Management for Phase I (launching in
December 2011). HR Analytics and iRecruitment were
scheduled to go live during 2012.

Lessons Learned
l Carefully evaluate the need for

additional languages
l Ensure that the infrastructure can handle

Securing Data during the Project

The first concern was how to collect and secure
employee data to be used for testing conversions,
requirements and functionality during the project, as well
as having employee records to use for training sessions.
Each HR location (approximately 10) was using its own
HR and payroll system.

Conversion programs were written from the payroll
systems used in the U.S. and Germany, which are
Jeppesens two largest locations. All other locations are
much smaller, and due to timeline, budget and resource
constraints, those conversions were done with Excel/csv
files. File extracts and loads were done on a regular basis
throughout the project, which permitted testing with
fairly current data. This also facilitated extensive testing
of the conversion program itself. When it was time to
load data into production, most issues had already been
identified and resolved, and the conversion portion of the
cutover during go-live was fairly uneventful.

To ensure that personally identifiable information
(PII) remained protected, all Oracle user accounts in
the test instances created for the project were enddated, except for the members of the project team. This
prevented unauthorized users from accessing PII from the
front end during the course of the project. The instances
for the HR project were not available through any public
PL/SQL user accounts.

Within the IT organization, the individuals
dedicated to the project were designated as authorized
to access PII. Protocols were put in place to ensure that
PII was protected. Team members were to not access
tables or forms with PII unless there was a business need
to do so. In most cases, team members used their own
HR records for testing to minimize unnecessary exposure
to PII and only used other employees records when
their own records would not suffice. This was critical
for the success of the project because there needs to be

spring 2014

the additional patching requirements

l Keep new business processes and

workflows as simple as possible

l Interfaces and reports should have

dedicated resources
l Training, training, training!

reassurance throughout the organization that PII is being

protected and treated with the appropriate care.

Administrative members of the project team (e.g.,
the project manager, the project planning and control
specialist) were not authorized to access PII. They did
not participate in any meetings, working sessions or
testing activities where PII would be discussed, accessed
or displayed.

Jeppesen used an implementation partner to assist
with the implementation. The partner used its team in
India for a significant portion of the development effort.
Before that group could begin working on anything,
legal agreements had to be in place, and they needed to
comply with local statutory and legal regulations so that
they would be enforceable, if necessary. This resulted in
some lengthy negotiations regarding the contract and
the Statement of Work. It is essential to start working
on these agreements with the implementation partner as
soon as possible, and have the details worked out early so
there is no delay in moving forward on the project and no
impact to project deliverables.

For global implementations, it is important to get
buy-in and representation from all the countries that will
be affected. Europe has much stricter data privacy laws
than the U.S., so it is critical to ensure that new policies,

oaug.org 11

procedures and business processes do not violate any local

statutory regulations.

Feedback from the HR team was solicited for
this presentation, and one recommendation/piece of
advice was Dont get lazy with the data. When
project deadlines are looming, it can be tempting to
take shortcuts to meet deadlines to keep things moving
along. Members of the project team are immersed in PII,
working with it every day. Its easy to become immune
to its meaning and forget how sensitive it is. Commit
to performing regular check-ins with the team about
privacy and the established process for protecting PII.

Project Successes Recap

On Time Under Budget
l Strong Steering Committee was

instrumental in removing obstacles,

allowing the team to continue working
on project deliverables.
l Leveraging the expertise of the

implementation partner allowed the team

to keep the project moving forward.
l Protection of PII and sensitive information

was a top priority at all times during the

project.
l Many long hours worked by people

committed to the projects success.

Data Cleansing

Post-Implementation Data Security

Policies, procedures and protocols were put in place
to ensure that PII remained secured as the HRMS suite
was put into production.

Access to the Core HR responsibilities is controlled
with security profiles attached to Oracle responsibilities
that limit access to employee records by location. HR
personnel may only view information for employees in
locations that their office supports.
12

O A U G FEATURE

Prior to implementing HRMS, the only information
stored in employee records was the data necessary to
utilize the Purchasing Approval Workflow and Journal
Approval Workflow and to interact with Oracle Project
Costing: employee name, organization, job, supervisor,
ledger and default expense account. No PII was stored
in Oracle HR. As part of the cutover activities during
go-live, access to the core HR responsibilities was
restricted to only the people in the IT organization
authorized to access PII and the appropriate HR
personnel.

In the test and development environments used for
providing organization-wide IT support, PII is encrypted
and masked. Dates of birth have been changed, and
the salary for each person has a default value of $50 per
year. Tables with PII (people, assignment and salary
information) have been removed from all public PL/SQL
accounts used by people across the organization.

There are also tables in the application that store
sensitive information; those tables are empty when
the application goes live. However, they may become
populated after the applications have been in use.
For example, the PER_ASSESMENTS table holds
information about performance appraisals, including
managers comments about/for employees. This table was
empty when Jeppesen went live with HRMS. After the
first appraisal period passed, this table was populated with
private employee information, and the table was removed
from the public PL/SQL user accounts. It is important to
regularly review HR tables, and determine if PII or other
confidential information exists where it may not have
before.

Most Jeppesen employees were already defined
in Oracle, with the minimal setups needed to use
the Purchasing Approval workflow, the Journal
Approval workflow and the PA_INTERFACE_
TRANSACTIONS_ALL table. During the project,
the decision was made to move employees to the correct
business group.

Jeppesen uses two business groups: Western
Hemisphere (WH) and Eastern Hemisphere (EH).
The WH is the default Setup Business Group delivered
with the install and is a U.S. business group. It contains

oaug insight

the legal entities, ledgers and operating units for the

Americas, Australia and Asia. The EH was created
during the R12 implementation and is a U.K. business
group. It contains the legal entities, ledgers and operating
units for Europe and the Middle East.

During the implementation of the Oracle E-Business
Suite (EBS) R12 financials, all European employees
in locations still using legacy financial systems were
associated with the Western Hemisphere, as these groups
report into the U.S. location for financial reporting
purposes. At the time this was not an issue, as these
locations only had general ledgers defined and were not
using any other Oracle Applications.

The implementation of HRMS was the right time to
reassign these employees back to the Eastern Hemisphere
business group. It was more logical for employee
reporting relationships, and there is more uniformity
between European countries regarding safe harbor/
data privacy laws than with the U.S. As there were no
subledgers, operating units, inventory organizations, etc.,
defined for any of these entities, it was the least painful
time to complete the employee transfers. Therefore, this
task was incorporated into the HRMS project plan.

To move an employee between business groups,
the current employee record is end-dated, and a new
record is created in the new business group. When the
record is committed, a Potential Duplicate Record
message should be invoked, meaning that the person is
already defined as a party in the Trading Community
Architecture (TCA). The new person record may be
associated with the existing TCA party_id, and both
person records (the inactive one in the old business
group and the active one in the new business group)
will be associated with the same party_id in TCA.
This data cleansing was done for approximately 700
employees and built into the conversion program.

Language Patches

The HR team led the effort to determine which
language patches should be installed as part of the
implementation. Jeppesen installed four languages in
addition to English: German, Polish, Russian and
Canadian French. The location in Canada is fairly small,
but there is a statutory requirement in Quebec that all
HR-related materials (e.g., training, job postings, policy

spring 2014

and procedure updates) must be delivered in Canadian

French, even if the employees there are fluent in English.

Once the language patches are installed, they cannot
be rolled back, so the decision to implement them is
one that should be given careful consideration. Any
future patches need to be applied for each installed
language, which increases the size of the database and the
application top.

When the language patches are installed, any seeded
Oracle information will be translated into the selected
languages, including delivered menus and standard
forms in the application. Translations for any additional
user-defined items must be manually maintained. This
includes custom lookups, value set values and custom
menus. All non-seeded translation values must be
manually entered and maintained using the globe icon on
the toolbar in the core forms. There are some potential
automation opportunities by designing a DataLoader
template; however, if you are loading translations for
languages with special characters or that use a different
alphabet, the only option is to copy and paste. Value sets
that will have translated values must be defined as either
Translatable Independent or Translatable Dependent
in order to enable the Translation function in the
application.

In retrospect, Jeppesen probably could have omitted
the patches for German and Polish. Almost all the
employees in those locations are fluent in English, and
those that are not work with their managers. Installing
Russian has added value since English is not as prevalent
in that location, and the Canadian French language
patch allows Jeppesen to comply with local statutory
regulations.

The language patches need to be thoroughly
regression-tested to ensure that they do not hinder any
other processes, both inside and outside of HRMS.
During the system integration testing phase of the
project, Jeppesen encountered some issues when the
language patches interfered with the Advanced Pricing
engine, which required some configuration and
programming changes.

The IT group clearly communicated to all existing
Oracle users that the language patches would only be
supported within the HRMS applications. For example,
an error encountered in Payables while logged in using

oaug.org 13

German would need to be replicated in English in order

for IT to be able to troubleshoot and support the issue.

Performance Management

The Oracle Performance Management tool is a
workflow-based application that routes objectives and
performance appraisals between employees and managers.
This tool was part of the first phase of the HRMS
implementation at Jeppesen.

The original process flow designed for Performance
Management had many steps along the way:
l

The goal setting period, with a set end-date;

The mid-year appraisal period, with a set end-date;

The year-end appraisal period, with a set end-date.

Also built into the process were some custom steps
added to the standard workflow.

Using end-dates for phases of the Performance
Management Plan (PMP) is a decision that needs to be
carefully evaluated. Once the dates pass, records are either
purged or not updatable at all.

For the goal setting period, any goals in an incomplete
state when the end-date arrives are purged from the
PER_OBJECTIVES table. Since this was the first time
for Jeppesen using the Performance Management tool,
numerous training issues were encountered. After the midyear appraisal deadline passes, any incomplete appraisals
cannot be modified any further, and the only option for
managers who miss the deadline is to add their mid-year
comments to the year-end appraisal document.

Some custom steps were added to the standard
workflow. These all worked as designed, and during testing
with a small group of users, no issues were encountered.
However, when the process was rolled out to the entire
employee population (approximately 3,300 people), it
quickly became much more cumbersome than anticipated.

The custom step that caused the most issues was
a requirement by HR that every employee receive a
performance appraisal for each manager he or she works
for during the year. The process required the manager
to complete the appraisal for the former employee (for
the appropriate portion of the year) and then manually
transfer it to the employees new manager. The leaders in
the HR group felt very strongly that receiving appraisals
from all managers for the entire year was very important
14

O A U G FEATURE

(and rightfully so), but this step was time-consuming

and confusing in the production environment. Appraisals
assigned to managers who leave the company are frozen
and not updatable once the managers person record is
flagged as an ex-employee, and the appraisals must be
moved manually.

There was also a final Provide Feedback step for
employees, which was required to update the performance
appraisal to a state of Complete. This step was meant to
serve as the employees electronic signature and was also
the employees final opportunity to add his or her own
comments to the performance appraisal. However, this
notification is received after one telling the employee that
the appraisal has been completed. Many employees did not
realize that this additional step was required.

The wisest course of action when implementing
Performance Management is to keep the process as simple
as possible, with the fewest possible number of steps, and
use end-dates very judiciously. With Workflow and the
Approvals Management Engine, anything is possible,
but that does not necessarily mean that it is a good idea.
A complex process may look outstanding on paper, with
many controls, checks and balances in place, but managing
it in the Production environment for a large employee
population is burdensome and time-consuming. Starting
simply, and adding more steps as new requirements are
identified, is a much more prudent approach.

Many users found this process to be too robust due
to the number of steps involved, the volume of Workflow
notifications generated and vague language in the standard
notifications. Performance Management: keep it simple
(See Figure 1).

Using an Implementation Partner

Jeppesen engaged an implementation partner to
help with the implementation and was able to leverage
their expertise with Oracle HR Applications. The
implementation partner was able to provide project team
members with training on functionality, guidance on best
practices and direction on using data in HR tables, which
keep history, unlike the tables in many other Oracle
Applications.

Working with an implementation partners
consultants is most successful when the client is
able to challenge them to provide examples of how

oaug insight

Oracle Performance Manager

Performance Appraisal Process

MANAGER

Log into MSS

and navigate
to Talent
Management

Select appropriate
appraisal function
(Mid-Year or
Year-End)

Click Appraise
icon for
employee

Add comments,
feedback,
etc.

Give Final
Rating

**

No

Add new
objectives

Share with
Appraisee

Yes

Additional
objectives
needed?

Receive appraisal
from employee
and review

spring 2014

Approve
Final Rating

Yes

Submit
appraisal to
employee

Appraisal
complete?

No

Receive
appraisal from
Manager

EMPLOYEE

Receive Final
Rating from
Manager

Add additional
objectives

Approve
appraisal?

Yes

Click
Approve
button in
Notification

Yes
No
Additional
objectives
needed?

Update existing
objectives

No

Submit to
Manager

Provide final
feedback

Reject
appraisal

END
comments or feedback at this point is optional. If a manager prefers to see the employees self-evaluation before sharing
** Adding
comments and feedback, this step can be skipped and the manager may proceed directly to the Share with Appraisee step.

Figure 1
other clients have handled similar situations. The
consultants have the expertise on the applications
and how they work, as well as experience with
implementing Oracle HR for other clients. On the
other hand, the client resources know the company,
its culture, the data, how it will be used, and why.

The most effective solutions are those developed
when the consultants and the client collaborate and take
both of these factors into consideration. While it is the
consultants responsibility to provide guidance and advice
on how to implement the application, it is the clients
responsibility to ensure that new business processes
will meet the defined requirements, complement
existing policies and procedures, and provide value to
the organization. This can mean numerous discussions
and asking many questions, but it is time well spent.

Managing Project Deadlines,

Budgets and Resources

The Jeppesen HRMS project was quite complex
and impacted employees in 17 countries. It was crucial
to have HR representation from each country on the
project team. Ideally, they would have been dedicated
resources for the duration of the project. Instead, they
also had their regular job responsibilities to manage;
almost everyone became overloaded. Virtually every
ERP project is challenged with a finite amount of
resources and funds, but if it is possible to use contract
labor to help manage some of the day-to-day functions,
it will allow the team members from the business
side to stay focused on the project without becoming
overwhelmed with additional responsibilities. In most
cases, its difficult to manage shared resources because

oaug.org15 15

there are always competing priorities and deadlines. If

this can be avoided, it will greatly benefit the project.

Jeppesens HRMS project included a significant
number of interfaces. Some of these were internal
interfaces, and others were to external systems. Some
project resources were assigned to work on interfaces as
well as other project tasks, such as requirements gathering
and gap analysis. If at all possible, interfaces and reports
should be assigned dedicated resources. When developing
interfaces with external systems, the lead time required
for testing can be much longer than for testing interfaces
between internal systems. The external partys employees
have their own deadlines and responsibilities to consider
and often cannot perform their part of interface testing
on short notice. This is exacerbated when project team
members have to manage other responsibilities in
addition to interfaces and reports.

Reporting requirements should be carefully
evaluated, and resources should be assigned early on in
the project to ensure that all custom reports are ready to
use when the system goes live. Reports can easily drop
down on the priority list since they can be created at
any time, but users want to access the information they
need in the proper format. If the reports users require are
not readily available, it creates frustration. Its difficult
to change someones first impression of a new system,
so every effort should be made to ensure a positive user
experience from the start.

If the project is phased and includes multiple
applications, the implementation should be planned to
meet the most immediate needs first. The first phase
of Jeppesens HRMS project included Performance
Management, with HR Analytics scheduled for Phase
II. In retrospect, the Performance Management module
could have been pushed to Phase II, and the Analytics
tool would have been valuable to have as soon as the
system was live in production.

Training

For most projects, training is usually accomplished
by following defined test scripts to execute specific
scenarios. This is useful for educating people about
basic functionality and form navigation, learning dataentry shortcuts and generally becoming comfortable
with the look and feel of the forms. However, limiting

16 O A U G FEATURE

training to simply running through generic test scripts

will not provide users with much insight about how
the application works and interacts with other Oracle
modules.

When users transact in a test environment with
real data, their confidence in the system and their
ability to use it post go-live will improve. Even more
important is learning how to care for the non-standard
situations that always arise during the normal course of
business. For example, its valuable for a user to know
how to create an employee record. Its more valuable to
know how to create a person as a contractor, process a
termination, re-hire that person as a regular employee, or
accommodate a scenario of an employee needing active
person records in multiple business groups.

Using real data in a test environment to learn how
to handle situations unique to the organization will help
users adapt more easily, and they will (hopefully) view the
new system as a good thing that helps them perform their
jobs more effectively.

Another challenge when implementing a tool that
all employees will use is trying to deliver appropriate
training for using the tool on a consistent basis. Users
familiar and comfortable with Oracle, who regularly log
into and use the applications as part of their standard job
responsibilities, can normally learn to use the Self-Service
applications on their own. However, users who access
Oracle only to use the Performance Management module
and other HR Self-Service products likely log into the
application infrequently and may find the tools to be
unintuitive. Determining the appropriate navigation path,
the correct forms to use, and so on, can be tricky.

Building an ongoing training plan into an HRMS
support strategy is something to be considered. This
includes things like refresher courses offered at the
beginning of goal setting and appraisal periods, regular
training for new employees and creating and maintaining
online training materials that can be accessed at any time.
It can be a challenge to find the time and right resources
to do this, but it will help things operate more efficiently
during critical points of the Performance Management
Plan.

oaug insight

Publicizing the New HRMS System

and its Benefits

When a new system is introduced, people
will naturally be apprehensive about it and may be
resistant to the change. This is particularly true when
new applications include a self-service component,
as Jeppesens HRMS implementation did.

The Manager Self-Service tool allows managers
to handle transactions for employees in their reporting
hierarchy without having to request assistance from
HR or wait for someone to process something on
their behalf. Managers are able to do things like
initiate transfers, job changes, assignment changes and
employment terminations. Some managers appreciate
being empowered to handle things on their own, but
others may perceive the implementation of a selfservice tool as one group (in this case HR) simply
shifting its job responsibilities onto other people.

Its important to educate managers about the benefits
of having access to a self-service tool. For instance, by
initiating a transfer, one manager can simply specify
the effective date and submit the request to the new
manager. Once the new manager approves the transfer,
the process is complete, and theres no need for followup emails or phone calls or checking the system to see
if the transfer has occurred. By initiating a termination,
the manager (and every other manager in his or her
reporting chain) has real-time visibility to the employees
end-date and can immediately begin the process to
recruit a replacement and/or develop a contingency plan.

When managers are able to handle some of the
administrative responsibilities regarding employees,
HR is able to spend time on more value-adding
activities that benefit the entire organization: coaching
people on performance management, performing
more compensation analysis, providing guidance
on corporate programs and initiatives, or offering
more strategic direction to the business about
organization design and skill assessments. For a
significant change of this nature, it is imperative that
the project and the new system have the full support
and buy-in of the organizations top leadership.

There does not seem to be the same resistance
to the Employee Self-Service tool, as employees
generally like being able to access and manage their

spring 2014

own information any time they need to. And there

is no perception of being asked to take on additional
work. For example, if an employee moves, rather than
sending an email to payroll, he or she simply updates
their home address in Employee Self-Service.

Test with Real Data

Using real data in a test environment
to learn how to handle situations
unique to the organization will help
users adapt more easily, and they
will (hopefully) view the new system
as a good thing that helps them
perform their jobs more effectively.

Project Overview

Jeppesen was able to implement the first phase of the
HRMS project on time and within budget. The project
had a strong steering committee that was instrumental
in removing obstacles to help the team be successful.
Leveraging the expertise of our implementation partner,
who had prior experience in rolling out HRMS to global
locations, helped keep the project moving forward and
on track. The entire team also made the protection
of PII and other sensitive employee information a
top priority at all times during the project. As a result
there were no security breaches during the project, nor
have there been any in production to date. This was a
huge contributor to the success of the project because
there was no need to spend time assuaging fears that
employee information was being compromised. And,
like with any ERP project, launching on time would
not have been possible without many long hours from
dedicated people committed to the projects success.

Laura Reynolds (laura.reynolds@jeppesen.com) is
a system engineer at Jeppesen. She has been working
with Oracle Applications for 15 years, as both a user
and an implementer. Her applications expertise includes
Financials, Project Accounting and HRMS.

oaug.org

17

oaug feature

Success and
Lessons Learned
in a Complex
Subledger
Accounting
Deployment
By Bill Klein, Sandia National Laboratories

andia National Laboratories employs

approximately 9,800 employees, most of them
at its Albuquerque, New Mexico, headquarters

or Livermore, California, laboratory. Sandia National

Laboratories is a multi-program laboratory managed
and operated by Sandia Corporation, a wholly owned
subsidiary of Lockheed Martin Corporation, for the
U.S. Department of Energys (DOE) National Nuclear
Security Administration under contract DE-AC0494AL85000. We are primarily a scientific and engineering
company providing scientific solutions and innovations
to various federal, state and local government agencies,
companies and other organizations. Being a primary
contractor to the federal government creates a complex
accounting reporting requirement that is different than
what is used to financially manage the Laboratories.

18

O A U G FEATURE

Because of the complexities of being a contractor
to the federal government, Sandia needs to report
its accounting activities to DOE on a monthly basis.
The accounting required by the government does not
enable us to manage our finances, so we have a need
for two accounting ledgers. Our primary ledger, which
consists of three segments, is our company ledger. Our
secondary ledger, which needs to be fifteen segments,
is used for reporting to the federal government.

Prior to Oracle E-Business Suite (EBS) Release
12, Sandia used a number of complex PL/SQL
packages to extract and translate necessary data
from most EBS modules, including manufacturing
to meet federal requirements. Combined, these
packages had approximately 100,000 lines of code.

With Oracle Subledger Accounting (SLA), Sandia
was able to produce the accounting for the secondary
ledger at the same time as the primary ledger, reduce
the custom lines of code by more than ninety percent
and significantly simplify the coding. In order to
reach this simplicity, Sandia took full advantage
of using SLA custom sources. Using SLA custom
sources requires significant effort, from requirements

Requirements

Before starting the journey of setting up the SLA,
there needs to be good requirements. Programmers and
accountants need to set aside enough time to gather
requirements for the secondary ledger. Because SLA is
so complex, it is difficult to identify all the requirements
before the setup, but unless most of the requirements
are accurate and identified, the SLA implementation
will be put in jeopardy of being completed on time.

Holes in the requirements will be identified when
setting up the SLA and during testing. The goal is to
ensure that requirements have enough information and
that staff is knowledgeable enough to make changes to
the requirements quickly. The better the requirements,
the more successful the implementation will be.

Setup Methodology and Technique

Before beginning, we read quite a few documents
about setting up the subledger accounting. In each
of these, it stated that the steps must be followed in
particular order. However, we found that it was more
logical to complete the steps in a different order, and
we had no issues with the setup. There are certain
things that cannot be completed until another step is
finished, but there is quite a bit of flexibility. When
setting up the subledger accounting, it is recommended
that you review different documents; this article is not
intended to cover all aspects of the setup in great detail.

Before starting any setup, it is recommended that
there is a standard naming convention for all custom
objects that are created. By the end of the setup, there
may be a hundred or more custom objects, and it can get
confusing, even with using a standard naming convention.
For our standards, we always used SL at the beginning
of the name, followed by the module abbreviation (e.g.,
PA for Project Accounting) and then gave as much
description as possible for the remainder of the name.

In many of the documents we read, creating the
Subledger Accounting Method (SLAM) was near the
end, a bottom-up approach. However, we found it
easier to understand the picture by doing a top-down
approach, so the SLAM was the first step. The only
drawback for doing a top-down approach is that it is
necessary to go back and complete the relationships later.

The SLAM is very simple to create. The easiest
method is to query an Oracle created SLAM and

to analysis to coding to testing. This article covers

the implementation of SLA and lessons learned.

oaug insight

spring 2014

ith Oracle Subledger Accounting (SLA), Sandia

was able to produce the accounting for the
secondary ledger at the same time as the primary

ledger, reduce the custom lines of code by more than

ninety percent and significantly simplify the coding.

hit the copy button. It is recommended that one

use the copy button for most of the setups and
then make any necessary changes. We used the
STANDARD_ACCRUAL method as our starting
point. The new SLAM will inherit the relationships
from the method copied. Relationships can be
deleted and new ones can be assigned at any time.

Application Accounting Definitions (AAD) are
assigned to the SLAM. For each application that
generates any accounting transactions, there must be
an AAD. Sandia needed to set up five definitions:

l

l
l
l
l

Assets.
Cost Management (for all
manufacturing transactions).
Payables.
Projects.
Receivables.

Even though we use Cash Management, all
transactions flowed through Payables and Receivables,
so a definition was unnecessary. Because the definitions
are quite extensive, it is highly recommended that
the copy button is used. There probably will be extra
unused event classes, but if that event ever occurs, then
accounting will still be generated with the defaults.

Within the AADs are event classes. For each event
class that is used in ones operations, there must be a
Journal Line Definition (JLD) assigned to it. Some of
the event classes are very easy to identify. Other event
classes may or may not need to have assignments.
Testing will reveal event classes that need JLDs.

As with the AAD, it is highly recommended that the
copy button is used to ensure that all Journal Line Types
(JLT) are associated with a JLD. Not all JLTs are used,
and identifying which ones are used can be a challenge.

For each JLT, there must be Account Derivation
Rules (ADR). The first ADR will be All Segments,
which defaults all segments that are not identified with

oaug.org 19

SLAM: Subledger Accounting Method

20

Figure 1: Subledger Accounting Options: Accounting Program Defaults

other rules. All segments that need to return a value need
to be assigned to the JLT and must have an ADR.

The setup of ADRs is probably the most important
and powerful part of the setup since this is where
we define what values are to be returned. ADRs can
have constants, conditions, custom sources or any
combination of the three. When initially creating the
ADRs, they were created as constants or conditions.
If a custom source was to be used, then the rule
was revised later to point to the custom source.

Custom Sources were the last part of the hierarchy
of our SLA setup. In most SLA setup documents, the
Custom Sources are listed as first to do. However, they
are the most complex and challenging part of the setup.
If the Custom Source is not set up correctly, then one
cannot even create any accounting transactions. If the
setup is done correctly through the ADRs and Custom
Sources are associated later, one can run the create
accounting and add or revise Custom Sources later.
Read more in the next section of this article for details
on how Custom Sources are tied to the SLA setup.

The last setup piece is the secondary ledger creation.
The secondary ledger can be set up at any time as long
as the SLAM has been created. This is completed in the
accounting setups menu via any subledger accounting
responsibility or general ledger super user responsibility.
There are four steps that are needed for the creation of
the ledger. The ledger can be modified later for certain
attributes. Other attributes cannot be changed, so ensure
that the requirements are known before creating the
secondary ledger. When creating the secondary ledger,
assign the SLAM that was created in the first step.

It is probable that the primary ledger must also
be updated. Sandia needed to assign a legal entity
in the intercompany accounts and update subledger
accounting options for the modules we use. For Sandia,
we changed the Accounting Program Defaults (see
Figure 1) mainly for testing purposes, but we kept

O A U G FEATURE

the same defaults in production as we use the product

Control-M to run our jobs. We also updated the
processor defaults and set them based on the number
of expected transactions to expedite processing.

Custom Sources Using PL/SQL Functions

As discussed previously, Custom Sources are very
powerful, and they allow for processing transactions in
a complex accounting structure to a secondary ledger.
Custom Sources are not in themselves very complex, but
they can be time consuming and frustrating. Custom
Sources use PL/SQL functions to return values. It is quite
simple to build a function and return the expected value.
The complexity comes into play in determining what
tables and what columns are needed for returning a value.

Oracle provides a certain large number of
parameters (there are more than one thousand
parameters available in each of the modules) that
can be used as inputs to a custom PL/SQL function.
Of the parameters listed, some have very similar
names, and it can be difficult determining with
what table a particular parameter is associated.

Many programmers will not be familiar with
all the tables in each module, and some functions
require multiple parameters to return the right value
(See Figure 2 for an example). It may take many
iterations of testing before one determines the correct
parameter to be used. If there are many changes to
multiple parameters, the SLAM may not even validate,
making it difficult to determine where the issue lies.

When programming custom PL/SQL functions, it
is recommended that they be placed in packages based
on the module. Separating the functions by module
makes it easier to maintain, test and promote code.

At Sandia, there are many instances that call a
function multiple times, and so these functions were
made as common functions and put at the top of the
package. By creating the common functions, there is less

oaug insight

spring 2014

Figure 2: Custom Source Example

code to rewrite if there is a change in the requirements.
All the functions should have an exception when
clause so that errors can be easier to identify.

Subledger Accounting
Database Schema (XLA)

Oracle delivers a new schema (XLA) with
subledger accounting. These tables containing the
accounting will be quite large and may even be the
largest tables in the database. In the xla.xla_ae_lines
tables, Sandia has nearly 300 million rows. Because
these tables have millions of rows, several indexes need
to be used when querying them. We almost always use
application_id and ledger_id. We also built a custom
index for accounting_date, which has sped up our
queries tremendously. Some of the more important
tables for tracing transactions in SLA include:

xah.ae_header_id = xal.ae_header_id
xal.ae_header_id = xdl.ae_header_id
xal.ae_line_num = xdl.ae_line_num
gir.gl_sl_link_id = xal.gl_sl_link_id
gl_sl_link_table = xal.gl_sl_link_table
gjl.je_header_id = gjh.je_header_id
gjl.je_header_id = gir.je_header_id
gjl.je_line_num = gir.je_line_num

Some of the transaction source tables that
one can use to join with SLA include:

xla.xla_ae_headers
xla.xla_ae_lines
xla.xla_distribution_links
gl.gl_import_references
gl.gl_je_lines
gl.gl_je_headers

When joining these tables, it is recommended
that the following joins be used:

pa.pa_cust_rev_dist_lines_all pcrdla
pa.pa_cust_event_rdl_all pcera
pa.pa_events pe
pa.pa_draft_revenues_all pdra
ar.ra_cust_trx_line_gl_dist_all rctlgda
ar.ar_distributions_all ada
inv.mtl_transaction_accounts mta
wip.wip_transaction_accounts wta
po.rcv_receiving_sub_ledger rrsl
ap.ap_invoice_distributions_all aida
ap.ap_payment_hist_dists aphd
ap.ap_prepay_app_dists apad
fa.fa_adjustments faa
fa.fa_deprn_detail fad

oaug.org 21

There are many joins to the various transaction source tables, but some of the key joins are as follows:

xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = pcrdla.expenditure_item_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_2 = pcrdla.line_num
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = pe.event_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_2 = pcera.line_num
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = pdra.project_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_2 = pdra.draft_revenue_num
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = rctlgda.cust_trx_line_gl_dist_id
xdl.event_id = rctlgda.event_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = ada.line_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = mta.inv_sub_ledger_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = wta.wip_sub_ledger_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = rrsl.rcv_sub_ledger_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = aida.invoice_distribution_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = aphd.payment_hist_dist_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = apad.prepay_app_dist_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = faa.transaction_header_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_2 = faa.adjustment_line_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_1 = fad.asset_id
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_2 = fad.period_counter
xdl.source_distribution_id_num_5 = fad.distribution_id

andia processes around

four million transactions
per month with most

of the transactions being

processed weekly and coming
from Project Accounting.
There was concern that
SLA processing would add
considerable time to the batch
processing. However, we are
now processing faster than we
did prior to moving to SLA.

There are a number of tables that contain the setup of subledger accounting. Below is a SQL query that could
prove valuable to see the SLA setup by module:
select distinct
fndapptl.application_name,
xldaa.event_class_code,
xldaa.event_type_code,
xldaa.accounting_line_type_code,
xldaa.accounting_line_code,
xldaa.flexfield_segment_code,
xldaa.segment_rule_code,
xsrd.user_sequence user_sequence_1,
xsrd.value_type_code,
case
when xsrd.value_type_code = C
then xsrd.value_constant
else xsrd.value_source_code
end constant_or_function,
xsb.plsql_function_name,
xsp.user_sequence user_sequence_2,
xsp.ref_source_code func_parameter

22

O A U G FEATURE

from
xla.xla_line_defn_adr_assgns xldaa,
applsys.fnd_application_tl fndapptl,
xla.xla_seg_rule_details xsrd,
xla.xla_sources_b xsb,
xla.xla_source_params xsp
where xldaa.segment_rule_type_code = C
AND xsrd.segment_rule_type_code = C
AND xldaa.application_id = fndapptl.application_id
AND xsrd.application_id = fndapptl.application_id
AND xsrd.segment_rule_code = xldaa.segment_rule_code
AND xsb.source_code (+) = xsrd.value_source_code
AND xsp.source_code (+) = xsrd.value_source_code
AND xldaa.application_id = :p_application_id

Subledger Accounting Method

oaug insight

The Oracle SLA setup can become quite complex.
For Sandia, we created about 1,400 custom objects
related to SLA. Getting the objects from one instance
to another can be a daunting task. Fortunately, Oracle
provides a great method to move SLA setups from
one instance to another. The export and import
will only move one module at a time. In requests,
run the export by selecting Export Application
Accounting Definitions. For versioning mode, select
Standard, but if it errors, change it to Leapfrog.

Once the export is successful, verify that any
custom code has been promoted and custom sources are
created before doing the import. Imports do not include
custom sources. Custom sources need to be moved
with a script or manually created. When importing,
select Overwrite for the Import Option or it may leave
residual objects. If after the import, one cannot see
the accounting definitions tied to the SLAM, rerun
the import with the Import Option set to Merge.

Processing of Create Accounting

Sandia processes around four million transactions
per month with most of the transactions being processed
weekly and coming from Project Accounting. There was
concern that SLA processing would add considerable
time to the batch processing. However, we are now
processing faster than we did prior to moving to SLA.

Other than Project Accounting, the create accounting
in the other modules all finish on average in five minutes
or less. We break down the Project Accounting into
two jobs with the accounting for revenue starting
immediately after Generate Revenue finishes and the
accounting for the remaining transactions starting after
Generate Cost is completed. The revenue accounting
takes about thirty minutes to run while the other
transactions from PA take a little less than two hours.

Accounting Errors

Occasionally an error is generated when trying
to process accounting in SLA. This can happen for
a variety of reasons. At Sandia, the number of errors
has been minimal, and most of the errors occurred
soon after implementation. Some of these errors would
have been avoided if we had certain patches applied.
Some of the errors that were encountered were a
result of implementing SLA in the middle of the fiscal
year, and SLA was trying to perform accounting on
correcting transactions originally created in EBS 11i.

Oracle has released patches that have eliminated
most errors. The two most common errors that we
have encountered include revenue adjustment errors in
Project Accounting and unable to derive accounting
code combination in Payables. The revenue adjustment
error has basically disappeared by changing processes,
but the Payables error continues to occur about once
every four months. Oracle has scripts to fix each of these
issues. We set up a job that runs at the end of our job
stream to look for errors after each nights processing
so we can resolve the issue as soon as possible.

Manual Journal Entries

Subledger Accounting provides a method for
creating manual journal entries within the subledger.
However, these manual journal entries only create
the accounting for the primary ledger. The secondary
ledger does not receive any accounting from a
manual entry. The same issue exists when creating
a manual journal entry in the general ledger.

We decided to build a trigger that would
automatically create a manual entry in the secondary
ledger whenever a manual entry was created in
the primary ledger. This worked, but it took some
intervention as we had to use contexts in the
descriptive flexfields, and contexts are limited to ten
attributes. So our solution was to assign contexts to
two descriptive flexfields: Enter Journals: Lines and
Enter Journals: Captured Info DFF. To enforce this,
the accountants only enter manual journal entries using
ADI and all uploads are validated for the attributes.

SLAM: Subledger Accounting Method

Export/Import

spring 2014

Benefits of Using Subledger Accounting

There are a number of benefits that we received
due to implementing SLA. As stated prior, we had
around 100,000 lines of code used to produce the
second set of books (ledger). The code was written
over a number years, and it was quite complex with
its many packages. When any changes were required,
it took a very long time to analyze the code and make
the changes. Plus, the certainty that all necessary
changes were made was not one hundred percent.

With the implementation of SLA, we have
reduced the lines of code to 6,000 lines in five packages.
Therefore, when changes are required, it significantly
reduces the time to analyze and modify the code.
Additionally, when we make the changes, we have
certainty that every necessary change has been made.

Creating both set of books (ledgers) in 11i took
about four hours to run the accounting, with most of

oaug.org 23

Lessons Learned
l

Requirements Before starting the

implementation, we had requirements,

but we did not realize how many gaps
there were in the requirements. Because
of the requirement gaps, we struggled to
complete the implementation on time.

Customer Involvement The accountants

had their normal activities to complete as well as

the extra duties, such as requirements and testing,
required as part of the SLA implementation.
Management needs to commit and provide the
necessary resources to perform the tasks.

Setup The setup is not perceived to take a lot

Testing Testing begins with having identified

24

of time. That is true for a great deal of the setup,

but the custom sources take a lot of trial and error,
and there must be enough time to discover the
right parameters for returning the desired values.
nearly all types of transactions and including
them in a test plan. We did miss a couple of
minor event types, but the number of transactions
was minimal, and manual entries could easily
be made to correct them. Draft accounting
makes the testing much faster and easier to
perform. Resources must be committed to test
at both the programmatic and functional level.

Implementation It is recommended that

implementation be done at the beginning of

the fiscal year. We implemented within the
fiscal year, and this caused some issues with
transactions. If an original transaction occurred
prior to implementing SLA and that transaction
is reversed after implementation, the secondary
ledger does not pick up the new transaction
in all circumstances. We have requested an
enhancement of Oracle to have the secondary
ledger always create accounting, but they
have not implemented it in every module.

O A U G FEATURE

the processing time being spent building the second

set of books. By using SLA accounting, it builds both
ledgers at the same time; we are able to finish in less
than three hours of processing the accounting jobs.

Prior to using SLA, it was difficult for our accounting
staff to take the secondary ledger accounting transactions
and trace them to the originating transactions. With
SLA, the accountants are able to find a transaction,
and with a few clicks, they are able to see the entire
journal entry or the originating transaction within
the particular module in which it originated.

One of the most valuable features with SLA
is the ability to run draft accounting. Prior to our
implementation, Oracle sold the draft accounting as a
way to view transactions in production prior to finalizing
them. For some organizations that may be of use, but it
is something that we have never used. Where we found
a great benefit for draft accounting is in testing. SLA
takes a considerable amount of testing and retesting.
If users had to create new transactions each time SLA
ran, it would add a substantial amount of time to the
implementation. With draft accounting, simple changes
can be made and tested in less than one hour, and there
is no waiting for someone to create another transaction.

Lessons Learned

Sandia was able to successfully implement SLA,
but there are things we could have done differently
that would have made the implementation much
more successful. Some of the lessons learned in our
implementation are listed in the sidebar at left.

Conclusion

A successful implementation of a complex SLA is

very attainable, but it requires a considerable amount of
work. Before beginning an implementation of SLA, ensure
that nearly all requirements have been gathered and are
as accurate as possible. It is also necessary to understand
how SLA is set up and the time required to set up custom
sources. Remember that SLA has some tools such as draft
accounting to help with testing and export/import to move
setups from one instance to another. An organization can
reap a number of benefits from implementing SLA.

Bill Klein has degrees from Weber State University and
the University of New Mexico. He is an Oracle application
developer at Sandia National Laboratories. He has worked
with the Oracle E-Business Suite since 1997. Bill has presented
at a number of Oracle conferences on a variety of subjects.

global solutions

oaug insight

spring 2014

Our Sales Cloud Journey

WhiteLight Group is one of the first 100 Oracle
customers on Oracle Sales Cloud. We migrated
from Oracle CRM On Demand to Oracle Sales
Cloud in the last quarter of 2012. The project
was completed on time and was instrumental

Oracle Sales
Cloud

in developing key Oracle Fusion Applications

expertise and ensuring our continued adoption of
the latest technologies from Oracle.
Wed like to share our journey to success from
a customers perspective. Well share priority
features and options, business decisions that
drove this change, some lessons learned and what
we believe would be key reasons other customers
would consider adopting Oracle Sales Cloud.

About WhiteLight Group and

Our Application Strategy
WhiteLight is an Oracle Gold
Partner and Validated Integrator. We
leverage best-in-class Oracle technology
with a business-focused approach to
implementation to help our clients use
information systems as more effective,
strategic business tools.
WhiteLight Group has specialized
in Oracle business applications, such as
JD Edwards, since its inception in 2002.
Although a strong advocate for the value
of leading technologies provided by Oracle,
we were actually a user of Salesforce
as a CRM solution for many years. In
2008, we made the decision to move to
Oracles CRM On Demand. In addition
to its strength in functionality, we felt

G lobal S o l u t i o n

By Trudy Sturino and

David Ghaowi, WhiteLight Group

the implementation and daily use could

provide better insight and deeper product
knowledge to assist our clients with
product selection and services. Our strategy
for internal applications was to adopt and
align our application portfolio with Oracle.
This offered us continual education on
other Oracle products and applications
and demonstrates to our customers that we
believe in what we sell.

Our Move to Oracle Sales Cloud

A Look Back at 2012
After Oracle Sales Cloud was
released and became Oracles lead CRM
application, we decided to migrate to
this new platform. We were excited to
begin our journey with the on-demand
sales suite, with its rapid adoption, new
user interface, social infrastructure and

Fusion architecture. With Oracles Fusion

Applications becoming more robust and
available, we had also added Oracle Fusion
Applications services to our cloud solutions
offerings.
Our business development team
gained valuable features like mobile
integration, integrated marketing
management capabilities, standardized
sales operations and embedded business
intelligence. These features maximize
revenue potential while adding value to the
existing business application footprint used
internally. (See Figure 1 on the next page.)
We appreciated the tremendous
investment Oracle continues to make in
the development of Fusion Applications to
offer flexible functionality and ease of use
with a powerful functional capability.

oaug.org

25

Comprehensive
Sales Suite

Rapid
Adoption

Figure 1

screen changes without

adding resources or
On-Premises or
spending additional
On-Demand
dollars.
Role Based
We also were
User Experience
using an industry database,
Inside View integrated
100%
with CRM On
Standards Based
Infrastructure
Demand, which had to
be similarly integrated
with Oracle Sales Cloud.
This
tool
supports our internal
Building Our Fusion Application
sales staff, and with the open-standards
WhiteLight Group opted to run our
architecture of Fusion Applications, allows
CRM applications in the cloud. With prior
for many plug ins to be added easily to a
success with CRM On Demand, along
Fusion instance.
with other subscription-based applications,
We were successful in our initial
we feel it offers simplicity in operation and
footprint
of Oracle Sales Cloud and
access, minimized system overhead and
continue on with the addition of more
stability for our internal user group.
options and functionality.
The releases are automatically

Why Oracle
Sales Cloud?

updated to our Fusion instance, with prior

notification from Oracle. Automatic,
continued maintenance and patch updates
are applied to our Fusion instance as
well. We experienced minimal downtime
through version updates, as we started
on release 11.1.3 and now are on release
11.1.5.

What Makes Up Our Fusion

Instance?
Our team determined that the initial
release of Oracle Sales Cloud must have
a common CRM configuration, lead
management, opportunity management,
territory management and the ability to
import/export data. Our goal was to match
the existing functionality of our Oracle
CRM On Demand with any desired
options we could incorporate without
compromising the timeline.
Initially, we analyzed the volume of
data in our current CRM On Demand
environment to map to Oracle Sales Cloud.
These data elements had to be incorporated
into the Sales Account and be viewable in
Sales and Opportunity screens. Our internal
project implementer added fields, data and

26

G lobal S o l u t i o n

Understand Fusion Offerings

You need to know the functionality
and how it will be applied to your
organization.

Review all Fusion Options and

Features These will drive what
functionality you will be using.

Identify Report Requirements

Review the prepackaged reports with
built in intelligence in Fusion; there
should be very little custom report
building.

Understand Related Business Objects

and Related Infrastructure Know
how the metadata and objects will
relate and provide you with a baseline
for data conversion.

Establish Environment Setup

Determine whether On-Premises or
On-Demand; this will drive how you
support the application.

Develop Application-Specific
Knowledge Spend time on key areas
to develop knowledgeable internal
resources.

Organizing Our Fusion Project

The WhiteLight team used
the same approach we use with our
implementation projects. We utilized two
part-time resources for the duration of
the implementation project. Our internal
business sponsor coordinated the project
and led all change management activities
within our organization.
After business requirements were
identified, we determined the Oracle Sales
Cloud core functionality required and
identified potential gaps. Understanding
the element needed for our project, the
management team established the project
budget. The last step in organizing our
project was to determine the timeline and
go-live cutover activities.
At the time, Oracle Sales Cloud
was a relatively new application, and
there was no precedent set for project
adoption methodologies. We needed
to create a strategy that made sense
to our organization, addressing the
requirements and aligning budgetary and
time investments. We came up with the
following strategy areas:

Our Stepping Stones to Success

In order to proceed with setting
up Fusion Applications, it is important
to follow Oracles path to adapting this
application. Our first task was completing
the questionnaire, which identifies the
base information required to set up an
environment. When completed, it allowed
us to set up our environment with our
company information, its core accounting
policies and other key information. Oracle
inputs this data from the questionnaire into
our provisioned environment and then the
environments were turned over to us to
validate.

1) Building Our Cloud

So, how did we create our cloud?
We initially contracted with Oracle for
a selection of services, including the
application and on-demand access. Oracle

oaug insight

spring 2014

Implementation Strategy Areas

Understand
Fusion
Offerings

Review all
Fusion Options
& Features

prepares the shared components and the

application utilizing information from our
completed questionnaire. Access is granted
based on how many licenses are contracted.
An Administration ID was established,
which allows our administrator to continue
with the project through the self-service
portal. Upon completion of the initial setup
and configuration, Oracle provided us a
notification. The system environments were
now turned over to us.
We were ready to kick off our project!
While waiting for our provisioned
environment, we had two parallel activities
running. Our first activity was providing
training to internal resources. The second
activity was to begin reviewing our data
in Oracle CRM On Demand and assess
archive and purge requirements, additional
data maintenance, what we needed to
migrate over to Oracle Sales Cloud and any
manual data management following the
migration.

2) Training Our Project Team

Our training processes to develop
internal resources utilized Oracle
University, and in turn, led to our resources
passing the Fusion Certification exam.
Because the certification process provided
a core foundation of skills and specific
product application knowledge that can
be used on the expansion of other Fusion
Applications, this was a key element in our
project success.

3) Training Our Internal

User Community
We identified what was different
in Fusion from our existing application
and provided users helpful tools like User
Productivity Kit (UPK) lessons for different
processes. This allowed us to review the

Identify
Report
Requirements

Understand Related
Business Objects &
Related Infrastructure

user interface and any changes in tasks well

before we actually started our core setup
of the application. With the users input,
we had time to adapt features or options,
which led to stronger user adoption. We
further developed small user training guides
with references for application basics and
user tools to assist with personalization.
We held live training sessions across
multiple offices with our user community
from our test or STAGE environment.
They were able to identify any concerns, get
their questions answered and have one-onone time with our certified staff.

4) Utilize the Application Toolset

Functional Setup Manager (FSM) is
used to implement all Fusion Applications
through a consistent, standard process. This
is the Self-Service Administration Tool,
which allows your implementation team to
configure Oracle Sales Cloud in the best
way to meet your business requirements.
The FSM gives the implementation team
complete visibility to setup requirements
through guided, sequential task lists. This
contributes to a business intelligence model
and allows full visibility to the progress
and status of individual tasks. The team

Establish
Develop
Environment Application-Specific
Setup
Knowledge

validates requirements from built-in

application reports that can then be sent to
team leads for sign-off.

Our Project Timeline

The full implementation from a
provisioned environment to go-live was
twelve weeks. Core setup and configuration
lasted approximately eight weeks. Before
we conducted approximately two weeks of
user testing and retrofitting, all users were
trained on the Fusion Application. The
go-live and data conversion activities lasted
another two weeks.
We allowed extra time in our project
to develop our own Fusion implementation
methodology for our in-house expertise.
We also factored in time for deployments,
holidays, data conversion without prebuilt
templates and security setup of our sales
team. The overall progress of our initial
project was impacted only slightly.
We recommend that a customer look
at starting with an eight-week timeline and
adjust as needed for operation complexity,
selected options and personnel availability.
This assumes that there is already a sales
methodology within the organization. We
also suggest that customers:

Our Project Timeline

Implementation
8 Weeks

Testing
2 Weeks

Go Live!
2 Weeks

Total Implementation Time = 12 Weeks

Extra Time Allowed: In-house training with certification and
deployment scheduled during holiday season.

oaug.org

27

Conduct a pre-plan audit of their

system and data.

Train their resources to support this

technology.

Understand business requirements and

what their goals and objectives are.

Allow enough time to test the Fusion

Application.

Make sure to start early on data

conversion and scrubbing data.

Oracle Sales Cloud

has kept pace with other
applications by continuing
to invest in enhancements,
new functionality and
integrations.

The Smart and Adaptable

User Experience Boosted
Our Productivity
We found that Oracle Sales Cloud
made each of our users feel at home by
allowing personalization, customization
and flexibility. By making an intuitive
user-centered experience, Oracle Sales
Cloud has effectively minimized the
time our sales reps spend navigating.
This increased the efficiency of our
sales team while making them more
productive and allowed them to do what
they do best interact with customers
and prospects to present solutions!
While all these features are great on
the desktop usage, they are not lost on
the Oracle Sales Cloud mobile application
offered to the field sales teams while out
on the road. Changes made to the Oracle
Sales Cloud internally are updated in real
time to reps in the field while using the
Oracle Sales Cloud Mobile application.
This collaboration allows for sales teams,
28

G lobal S o l u t i o n

sales management and executives to share

information without any need for report
generation and additional meetings.
Oracle Sales Cloud vastly improves
real-time collaboration and organizes
internal interactions by offering social
networking capabilities within the
organization, customer-specific discussion
boards and activity streams. This real-time
collaboration is essential for making the
most of leads and opportunities, managing
relationships and ultimately growing our
win rate. In short, Oracle Sales Cloud is
the ultimate tool to help sales people do
their jobs at peak productivity levels.

Lessons Learned
Lets review what we learned
from our Fusion Journey. Our
company was able to execute our
project within the planned budget
and project timeline using only internal
resources. We experienced similar issues
as with any new application release
adapting to the new technology and
working some development challenges.
We began our Fusion project on release
3 and 90 days later were on release 5. We
have been receiving ongoing maintenance
from Oracle with updates/patches that
are automatically updated with minimal
downtime. We are now on release 7.
We have had no system outages since
our go-live on November 26, 2012.
We utilized the FSM for most of our
configuration, which provided a checklist
and visibility to tasks and their status
to our business sponsor, management
team and implementation team. We
did experience some challenges with
security, which we overcame; our first
pass at roles and assignments were not
compatible with the actual user needs,
and we determined the Administration
ID should not be user specific.
We find the best approach is to
start with a baseline of functionality
and grow into your Fusion Application.
You will want to spend time on the data

architecture and the concepts of related

business objects. This is the foundation
of the application and will drive much
of your data conversion activities.
We now know that we may have
introduced unnecessary complexity that
manifested itself at go-live as a system
design flaw. In reality, we needed to
apply changes to our configuration to
simplify some setups. Through our
process, we developed deep product
knowledge internally. By documenting
and analyzing our challenges, mistakes will
not be repeated, and a solid infrastructure
has been established to build upon.

Our Fusion Journey Continues

The next phase of our journey
provided for an extended Fusion footprint
and additional services for our user
community. The group of features and
functionality desired would add new
abilities to our organization.
The enhancements included:
l

Fusion Mobile Sales for iPad, iPhone

and Blackberry to extend the arm of
our sales team.

Additional user personalization to

provide cool tools for the user group.

Microsoft Outlook to operate

within one screen to increase sales
productivity.

Additional reporting to use built-in

business intelligence to drive better
decision making.

Marketing campaigns to allow us

to measure marketings impact and
contribution to the overall revenue.

Forecasting to enable the sales team to

automate and turn opportunities into
forecasted revenue.

We started this part of our journey

just 30 days after go-live, which was at
the first of 2013. We have been able to
utilize the FSM to update our production
environment with ease and in a short
period of time.

Fusion
CRM is just the
beginning!

Accomplishments to Date
We have not yet started the
Marketing functions of Sales, but are
excited about this function in achieving
alignment between Sales and Marketing,
with a single view of our pipeline.
This will allow our marketing teams to
not only measure the outcomes from
individual campaigns, but also measure
marketings impact and contribution to
the overall revenue of our business.
We have started our integration
between Oracle Sales Cloud and Microsoft
Outlook. This integration will allow us to
have our sales team work within one screen
and utilize the two-way sync for all data.
This will also allow users full featured,
off-line access and then synchronize back
to keep our data current. The application
is able to handle customized objects
and is downloadable within Fusion.
The completed mobility applications
are phenomenal! They provide BI and
analytics on the dashboard screen;
any data updates auto sync with our
Fusion database, which provides full
visibility in real time to the rest of
the organization! In addition, the
mobile app has calendar visibility to
our field sales team to keep them on
target with any changes that occur.
We have allowed our user community
to personalize their welcome pages, which
include different panes like Worklist,
Report, Activity Stream and Opportunity.
There were no additional costs or requests
to IT to perform these changes.
Our organization is now evaluating
an additional Fusion Application for
future use. We are looking at Oracle
Fusion Financials. This is a complete
and integrated solution with streamlined
financial management processes that
provide best-in-class financial capabilities
and embedded business intelligence,
which will provide additional tools to
our CFO and management team.

oaug insight

spring 2014

Fusion changes
the paradigm of
sortware

Connect to Oracle
products with short
configuration times

We
Believe
Giant
horsepower
Pluggable
at a micro
software level

Equivalent to
iPad business
applications

Very
Integrated

Conclusion
We believe Oracle Sales Cloud is
just the beginning! Oracle Sales Cloud
crushes the competition in the market
as a stand-alone software package that is
viable in the long run for most companies.
Oracle Sales Cloud is just the start for
most organizations as it is easy to deploy,
its integrated and its available as a cloudbased set of solutions that cover the
entire business from financials to sales to
manufacturing. Fusion is based on the
latest technology, and other applications
in the market just cant offer that.

Our Next Fusion Journey

Future 2014
Oracle Sales Cloud has kept pace
with other applications by continuing to
invest in enhancements, new functionality
and integrations. The state-of-the-art user
interface has dramatically pushed Oracle
Sales Cloud ahead of the competition.
The key integration between Oracle
Sales Cloud and Microsoft Outlook
provides us a single, seamless view of
contacts and interactions that allows us
to follow up quickly on any open tasks
or new requests for current and potential
clients/customers. We have taken a userby-user approach with this integration and
foresee our entire organization integrated
by the end of the first quarter of 2014.

Mobile sales cloud allows field

personnel to add new clients/customers,
contacts and interactions quickly and
also update existing data for updates
in the marketplace. The new tools
within release 11.1.7 have enhanced
our ability to review customer content,
leads and opportunities and update or
add new information more quickly.
The evolution of the Oracle
Fusion product line and the continued
investment in addressing key customer
concerns makes these applications
unique. Application updates continue to
occur and are applied with no downtime
or any additional resources required.
These are key application attributes that
allow greater customer satisfaction and
confidence with Oracle Applications.
David Ghaowi is a senior member of
the WhiteLight Group business development
team. His focus is on cultivating industry
relationships and delivering innovation
with Oracle Cloud Solutions and Mobile
Applications.
Trudy Sturino is the product application
director with more than 20 years of Oracle
Application experience. She currently
holds Oracle Application certifications
and is responsible for WhiteLights Fusion
Application Portfolio.

oaug.org

29

global solutions

Top 10 Tips and Tricks for

Oracle Business Intelligence
By Patrick Callahan, AST Corporation

Sometimes you just want to cut to the chase, sidestep all

of the product jargon, find out what works best and hear tips and tricks from the experts.
This article provides my favorite Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition (OBIEE) 11g implementation tips and
tricks, providing context and highlighting the value around the related 11g product features and capabilities.
As an introduction, the Oracle BI platform offers many features while providing an open architecture
consolidated into a common enterprise information model. (See Figure 1.)

Common
Enterprise
Information
Model

Common Metadata Foundation across all Data Sources

Common Security, Access Control, Authorization, Auditing
Common Request Generation & Optimized Data Access Services
Common Clustering, Workload Management & Deployment
Common Systems & Operational Lifecycle Management
Figure 1

Tip #1

Dig Into Whats

New in 11g and
Recent Releases

Whenever Im asked whats new
in OBIEE 11g, I often respond what
isnt new? I truly believe thats the case.
OBIEE 11g was a substantial release,
and each dot release further tweaks
the capabilities and quietly offers new
features. I think the new look and feel
is great, but the enhanced interactions

and animations on top of the new

features really turned out quite well.

I recommend jumping in and
using the basic Sample App offered as
part of the installation or grabbing the
expanded one. Youll quickly realize
the high-fidelity charting across the
powerful user interfaces with interactive
analytics that include animated
transitions and master-detail linking.
There is more to come on those fronts.

Moreover, BI Publisher has a
brand new online layout builder, which

finally brings development into the

OBIEE environment. BI Publisher is
a strategic solution for Oracle and will
continue to get enhanced. The new
editor is page oriented and interactive
with instant preview capabilities all
well-received features of the editor.

Another new component of 11g
is Oracle Scorecard and Strategy
Management (OSSM), Oracles new
strategic solution for performance
scorecards (replacing Hyperion
Performance Scorecard). Its integration

By Paul Martin and Fred Janzen,

Western University Canada

30

OAUG solution

oaug insight
into OBIEE is a big plus, with all
of your BI metadata (metrics, etc.)
available to feed into and enrich your
scorecards. The standard methodologies
are supported (Balanced, Six Sigma,
Baldridge). Overall, the solution
offers strategy visualization with
strategy maps and trees, cause and
effects, watch lists and annotations.

With the recent OBIEE 11.1.1.7
release, there are more features to
support Oracle Essbase, a new Oracle
Fusion Apps look and feel, new graph
types (waterfall, performance tile, 100
percent stacked bar, etc.), visualization
suggestions and breadcrumbs when
drilling into reports (finally). All of
these new features, mostly visualizations,
are worthy of experimentation.

Tip #2

Learn the

Architecture and
Terminology

Not to be overlooked is the fact that
much of the OBIEE 11g architecture
has changed, and with that comes new
terminology that must be understood.
A key differentiation is the fact that
OBIEE now resides or is deployed within
WebLogic (WLS) as a WLS domain.

The following terms are important
for understanding how the BI system
within 11g functions and is managed.
In general, they apply to Oracles
architecture schematic (See Figure 2).
l

Oracle BI Domain - the overall

OBIEE system.

WebLogic Domain - set of WebLogic

instances servicing applications.

Admin Server (WebLogic) - provides

management of both the WebLogic

O A U G FEATURE

spring 2014

Figure 2
and BI Domain; only one (1) per
WebLogic Domain.
l

Managed Server (WebLogic)

- contains deployed J2EE BI
application.
Node Manager (WebLogic) - daemon
process that provides remote server
start, stop and restart capabilities in
addition to monitoring.
Oracle BI System Components this
includes the BI Server, Presentation
Server, Scheduler, Cluster Controller
and Java host.
Oracle BI J2EE Components this
includes BI Publisher, BI Office,
Action Framework Service, BI SAW
Bridge Plug-in, Security and Web
Services for SOA.

This architecture applies to the
installation as well. No longer just an
option, repositories must be created
before installation using the Repository
Creation Utility (RCU); minimally,
the MDS and BIPLATFORM
schemas are needed. From there,
you have a few installation options
that I would like to explain:

Simple For development machines/

laptops only; this installation option
combines Admin and Managed
Servers so it cannot be scaled out.

Enterprise - Includes configuration

steps; generally used when
doing primary server installs.

Software Only - Configuration

is separate; generally used when
scaling out or adding components.

If you are simply sampling OBIEE
11g, go with the simple install. For
recommendations on sizing and capacity
planning, I suggest referring to Doc ID
1323646.1, available online from Oracle.

Related to installation, there are
a couple of configuration tidbits to
consider. First, installing a separate
web server is recommended for HTTP
compression and caching, especially for
larger user bases. WebLogics embedded
web server is not optimal; installing
and configuring Oracle HTTP Server
is now an option during install and you
can enable compression / caching by
editing the httpd.conf file. For earlier
11g installs, you can separately install

oaug.org

31

The OBIEE Model

User
requests

Logical Queries

presentation
catalog

business
models

physical
models

Data
sources

Dimensional
Models

Star Schemas
Snowflakes

SQL

Multi-Dimensional

XML/A

Normalized
Denormalized

Native SQL

XML Files

XML, CSV, Excel,

Flat Files, etc.

Role-Based
Subject Areas

Figure 3
and configure Oracle HTTP Server or
your web server of choice. Though BI
is dynamic in nature, the platform can
still benefit from such optimizations.

Oracle also provides an Upgrade
Assistant in 11g to help users migrate
from 10g and Patch Set Assistants
ongoing. These upgrade the repository
(RPD) and presentation catalog. The
Upgrade Assistant actually deploys
everything as well. As a result, you
need a working BI 11g environment
for this to work. This is necessary
because the UA ports users from the
10g RPD into WebLogic; users are
no longer in the RPD in 11g. Thus,
when migrating 11g environments,
one must migrate the Identity Store,
Credential Store and Policy Store.

One last note: New in 11.1.1.7 is
the OBIEERPDPWDCHG utility that
allows one to change RPD password
from command line. Cool stuff!

Tip #3

Dont Ignore
Your Data
Warehouse
Design

Yes, OBIEE 11g is a great BI
solution offering robust features, even
federated data sources. I consider
federated configurations as earlystage solutions since sophisticated
32

OAUG solution

analytics solutions typically require

data quality applications and well
architected models at the physical layer
to produce the desired results. To that
end, I generally architect a data mart
(warehouse) underlying OBIEE to
support my analytics requirements.

Going into this activity, I try to
follow some core data warehousing
and BI modeling principles gleaned
from experts like Ralph Kimball*:
1. Target a business process
or subject area.
2. Solidify the level of detail
or grain. By default, capture
the lowest level of detail that
promotes drill-down capabilities
and makes BI operational.
3. Identify the dimensions by which
data needs to be analyzed. This is
how to slice and dice the data?
4. Identify the metrics to be included
for analysis. This is what numbers
and calculations are desired.
FOOTNOTE: *Kimball, Ralph; Margy
Ross (2013). The Data Warehouse
Toolkit: The Definitive Guide to
Dimensional Modeling (3rd ed.).
Wiley. ISBN 978-1-118-53080-1

For the basis of modeling, I always
target snowflake (dimensions in multiple
tables) and star (dimensions in single

table) schemas since such models are

well supported by every BI solution (not
just Oracle) and eventually translate well
into multi-dimensional implementations
within Essbase or otherwise.

When you are modeling, also
adhere to data modeling standards.
If you dont currently have defined
data modeling standards, the Oracle
Business Analytics Warehouse Data
Model Reference is a good start.

Finally, the physical implementation
of a data warehouse model is important
as every RDBMS has many options
to choose from. First and foremost, all
dimension tables need primary keys
and, with few exceptions, these ought
to be surrogate keys. Natural keys must
still exist as attributes and be used
by ETL. A dummy (blank/zero/
placeholder) record is recommended
for each dimension. All fact tables
must have foreign keys to dimensions,
and these ought to have indexes.

In Oracle, choose from standard,
bitmap or bitmap-join indexes (stores
rowid for primary key as well uses
more storage). If bitmap or bitmapjoin indexes are implemented and
STAR_TRANSFORMATION_
ENABLED=TRUE, the Oracle
database will force sub-queries
against the dimensions before the

oaug insight
fact. Partitioning will almost always
help in a BI environment and
materialized views are often a good
choice for generating aggregates.

For larger implementations, one
might consider Oracle Exalytics for its
optimized BI connectivity, advanced
data visualization capabilities and its
plug-and-play architecture. Another
benefit of Oracle Exalytics is that it
can also support Oracle EPM solutions
like Hyperion Planning on top of
Oracle Essbase; some of our clients
co-mingle these on the same machines.

Tip #4

Allocate Enough
Time for Oracle
BI Repository
Design

With very little change from
10g, the OBIEE repository is the
nuts and bolts of an Oracle BI
implementation. The connections
to data sources, analytics modeling,
definition of presentation subject
areas and all related metadata are
managed here. The schematic in
Figure 3 highlights the key areas.

Moving from right to left in the
schematic, the Physical Models define
components for physical queries,
aligning with data source structures and
encapsulating source dependencies for
portability and federation purposes.

The most important aspect of
the BI repository is the Business
Model in the center. Here, analytic
behavior is defined, abstraction of
sources occurs, mappings for each
logical column (decision rules, etc.) are
implemented and dimensions and their
related hierarchies are confirmed.

Finally, the Presentation Catalog
offers a structured view of the
dimensional business model and general
organization of objects with desired
names and descriptive overrides.

Within Oracles BI Administration
tool, the facility where the RPD is

created and modified, there are some

very helpful utilities available through
the menu options. For the bulk work
associated with building and maintaining
models and subject areas, the Replace
Columns or Table in Logical Table
Sources, Rename Wizard, Update
Physical Layer and Remove Unused
Physical Objects options are great.
In particular, the Rename Wizard
is great for initial model cleanup of
names, such as making them more
discernible for business users and
less like physical database names.

For metadata documentation, the
Repository Documentation (delimited
output) and Generate Metadata
Dictionary (will need to configure
online access) options are great. For
deploying change, the Generate
Deployment File option works well.

Not necessarily an RPD utility but
a new option in 11g is the Creating
Subject Areas for Logical Stars,
Snowflakes facility that is available
when you select a business model and
right mouse-click to get a pop-up
menu. With this, the facility simply
creates a subject area for every fact in
the selected business model, including
all necessary metrics and dimensions.
This is a creative way to quickly kick off
design and POC development efforts.

Finally, you may want to further
look into the externalizing metadata
objects for localization requirements
and the use of new lookup tables in 11g
for translations of dimensional data.

Tip #5

spring 2014

objects (charts). Within the layout

editor of the Results tab for an analysis
definition, go ahead and move a
report element into the section area
below the graph prompts, and ensure
the Display as slider checkbox is
checked. Its that easy to do and surely
will be well-received by your users.

Another neat, new feature of 11g
is Chart Zooming. This is a simple
enhancement to the UI that may benefit
some users. First, on the graph properties
page (on the Canvas tab), one can
selectively enable Zoom and Scroll
for the vertical and horizontal axes.
With that set, the zip option (seen as a
magnifying glass icon), is available along
the lower left side of the chart. When
selected, the zooming occurs in-line, and
the scrolling window can be adjusted by
sizing the bar within the scrolling widget
itself. Occasionally, we encounter some
flaky behavior with this feature, but all in
all, its a nice facility to have available.

In 11.1.1.6, one could enable
freeze panes to replace the pagebased navigation through data
records (this requires a change to the
instanceconfig.xml file). However,
this becomes the default in 11.1.1.7.

Also in 11.1.1.7, one can give
users the ability to select, add, remove,
group, calculate, sub-total, etc., during
runtime; these settings are on the
Analysis Properties page (Figure 4).
Once enabled, users can do much more
without having to edit an analysis.

Take Full

Advantage of
User Experience

Enhancements

Weve seen our users fully
embrace the use of sliders in lieu of
standard prompts. Honestly, slidertype dashboards and page prompts
are less attractive. Here, Im talking
more about sliders used within analysis

Figure 4
oaug.org 33

Tip #6

Make BI
Interactive

Im a big proponent of the
interactive features of OBIEE 11g,
the wow factor it often has on users
and the overall role it has in making
BI actionable. The key component
of this in OBIEE is what is referred
to as the Action Framework, which
includes agents and actions. In many
respects, agents are the new generation
of iBots from 10g and earlier; they
enable business processes and provide
event-driven alerting, scheduled
content publishing and conditional
event-driven actions. Agents have
various subscription and recipient
options, and complex layered triggering
requirements can be implemented.

Moreover, alerts (via
agents) can be delivered:
1) To the alerts section of
the Home page.
2) To the first page of My Dashboard.
3) On any dashboard page.
4) Within the dialog displayed
from the Alerts! button
in the global header.
5) To specific delivery
devices (phones, etc.).

Finally, actions allow for
enabling navigation or invoking
of services or other requests.
Another interactive feature of
OBIEE 11g is Master-Detail Linking,
which is the interaction between separate
analyses (charts, reports). This capability
is helpful in making a dashboard page
come alive and effectively react to
the actions of the user. For example,
selecting a year, department or product
in one chart flows down to linked
charts or tables across the dashboard
the effect is great. At a high level,
this interaction is done by an event
34

OAUG solution

being initiated by a driving analysis

with other analyses listening for the
specified event. First, pick a driving
column (report element) on the Master
to initiate the event, also specifying a
channel name. Second, have the Detail
analyses listening; its possible to list
multiple event channels. In the end, it
is quite easy to set up and implement
for key dashboards in your OBIEE
11g deployment. This same linking
capability can be applied to maps.

Tip #7

Leverage
Integrated
Hyperion
Solutions

New with version 11.1.1.7, there
are many integrated Hyperion-related
tools. OBIEE adds these tools to the
list of BI desktop tools that are available
for download. The first tool is Oracle
Hyperion Smart View for Office,
which provides more robust features
than the previous/current BI Office
solution. Also, if Essbase is selected
as part of the installation, you get the
following: Oracle Hyperion Financial
Reporting Studio, Oracle Essbase
Studio Console and Oracle Essbase
Administrative Services Console.

To get Smart View set
up, follow these steps:

and clicking on the View Designer

option. Youll notice the subject
areas look familiar, and the user
interface is pretty self-explanatory.

Tip #8

I think most people who implement
technical solutions realize that you have
to be prepared for and offer solutions
to users of all types and skill levels.
That is no different with analytics
solutions, even though they are supposed
to be inherently straightforward.
With its core report building and
ad hoc capabilities, OBIEE 11g is,
in fact, quite easy for most users.

For those users who could benefit
from a wizard-driven approach, you
can enable BI Composer, a little known
component of OBIEE 11g. There is
some configuration required; those
steps are easily accessible online.

To turn BI Composer on, go to
account settings while logged into
OBIEE and set Analysis Editor to
Wizard (or turn Accessibility Mode
on in earlier 11g releases). Once this
mode is enabled, youll notice that your

1) Download and install from the BI

desktop tools area of home page.
2) Go into Microsoft Excel.
3) On SmartView ribbon,
click on Panel and set up
a Private Connection.
4) Choose OBIEE for the provider.
5) Enter Server and Credentials
(for the server, change as
follows:../analytics/jbips).

Once installed and configured,
one can begin designing and building
content by going to the Oracle BI
EE ribbon within Microsoft Excel

Consider All
of Your Users

Figure 5

oaug insight

options change in OBIEE and analysis

now means something different.

Creating a new analysis now
takes you to the BI Composer
wizard. (See Figure 5.)

This whole approach does not seem
well thought out, and Im uncertain as
to whether or not this functionality will
survive in future releases. It would have
been nice to have the option to use the
wizard or not without enabling a mode
that changes the process. Go ahead
and give it a try; it may be just what
some of your users are looking for.

Tip #9

Utilize Metrics
for System
Performance

The move to WebLogic has
additional benefits, as Enterprise
Manager (EM) now offers a ton of
information for you to assess and
investigate the performance of your
OBIEE 11g environments and
applications. By logging into EM,
navigating to the AdminServer area
and selecting Performance Summary
from the drop down menu at the top,
youll quickly gain access to a ton of
available performance metrics. These
include many variations around resource
usage and performance areas. Plus, the
timeframe to be analyzed can easily be
targeted with the on-screen options.
The metric palette on the right-hand
side of the Performance Summary
screen organizes the available metrics
for selection. (See Figure 6.)

Figure 6
But its important to be iterative and
make progress each time, offering
new, actionable content with every
release. Commit to a continuous
cycle of data gathering, analysis,
planning and action. (See Figure 7.)

I have found the following online
documentation areas and examples
quite helpful in starting with 11g:
l

Tip #10

BI is truly a process and an
evolution for any organization.
Depending on where you are starting,
goals can be conservative or aggressive.

Sample Applications:
Lite comes with installation.
Full version of SampleApp
available for download: http://
www.oracle.com/technetwork/
middleware/bi-foundation/
obiee-samples-167534.html

OBIEE Tutorials
(Oracle by Example):

and good luck with your OBIEE 11g

implementations! Many thanks to the
AST BI team members and Oracle
PTS BI experts that offered their
experience and insights to this article.

Patrick Callahan is the senior practice
director of Business Intelligence/EPM at
AST Corporation (astcorporation.com),
additionally product manager of ASTs
Grants Analytics and ASTRA BI
solutions for Airports and Transits. His
experience centers in BI and EPM, data
warehousing, program management,
Oracle Applications and core technologies.
Patrick has presented at Oracle OpenWorld,
COLLABORATE, Oracle Tech Days,
Oracle Developer Tools User Group
(ODTUG) and many regional conferences.

http://www.oracle.com/
technetwork/middleware/
bi-foundation/obieesamples-167534.html
l

Finally, Be
Iterative!

spring 2014

OBIEE Documentation:
http://download.
oracle.com/docs/cd/
E21764_01/bi.htm

Conclusion

In summary, OBIEE 11g
has a lot to offer. Digging in
and getting your hands dirty
is the way to go. Best wishes

Gather Data
Assets
Take
Action
Derive
Strategies

Consolidate
Information
Analyze &
Report Insights
Figure 7

oaug.org 35

global solutions

By Arthur Forbus and Tammy Norton,

Alvarez & Marsal Business Consulting

Get everyone
involved.

Know where
you are going.

Create a
project plan.

Define your
requirements.

Lessons on
Hyperion EPM
Implementations

Your road to
EPM success.

Over the past two decades we have learned a lot of lessons around what works and what doesnt when it comes
to implementing Oracle Hyperion Enterprise Performance Management (EPM). No two implementations are ever
the same, which is why we love the challenge. However, there are some best practices for enabling Hyperion EPM
technology into business processes that will allow you to enjoy success both during and after implementation.
Of utmost importance is determining
where you are going. Start with defining
an overall vision for performance
management. This should include strategic
modeling and planning, budgeting and
forecasting, and reporting and analytics; it
should not just be a plan for replacing your
Microsoft Excel spreadsheets for the close
and consolidation process with Oracle
Hyperion Financial Management (HFM),
for example. While the automation aspects
of HFM will bring relief to your hours of
data manipulation in Excel, you dont want
to have to re-implement when the business
changes suddenly or financial planning and
analysis (FP&A) decides it needs to get out
36

OAUG solution

of Excel as well. Create the roadmap and

then redesign your close and consolidation
process with an integrated vision for
performance management.
Second, you must get everyone
involved. This means engaging with
business users, accounting, FP&A,
the business units, and all of the key
stakeholders, not only at corporate, but
also in the field. Do not allow your project
to turn into a turnkey consulting project
in which you describe your requirements
and then months later the consulting team
hands you a manual and says, Call us
if you need us. Likewise, do not let the
project become an IT-only project. They

may get the software installed and turned

on, but you may spend years tweaking it
to your real requirements. The business
users must be involved with the Hyperion
EPM implementation from the beginning,
and that includes helping to establish the
vision and roadmap, defining requirements,
designing and building the technology, and
finally testing and deploying it. Then guess
what? It is back to the roadmap.
Now you are ready to leverage
a third best practice for Hyperion
EPM implementations: defining
your requirements. A great place to
start investigating requirements is by
documenting your existing processes using

oaug insight

Value Stream Mapping (VSM). The

traditional, detailed Visio process flows
usually get thrown away almost as soon as
you create them. The key with VSM is to
document key processes, looking for waste
and variation. Once you understand the
current processes, you can start thinking
about the future state processes, again
using VSMs. Use your own company,
benchmarking business units with each
other and looking for the best practices to
include in the future state processes. Also,
consider looking outside your company
to others in your industry with similar
size and complexity, as well as Hyperion
user groups. Both are great avenues for
exploring things others are doing that may
be adaptable to your business processes.
In addition to the VSMs, developing
a functional requirements document for
your Hyperion EPM implementation
should include the system technical design,
implementation cost, training cost and
rollout strategy. Design architects should
perform the functional and technical
design of the new system and produce the
design document, which will include the
detailed models of the system, such as the
application and infrastructure components,
metadata descriptions, dimensionality, data
flows and the details of each component of
the software. The functional requirements
document is critical to outlining whats
required in a new system. The document
should provide additional detail to the
overall functional scope of the project and
should also lay out the goals of the project,
key stakeholders, project assumptions
and project in/out of scope items. Other
important items to define are focused
on key features of the software related
to the functional and data components.
Non-functional focus is on the usability

Create the roadmap and

then redesign your close and
consolidation process with an
integrated vision for performance
management.

requirements, performance and operational

requirements, and user documentation.
And finally, the document should
explore security requirements and future
maintenance best practices.
After the requirements are complete,
the team should create a project plan
that lays out key dates, dependencies and
tasks. Once the functional requirements,
design document and project plan have
been signed off by the steering committee,
the exciting journey to implement the
technology can begin. In the end, the
amount of effort and time you put in before
you actually start touching the software will
determine the success of your Hyperion
EPM project and will provide an excellent
example to your stakeholders of what you
are proposing and what they can expect as
a result.
At an international offshore drilling
contractors recent Oracle Hyperion EPM
Suite implementation, each of these best
practices was employed. The company
established a vision, which included
guiding principles of:

spring 2014

These guiding principles were

established to address specific requirements
and resulted in a roadmap for the parallel
and global implementation of Hyperion
Financial Management, Financial Data
Quality Management, Planning, Essbase
Analytics Link and Financial Reporting.
The result was a journey from silos
and manual processes to an integrated
technology with appropriate automation.
Their need for integrated performance
management and the road they traveled
to achieve success while readying the
organization to continue its dynamic nature
in the global offshore drilling industry was
a result of following best practices before
the technology was even employed.
Following these best practices will go
a long way toward a successful Hyperion
EPM implementation that is both on time
and on budget, with the final product
being one that will be accepted by the
stakeholders as well as sustainable and
adaptable as your company grows.
Arthur Forbus is a managing director
with Alvarez & Marsal Business Consulting
where he specializes in integrated performance
management (IPM). Tammy Norton, a
managing director with Alvarez & Marsal,
focuses on the Oracle Hyperion Suite and
enterprise performance management (EPM).
Tammy is a member of the OAUG Board of
Directors.

Single, controlled source for all

financial data.

Consistent data model for both actuals

and planning information.

Collaborative project built by both

corporate and divisional stakeholders.

This article was originally

Reduced data manipulation, increased

time for analysis.

a TechTarget publication, and

published by SearchOracle.com,
is reprinted with permission.

Improved reporting detail.

oaug.org

37

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Breakout Sessions
7 p.m. - 10 p.m. COLLABO-CON Party

Friday, April 11
8 a.m. - 12 p.m. General Registration
8 a.m. - 8:30 a.m. Morning Coffee Break
8:30 a.m. - 1:15 p.m. OAUG Educational
Breakout Sessions and
SIG Meetings

At press time. Visit collaborate.oaug.org for updates.

*Pre-registration required. **Invitation only.

oaug.org 39

KEYNOTe

Adam Savage
Curiosity: Asking the Right Questions
Tuesday, April 8 | 9 a.m. 10 a.m.
Adam Savage is, in general, a maker of things. Adam may be best
known as the co-host of MythBusters on the Discovery Channel,
but he is also a longtime special-effects artist, fabricator, model
maker and general dreamer-upper who has worked on films such
as Galaxy Quest and The Matrix sequels as well as Episodes
I and II of the Star Wars series. As a self-described collector
of skills, Adam has spent his life gathering skills to allow him
to take what is in his brain and make it real. He is quite possibly
the ultimate combination of artist and scientist and brings that
analytical and creative mindset with him wherever his often
surprising pursuits take him. Join us Tuesday morning to enjoy
whats sure to be an extremely entertaining hour!

COLLABORATE WITH
Oracle Keynote
Wednesday, April 9 | 9:45 a.m. 10:45 a.m.

Oracle Roadmap Sessions

Tuesday, April 8

Gain a big-picture perspective on Oracle strategy and

innovation from a top executive to be announced soon.

Oracle E-Business Suite - Strategy, Update and Roadmap

Cliff Godwin, Senior Vice President, E-Business
Suite Development

Meet the Oracle Experts Daily, Tuesday-Thursday

An exclusive for OAUG attendees, meet with Oracle
executives during COLLABORATE. Topics include Oracle
E-Business Suite, Hyperion and Oracle Support Services.
Gain personal insight on your product investments.
Hands-On Usability Lab
The Oracle Applications User Experience invites Oracle
customers and partners to participate in a usability
feedback session at COLLABORATE. Gain knowledge
about new functionality directly from the source and
ultimately influence the direction of the Oracle products.

FOR MORE INFORMATION

PLEASE VISIT
COLLABORATE.OAUG.ORG/
EDUCATION/ORACLE

Oracle Cloud Applications (including Fusion Applications):

Strategy and Overview
Steve Miranda, Executive Vice President,
Applications Development
Oracle Hyperion Applications: Strategy and Roadmap
Al Marciante, Senior Director, Product Management
Build Mobile Apps, Extend Fusion Apps and Integrate
Cloud Apps with Fusion Middleware
Ed Zou, Vice President, Product Management
Oracle Primavera: PPM Trends, Drivers and
Future Direction
Paul Verveniotis, Senior Director, Product Strategy
Oracle Human Capital Management Cloud Service
Vision and Roadmap
Zachary Thomas, Vice President, HCM Strategy

ADVANCE discount expires APRIL 3, 2014

40

oaug c o n f e r e n c e s

EDUCATION Tracks & Session Highlights

Application Strategy
and Services
Discuss the overall strategy of Oracle
Applications through leadership, user
experience and integration sessions,
applying to all product lines, including
E-Business Suite, PeopleSoft and Siebel.
Sample Sessions:
Tuning an E-Business Suite R12.1
Environment at All Layers
Tips and Tricks for DBAs
Kaberi Nayak, MITRE Corporation

Business Intelligence /
Data Warehousing /
Enterprise
Performance
Management
BI and analytics are about better
decision making and supporting an
organizations competitive edge. Learn
how organizations are using BI to
transform their operations and sustain
their competitive advantage.
Sample Sessions:
Empowering Data-Driven Decisions
Utilizing Data Mining Through Business
Intelligence
John Loeffelbein, West Virginia University

E-Business Suite Upgrade Strategy

Session
James Morrow, Red River Solutions

Asset Lifecycle
Management
Organizations are realizing significant
cost savings and improved planning
capabilities through integration of the
entire asset lifecycle. From sourcing and
procurement through capitalization,
financial and operations management
and write-off, out-of-the-box enterprise
integration links all business functions
for complete asset visibility and control.
Sample Sessions:
How to Utilize Oracle Assets to Manage
Asset Movements Between Countries
Brian Bouchard, Northern Tier Energy
Learning About Tax Books
Aditi Mukherjee, Deloitte Consulting
India Pvt. Ltd.

Big Data
Big Data is driven by the massive
amounts of data collection mechanisms
in place today, for everything from
customer tracking to research projects
to financial transactions. Sessions
cover solutions like parallel processing
and innovative data mining solutions,
technologies like Hadoop and scalable
storage options.

How Rust-Oleum Embraced Unlimited

HFM Dimensionality to Meet Complex
Reporting Requirements
Kris Nelson, Rust-Oleum

C-Level Development
The C-Level Development track
provides the inspiration and know-how
you need to rediscover the value of
business fundamentals while continuing
to investigate the new systems,
processes, strategies and markets.
Sample Sessions:
An Alternative to Exadata for Large
Scale ERP Deployments
Cliff Burgess, Gentex Corporation
Rapid Deployment: 100 Countries, 100
Days, A Success Story
Sylvain St-Pierre, Food and Agriculture
Organization (FAO)

Cloud Computing
How do you determine if going to the
cloud is right for your company? Already
using the cloud? Learn some best
practices to make it more efficient. Private,
public and hybrid clouds are covered.

Sample Sessions:
Enhancing Application Analytics With
Oracle Big Data
Ajay Arora, Centroid Systems Inc.

Sample Sessions:
Oracle E-Business Suite In the Cloud:
From Install To Up and Running,
In 1 Hour
Jayaram Ampolu, Cerebra Consulting Inc.

Getting Started With Big Data 5 Game

Changing Use Cases
Richard Clements, IBM

Cloud Computing and the E-Business

Suite Panel
Ron Batra, AT&T

Customer Relationship
Management (CRM)
The customer is always right, so
you need to be right about your
customers. Creating profitable, loyal
customers is the ultimate goal of
customer relationship management
(CRM) customers who will continue
to buy from you when a competitive
alternative exists. Gain insight and
guidance from your peers who are
setting the standard for customercentric business transformations.
Sample Sessions:
Oracle Sales Cloud vs. Salesforce
Mike Schultz, WhiteLight Group
Provide an Exceptional Call Center
Experience With Clean Data
Michelle Kavalchuk, Experian

The 1250+ education

sessions at COLLABORATE are
organized into 23 tracks. Visit
collaborate.oaug.org for
extended track descriptions
and session abstracts.

Database
The Oracle relational database continues
to evolve and become even more
complicated. This track provides DBAs of
every experience level and industry with
the tools to productively and creatively
administer data.
Sample Sessions:
Getting Ready for 12.2: Edition-Based
Redefinition
Michael Brown, BlueStar Inc.
E-Business 12.2 Street Smarts:
2-ApplTops, 2-Database Editions and
2-Minute Patch Window Outages
Michael Barone, OATC, Inc.

= Track eligible
for credit

oaug.org

41

EDUCATION Tracks
& Session Highlights
Development
Working in application development
means learning an alphabet soup of
languages and performing a balancing act
between web-based, wireless and client/
server applications. This track covers
topics that surround the development and
deployment of your applications.
Sample Sessions:
E-Business Suite and Application
Express (APEX): Create a Custom
Personnel Action Application
Chad Johnson, Polk County Florida,
Board of County Commissioners

(cont.)

Human Capital
Management (HCM)

Master Data
Management (MDM)

This track discusses how Human

Capital Management can be employed
to improve workforce performance
to drive top line financial results
and covers processes ranging from
hire to retire and ways to improve
operating efficiencies and bottom-line
performance.

Master Data Management is a set of

disciplines, processes and technologies
for ensuring the accuracy, completeness,
timeliness and consistency of multiple
domains of enterprise data across
applications, systems and databases,
and across multiple business processes,
functional areas, organizations,
geographies and channels.

Sample Sessions:
Healthcare Reform at The Wendys
Company
Stephanie Shaw, The Wendys Company

Ten More Forms and OAF

Personalization Examples Version 3...
Updated for R12.2
Susan Behn, Infosemantics, Inc.

Modernize Your HR Practice! A Strategy

Session for Oracle Customers
Scott Ewart, Oracle

Engineered Systems

Manageability

High performance is key, but software

and hardware conflicts can sap your
speed. Maybe its time to consider
Engineered Systems and take
advantage of a pre-integrated solution
with some serious power. Learn how to
optimize your database performance,
decrease your time to production and
reduce your overall costs with the
family of products within this track.
Sample Sessions:
Virtualize Oracle E-Business Suite on Oracle
Exalogic with Extreme Performance
Srini Chavali, Oracle

Financial Modules
Financial Modules provides
the regimen needed to
maintain the health and well-being of
an organization. This track covers the
systems and processes that enable
efficient operations and support strong
internal financial controls.
Sample Sessions:
Entangled in the Currency Maze? A
Deep Dive with Oracle Tools on Rate,
Balances, Variances, Ledgers
Mrunal Potdar, Facebook
E-Business Suite Release 12 Best
Practices for Subledger Accounting and
the General Ledger
Alyssa Johnson, ROLTA

Manageability topics include change

management, configuration, diagnostics
and tuning, deployment and patching,
and data security.
Sample Sessions:
JVM / OACORE Memory Tuning Best
Practices for Oracle E-Business Suite
R12, A Customer Case Study
Udaya Peddibhotla, Apps
Associates LLC
Making Workflow Flow
Jerry Ireland, Rightsizing, Inc.

Manufacturing
In order to compete in the
manufacturing arena, companies must
deal with the pressures of globalization,
increasing supply chain complexity and
increasing customer expectations. Learn
how different companies are gaining a
competitive edge by building responsive
and lean manufacturing organizations.
Sample Sessions:
Case Study: Implementing Mobile Data
Collection in Release 12 for Process
Manufacturers
Jim Kruse, Blue Bell Creameries, LP
Shop Floor Scheduling for Configured
to Order Products at Emerson
Navneet Goel, Inspirage LLC

ADVANCE discount expires APRIL 3, 2014

42

oaug c o n f e r e n c e s

Sample Sessions:
Integrating Hyperion Planning
11.1.2.2 Applications with Oracle Data
Relationship Management (DRM)
James Minks, CSX Technology
Oracle EBS + DRM + Salesforce = Like
Peter Graham, Cervello

Middleware
The ever-changing mix of middleware
technologies might be your biggest
challenge, or your greatest opportunity.
Learn from Oracle experts on their
experience with application servers,
data integration, identity management,
service-oriented architecture, web
experience management, WebLogic
and more.
Sample Sessions:
SOA Quick Win Building an E-Business
Suite Interface With Oracle Service Bus
Dave Hebden, Akamai Technologies
WebLogic Server System Administration
Top Ten Fundamental Concepts
Shyam Kumar, Application Software
Technology (AST) Corporation

Primavera

Sales Order Fulfillment

Vertical industries are utilizing

Primavera PPM products to manage
projects throughout their lifecycles.
Successful implementation of Primavera
allows companies to utilize realtime data to reduce costs, optimize
resources, manage tasks, minimize risks
and meet delivery deadlines.

Sales Order Fulfillment applications

streamline and automate the entire
sales order management process, from
order promising and order capture to
transportation and shipment. Business
benefits include reduced fulfillment
costs, reduced order fulfillment cycle
time and improved order accuracy and
on-time delivery.

Sample Sessions:
Primavera Keynote Session
Dick Faris, Senior Vice President,
Primavera Global Business Unit, Oracle
Saving the World with Primavera Unifier
John Hovey, Engineering Applications
Manager, DFW International Airport

Professional Development
Its not enough these days to just know
how to tune a database or build a web
page. Skills like risk analysis, project
management, determining return on
investment, resolving conflicts and
team building are just as valuable in the
work place.
Sample Sessions:
The Winning Hand: Master Human Side
Change Management for Your Oracle
Application-Based Organization
Douglas Manning, Johns Hopkins
University Applied Physics Lab
5 Best Practices to Improve
Communication and Cooperation
Between Technical and Functional Areas
Emily OMara, Louisville Water

Project Portfolio
Management (PPM)
Whether in IT, delivering professional
services, constructing a bridge,
launching a global advertising campaign
or driving efficiencies around business
processes, this track will help you
leverage PPM into strategic advantage
via visibility and control into all stages
of the project lifecycle and by driving
transparency into business decisions.
Sample Sessions:
Cross Charging Best Practices for
Intercompany Cross Charge
Becky Alvarez, Rysigo Technologies
Corporation

Sample Sessions:
Best Practices in Warehouse Management
Lokesh Verma, Oracle
Delivering the Buns: How the Wendys
Company Implemented Oracles
Transportation Manager
Phil Kilgore, The Wendys Company

Security, Risk and

Compliance

Supplier Relationship Management

(SRM) is the integrated suite of
procurement applications that can assist
in managing supply costs. Enterprise
SRM reduces spend on goods and
services, streamlines procure-to-pay
processes and drives policy compliance.
Sample Sessions:
ASL, Sourcing Rules and Other
Procurement Mysteries
Bill Pick, Fujitsu Computer Products of
America
R12 Advance Procurement Solution
iSupplier Collaboration
Sridhar Edupalli, MARTA

Supply Chain

It makes sound business sense to

protect your reputation, remain
competitive, ensure your staff follows
your business processes and control
your business finances. Follow this
track if you are affected by government
regulations or industry requirements, or
you want to improve your management
of business risk.
Sample Sessions:
Enabling Shared Service Operations
Through Application Security
Phil Hartmann, Ernst & Young LLP
Oracle Exalogic Security Best Practices
and PCI Compliance
Kelly Goetsch, Oracle

When a performance-driven approach

is applied to a manufacturing-based
enterprise, an effective, streamlined
supply chain takes center stage. These
enterprises focus on performanceenhancing initiatives that let them
reduce inventories and operational costs
and improve customer service through
better, timelier product availability.
Sample Sessions:
Demand Driven Supply Chain Planning
in Healthcare
David McCormick, Kaiser Permanente
There and Back Again: A Diodes
Incorporated Demantra Tale
Karyn Guttman, Diodes Incorporated

Gather with attendees from your

region, PRODUCT OR INDUSTRY to
exchange ideas and resources.

OAUG Special Interest

Group (SIG) Meetings
Get the insights you need on a
particular product, function or
industry focus by connecting
to the OAUGs Special Interest
Groups.

Projects R12.X Features Finally, But

What Does It Mean to You?
Angela Bunner, Impac Services

Sourcing and
Procurement

OAUG Geographic User

Group (Geo) Meetings
Geo meetings will be held on
Wednesday, April 9, 2014,
from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m.
Details online.

oaug.org

43

NETWORKING
Monday, April 7

New Attendee Orientation

3:30 p.m. 4:30 p.m.

Join us for a conference overview and to hear tips on

making the most of your experience.

Meeting of the OAUG Members

5 p.m. 5:45 p.m.

Bring questions to this Q&A session to learn more about

the OAUG. Member, Innovator and Oracle Ambassador of
the Year are also honored here.

Upgrading to E-Business Suite R12: How-To, New

Features, Functionality and Better Ways to Do Things!
Excel-Based Reporting Alternatives for E-Business
Suite: An Excel4apps Interactive Workshop

OAUG Welcome Reception

6 p.m. 8 p.m.
Dal Toro Ristorante &
Exotic Car Museum

Simplify, Automate, and Enhance Management of

E-Business Suite (EBS) Applications

Fast cars, hot food, cool

drinks and more welcome
you to Las Vegas!

Tuesday,
April 8

Supercharge your week by adding one of these optional,

intensive workshops on Monday, April 7. An additional
fee is required; select and pay for this event during
conference registration. Descriptions are online at
collaborate.oaug.org/education/workshops.

Implementing FAH: A Step-Wise Approach

Maximizing ROI in your ERP, CRM and BI Investments
by Enhancing the Quality of Your Data
Oracle eBtax Debug and Optimize Your Tax Rules

Women in
Technology Lunch
12:30 p.m. 1:30 p.m.

Oracle E-Business Suite Release 12.2.2 Upgrade

Workshop: The Whole Nine Yards

Featured speaker is Jhone M.

Ebert, chief innovation and
productivity officer for Clark
County, Nevada, School District.

OAUG Membership Orientation

1 p.m. 1:30 p.m.
Discover the resources and unlimited
education the OAUG provides year-round.

Its a bird! Its a plane!

THURsday, April 10

Its the epic COLLABORATE

closing party! Experience the

Women in Technology
Panel Discussion
9:45 a.m. 10:45 a.m.

excitement of the legendary

R

Comic-Con, the epicenter of

comic book, science fiction and
fantasy fandom. Collabo-CON
delivers a night of super-

A moderated forum for discussing issues

faced by women in the technology field.

human fun with drinks, hors

doeuvres, games and
live music.

ADVANCE discount expires APRIL 3, 2014

44

oaug c o n f e r e n c e s

Tuesday, April 8
6:30 p.m. 8:30 p.m. - WELCOME RECEPTION

THURsday, April 10
10:45 A.m. 3 p.m.

Get in gear with

the crowd and
build some
energy to compete
against your fellow
attendees and have lots of fun as you win
cool prizes.

Tune In to the OAUG at COLLABORATE 14

Broadcasting live from the
OAUG membership booth at
COLLABORATE, RadiOAUG
features interviews with key
Oracle executives, session
presenters, product specialists
and OAUG leaders.

Solutions Spotlight

TUNE IN

Drop by for 30-minute educational

presentations on the Exhibitor Showcase floor.

REGISTRATION
OAUG

FULL CONFERENCE PASS

MEMBER

(APRIL 7-11, 2014)

Advance
Registration

Register online. For additional registration details and offers visit

collaborate.oaug.org. Questions? Contact Registration@oaug.com.
NON-MEMBER
RATE

RATE

GOVERNMENT

GOVERNMENT

RATE

RATE

(OAUG MEMBER)

(NON-MEMBER)

Staying within
COLLABORATE 14
hotel block

USD
$1,950

USD
$2,340

USD
$1,240

USD
$1,580

Outside
COLLABORATE 14
hotel block

USD
$2,150

USD
$2,540

USD
$1,440

USD
$1,780

USD
$2,275

USD
$2,670

USD
$1,600

USD
$1,830

On-site Registration

Book Hotel First and Save

Book your stay in the official conference headquarters

hotels, The Venetian and The Palazzo, to receive
significant conference registration savings. Use your
Hotel Acknowledgement Number during conference
registration to claim a $200 discount, which
can be combined with other registration discounts.
Reserve your hotel room through
collaborate.oaug.org/location/hotels only.

star

The OAUG thanks its 2014

PARTNER
Star Partners, who are
among the leading thirdparty solutions providers in the Oracle
community. It is through their continued
support that we are able to provide
OAUG members with outstanding
educational opportunities. Visit them in
the Exhibitor Showcase.

WEDNEsday, April 9
10:45 A.m. 3:15 p.m.
5:30 P.M. - 7 P.M. - HAPPY HOUR

THEgame

2014 STAR
Partners

2014

Exhibitor SHOWCASE

AVAILABILITY

February 13
through
April 3, 2014

After
April 3, 2014

OAUG Members Save

A membership in the OAUG ($920 annually for
organizations that are licensed users of Oracle
Applications) provides valuable training and
networking benefits to your entire company all
year, and significant savings on COLLABORATE 14
registration up to $395 per person!

oaug.org

45

oaug sig update

Update on
Special Interest Groups (SIGs)
2014 Special Interest Groups

What is a Special Interest

Group (SIG)?

ADI SIG
l AP SIG*
l AR, Credit & Collections SIG
l Archive & Purge SIG
l Assets SIG*
l BI Publisher SIG
l Change Management SIG
l Channel Revenue SIG
l Communications
Billing and Revenue
Management (BRM) SIG
l Communications MetaSolv
Solution SIG
l Configurator SIG*
l Consumer Goods SIG
l Contracts SIG
l Cost Management SIG*
l Customer Experience
Community (CXC)
CRM On Demand SIG
Siebel SIG
l Customization and
Extension SIG
l Database SIG*
l Demantra SIG
l Discrete Manufacturing SIG*
l E-Business Applications
Technology SIG*
l E-Business Suite SIG
l E-Business Suite User
Management SIG*
l EDI (e-Commerce Gateway) SIG
l Endeca SIG
l Energy & Utilities SIG
l Engineering & Construction SIG
l Enterprise Asset
Management (EAM) SIG*
l

Special Interest Groups (SIGs) are

user groups that bring together members
that share a common interest with specific
Oracle Applications products. SIGs
may also bring together members that
represent a specific industry, such as the
public sector or manufacturing. Additional
SIGs are affiliated in response to the
development and expansion of the family
of Oracle Applications. SIGs are open for
worldwide membership and operate online
communities, with many hosting meetings
at the annual COLLABORATE or Oracle
OpenWorld conferences.
A complete list of SIGs, upcoming
meetings, website addresses and contact
information is available at oaug.org under
the User Communities tab.

l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l
l

Enterprise Manager SIG

Federal SIG
Financial Services Industry SIG
Fusion Middleware SIG
General Ledger (GL) SIG*
Governance, Risk &
Compliance SIG
Government Contractor SIG
Higher Education SIG
Hyperion SIG*
Incentive Compensation SIG
K-12 Education SIG
Logistics SIG
Master Data Management SIG
Migration and Integration SIG
Multi-National/Multi-Org SIG
Oracle Agile/
Enterprise PLM SIG
Oracle Business Intelligence
Big Data SIG (OBI-BD SIG)*
Oracle Primavera SIG (OPSIG)
Order Management &
Advanced Pricing (QP) SIG
Oracle Tax Management SIG
OTM SIG
Process Manufacturing SIG*
Procurement SIG
Projects SIG*
Public Sector SIG*
Quality SIG
SysAdmin SIG
UPK SIG
Upgrade SIG*
Value Chain Planning SIG
WebCenter SIG
Workflow SIG

* Special Acknowledgement 2013 OAUG Geo/SIG

Certificate of Distinction Award recipient
46

oaug GEOS & SIGS

oaug.org

A LEARNING OPPORTUNITY
OAUG associate members have the
opportunity to host educational sessions,
which are held several times each month.
These interactive webcasts provide
information about a variety of products
and services that complement Oracle
Applications. Visit oaug.org and click
on the Partners tab for details.

If you are an Associate member of the OAUG and

would like to host a Vendor Awareness session, visit
oaug.org and click on the Partners tab, or send an
e-mail to mnessing@oaug.com, or call +1 404.760.8179.

OAUG Vendor
Awareness Sessions

Reserve your session today!

oaug geo update

Update on
Geographic User Groups (Geos)

Geographic user groups (Geos) are independent OAUG affiliated user

groups that bring together a variety of Oracle Applications users within

a defined geographic region. Geos create opportunities for members to
discuss a variety of applications and share ideas. Currently, the OAUG has
Geo affiliates in the continental United States, Canada, AsiaPac, Latin
America and EMEA.

There are many benefits of membership and participation in a users

local Geo. These benefits include:

l Communication with OAUG members to learn tips and tricks for
installation, integration, utilization and maintenance of Oracle
Applications.

l Knowledge of best practices from colleagues utilizing Oracle

Applications.
l Local meetings and training sessions featuring Oracle experts.
l Direct access to local Oracle management and much more.

l Atlanta

OAUG*
(Australia)
l British Columbia OAUG
l Calgary OAUG
l Central States OAUG*
l Colorado OAUG
l DC-OAUG
l Eastern States OAUG
l Florida OAUG*
l German Oracle Users Group (DOAG)
l Heartland OUG
l India OAUG*
l Japan-OAUG
l Latin OAUG*
l Michigan OAUG*
l Mid-Atlantic OAUG
l Middle East OUG
l Netherlands OAUG
l Nevada OAUG*
l New England OAUG*
l New Jersey OAUG
l New South Wales OAUG
l North Central OAUG*
l Northern California OAUG*
l Northern Ohio OAUG*
l Northwest OUG
l NYC Metro OAUG (New York City)
l Ohio Valley OAUG*
l ORAUG-Brazil
l Pittsburgh OAUG
l Queensland OAUG
l San Diego OAUG
l South Central OAUG
l South Texas OAUG
l Southern Australia OAUG
l Southern Ontario OAUG
l Southwest Regional OAUG*
l Twin Cities Financials OAUG
l Twin Cities Manufacturing OAUG
l Victorian OAUG
l Western Australia OAUG
l Ausoug

What is a Geographic User Group (Geo)?

2014 Geographic User

Groups

A complete list of Geo groups, upcoming meetings, website

addresses and contact information is available at oaug.org under the

User Communities tab.

Geos and SIGs serve the grassroots of the Oracle

community and offer additional educational
opportunities and new product enhancements through
their links with Oracle Corporation.

* Special Acknowledgement 2013 OAUG

Geo/SIG Certificate of Distinction Award
Recipient
4488

oaug GEOS & SIGS

Why Belong to the OAUG?

Thousands of organizations around the world make up the
Oracle Applications Users Group (OAUG). These companies
know that through the OAUG their employees are equipped
to improve efficiency, enhance problem solving, and spark
innovation through opportunities for education, networking,
and influence.

Education
OAUG membership includes extensive educational
opportunities for employees to enhance their knowledge
and expertise and stay up to date on the latest information
in order to maximize return on the organizations significant
investment in Oracle Applications.

Networking
One of the greatest strengths of the OAUG is connecting real
users with others who can provide tips, ideas, best practices
and share real-time solutions. Employees of OAUG member
organizations are connected with thousands of colleagues
and counterparts in other companies who are facing the
same issues.

Influence
Oracle listens to the collective voice of the OAUG. Joining
with hundreds of other member organizations provides
unprecedented access to Oracle executives who want
to hear real customers experiences and suggestions for
enhancements.

Discover the benefits of OAUG

membership today!

92% of OAUG members would

recommend membership.
Heres why:
OAUG is a great source of information
and networking.
OAUG is THE group for the Oracle user
community. Opportunities abound for
education and networking among your peers.
Essential membership for anyone who uses
Oracle Applications. Its a bargain!
It is a very good resource for problem solving
involving Oracle issues. In the past, I found
other users were an invaluable resource.
OAUG is a great users group for anyone that
uses/develops/ manages any of the Oracle
Product Line.
If you own, use, or implement Oracle
Applications there is an extraordinary value
proposition in the very modest membership fee.
OAUG is fantastic resource for users to engage
others users for knowledge and updates of
Oracle applications, hardware needs and
software, training and expertise from user
perspective.
The influence that OAUG has with Oracle has
been instrumental in saving our company
time and money with the Oracle applications
investment.

www.oaug.org/membership
membership@oaug.com
+1 404.240.0897

The benefit in networking and education

provided to a user of Oracle Applications is so
great that all users should participate
in the Organization.

oaug.org

Member Benefit Showcase

Tune in to
the OAUG for
Education
The OAUG broadcasts time-saving
and efficiency-building knowledge
to individuals at thousands of
member companies worldwide.
Through the OAUG, you can find
numerous opportunities to access
and exchange information, build
knowledge and capabilities, and
find solutions. If youre looking
for ways to improve efficiency,
enhance problem solving and spark
innovation, take a look at the many
types of education available through
the OAUG.

Conferences
OAUG conferences provide
unparalleled opportunities for you
to increase your knowledge. During
these events youll learn about best
practices, hear from real users and
discover tips for improving efficiency.
The annual COLLABORATE
conference features real-world,
in-depth education presented in
hundreds of sessions over just
a few days. Plan now to attend
COLLABORATE 14, April 7-11, 2014,
in Las Vegas. Get all the details and

50 50

view the comprehensive educational

program at collaborate.oaug.org.
OAUG Connection Point
conferences are smaller and more
focused on a particular topic or area
of interest. If you are involved in
the technical side of things, youll
want to attend the OAUG Connection
Point AppsTech July 22-23, 2014,
in Pittsburgh, PA.

Conference Paper
Database
Attending live events is great, but
often you need a quick answer right
away. The all-new OAUG Conference
Paper Database is the place to turn.
All of the papers and presentations
from COLLABORATE and OAUG
Connection Point conferences are
stored and easily accessible in the
new Conference Paper Database. You
can quickly and easily search by topic
or key word or browse through papers
from a particular event.
Everyone can view and search the
OAUG Conference Paper Database,
but only OAUG member company
employees can download the papers
and presentations.

oaug m e mb e r b e n e f i t s

eLearning
Convenient, relevant and free for
OAUG members, OAUG eLearning
brings exceptional educational
content to your desktop or mobile
device. Each hour-long webinar is
presented live by a subject matter
expert. Participants in the live
webinars can ask questions and
interact with the presenter. In
addition, recordings of each session
are available online following the
presentation.
Most of the OAUG eLearning
live sessions and recordings are
only available to OAUG member
company employees. However, some
OAUG Geo and SIG groups sponsor
webinars that are open to everyone.
If your organization is not an
OAUG member yet, please join
online or contact the membership
staff at membership@oaug.com
or +1 404.240.0897 so that you
and all of your co-workers can
take advantage of the educational
opportunities available to OAUG
member company employees.

oaug.org

TUNE IN

to the OAUG

The Oracle Applications Users Group (OAUG)

broadcasts time-saving and efficiency-building
knowledge to individuals at thousands of
member organizations worldwide.
Tune in for Education: get instant
access to solutions to real problems
through conferences, webinars, and an
extensive conference paper database.
Tune in for Networking: connect
with other people who are using the
same applications and share ideas and
best practices.

OAUG

Tune in for Influence: share your thoughts

and suggestions with Oracle through the
OAUG. Oracle listens to the collective
voice of OAUG members.

92%
of OAUG members
would recommend
OAUG membership

Visit www.oaug.org/membership or
call +1 404.240.0897 to discover
the benefits of tuning in to the
OAUG for you and your organization.

Visit the OAUG membership booth at

COLLABORATE 14 to learn more and win prizes!

global users

OAUG Member Snapshot:

The OAUG Board of Directors
Welcomes Three New Members in 2014.

The Oracle Applications Users

Group (OAUG) Board of Directors
provides leadership, influence and
guidance to drive and enhance the
focus of the OAUG. In following the
mission of the OAUG, the board works
with the OAUG Executive Director to
create a strategic plan for the year that
supports the views of the members
and works to enhance the capabilities
of the organization.
Joining the OAUG Board in
2014 are:

Karen Brownfield, Oracle

Practice Director, Infosemantics,
Associate Member Organization:
Brownfield
has more
than 35
years of
experience
programming,
installing
and
managing
applications
used in various industries, and during
the past 22 years she has focused
on Oracle Applications, specializing
in project management, financials,
workflow and system administration.
Oracle awarded her ACE certification in
2009, and she is also a certified Oracle
E-Business Suite GL/AP and Oracle

52

O A U G m e mb e r s h i p

Fusion GL implementer. Brownfield

has made extensive contributions to
the OAUG, serving various leadership
roles in OAUG committees and special
interest groups (SIGs) since 1994.

Whats an example of a costor time-saving payoff your

organization has realized as
the result of being an OAUG
member?
Patch Wizard is part of the free tools
Oracle provides to its customers.
I learned about this tool at one of
the OAUG conferences. During an
implementation, UAT had started when it
was learned that patches were missing.
I was able not only to identify which
patches were missing, but what tests
had to be redone. Had it not been for
this knowledge obtained at an OAUG
conference, UAT would have been
rescheduled, the go-live would have been
missed and thousands of extra dollars
spent.

Oracle values interaction with

its users groups as well as the
feedback it receives from user
group members. How does the
OAUG facilitate that?
The OAUG was founded to provide
feedback from the customer base to
Oracle. Over the years the relationship
has developed to where Oracle sees
the OAUG as a valuable resource for
input into improvements for using and

maintaining the various products. The

methods vary from customer councils,
interaction with the SIGS, enhancements
and interaction and collaboration at
conferences. The OAUG comprises
Oracle customers and partners and,
thus, provides a collective voice that is
beneficial to all parties.

Daniel McGarry, Vice President

of Application Services, Parsons
Brinckerhoff, User Member
Organization:
Daniel
McGarry has
extensive
knowledge
of Oracle
E-Business
Suite
financial,
human
resources
and project
accounting modules and, more recently,
managing implementations of Oracle
CRM On-Demand, User Productivity Kit
and an upgrade to R12. He is a 12-year
employee of Parsons Brinckerhoff, a
global organization that assists public
and private clients to plan, develop,
design, construct, operate and maintain
hundreds of critical infrastructure
projects around the world. Daniels
oversight areas include managing the
ERP landscape, corporate applications

The OAUG was founded to provide feedback from the customer

base to Oracle. Over the years the relationship has developed to
where Oracle sees the OAUG as a valuable resource for input into
improvements for using and maintaining the various products.

Ketan Thanki, Director

strategy, identifying key technology

and operational drivers, recommending
software solutions and working with
internal customers to envision future
technology needs.

of Enterprise Applications,
Geokinetics, User Member
Organization:

Do you have a favorite OAUG

program or activity?
You cant beat Collaborate for
value. I get great value from the OAUG
Conference Paper Database, but its not
the same as hearing from the presenter
and being able to ask questions.

COLLABORATE 14 is coming
up. Whats your strategy for
getting the most from the OAUG
conference experience?
Plan your sessions well in advance and
try and get to sessions early as the most
popular sessions fill up quickly. I always
leave one or two sessions open to walk
the vendor booths and baseline my
understanding of the Oracle ecosystem
provided by third parties. Its amazing
the number of times I have said I know
how I can solve that problem based
on earlier discussions with vendors at a
conference.

You cant beat COLLABORATE for

value . . . Plan your sessions well

What keeps our members up at

night? How can the OAUG help?

An OAUG
member
since 2000,
Ketan
Thanki has
been a
coordinator
of the
Procurement
Special
Interest
Group (SIG) from August 2009 till
November 2013, a past member of
the Oracle Usability Advisory Board
for two years and a staunch advocate
of the OAUG. At Geokinetics, he has
been instrumental in stabilizing the
Oracle E-Business Suite Release 12
environment by upgrading it to version
12.1.3. Thanki has also deployed an
ad-hoc reporting solution to enable the
business to analyze data directly from
Oracle E-Business Suite.

The pace at which technology progresses

and the improvements that software
vendors make are much faster than
customers can consume, especially in
an ERP environment. Therefore, it is
a constant challenge for IT leaders to
convince their user base to keep up
with technology. The OAUG can assist by
providing appropriate upgrade practices
and knowledge sharing among its many
members.
Serving on the 2014 OAUG Board of
Directors are:

What advice do you have

for leaders in OAUG member
organizations to help them get
the most from their membership?
I recommend making full use of the
OAUG Conference Paper Database,
the knowledgebase that OAUG has
built over a period of time. Since the
knowledgebase is now searchable

in advance and try and get to

sessions early as the most popular
sessions fill up quickly.

through Google, too, it should be a lot

easier to query them.

Dana Bartolf, CH2M Hill Corporation

Karen Brownfield, Infosemantics, Inc.
John Bushell, JT&M Bushell
Mark Clark, O2Works
Dr. Patricia Dues, City of Las Vegas
Melissa English, Alticor
Peter Gee, Ryerson University
Joseph Imbimbo, PPG Industries, Inc.
Daniel McGarry, Parsons Brinckerhoff
Alyssa Johnson, Rolta
Tammy Norton, Alvarez & Marsal
Business Consulting LLC
Donna Rosentrater, Cobham plc
Ketan Thanki, Geokinetics, Inc.
Rob Tudor, Individual Associate
Margaret Wright, Southern Company.

oaug.org

53

global users

New and Returning Members

Returning
Associate
Members:
Avata
BIAS Corporation
Blue Dot Solutions
Cerebra Consulting Inc.
Compuware
Config Consultants
Creative Consulting
Solutions, Inc.
Delphix
DiCentral, Corp
Enterprise Solutions Group
Grant Thornton LLP
IBM Corporation
Impac Services
Infosemantics, Inc.
IngenuitE, Inc.
Innovus Partners
Intelligo, Inc.
Kofax
Loftware, Inc.
MOD43
Neocortex, Inc
Performance Architects, Inc.
Primus Delphi Group GmbH
Resources Global
Professionals (RGP)
SafeNet, Inc.
Signum Group
SmartDog Services
STR Software
Synaptis
The Goal Getters

Returning
Individual
Associate
Members:
Catapult Consulting, Inc.
JRB Engineering Pty. Ltd.
JT&M Bushell
Niveus Consulting LLC
VLAD Group, Inc.

54

Returning
User Members:
Avio Consulting
CSC
Data Communication
Solutions (DCS)
Hitachi Consulting - US
Revitas
Secure-24
SkyBridge Global

New Associate
Members:
24 Hour Fitness, Inc.
ABS Global, Inc.
ACCO Brands
Acushnet Rubber Co.
Inc., DBA Precix
ADT Security Services, LLC
Ag Processing Inc.
Albany Molecular
Research, Inc.
Almac Group
Amalgamated Life
Insurance Company
American Commercial Lines
American Tire Distributors
AmeriPride Services Inc.
Ames True Temper
Analytic Services Inc.
Anchor Packaging
Arizona Public Service (APS)
ATI Allvac
Azz
BAE Systems - Land
& Armaments
BAE Systems Australia LTD
Barrick Gold Corp.
Bechtel Marine Propulsion
Corporation
BioMarin
Blood Systems Inc.
BlueStar
Boston Consulting Group
Brasfield and Gorrie
British Defence Staff - US
California Institute of
Technology (Caltech)
Callista Software Services

oaug
O A U G GEOS
m e mb e&rSIGS
s h i p

Camping World, Inc.

Canadian Forest Products
Ltd. (Canfor)
Capital BlueCross
Capital One
Cato Corporation
CB Consulting WA Pty. Ltd.
CBS Corporation
Celgene Corp
Centers for Medicare and
Medicaid Services
Central Arizona Project
Charles Darwin
University (CDU)
City of Atlanta
City of Burbank
City of Moncton
CNO Financial Group
Comverse
Cox Communications
Dallas Market Center
Darden Restaurants (GMRI)
Datacard Group
DEMDACO
Dept. of Treasury &
Finance ICT Services
Dialog Pty. Ltd.
DOI, Interior Business
Center
DreamWorks
Animation SKG
Dresser-Rand Company
Duke Energy
Dunkin Brands, Inc.
Elliott Company
Emerson Electric Co.
Enabil Solutions, Canada
ESCO Corporation
ExactTarget
Excel4apps Australia
Experian
Farwest Steel Corp.
Fermilab
Ferrotec (USA) Corporation
Fidelity Investments
Fiteni International, LLC
Foremost Farms USA
Garmin International
Gaylord Entertainment
Gear For Sports
Gentex Corporation

Georgia Tech
Research Corp.
Gopher Sport
Government of
Newfoundland
and Labrador
Greater Cleveland Regional
Transit Authority
Greater Toronto Airports
Authority (GTAA)
Hartz Mountain Corporation
Harvard Business
Publishing
Helena Chemical Company
Helix ESG
Hitachi Data Systems
HomeAway, Inc.
Hormel Foods Corporation
HP Australia Pty. Ltd.
Hyatt Corporation
IMS Health
INC Research Inc.
Indianapolis Power
and Light Co.
Ingersoll Rand Company
Intelligrated Inc.
Interval Holdings, Inc.
Ithaca College
J.G. Boswell Company
Jacksonville Aviation
Authority (JAA)
JT3
Key Energy Services
Kirby Corporation
Knouse Foods
Cooperative, Inc.
Knowles Electronics
L.S. Starrett Company
Landor Associates
Law School Admission
Council
Lee County Clerk of Courts
Lee County Electric
Cooperative, Inc. (LCEC)
Leupold and Stevens
Liquor Control Board
of Ontario (LCBO)
LKQ Corporation
Macys Department Stores
Maricopa Community
Colleges

Mars Chocolate
North America
Masco Cabinetry
Masters Australia
McGraw Hill Financial
McGraw-Hill Education
McKee Foods Corporation
M-D Building Products
Merrill Corporation
Metropolitan Water
District Of S. CA
MFA Oil Company
MidAmerican Energy
Company
Minnesota Power (Allete)
Minnkota Power
Cooperative, Inc.
MITRE Corporation
Mountaire Farms
National Retail
Properties, Inc.
National Rural Electric
Cooperative
Association (NRECA)
NCH Corporation
NEC IT Solutions
Australia Pty. Ltd.
Nifco America Corp
NIH Business Systems
Noble Energy
North Atlantic Refining Ltd.
Nucor
Ocean Optics, Inc.
Oncall DBA
Oregon Health & Science
University (OHSU)
OXY, Inc.
PAREXEL International
Corporation
Paychex
PEMCO Mutual
Insurance Company
Phoenix Park Gas
Processors Limited
POWER Engineers, Inc.
Progressive Corporation
QLogic Corporation
R. Torre and Company
Racing & Wagering WA
Rafael
Railinc

The OAUG welcomes the following new and

returning members who joined October 1, 2013
through January 31, 2014.
ResCare
Research Foundation of SUNY
Ricoh US Office Solutions
Ritchie Bros Auctioneers
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
Rochester Institute of Technology
Rochester Midland Corp.
Rockwell Collins
Rosendin Electric, Inc.
Sandia National Laboratories
Sargent & Lundy
Saskatoon Health Region
SaskTel
Schnitzer Steel Industries, Inc.
School Specialty
SDS Group Pty. Ltd.
Seacor Holdings, Inc.
Silgan Plastics Corp
SimplexGrinnell
Sleepys LLC
Sonoco Products Co.
South African Reserve Bank
South Mississippi Electric
Power Association
Southwest Gas Corporation
Southwestern Energy
SP Plus
Spyglass Corporate
Services Group
State Trustees Limited
Stowers Institute
Sturm, Ruger & Co. Inc.
Suncorp Group Limited
Sybron Dental Specialties
T. Rowe Price Associates
The Talbots, Inc.
The University of Melbourne
Tootsie Roll
Trimble
TRI-MET
Tri-State Generation &
Transmission
United States Enrichment
Corporation
University of Alabama at
Birmingham (UAB)
University of Chicago Hospitals
University of Virginia - ISDS
University of Waterloo
ValueOptions, Inc.
VeriSign Inc.

ViaSat
Visa Inc.
Wabtec
Washington County
Wells Gardner Electronics
Corporation
Wilsonart, LLC
Xilinx, Inc.
Yokohama Tire Corporation
Zebra Technologies Corporation

New Associate
Members:
Avout
Infosenseglobal Inc.
Jibe Consulting, Inc.
Mastech Corporation
Panaya
Seagull Scientific
The Pythian Group (Canada)
Thridware Solution

New Individual
Associate
Members:
Abhay Agarwal
Neopoint Consulting, Inc.
S2L, LLC
Suraj Kumar
Techno Professionals Inc.
ZabbTech LLC

New User
Members:

Advanced Technology
Materials, Inc. (ATMI)
Evraz NA
LifeCell
Pepsi Beverages Company
Republic National
Distributing Company
Rubicon
Sonic Corporation
Stewart & Stevenson LLC
STP Nuclear Operating Company
Terex Corporation

oaug.org

Special Advertising Section

oaug
strategies
vendor
corner

Smarter Database
Partitioning Gives Leading
Enterprises an Edge

W
Informatica is a 2014
OAUG Star Partner

LEVEL three

hat does an electronic

components leader and a global
500 telecommunications, cable
and broadband services provider have in
common? They leveraged a new approach
for managing their Oracle E-Business
Suite data based on Oracle database
partitioning with Informatica to improve
performance while lowering infrastructure
costs and simplifying DBA operations.

Editors Note: The Vendor Corner section of OAUG Insight provides

information on products from OAUG vendor members. The OAUG does not
specifically endorse any product or service from any of our vendor members.

56

v e ndor c o r n e r

vendor corner

Special Advertising Section

oaug insight

Taking Control of
Growing Oracle E-Business
Suite Data Sets
An electronic components
leader took control of data growth
in an Oracle E-Business Suite
12 environment as they fought
to efficiently manage growing
ERP data volumes. The data
footprint caused degradation in
performance, impacting end users
and financial analysts. Performance
needed to be fixed and a hardware
upgrade was not an option.
We had some quite serious
performance problems owing to
large transaction data volumes in our
Oracle E-Business Suite environment,
and most attempts to curb the growth
and tune the performance met with
limited success, explains the director
of IT infrastructure. We tried
tuning the SQL, for example, but six
months later we were back where we
started, with reduced performance.

Smarter Partitioning
Improves Oracle E-Business
Suite Performance
By deploying a solution
that automatically segments the
Oracle data against specific Oracle
E-Business Suite criteria, each
segment can be accessed and
managed as an individual unit while
maintaining referential integrity.
This ensures end users benefit from
improved performance without
changing how they leverage the data
because each segment can be accessed
and managed individually. For this
enterprise, reports that took two
hours now complete in 20 minutes.
The Smart Partitioning solution
from Informatica makes sense on

spring 2008

Informatica Data Archive Smart Partitioning

fixed degrading performance of the sales
commission system at a fraction of the cost
of using a new purpose built storage server.
Senior Applications Database Administrator, cable
entertainment and broadband services provider
so many levels. You get all of the
benefits of deleting the data, without
deleting it using a non-intrusive
platform. The technology has not
only transformed our application
performance and reduced complexity,
it has also significantly lowered the
cost of data and streamlined the way
we manage this critical environment.
We have seen a gain in
performance. We are looking to
implement more modules in full
scale and explore the option of
multi-tier storage and restricting
the data while refreshing the
Test and Development, etc.
http://www.techvalidate.com/
product-research/informaticaapplication-ilm/case-studies/
421-719-E2F

Smart Partitioning Increased

Application User Adoption and
Streamlined DBA Operations
Large data volumes impacted
a global telecommunications
enterprises ability to gain acceptance
by its sales team due to unacceptable
performance of its Oracle E-Business
Suite incentive compensation
implementation. We had reached
a point where the business users
were not able to use the application
efficiently, said the global

telecommunications IT Architect.
Archiving was not an option, nor was
upgrading the hardware platform.
Using the Informatica Smart
Partitioning solution, they have
increased sales growth by improving
the performance of the sales
commission system, lowered the
time needed to process data by one
fourth and reduced the demand
for storage by 200 GB per quarter.
This was accomplished with the
existing hardware without the need
to archive or purge production data.
Backups, clones and
maintenance were taking multiple
day outages to accomplish.
We had three full-time DBAs
working on maintenance and
performance. We now have one
full-time and one part-time DBA
to accomplish the same tasks.
http://www.techvalidate.com/
product-research/informaticaapplication-ilm/case-studies/
3A9-97F-577
To learn more about a joint
solution between Oracle and
Informatica Smart Partitioning:
http://www.informatica.com/us/
solutions/solutions-for-applications/
Oracle/

oaug.org

57

OAUG Connection Point AppsTech

July 22-23, 2014
Pre-conference Training:
July 21, 2014
Pittsburgh Marriott City Center
Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Presented by the OAUG, Pittsburgh OAUG, DC-OAUG,
NorCal OAUG and the OAUG Database, Workflow,
EBS Apps Tech, and Upgrade SIGs

This event is for YOU if you are a:

Oracle Applications Database Administrator
Oracle Applications Developer
Systems Administrator, Middleware Technologist or
Security Officer supporting Oracle E-Business Suite
OAUG Connection Point AppsTech is for technologists that support Oracles E-Business
Suite of Applications. Experts from Oracle will share details about Release 12.2, Oracle
Enterprise Database 12C and product direction for the entire Oracle E-Business Suite
technology stack, while industry experts and Oracle E-Business Suite customers will share
key insights into how the technology works and how to resolve common problems related
to application upgrades and lifecycle management.

TOPICS WILL INCLUDE:

KEY DATES:

April 1, 2014: Registration opens

April 20, 2014: Deadline to submit
presentation proposals

Applications Strategy and Service

Applications Development
Business Intelligence/ BI Analytics
Database
Middleware
Upgrading

Register, submit a presentation proposal or get more information at cp.oaug.org today!

58

oracle directions

Closer to Home
Should human capital management activity
move away from shared service centers?
By Laura Schaulat

ver the last 15 years,

many organizations
have standardized
processes and consolidated costs
through the shared service model.
This transition was enabled
in part by a common global
technology platform, surfaced in
local languages. That platform
also laid the foundation for the
next development cycle of human
resources (HR) process maturity:
a slight swing of the pendulum
back toward localization, as HR
leaders realize that one size does
not fit all for HR shared services.

relocalization of specific human capital management

(HCM) activities makes sense and adds value. In the
hybrid model of combining shared service centers
with select local support, as described by global
consulting firm Mercer, local HR managers provide
employee support for complex, sensitive issues best
handled in person for example, union relations.

A Focus on Talent Management

Taking a closer look at Mercers top activities

for local HR managers, many are focused on talent

management, including onsite talent acquisition
activities, onboarding and ongoing training delivery.
It is no surprise to see talent at the top of the action
items. Moving to shared services and cleaning up the
transactional side of HCM has enabled the heads of HR

There are several situations in which some

oaug c o n n e c t i v i t y

CEOs say attracting and keeping

younger workers is one of their
biggest talent challenges.
At the same time,
emerging markets
have left a talent
war in their wake.

organizations to focus on strategic business priorities.

One top priority and concern is talent in particular,
younger talent in emerging markets. CEOs say
attracting and keeping younger workers is one of their
biggest talent challenges. At the same time, emerging
markets have left a talent war in their wake. To win that
talent war, fuel growth and increase retention, executives
need to relate to both new talent and existing employees.

oaug.org

59

The next generation of talent is increasingly

The next generation of

based in emerging markets. As reported by PwC,

talent is increasingly based in

workers in these markets want continuous learning

emerging markets . . . workers

and development, and they expect to have many

careers during their working lives. Thanks to the

in these markets want continuous

global economic recession, baby boomers are forced to

learning and development, and

maintain employment longer than expected, and global

they expect to have many careers

corporations prefer to ride out these troubled times

with seasoned personnel rather than taking a chance

during their working lives.

on the younger generation. So our budding talent has

been forced to take a back seat in recent years. Its no
wonder they are described as loyalty lite and express

Key Considerations

decreasing employer loyalty every year. They havent

had the best start to their careers, and they are primed

No matter what the driver for making select HCM

relocalizations, there are some key considerations and

to vote with their feet. Organizations will have to

principles that HR leaders should think through and

work harder on a local level to keep them interested.

follow. First of all, ensure that shared service centers

continue to provide transactional support, or risk a
pendulum swing all the way back to the suboptimal
local HR model. Second, utilize data to understand
which geographies to target for relocalization by
leveraging talent management systems and business
intelligence. For example, companies can analyze
their global talent footprint, focusing on key roles
affecting the business. Where is that footprint
today, and where will they be in three years? Finally,
review the relocalization strategy on an annual basis

Be sure to ask your software vendors with integration to Oracle

to ensure that it evolves along with the business.

Applications if they have Oracle Validated Integration.

and making strategic changes will ensure that the

With Oracle Validated Integration, Oracle Applications

customers can be confident that a partners integration has

pendulum swing toward relocalization adds value

been tested and validated by Oracle as functionally and

in the right places and does not undermine all the

technically sound, that the partner solution is integrated with

benefits achieved through shared service centers.

Oracle Applications in a reliable, standards-based way, and

Laura Schaulat is a director in Oracles

that the integration operates and performs as documented.

Insight and Customer Strategy team based in

For the most current list of Oracle Validated Integrations,

Singapore and serves as Insights human capital

please visit http://www.oracle.com/us/partnerships/

management strategy lead in Asia Pacific.

solutions/index.html.

60

Understanding specific relocalization needs

oaug c o n n e c t i v i t y

From Oracles Profit magazine,

reprinted with permission.

oaug.org

w
e
n
l
l
a
e
h
T

e
c
n
fere

e
s
a
b
a
t
a nswers
D
r
ga
pe

Con
Pa

tin
t
e
er.
v
g
e
s
e
n
mak sier tha
ea

View the re-designed

and enhanced Conference
Paper Database on
oaug.org and see how
easy it is to find:
Best practices
Productivity tips
Real user experiences

The OAUG Conference Paper

Database includes thousands
of white papers and presentations
from dozens of OAUG
conferences over the past
several years.

Everyone can search the OAUG

Conference Paper Database, but only
employees of OAUG member companies
can download the presentations. If your
organization is not a member yet, please join
online or contact the membership staff at
+1.404.240.0897 or membership@oaug.com
to learn more about the many
benefits of OAUG membership.

e
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data conversion

tool for Oracle EBS

11i/R12

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New generation

data interface tool

for Oracle EBS 11i/R12

New generation

data migration tool

for Oracle EBS 11i/R12

www.chain-sys.com
1-855-appLOAD Option 1
appload_sales@chain-sys.com
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Oracle and/or its affiliates. Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.

New generation

e tool for Oracle

business intelligenc

EBS
New generation

data conversion

tool for Oracle EBS

11i/R12

CHAINSYS