The vendor and the Core Implementation Team have mapped out an ambitious timeline of specific steps and tasks to accomplish our desired implementation date for the first phase of the system. We’re confident we’ll reach our target date because of several factors in our favor: The new IWMS solution is “cloud-based” and hence the University will not have to set up or maintain its own servers and hardware (which was the case with our existing system). This past year, several UVM facilities and IT professional staff have already been doing the enabling (“pre-work”) for this project such as ensuring that existing data in our current system is accurate and up to date. Lastly, the vendor we’ve chosen has worked with many other higher education facilities organizations who’ve been successful.
—-> NOTE: PROJECT TIMELINE UPDATED AS OF MARCH 2023 <—-
The major project implementation stages were summarized by the vendor as follows:
—-> NOTE: PROJECT TIMELINE UPDATED AS OF February 2023 <—-
Initiate (September 2021)
An official project kickoff meeting took place on September 1st with the vendor, UVM Core Team and the UVM Senior Leaders (“Sponsors”) who are supporting the IWMS project.
Align (September 2021)
This project stage entails a series of “Functional Review” sessions (which already took place mid-September) in order for the vendor to learn about and understand how UVM currently manages things. Session participants included Core Team and invited Subject Matter Experts (SME’s). Each 90-minute session followed the same basic format with vendor asking insightful probing questions of UVM such as:
- Data Sources (e.g., how and where is existing data kept? what other data sources exist? what data needs to be migrated and/or integrated into new system? etc.).
- Stakeholders (who are/will be the primary users? who else may need to be involved? etc.)
- Current Process (how do we currently “do” things? what business processes, administrative processes, and forms (paper or electronic) are in use? what problems or existing system shortcomings would we like to improve?) and lastly,
- Vision for Future Management (e.g. what reporting capability or data dashboards we’d like to have? what key metrics or analytics will be useful for decision-making related to facilities and operations? etc.)
Exhibit (October – December 2021)
This stage is when the vendor will give us our first glimpse of what the system might look like in terms of functionality and navigation. The vendor will use “real world” data that UVM Core Team provided during the Align stage of the project. Hence, demonstrations will portray actual data about selected campus buildings rather than generic data from a fictitious university. (The Core Team chose four buildings of varying size, complexity and type to include in the data exhibit sessions: Given Building Complex, Waterman Building, Central Campus Residence Hall, and Peirce-Spaulding House.)
Design & Configure, Data Uploading (December 2021- September 2022)
This stage is when “the rubber hits the road” and the vendor works closely with the Core Team and SME’s to get all of our existing data into the IWMS solution. We “kick the tires” to identify any gaps between the vendor’s standard software solution and what our campus needs to do our facilities and operations work in a way that works for us. This is essentially like a Test, Rinse, Repeat phase where the vendor and UVM explore alternate configurations if needed, try them out and agree upon the one final solution for each of the functional areas of the software. This is also when all of the existing data from FAMIS is extracted, transformed and loaded (i.e, old or out of date information is “cleaned up” before being loaded into the new system).
System Integration Testing and User Acceptance Testing (September 2022-April 2023)
This is where “the proof is in the pudding and during this stage, we fully test the system the vendor has designed for us. We conduct UAT (“User Acceptance Testing”) and make sure all of the parts and pieces and functionality that we originally sought are indeed in this final product. And this is when the decision of when to “go live” can be made.
End User Training (Summer 2023)
If all goes as planned — we’ll be kicking-off end-user training later this summer.
“Go Live” on Phase One of Planon (Exact Date TBD)
Exact date and time is still unknown
We appreciate everyone’s patience.
-The IWMS Core Team