Quest recently conducted a survey with our community about their PeopleSoft environment. Overall, the survey results showed that PeopleSoft customers are generally satisfied with their product and their environment, but there are still some areas that customers would like to learn more about. As a follow up to the survey, we brought these topics to the Oracle PeopleSoft team to see if they can help clarify some things for the community.

Jon: Our survey results showed us that a lot of customers have yet to develop a Selective Adoption strategy. Could you talk a little bit about why it’s important for customers to develop this type of strategy?

Rebekah: Selective Adoption is one of the most powerful and unique capabilities that our PeopleSoft customers have. It’s something that doesn’t exist anywhere else in the market, whether you look at traditional enterprise software packages or Cloud solutions. PeopleSoft customers are the only ones that have the PeopleSoft Update Manager technology and processes that enable customers to pick and choose the features and updates they want for the applications they are running. Customers do this completely on their schedule, and the strategy can be one hundred percent tailored to that organization’s needs. Selective Adoption is the key that unlocks the value in the investment that customers have made with their enterprise solution—allowing customers to take new capabilities and features constantly, in small, frequent increments if they choose, without the cost of an upgrade.

Christina: That’s great Rebekah. I have had many conversations with customers who have already created their Selective Adoption strategy, and they have told me it’s like having your cake and eating it, too; they get to have the functionality of PeopleSoft in basically a Cloud-like environment. If I’m a customer beginning my selective adoption journey, what advice would you give me?

Rebekah: I would say to first get in touch with the customer community. There is a lot of great information and lessons learned from customers that have evaluated selective adoption and started to look at how they can take advantage of it. There’s a thriving body of knowledge that has developed. What we’re finding is that most customers will want to have a strategy for maintenance and a strategy for future adoption. From a maintenance standpoint, customers will typically get current about once a year; this frequency will vary depending on the size of the shop, how risk-averse they might be, and what their drivers are. Along with that, and in many ways more important than that—because again, that’s how you get the value out of the investment you’ve made in your applications—is having a strong strategy around adopting new features and functionality. To do that, you really need IT and the line of business working together. Sometimes, that is easier said than done. Although it can be challenging, it’s an important thing for customers to figure out how to do. I would also say that customers need to plan, budget, and develop a level of discipline around adopting maintenance and features and what it means to be updated on a continuous basis. For customers that choose to wait three to five years to get current, the cost and process will feel a lot like a traditional upgrade. With continuous adoption, there is still cost, but it is spread differently and it will likely be spent in different areas or functions; the way that your organization needs to respond and manage that is quite different. Those are the things that I would recommend.

Jon: I have also heard from several customers that they feel like Selective Adoption is about a mindset and that it’s important to make sure your business and your IT are working together. Many of our customers say that there is no right or wrong way to do it, but that you need to do it. Marc, we know you have hosted several sessions with customers around Selective Adoption; what have you seen to be successful, particularly with technical teams engaging functional teams in the conversation about selective adoption?

Marc: I have found that customers with the most successful Selective Adoption strategies have a few common traits. One of those traits definitely is ensuring that IT and the line of business work collaboratively. IT is fantastic at being able to effectively apply changes to their PeopleSoft environments, inclusive of configuration, regression testing, and roll out. The line of business knows that they need to address the challenges they are facing. The obvious synergy is the line of business working with IT to identify and prioritize which new capabilities to adopt. Another trait of successful Selective Adoption strategies is operationalizing it. That mean’s ensuring it is regularly executed, easily repeatable, and funded accordingly. A true change in the customer’s mindset is not to merely execute a change once, it is redefining business as usual to create a new normal way of doing things.

Christina: Rebekah talked earlier about the more regular/staying current process, and with Selective Adoption, we know that taking on features in a more regular cadence can give a higher return on investment. What have you seen work well with regards to customers having a more regular update, other than when maintenance is required?

Marc: Regularity brings familiarity. Customers that not only have a regular cadence of applying maintenance but also a regular cadence of adopting new features and functions find that the execution of their Selective Adoption strategy becomes second nature. Rather than the application of change being a “one-off” project, it becomes part of normal business operations. What else I have noticed is customer’s that regularly apply both maintenance and new features learn from their actions. They know their Selective Adoption strategy is not set in stone. Customers learn more each time they execute. They learn what works well and what needs improvements; fine-tuning and adjusting their process each time.

A big “thank you” to Oracle for their involvement in answering these questions. Now, I would also like to pose a question to the community: “If I’m a customer beginning my selective adoption journey, what advice would you give me?” Feel free to comment below with any advice you would provide another customer.