5-4-2007 | 6-4-2007 | 1-1-2008

"Our partnership with SAP America, Inc. is a key step toward a new integrated human resource and payroll information system at MSU," said Chris Hannah, Acting Assistant Vice President for Human Resources. "The new system will enhance our ability to manage data strategically to support our human capital management decisions at MSU for many years to come." "This new system supports the unique aspects of academic administration and supports the institution's commitment to recruiting and hiring the best complement of faculty and academic staff, advancing diversity of the university's academic workforce," adds Theodore Curry, Associate Provost and Assist Vice President for Academic Human Resources.

David Brower, Assistant Vice President for Business Operations, Chief Financial Officer, and Controller continues, "We expect the new system to enable streamlining and automation of collection, management, and distribution of payroll information. These improvements will likely minimize manual data entry and reconciliation, reduce processing time, and increase ease of reporting. Together these improvements will result in more accurate and timely information for the university."

The human resources/payroll system is a component in a larger project authorized by the Michigan State University Board of Trustees on October 20, 2006. The Board directed the MSU Enterprise Business Systems Project to replace and upgrade existing financial, research administration and human resource systems. The overall goal is to design an updated set of electronic administrative tools that can be used by faculty and staff to accomplish the business goals of Michigan State University.

According to David Byelich, Assistant Vice President for the Office of Planning and Budgets, "The intention is for the systems to provide the capacity to view information from multiple perspectives and the tools to use that information for forecasting and budgeting. These anticipated improvements will further support the university's strategic planning. "

"MSU is planning an integrated, modular approach for the software architecture," confirms David Gift, Vice Provost, Libraries, Computing & Technology. " This approach provides the university with flexibility now and into the future. It supports MSU's ability to respond nimbly to emerging opportunities and challenges."

The agreement reached between Michigan State University and SAP America, Inc. supports the overall goal of the university to provide an IT infrastructure that is open and flexible driving innovation across the entire enterprise while safeguarding confidential and sensitive information. SAP America, Inc. has a proven track record with higher education clients that ensures MSU ongoing success by enhancing services and allowing the university to manage information and business activities better. Educational institutions worldwide are seeking improved ways to manage and coordinate diverse relationships with external stakeholders while maximizing their resources for recruiting, marketing, customer service and support.

With nearly 11,000 faculty and support staff providing a challenging and academically rich environment to more than 46,000 students from around the world, MSU will utilize industry-specific applications from SAP to support the entire academic business life cycle. In addition to SAP's human resources/payroll software, MSU will take advantage of SAP® Netweaver, data warehouse and reporting tools, plus training and user help software. These applications provide the technical environment that supports the university's ability to create business processes that are seamless transactions across departments increasing efficiencies for the entire campus.

The financial and human resources projects are to be completed by the conclusion of the 2010-2011 fiscal year. The university will create many new technical, administrative and support jobs to accomplish the project goals and deadlines. The resulting systems and tools will facilitiate MSU's capacity to achieve the business needs of a world-grant university.