DOs

Do:

Plan ahead. Work with stakeholders far in advance to figure out if you’ll need to change your planning solution from one process to the next.

Do:

Let us know as early as you can if you expect to make changes to your planning process, calculations, or rules. The more detail you can share about your changes, the better. Plan on getting us your changes at least 30 days before you go live.

Do:

Be responsive to our requests for information or data. The more helpful that you can be with answers to our questions or request for data, the quicker we can get your changes made and tested.

Do:

Review any relevant documentation:

• Check out the Sys Admin guide to become familiar with tasks you can do on your own.
• Read the FAQ – especially on Change Requests and the process to rollout these changes to the TEST and PROD environments.

Do:

Itemize each change and be clear and complete in your work descriptions. Include explicit instructions on what should be changed. Include test criteria so both parties can know when an item has been properly addressed. The goal is to complete a task efficiently without need for additional follow-up. This will be particularly important if you work in a different time zone as there may be delays in responding to email clarifications.

Do:

Let us know if a change will impact other areas. Don’t assume we will remember the exact specifics of your implementation. We have many clients, and we may not have been exposed to your implementation for the better part of a year. You are the expert for your implementation.

Do:

Think about alternate outcomes. It’s easy to focus on the item at hand but don’t forget about the opposite case. How should the application behave if data is missing?

Do:

Use the “System Integrity Check” feature to confirm your data is clean. Most client-reported issues are related to incomplete or erroneous data.

DON’Ts

Don’t:

Give us your changes one at a time. Working on your changes one at a time or iteratively increases time and expense for you and us.

Don’t:

Wait until the last minute to decide important functionality requirements for your planning process. There will not be SUFFICIENT time to get these changes on the schedule and for both you and us to test your changes properly.

Don’t:

Wait until you have final data to test your changes. Verify each change using sample data to confirm that the modification is working properly.

Don’t:

Use the data import template to communicate changes to columns or calculations. This file is solely used for providing application data and likely won’t be opened as the Data Import process is largely automated. Use the configuration worksheet, when possible, to communicate any changes.