The first phase of EISE/Banner's implementation is almost complete, as the Finance module of the project has moved its data into the system, making it the first component of the new university-wide software suite to go live.

Banner Finance encompasses three areas – purchasing, accounting and budget – and will replace the old FRS system with a more user-friendly, comprehensive system.

As the Finance portion gets up and running, behind-the-scenes work continues in the other Banner areas: Human Resources, Financial Aid, Alumni/Development, and Student. Each area is on a different timeline, with all working toward project completion by early 2008.

For now, Banner's impact will only be seen in the Finance area. Training will soon begin for the university's more than 400 fiscal agents and designees, who can expect some very positive changes, organizers say.

“We're excited to start rolling this out to people to start training,” said Larry Cannon, EIU's director of finance and accounting, assistant treasurer, and Banner Finance Process Team leader. “We know that staff members are going to be excited to use it. It's not going to be difficult.”

Cannon advises the fiscal agents and their designees to watch the University Newsletter for signup information for training sessions. Passwords will be assigned during the sessions, so it's important for people to attend.

Budgets for fiscal year 2007 have been loaded into the system, “so as soon as they're trained, they can start entering their fiscal year '07 requisitions,” Cannon said.

As is customary, requisitions and purchase orders are being accepted now for payment in the next fiscal year.

In fact, the first requisition and purchase order – fittingly, a payment of a maintenance fee to SunGard Higher Education, the company providing the Banner software – was put through the system Friday, April 21, with a payment date of July 1.

“Banner is easier to use than the current system for doing requisitions,” Cannon said.

Account numbers have changed, and although they now contain more digits, the system will remember each person's frequently used account numbers so that they won't have to be keyed in each time.

Approval of invoices will now be done inclusively in the Banner system, replacing the former system of sending a series of faxes and e-mails.

“I think overall, it's going to be very beneficial,” Cannon said. “The system is very robust.”

While a lot of the information required by the system is the same, the biggest benefit comes in for those who will be accessing the data.

For starters, the system will always be online and accessible at almost any time of the day. The old FRS system had to be shut down several hours each night to allow reports to be run.

Depending on his place in the organizational hierarchy, a person will be able to view the balance available for a specific department or for an entire organizational area. Previously, those numbers were only available via monthly reports.

The Banner system allows a broader view of data at all levels of a transaction, all in one location. This will prove to be much more user-friendly than the FRS system, in which data was transaction-based and one-dimensional.

“From a management perspective, it offers more,” Cannon said. “If you're the president and you want to see what's going on in the lower levels, you can keep drilling down and see a transaction in, say, athletics, that you were wondering about.”

There will be two levels of access available. The first, called Internet Native Banner, will be used by fiscal agents and their delegates. The other, called Self Service, can be considered a “lite” version of the system, used mostly for accessing data instead of entering data.

The Self Service component is designed for users who will need limited involvement with the system for purposes such as doing a quick check of a budget. Deans and department chairs are among the people who might find this component useful.

All fiscal agents and their delegates will be asked to attend two training sessions by August, each expected to last no more than two hours.

The first session is for Internet Native Banner. Attendees will be trained on system navigation; My Banner, a component that allows users to create their own customized menus; requisitions; and approvals.

The second session will train people to use the Self Service component of Banner Finance, which will cover how to make approvals, budget queries and other queries.

Those who require a refresher after attending training will be able to review training sessions online. This is not meant to replace the hands-on training sessions.

Work is continuing behind the scenes in the other areas of Banner, as well. All told, about 100 people are involved in teams and committees, said Bill Witsman , EISE/Banner project director.

The Banner project is allowing those involved to think outside the box and look beyond the way things have always been done to find more efficient ways of conducting business, Witsman said.

“This is significant work,” Witsman said. “People are making decisions on how the university is going to operate for the next decade. We're building leaders at our university. People are empowered to think and look at other ways of doing things.”

EISE – which stands for Enterprise Information Systems Enhancement – actually encompasses two software suites: Banner, the main software suite involved; and DARwin , a degree-audit system.

The purpose of the project is to change the university's entire campus over to one integrated infrastructure system to make the system easier to use; cheaper to maintain; and more efficient in data collection, organization and reporting.

The project, which started taking shape in January 2005, is on schedule and on budget. All aspects of the system are expected to be online by early 2008.

Upcoming milestones for EISE/Banner

By EIU Department of University Communications