Board committee authorizes Gartner to conduct ERP needs assessment funded from governor's audit

The Committee of Finance and Operations authorized the administration to execute a professional services contract with Gartner to conduct an enterprise resource planning (ERP) needs assessment.

Chief Human Resources Officer Dominic Maniscalco described a multi-month internal review — including staff interviews, Lean Six Sigma Gemba walks and a Request for Information — intended to assess whether the district should move to one integrated ERP or otherwise improve the interaction between PeopleSoft (HR/payroll) and BusinessPlus/PowerSchool (finance). He said the objective of the engagement is a needs assessment and process-improvement recommendations, not a decision to purchase a specific ERP product.

Maniscalco said three vendors responded to the district’s solicitation; Gartner was one of the three and was selected unanimously by the evaluation team. He described the vendor’s work as an outside, subject-matter expert needs assessment that will examine current processes, staffing capacity and recommendations that aim for sustainability over one, two and five-year horizons.

Dr. Sellers noted the contract funding is coming from money associated with the governor’s audit. Matt Chason of the Office of Accountability and Efficiency and others described the two legacy systems and the implementation challenges created by interfaces and degraded controls.

The committee voted to approve the administration’s recommendation to authorize the professional services contract as described in the attachments; roll call recorded four ayes and the motion passed.

Administration said the work will inform any future procurement or implementation plan and is intended to improve position control, reconciliation and interoperability between HR and finance systems.