Down by the bayou
User stories from the knowledge front
The state of Louisiana is implementing a portal solution to streamline access to information for its employees. MySAP Enterprise Portal from SAP is being rolled out initially to 45,000 workers.
The portal is powered by SAP NetWeaver, an application platform designed to integrate people, information and business processes. State IT and business managers chose the portal technology to unify disparate legacy information and ensure that all the state's important information resources—regardless of which vendor systems they reside in—will be available to employees through one people-centric window.
The state believes that the solution's out-of-box capabilities will facilitate e-learning, real-time online training and differentiated self-service for managers, because they will now have centralized access to relevant HR information for employees on their teams, according to SAP.
The portal interface is role-based, meaning that employees' personal preferences are set as defaults and that an individual worker's access to information is correlated to job function, seniority and security clearance. Federated search functionality—the ability to search multiple databases and applications through one interface—will make self-service easier for employees.
Louisiana's use of SAP technology began with the rollout in 2000 of mySAP HR to more than 300 state agencies. The integrated solution replaced three mainframe legacy systems and 20 departmental standalone systems. That implementation gave state employees real-time access to personnel records, change of address, insurance enrollment and payroll information.
New self-service functions will be available to employees by August. Manager self-service, learning management and other features and functions will be phased in over two years. Eventually 100,000 state workers will have access to employee resources through the portal.
Says Gov. M.J. "Mike" Foster Jr., "Civil servants of this state will find it easier to do their jobs with the benefit of a portal, and that in turn will make them more efficient and effective. That's good news for Louisiana's taxpayers and residents.