Microsoft Outlook integration for Absence Management in PeopleSoft 9.2: Update

In a previous post, we had talked about the integration that Oracle will be providing to Microsoft Outlook from PeopleSoft Absence Management. We had mused upon the level of integration that Oracle will provide for this feature. If a sneak peek we got has it right, Oracle has designed a bi-directional integration between Absence Management and Microsoft Outlook. This feature is bringing in the functionality to request absences from....hold your breath - Microsoft Outlook!! Now, that is one of the best functionalities I've seen in PeopleSoft Time and Attendance over the last few releases (the integration of Absence requests in Time and Labor and integration to OWS would ofcourse top my list!). Oracle would be delivering an add-in to MicroSoft outlook with fields similar to the Absence Request page in PeopleSoft, from where you can directly request for an absence.
Seeing is believing for me and I would really wait to see this in action before being excited about this functionality. There are a lot of scenarios that this integration would have to cover like:
1. Absence edit/cancel functionalities: Will we have these features in the Outlook version and will they be synchronised with what exists in the Absence Request History page?
2. Will it be possible to adjust the absence dates by simply moving the absence event in the Outlook calendar?
3. Will forecasting be supported in the Outlook add-in?
4. Will user fields be supported in the Outlook add-in?
5. Will there be support to report half day/partial hour leaves? Will there be support for a true start time/end time based absence reporting which is supported by Outlook? (Oracle Absence Management product managers - it is extremely imperative to have an absence management system where employees can report accurate Start and End time. This is a pretty common requirement outside USA and has implications to payroll calculations in many countries. It is a pity that PeopleSoft doesn't support this and defends by saying that Absence Management is not a punch time based system!)
6. Is there integration from Absence Event page to an employee's Outlook or is it only supported for self service based leaves?
7. Are translations supported in the Outlook add-in?
8. If a customisation is done to some of the fields in the Absence Request page in PeopleSoft, how will that affect the Outlook add-in?

One of the main reasons why I am upbeat about this functionality is because it brings enterprise functions to the desktops/tablets - which is the way to go. The fact that you can carry out enterprise transactions through desktop applications is greatly enabling for an employee and in turn the organisation. Another major advantage of this feature will be the ability to present a team calendar of absences. With absence events coming over to Outlook Calendar, employees can easily look up the planned absences of their colleagues, which is a commonly requested functionality during implementations.
Note to customers when you implement this functionality:
Ensure that you run through all possible use cases of Absence reporting to ensure that this add-on covers all valid business cases. Also look at how you would be keeping the ESS Absence Request functionality in sync with the Outlook add-in features.

This post is authored by HRoi Consulting - The PeopleSoft Time and Attendance Experts. Email us at partner@hroiconsulting.com to see how you can leverage ROI on your PeopleSoft Time and Attendance investments.

Microsoft Outlook integration for Absence Management in PeopleSoft 9.2

If I read the summary of main HCM features in version 9.2 correct, Oracle will be providing a functionality to integrate Absence Management with Microsoft Outlook calendars. This is a feature enhacement I will cheer for. There is a real business need for this as I had argued in a post almost two years ago. It will be interesting though to see the use cases that will be supported by this integration. For example, will there be a two way integration in this case, just like what is present for recruitment solutions? I would assume no as the edit functionalities of Absences is pretty minimal in PeopleSoft (and one of the major pain points of the module!). Let's look ahead to the actual Release Value Proposition (RVP) document to see more detailed features.

Another use-case for PS-Microsoft Outlook Integration

I was walking towards my workstation when I heard an animated conversation between a manager and her reportees. The manager was instructing her reportees to make an entry in her Outlook calendar when they are on leave, so that she could plan her resources better. That just struck me that this was another potential area where we could use the integration between Peoplesoft and Microsoft Outlook on which I had written about here. That also got me thinking about the need to provide better views of team absences to managers. There are some excellent Calendar Views in Time and Labor, that gives complete information of scheduled hours, reported hours, exceptions etc. It is really imperative that such views are also delivered from the side of Absence Management - so that managers have a holistic view of their team's attendance.

P.S.: It's wonderful that Peoplesoft HCM 9.1 comes with an integration with Microsoft Outlook.
P.P.S: The Calendar views in Time and Labor does show reported absences, but only when the absences are brought to the timesheet.

Peoplesoft 9.1 - Release Value Proposition for Time and Labor

Oracle's coming out with some welcome enhancements to Time and Labor in the 9.1 release. The release value proposition (RVP) document which highlights the major feature additions to the various modules talk about the following enhancements to T&L:

• Integration with Oracle Workforce Scheduler: I had mentioned this in a previous post and it will be a major product enhancement and offering from Oracle. I am raring to see how this integration works in 9.1 and I am sure a number of customers would love to have this feature in their enterprise application suites for workforce management.
• Adoption of Approval Workflow Engine for T&L approvals: A number of HRMS modules like Absence Management has been using AWE from version 8.9, while the T&L application development team stuck to the traditional row security and time and labor groups driven approval. It is good to bring T&L to the fold of modules using AWE as organisations will be able to maintain the approval rules under a single framework. It will be interesting to see though how customers who are using custom T&L Dynamic group driven approval routings will migrate to AWE - I see some retrofit work there.
• Adoption of Delegation Framework in T&L: Oracle started offering the delegation framework in version 9.0 and it is a welcome move that even T&L has moved over to that fold.

I also read about a very interesting and welcome enhancement is a bi-party integration with Microsoft Outlook 2007 (they have not mentioned whether they will be supporting older versions of MS Outlook) - I had mulled about this possibility while piloting the one way integration with MS Outlook from Peoplesoft. It is exciting to note that in 9.1, the Outlook Calendar and events can be read from Peoplesoft - it's high time that enterprise products integrate with desktop applications and this is a move in the right direction.