General TM1 Resource Requirements

[pmerrill]

We're thinking of developing a financial consolidation application using TM1 that will take feeds from 9 company financial feeds (probably via spreadsheet) into one chart of accounts. We do not have the expertise in house to develop this application, so we'll need to rely on some consulting company to develop it for us. Once it is completed and rolled out, I'm wondering how much internal company expertise we will need to support it. The options I can see are:

• One technical support person in the global finance function who can maintain the TM1 application and undertake additional builds for finance
• No one in global finance but one technical support person in IT who can maintain the TM1 application and undertake additional builds for finance
• No one anywhere in the company but rely on an annual support contract from the company that developed the software to maintain it and extend it as required by finance

We are a mid sized global company with a dozen or so world wide offices and a head office with about 30 people in finance and 30 people in Global IT (maintaining a host of ERP, manufacturing and sales systems). The only use of TM1 we have in the company is for finance.

If you were running Finance or IT, what general support and maintenance resources would you feel would be appropriate and where would you have them reporting, into IT, into Finance, perhaps two people, one in each department as backup? Any advice out there? An examples of staffing that worked or staffing that failed you can share?

[tomok]

Coming from someone who ran the TM1 support function for a number of years at a large US bank and as someone who has now been in consulting for a number of years, let me say it is crucial to the success of your project that 1) you do your due diligence and find the right fit for you as far as TM1 consultancy is concerned and 2) you designate an internal resource to be the owner/administrator of your new application. The worst thing you can do is rely completely on an outside consultant for everything. You'll quickly become frustrated and the consultant will move on to other projects, leaving you scrambling to get his time at those crucial times when you need immediate support.

If your consultant does his/her job right, they will design your consolidation system with an eye towards maintainability, meaning giving you mechanisms for adding new accounts, new companies, etc. that are easy to understand and don't require a full education in the intracies of the tool. Then you can take your time getting your internal resources up to speed if they can't be fully involved in the implementation.

As to who should own TM1, I would say Finance. Having IT own it is a mistake. IT can own the infrastucture, managing the server(s) but Finance should be responsible for maintaining the consolidation model. The last thing you want to have to do is go through change control just to add a new account to the chart or something like that.

[pmerrill]

Tomok,

Many thanks for the great advice, my thinking about choosing the consultant matches yours. With regard to finance owning the solution, that's fine as well, I agree.

I am also interested in your opinion on the level of expertise that the owner/administrator needs. My gut feeling is that they need not be a guru, as probably they'd be bored stiff with maintaining an app, but I also should keep away from people who have just "read the book". I'm thinking that I'd pick someone competent, who's had a year or two doing TM1 development and wants to settle into a admin role, with a good work/life balance. Alternatively, we may be able to find an more experienced TM1 hack that has had enough of running flat chat on consulting projects and wants to settle down as well. The last thing we want to do is hire an admin just to have them move on every two years.

Any advice?

[tomok]

I am also interested in your opinion on the level of expertise that the owner/administrator needs. My gut feeling is that they need not be a guru, as probably they'd be bored stiff with maintaining an app, but I also should keep away from people who have just "read the book". I'm thinking that I'd pick someone competent, who's had a year or two doing TM1 development and wants to settle into a admin role, with a good work/life balance. Alternatively, we may be able to find an more experienced TM1 hack that has had enough of running flat chat on consulting projects and wants to settle down as well. The last thing we want to do is hire an admin just to have them move on every two years.

Funny you should ask that because that was kind of my specialty, back when I was in the corporate world, meaning spotting finance people with a talent for systems. I would let the accounting managers hire the new bodies and then I would pilfer from their ranks whenever I found someone that had a knack for tools like Microsoft Excel, Access, SQL server, etc. That's what you need, an accountant that has a knack for systems. Look for someone that has done a lot of work with Excel macros or has designed some Access databases or is the go to guy when everyone needs to run a query against the company's servers. This is the kind of person that will take to TM1 like a duck to water. Try to identify this person BEFORE you start your TM1 project. Having them involved in the implementation will kill two birds with one stone: It will give them an education in the tool while at the same time give you a built-in administrator.

If you have to go outside the company to find someone be wary. There aren't a whole lot of people that really know this tool. That condition is improving now that IBM owns TM1 but there are still a lot of charlatans out there.

[dubs]

You definitely need someone in-house who knows TM1, I would say have a good BA and a good TM1 is better than having a TM1 super-user who doubles as a BA.

Having worked on both sides of consultancy I can say that it will be all too easy for you to not be able to maintain your system once the consultants leave if you don't have someone who knows what they are doing, the consultants will come in build something to a spec, get paid and leave - if you want to have a maintainable system you should include firm requirements in your spec that the system is fully documented, is easily extensible, that knowledge transfer has taken place and that there has been a rigorous testing process. I'm in the process of building something that I won't be maintaining so am making it as automatic and dynamic as possible and will be writing extensive documentation- all this will be in vein if the client doesn't designate at least one BA and an experienced TM1 Dev to look after the system after hand-over.

it may be cheaper to build it in house but it may work out more cost effective to get a fixed price deal with a consultancy and then use a smaller team to maintain, I guess it depends on how far you want to take this system after this initial project, if you feel there is a lot of scope for extra TM1 projects it may be worth building an in-house team

main advice is make sure you get an experienced TM1 Dev as a super-user may not have the IT knowledge a dedicated Dev would.

[dubs]

As to who should own TM1, I would say Finance. Having IT own it is a mistake. IT can own the infrastucture, managing the server(s) but Finance should be responsible for maintaining the consolidation model.

I would agree with this but suggest you put a TM1 Dev as part of finance with the requisite access they need, having a finance owner who has no TM1 skills or access to the system will cause problems, best give them a dedicated Dev