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  • 1.  Cutting over to a new system in parallel

    Posted 02-20-2023 07:36 AM

    Colleagues,

    For those of you who have converted to a new fundraising system ... I would be interested in hearing from folks who either chose to run their old system in parallel to the new one after cutover, or evaluated that option but chose not to. We are due to go live on UCI ascend in January 2024 and are doing due diligence as to whether we should consider running in parallel for a short time. I'm curious what "parallel" meant for folks (e.g. dual data entry or data transfers?), how long you did it, was it a good idea, pain points, etc.

    Thanks,

    Joe



    ------------------------------
    Joe Medina
    Associate Vice President for Development
    Hamilton College
    jmmedina@hamilton.edu
    ------------------------------


  • 2.  RE: Cutting over to a new system in parallel

    Posted 02-20-2023 08:13 AM

    Running systems in parallel is double work which is typically frowned upon by your gift entry staff.  Also, you can only post/feed to your business office or Foundation from one system.  If you choose to post from your legacy system, then you're still not validating the production post/feed process unless you feed twice and have your business office dismiss the second feed which incurs more work and more handshaking between offices.  For these reasons we didn't consider running parallel and simply cut over "big bang" approach.



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    Eric Valdescaro
    Senior Director, Advancement Services
    University of Memphis
    eric.valdescaro@memphis.edu
    ------------------------------



  • 3.  RE: Cutting over to a new system in parallel

    Posted 02-20-2023 08:22 AM
    Joe, I typically advise against running parallel.  If you have successfully conducted your two or three sandbox scenarios, there is no need.

    The challenges I often see when running any portion of the conversion in parallel is to create both a lack of trust in the new system and a lack of acceptance.

    The third issue is that running in parallel will also burn out your staff, who must work twice as hard after already working overtime to complete the testing.

    And then there's always the issue of when is enough, enough? Why are you running parallel anyway? To find "differences" or errors? Again, you likely encountered most of those in the sandbox. But years from now, you will probably find an item that didn't convert correctly. When do you decide to stop running two systems?

    My advice is to draw a line in the sand and flip the switch - which most vendors I work with suggest. Keep the old system intact if you need to look at something months from now. But make a clean break from the old and embrace the new!

    John

    John H. Taylor
    Principal
    John H. Taylor Consulting, LLC
    2604 Sevier St.
    Durham, NC   27705
    919.816.5903 (cell/text)

    Serving the Advancement Community Since 1987






  • 4.  RE: Cutting over to a new system in parallel

    Posted 02-20-2023 08:29 AM
    John and Eric,
    My thoughts as well, but I want to make sure I'm not missing anything. There has been a request from senior leadership to explore this option. Having done this many times (too many times!) my experience says running parallel is very painful. But hearing from others is always a very helpful thing when presenting to leadership.

    Other opinions are welcome!
    Joe

    Joe Medina
    Associate Vice President for Development
    Hamilton College 198 College Hill Road Clinton, NY 13323 315-859-4902 (direct)

    CAMPAIGN for HAMILTON COLLEGE





    Original Message


  • 5.  RE: Cutting over to a new system in parallel

    Posted 02-20-2023 08:40 AM
    What advice have you gotten from UCI? I suspect they, too, say don't do it!

    Senior leadership might be thinking of the "olden days," like when you implemented Colleague and had a "mainframe" :-). 

    We ran in "parallel," too, when I was at Duke - in the early 1990s. But then we ran on an IBM 3090 mainframe ("clouds" had not been invented!).

    Times have changed. For me, what is the most critical thing for you is to test your interfaces to your GL, Admissions, and HR & Student systems. But that's done in the sandbox!

    John

    John H. Taylor
    Principal
    John H. Taylor Consulting, LLC
    2604 Sevier St.
    Durham, NC   27705
    919.816.5903 (cell/text)

    Serving the Advancement Community Since 1987





    Original Message


  • 6.  RE: Cutting over to a new system in parallel

    Posted 02-20-2023 01:34 PM
    We are going live today (!) on Affinaquest. Our Project Manager advised us against running old and new in parallel. We ended up stopping entry in our old system for gifts as of 12/31, which took us a couple of weeks into January to catch up from the holiday break before we closed our books for 2022 (we continued doing bio updates through this period). It made things really clean when it came to running calendar-year-end receipts and reports, refreshing our conversion data one last time, and keeping it clear in our users' minds. We are, however, now, in the process of catching up with entry for 2023 into our new system, which will take awhile.

    With you going live in January 2024, this method may work for you as well.

    Julie

    Julie Domel | Assistant Director of Advancement Services  -
    Reporting, Data Analysis, & Special Projects
    Alumni Relations & Development Division |     Trinity University
    Physical address: 323 Stadium Drive 
    Mailing address: One Trinity Place, Box 49 | San Antonio, TX 78212 
    jdomel@trinity.edu | office: (210) 999-8057 | fax: (210) 999-8489






    Original Message


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