Queensland University of Technology Overhauls Budgeting Practices

Queensland University of Technology Consolidates Budgets Within a Day, Instead of a Week, Overhauls Budgeting Practices

Queensland University of Technology (QUT) is a selectively research-focused Australian University, catering to 45,000 students, including 7,000 international students. The University employs more than 4,000 permanent staff and over 7,000 casual staff, and consists of six faculties, six divisions, and a number of research institutes spread across two Brisbane city campuses, as well as Caboolture to the north.

To support a decentralised budgeting process, QUT implemented Oracle® Hyperion products to standardise and streamline budgeting practices across the University. QUT can now consolidate budget submissions developed by the University’s faculties, divisions, and institutes in less than a day, rather than taking at least a week. The management accounting team (MAT) can also address financial queries from senior managers, and QUT’s planning and resources committee, with confidence, knowing that budgeting data is accurate, up to date, and contains enough detail to respond to a range of queries.

Challenge

QUT relies on a decentralised budgeting process, providing university faculties, divisions, and institutes with a high level of input into, and control over, how their allocated funds are spent. However, this decentralised budgeting process created difficulties for the University’s management accounting team (MAT), as compiling a University wide budget required input from numerous staff throughout the institution. In addition, the process was made even more complex by a lack of standard budgeting tools across the University, as well as limited access to detailed workforce expenditure.

QUT was already using Oracle products such as Oracle Financials, which meant it had a high level of in-house Oracle experience and expertise. When it came to choosing a new budgeting platform, it was the Oracle Hyperion product’s flexibility, robustness, and ability to integrate with Oracle Financials that was appealing.

Solution

After an open tender process, QUT engaged Oracle Specialised Partner DXC Red Rock to implement the Oracle Hyperion Planning and Oracle Essbase solution across the university. It used Oracle Data Integrator to integrate the Hyperion system with Oracle Financials and the University’s ALESCO v12 human resources system.

The move to Oracle Hyperion provides a central portal to integrate financial data from all faculties, divisions, and institutes. The project involved an extended consultation with end users from various organisational areas, resulting in comprehensive business and technical requirement statements, which contain user expectations for functionality and technical capabilities that best fit the university’s IT environment.

Result

Oracle Hyperion allows QUT to draw budgets from across the University much faster, significantly reducing the time required to produce a consolidated budget report. MAT also has much greater assurance in the accuracy of the data.

In addition to retaining an Excel-style interface to assist with change management, Hyperion improved financial management by allowing the MAT to analyse, investigate, and follow up on issues, rather than just simply reporting. The productivity gains from moving to Hyperion allow QUT to consider deploying rolling forecasts and monthly reporting, as well as expanding the university’s financial planning using Hyperion costing modules.

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