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Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

theregister.com

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Re: Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

#61

Post by dwood_dev »

rgovostes wrote: post #50
rwmj wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes! It always amazes me there seems to be no obvious URL scheme for servicenow.sadcompany.com/ Like, did the developers forget to implement that?

Yeah, and there's no search field, either. Surely, this is my misunderstanding and I should click the "Show Help" icon for a product tutorial, right? This pops up a window saying: > Now Assist offers real-time guidance and support for users seeking help with Virtual Agent. This feature’s generative AI skills blah blah blah Ok...? There is no input box to interact with "Now Assist" or the "Virtual Agent", it's just li…

F500, we have a pretty custom ServiceNow, but all I do is put the ticket or any other identifier in the search box and go. Takes 2 seconds to be in the ticket. Granted, that interface sucks too, but I suspect your main problem is internal to your org and the people that configured your ServiceNow.

Re: Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

#62

Post by basket_horse »

msy wrote: post #56
basket_horse wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These companies exist because non-tech companies building in-house software for their complex workflows also tend to run millions over budget and create brittle, bespoke software. Also, I wouldn’t put Palantir in the same bucket as Workday and ServiceNow. It’s expensive, but it does work.

So now 'professional management' bring in these firms and instead run hundreds of millions over budget to create brittle, bespoke software. It's profoundly damning on our industry that decades of software development later most productivity gains stopped at about the point Excel and email became widespread. Software has eaten the world('s budgets) with little to show for it. No wonder all these parasites are so excit…

I empathize with you, but it’s also worth saying that not all firms are the same. Just as not all in-house teams are the same. There are good ones and bad ones. Even inside firms there are good teams and bad teams. Enterprise software is complex and good software engineers are expensive. These projects are delayed and go over budget because their complexities are grossly underestimated.

Re: Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

#63

Post by refulgentis »

Spivak wrote: post #20
bc569a80a344f9c wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Just let students vibe code your ERP” is a hell of a take.

Is it any worse than an army of consultants? It would be one thing if it was some off the shelf software but a huge chunk of this project seems to be a new custom application intended for student and faculty use. It just sounds like Accenture-ware with a new name.

If you’re going to open with “is having cs students hack their way to a solution via AI actually worse than Workday?”, this isn’t a fair discussion for who you’re replying to. I assume you’re young and well-intentioned. I would have said the same thing when I was young. The problem is that approach leaves you with, best case with overworked students looking for glory instead of pay, failing classes and enjoy hacking, ~80% of the work done and no staff for maintenance. This isnt an opportunity for hero hacker story, its a real business, it affect people’s lives at their most vulnerable (higher education, paid education, hospital system)

Re: Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

#64

Post by FireBeyond »

rwmj wrote: post #8
msy wrote: post #4

Workday, Palantir, ServiceNow - a new generation of Accenture/Oracle et al 'consulting' parasites that wine and dine their way into organisations (and governments) and then bleed them dry. There's a reason software spending endlessly goes up but productivity has flatlined.

ServiceNow is so terrible I genuinely wonder how it is ever deployed anywhere. Seriously, do the purchasers never look at it? Is there no product demo at all during the purchase process? Do the sales people actively hide it or something?

I love that ServiceNow has completely broken the back/forward behavior in its own unique way.

Yes, many other sites also break this navigation, but SN takes it to a whole other level.

Want to open and edit multiple records in different tabs? You're a braver soul than I. Better also double check what record you go back to when you click Update. Which is of course different to when you right click and choose Save.

What comes after UI16 for user interface design? Well, UIB, of course. UI16 still looks straight out of 2016.

Re: Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

#65

Post by FireBeyond »

alephnerd wrote: post #39
jasonwatkinspdx wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked for a CRM reseller for a bit when I was younger. At the time the industry wisdom was that basically 80% of CRM projects fail to return value. And the customers knew that plainly, but the alternative was trying to keep some COBOL era system limping along. So even though they knew they were likely going to burn a huge pile of money, it felt like a necessity. So a sort of stockholm syndrome mentality takes root…

> Also just HIPAA being in the mix adds non trivial complexities Yep, and WUSTL - like most Universities - is a major medical network in it's region. Ime, the bulk of the costs that arose from Higher Ed contracts I dealt with were due to the fact that most Higher Ed institutions were also medical networks. But the issue is, medical PHI is important, and outages can lead to liability and potentially patient risk. > At…

What the hell PHI / EHR work is Workday doing?

The answer should be "none".

Re: Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

#66

Post by rasz »

bc569a80a344f9c wrote: post #13
russfink wrote: post #9

Back in the day, wustl.edu was seen as a leader in computer applications. Sad now that it cannot just create its own systems to handle its tasks, especially with AI’s around to offer coding help. Imagine spending a fraction of this money and vectoring it to students to develop said systems.

“Just let students vibe code your ERP” is a hell of a take.

Admitting "Our students cant design or code" is also pretty wild.

Re: Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

#67

Post by pknomad »

cootsnuck wrote: post #46
pknomad wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work at a lab associated with R1 university that has Nobel laureate output so I feel like I have some knowledge in this area: 1. They exist. However, writing a piece of software is not the same thing as supporting them, especially when it comes to dealing with core HR system. This is where SaaSs and similar platform offers lot of appeal. 2. Also difficult because everyone has different needs and at some point certa…

> For transparency, a single software engineer budget is $670K+. Are you saying that the costs to employ a single software engineer is $670K+? If you mean something else then nvm. Otherwise that's a ridiculous number to use unless you are specifically talking about places with the highest cost of living in the country where a mid-level dev starts at over $200K.

I am saying that. Salary + taxes + insurance + retirement + other benefits + support cost is around 670k. Salary eats up like 160k of that budget, though.

Re: Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

#68

Post by drjasonharrison »

fluidcruft wrote: post #48
rwmj wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ServiceNow is so terrible I genuinely wonder how it is ever deployed anywhere. Seriously, do the purchasers never look at it? Is there no product demo at all during the purchase process? Do the sales people actively hide it or something?

We have something called ServiceNow where I work. It's so horrible that I assumed it was in house.

I, too, made this assumption. Then I learned it was an actual product my ex-employer had selected and kept using.

It still didn't make sense why an enhancement request and a fix request couldn't be moved between queues. Or why I received three (at least) emails when an issue was closed.

Re: Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

#69

Post by drjasonharrison »

janstice wrote: post #53
kotaKat wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm surprised to see them on a patchwork of applications still and not already on an enterprise-wide system like Ellucian Banner. I wasn't expecting Workday here, though. That doesn't quite make sense for a college. Students aren't employees, why are we trying to fit them into the same mold as an employee in this nonsense it feels like?

Workday’s student offering is designed as a full student management offering like Banner et al, with the carrot that it’s internally integrated into the financial & HR systems, which avoids another vendor and also a massive and ongoing finger pointing exercise. It’s also one of the few from-scratch cloud-first student management solutions.

Its page load time is as if it's running to the first clouds...

Re: Workday project at Washington University hits $266M

#70

Post by cyberrock »

Telemakhos wrote: post #7

I guess I have three questions here. 1) What happened to the days when universities published their own software, like pine from UW? It seems like Washington of St Louis, which offers a PhD in computer science, should have some students capable of writing a database to run the university. 2) Why have universities not collaborated to develop a modular, expandable system for running a university, instead of putting the…

#1 has to be thought through carefully because ultimately this would involve students being able to access other students' information. It only takes one instance of stalking, harassment, etc. for it to blow up.
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