Office of Enterprise Technology Services

HONOLULU — The State of Hawaii today issued a request for proposals (RFP) to modernize its payroll and time and attendance systems to provide greater functionality and efficiencies in serving more than 75,000 full- and part-time employees statewide.

The Enterprise Payroll and Time and Attendance Modernization project is being led by the Department of Accounting and General Services (DAGS) in partnership with the Office of Enterprise Technology Services (ETS). The initiative provides significant opportunity to further Ige Administration efforts to transform the culture of government to embrace and accelerate the adoption of more efficient, less paper-dependent ways of doing business.

The RFP addresses two key components of an “enterprise resource planning” (ERP) system, which integrates and manages core administrative functions of a large enterprise like state government. Examples of ERP functional areas are acquisition, assets management, budget, finance, grants management, and human resources, in addition to payroll and time and attendance.

“Following through on Gov. David Ige’s call for a more results-driven strategy for ERP, payroll and time and attendance have been identified as targeted projects we can accomplish now,” said Comptroller Doug Murdock. “By repurposing requirements gathered during previous efforts, the state is in a good position to expedite and launch this ambitious modernization initiative using existing capitol improvement project funding.”

The DAGS central payroll system provides pay checks and deposits to employees across all Executive Branch departments (including the Department of Education and the University of Hawaii), as well as the Judicial and Legislative Branches, the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, and the Hawaii Health Systems Corporation. However, the current system is more than 40 years old, runs on the mainframe, and relies heavily on paper-based processes.

“Our state payroll personnel do an amazing job each pay cycle, especially considering that the current system is extremely manual and paper-based,” Murdock said. “We appreciate their work and look forward to building on that foundation to add 21st Century payroll capabilities and efficiencies.”

To ensure success, the initiative is being governed by newly implemented processes for IT projects.

“This modernization initiative, and all major IT projects moving forward, are subject to the state’s new IT governance process, launched last December,” said Chief Information Officer (CIO) Todd Nacapuy. “In addition, we recognize that a multitude of internal payroll processes have evolved under the current system, so we have identified individuals in each department and jurisdiction to serve as subject matter experts, as appropriate, to review specific sections of proposals.”

Following the receipt of offeror proposals, a period of formal review and evaluation will include the assessment of offeror references and viability, cost realism, technology review, functional review, and final scoring based on RFP requirements. Award of a contract is anticipated no sooner than June 2016.

As for other ERP functional areas, the state’s strategy is to identify targeted projects as necessary funds and resources become available, with the intent of integrating these subcomponents as they are established. State of Hawaii ERP projects that have already made significant progress include the Human Resources Management System upgrade and the Statewide Building Asset Management project, which both went live in 2015.

For more information, interested parties may visit the ERP website at erp.hawaii.gov.