Case Study III-4 • The Kuali Financial System: An Open-Source Project 463call since we were cutting scope and some schools
were losing functionality they felt they needed. It is
hard to do those types of things without face-to-
face discussions, but it worked and we got it done.Making those kinds of decisions is not easy when you
have to get agreement of seven institutions, each of which
has its own priorities and culture. McNeely described the
difficulty:Higher education institutions have cultures that are
very old and very ingrained. There are huge cultural
differences between our institutions, not only in the
way decisions are made but also in the way we com-
municate with each other. There were several instances
where people were offended.
When the council had disagreements on func-
tionality we tried to maintain the focus that the system
is not just for the core partners, but for all of higher
education. So when roadblocks occurred, I tried to
guide the discussion toward what was best for all of
higher education, not just what was best for Indiana or
Cornell or Hawaii. With a few exceptions, that worked.
Although the council didn’t vote on everything
there were times when a vote finalized an issue and
allowed forward movement in the decision-making
process. If a school disagreed with a Functional Council
decision and felt that it was core to their ability to imple-
ment successfully it had the right to escalate the issue to
the Kuali Board. That only happened twice. In general,
the Functional Council was extraordinarily successful in
resolving some very difficult issues.Another key to the success of Kuali was the close
relationship between the Functional Council chair and the
Project Manager. Without trust and close cooperation
between the users and the developers, it would have been
very difficult to succeed with this project. McNeely and
Thomas had an excellent personal relationship. Their offices
were just a few doors from each other, and they com-
municated face-to-face frequently. This relationship was so
important that McNeely questioned whether a project like
KFS could succeed if the chair of the Functional Council
and the project manager were from different institutions.The Development Process
The Kuali Financial System had some special characteris-
tics that impacted its development. James (Jim) Thomas,
Project Manager, explains:We completely re-architected the technology. The IU
FIS was a client/server-based application which wascall to make sure that each school was represented.
At the end of each agenda was a miscellaneous item
that allowed any issues to be brought up if missed.
The council followed the agenda. I usually sum-
marized what the issue was and requested that people
speak up with their concerns. I usually paused and
gave them an opportunity to think. The agenda was
always completed on time, and all participants were
provided an opportunity to speak. If an agenda item
had to be deferred or schools indicated they were not
ready to vote, the issue went back on the agenda the
next week. We are busy people, so one hour was it.
Minutes were taken and posted to the Kuali Web
site. If a Functional Council member missed a meeting
they could read the minutes. If a lead subject matter
expert (SME) wanted to know how a vote came about
he or she could read the minutes. If there was disagree-
ment later and somebody indicated they didn’t
remember the decision then the minutes could be
reviewed for final resolution. The Functional Council’s
documentation of the meetings was very good.
Occasionally a sensitive issue existed that
schools hesitated to speak about in front of every-
body. All Functional Council members knew that my
phone was open for calls. Every few weeks one of the
schools would call me and I would spend 20 minutes
talking to them. Sometimes I would add the concern
to the agenda and the council would discuss it and
sometimes the issue was resolved without going to
the Functional Council. Overall the communication
process for the council was very effective.There were some very difficult priority issues. For
example, at the face-to-face council meeting in November
2005, the project plan showed that they were short 5,000
hours. The Functional Council was charged with identify-
ing items that could be deferred. They agreed that all the
planned modules must be delivered and that they should
keep the essential priority enhancements. Eliminating all
the high-priority enhancements would result in a surplus of
2,000 hours. The difficult part was agreeing on which
high-priority enhancements should be moved back in.
When the dust settled, they were left with six enhance-
ments that would be deferred to future releases.
McNeely recalls another difficult situation:
Once we were over budget on our resources and
had to make some priority decisions that couldn’t
wait until the next face-to-face Functional Council
meeting in February. So I called a three-hour
Functional Council meeting via teleconferencing.
Although effective, it was a very painful conference