UCF Budget Planning & Analysis Employee Rocks at 2023 Workday Rising Conference

Sean Simmons, Senior Director of UCF”s Budget Planning and Analysis (BPA) Office was largely responsible for the design and implementation of the financial planning and reporting platform needed to support UCF’s responsibilty centered management (RCM) budget model via Workday’s Adaptive Planning. In fact, he has become such a recognized Adaptive Planning subject matter expert and collaborative partner that he was personally invited to present at the Workday Rising national conference in San Francisco on September 26, 2023.

Alongside Wake Forest University, Sean led a packed session on how these two leading universities are employing Adaptive Planning to help optimize their annual strategic planning processes, support all funds budgeting, drive strategic financial decisions, and eliminate manual activities. Additionally, he presented with Accenture, UCF’s Adaptive Planning consulting partner to share key learnings from the university’s first budget cycle in Adaptive Planning, how users are collaborating with the system, and the power of forecasting and planning in a singular system.

Implemented in October 2022, the BPA team is still actively working on optimizing Adaptive Planning to meet the university’s budgeting, forecasting, and reporting needs. One of the principal goals is to completely transition departments away from disparate and error-prone spreadsheets and take full advantage of the analysis capabilities Adaptive Planning affords.  We still have a ways to go, but with the BPA Office’s commitment and expertise and the continued support and feedback of our UCF community, we are making great progress!

October 9, 2023