Do you know Jack? Jack Crowley is one of our friends who has been helping coordinate the HRx Project. He is a Project Manager from CIBER and he’s been keeping the Core Team on track through his excellent organizational skills and his wicked sense of humor. We love him and we thought you’d love to get to know him also, so we asked him some questions and here’s what he divulged.
Where are you from?
My Mother & Father. Born in Plainfield, NJ and lived in “The Garden State” until the end of 2001. Now about 30 minutes south-west of Richmond, VA in the grand metropolis of Moseley, VA.
How long have you been a Project Manager?
Since I was a Boy Scout. I’ve always loved projects. I received my Project Manager Professional (PMP) Certification in 1996 from the Project Management Institute (PMI). I’ve also been involved in developing Project, Program and Portfolio Management standards for PMI. I’ve been doing system implementations since the late 80’s (1980s)
When you work on a project, what are your responsibilities?
Beat the team until the morale improves! Analogy #1: Play the parent to ensure all the parties play nicely together in the sandbox to build the solution. Analogy #2: Conductor of the orchestra. And for the tougher clients (definitely not UNC), analogy #3: Cat herder.
Project management is more of an art and relationship role than a technical one. I’ve been very blessed to have some great team members that do all the real work- and that goes for this team! I do a lot of listening to understand what the client wants and then coordinate the work with all the players to get it done. Ultimately, we get the project done in scope, on time, in budget that meets the clients needs.
What is your favorite thing about working at CIBER?
Team work and a consistent method that is well thought out. I spent a lot of time in the project management and software engineering world as it relates to application development and international implementation process standards. CIBER has one of the best I have seen and even more importantly, they follow it. It makes things so much easier for the client and us.
What are your top 3 favorite things about Chapel Hill/Raleigh/Durham?
• Environment (a blend of Charlottesville and Blacksburg, VA).
• The people, very friendly and easy to find running and biking partners
• The food – Franklin Street and other local spots!
You participate in physically taxing sporting events, most recently the ½ Iron Man in Williamsburg, VA- When did you become interested in these competitions? How many have you completed? Is there a specific competition that you would love to complete? When you finish what is your favorite thing to do, for example do you like to- go out and celebrate like it’s New Years, pass out in a tub of ice with a Gatorade drip, or eat a banana and run home?
I did my first triathlon, sprint distance (750 meter swim, 12 mile bike, 3.1 mile run) in 2005 and got bit by the bug. There are three other distances: Olympic (0.9 mile swim, 25 mile bike, 6.2 mile run), Half-Ironman (1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, 13.1 mile run) and Ironman (2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike and 26.2 mile run)
Since I began, I’ve done about 20+ triathlons, including the Ironman in Louisville, KY in 2007 and the National Duathlon Championship (6.2 mile run, 25 mile bike, 3.1 mile run) this year.
I would love to qualify for the World Championship Ironman in Kona, Hawaii. Maybe if I outlive my competition.
To steal the most common phrase from the HRx Project – It Depends! Sprint & Olympic distance races: Recovery Drink, Stretch, Beer, Socialize, Beer, Stretch, Beer and Dee, my wife (not the Dee you know from the project) drives home. For Half-Ironman: Rest and recover, eat, beer, socialize, beer….repeat. For the Ironman: Two IV bottles of fluids, rest, recover, sleep – no beer!
Aside from participating in intense endurance competitions what other things do you like to do?
There are other things besides endurance competition? I do spend most of my free time with my wife and two boys. Albeit, they are both in College, but as much time as I can, I spend with them. I am the president of the Richmond Triathlon Club and on the board of Richmond Multisports, a triathlon race event producer. Those two keep me busy. In the winter, skiing! I was on the National Ski Patrol for 15 years before moving to Richmond.
What are your favorite foods and where in the world do you think the best version of it is?
• Flaming Cherries Jubilee, The Manor in West Orange, NJ.
• Homemade Tiramisu
• Kriek Lambic Beer, Pajottenland region of Belgium (Ben Franklin said beer was food, that is good enough for me)
Below find pictures of Jack as a Project Manager and as an Iron Man (finishing with his son by his side).
- HRx Team
Did you know that prior to his very successful career in Human Resources, UNC HC’s Vice President of Human Resources, Bill Rotella, spent 11 years teaching youth in the Pennsylvania Public School System? On Thursday November 11th, he took a little trip down memory lane when he spoke to the 2nd year Masters in Healthcare Administration (MHA) candidates at the UNC School of Public Health.
Bill discussed his unique career path that included working education, sales and HR within a diversity of health systems. He also provided an overview of the roles and responsibilities of the various departments under UNC HC’s Human Resources and also some of the major projects that the group is undertaking, like HRx! The students were obviously very interested in learning more about HR in healthcare organizations, as evidenced by the onslaught of questions covering everything from the Joint Commission and the HR relationship with School of Medicine to EOS and nursing retention.
Below is a picture of Bill inspiring tomorrow’s Healthcare Administrators!
- HRx Team
As you know, the Core Team has been spending the past few weeks in Lawson Training sessions. Recently there was a week solely devoted to Benefits and all of the ways that Lawson will make our work in HR more effective. Sherretta Carter, the HR Benefits Manager, attended all of the sessions and so we asked her the following questions to see what she thought of the training sessions.
As Benefits Manager, what are the top two issues you have with the current GEAC System?
GEAC has a number of limitations. The main one is that it is not user friendly. There are no dropdown menus in order to help us understand exactly what information is in the system. The next issue is that it is very unpredictable. While we can enter data, we are not certain if that information gets appropriately transferred and reflected in the paycheck. The system that we are using was designed by people who are no longer with us, and we are always having to contact Andy Capps over at ISD to help us troubleshoot. This is time consuming for us and him.
Now that you have gone through the Benefits training, what are you overall thoughts about it?
The new Lawson system will give us a lot more capabilities to do the types of transactions that we need to do, so we can do more for our employees. I didn’t expect, however, for our role to change so significantly. We are going to have to do some programming whenever changes need to be made which we previously gave to ISD to do. For example, if there are any changes that need to be made to health insurance, then we in benefits will have to insert the necessary tables versus giving it to ISD to do. But, this is the direction that technology is going in- forcing us to be responsible for our own content, which will be a good thing in the end.
I am excited to see what the actual UNC HC module will look like, which will be available in November. Currently we have been training on a generic Lawson module, but the new one will be tailored for UNC HC’s needs.
What do you see is the most important way that the new HRx system will make Benefits Administration easier?
I think the new system is more user friendly not just for us but also for the employee and manager as well. The self service capabilities will allow employees and managers to easily make necessary changes, which will allow us to focus more on educating employees about benefits. Right now we are spending far too much time changing or correcting easy things like a change of address, but with the new system, the employee can quickly and easily do it themselves. It empowers the employee and lets us spend more time educating people about their benefits.
How have you liked the HRx implementation process thus far?
It has been a wonderful experience! I have a greater appreciation of how every level of Human Resources impacts my work, as well as how my work affects others. It has been quite an eye-opener. Seeing Lawson’s impact not just on our department but the entire institution will be exciting as well, especially considering all of the hard work we have been putting into it. The result will be a product we can all be proud of.
