The Joint Munitions Command is counting down the months to deployment of the General Fund Enterprise Business System. For JMC, deployment will take place Jan. 1, 2012, and employees are busy learning exactly what GFEBS is and how to use it.
In short, GFEBS is a modular, selected, off-the-shelf computer software system that will allow JMC and the entire Army to integrate financial and non-financial data. Users will not have to collect and search for needed data because it will be available in real time.
"The current system is not sustainable," said Col. Eric F. Zellars, director of deployment and transformation of GFEBS.
It is not sustainable because it involves maintaining many systems requiring costly interfaces. This inhibits efficient sharing of data and hinders timely responses to questions, and it requires time-consuming and costly reconciliations. Individual systems have become so customized and unwieldly that it is difficult to share data and to make changes.
The GFEBS system will implement a single, web-based system that standardizes processes Army-wide. Users cannot customize GFEBS, a positive which will not limit future, necessary changes. In accordance, JMC must configure its needs to the GFEBS system.
"With GFEBS, we are taking the 21st century power of software and putting it to use to transform the Army and to transform how we share information," said Jyuji Hewitt, deputy to the commander for JMC.
"GFEBS is a better technology that will allow us to evolve," said Zellars. "It will help us understand financial and non-financial data across the Army enterprise to better-manage taxpayer dollars."
The new system encompasses six business process areas: funds management; property, plant and equipment; spending chain; reimbursables; cost management; and financials. These six areas are broken down into 127 roles which supervisors assign to employees depending on their needs to complete tasks. Each role is the equivalent of a functional expert for the particular organization.
At JMC, these new roles will afford employees the opportunity to develop skills with a state-of-the-art enterprise resource planning system and cost management techniques.
GFEBS will process a million transactions a day, using standard processes, to provide essential data for transforming the Army to a cost culture. JMC staff will move through the remainder of 2011 learning more about GFEBS and counting down for its deployment.
Social Sharing