Business Analyst Carmen Peralta has been here through the beginnings of one of our most widely-used system, the Weill Business Gateway (WBG). Through her years of working at WCM, Carmen has helped transform WBG into a massive system that manages the daily needs of WCM staff to complete everything from training to payroll.
Hi, Carmen! Thank you for joining us today. In your own words, what is your role in ITS?
I’m a systems business analyst. I manage the payroll system day to day issues and and configuration changes. I am also involved in some of the projects. I work mainly with Payroll Department users, but also support many other users at WCM since I manage Change of Funding and Supplemental Compensation, widely used by all departments – clinical and non-clinical. For a while, I was also involved in supporting the Learning Management System. In that role, I coordinated the launch of training materials, managed user issues, system changes and upgrades.
And how long have you been in this role within ITS?
I joined ACG [Administrative Computing Group] in 2007. It's going to be 18 years this July.
Oh, wow, congratulations!
Thank you. My intention was not to stay this long. I was hired to work on a particular project, and I thought I was going to move on after a few years, but Weill Cornell has a way of retaining people for a long time. So here I am, 17 years later.
What project were you working on when you first joined WCM?
It was the Project Argo implementation, which led to the creation of the Weill Business Gateway to help streamline administrative processes at the college. I saw how people used the legacy system, which was very different from SAP [system currently used to run WBG]. And from there, SAP has evolved. Central users were mostly using SAP at first, but now it touches every employee in one way or another.
How does a business analyst for WBG help oversee all of these changes over the years?
I am the liaison between the users and the developers. I am the person that will sit down with the users to gather requirements. If it’s a change that's strictly configuration, I do it. But if the change requires customization, after gathering the requirements I coordinate with the Development Team to deliver the changes. This sometimes involves, writing a functional spec, testing the changes and deploying what the users requested.
What’s your favorite part of the job?
My favorite part is helping others. When someone calls me with a problem, and I can help them out… it feels satisfying. I am able to alleviate someone's pain, either by streamlining a process or fixing something that is broken.
Are there any projects you’ve worked on that you feel have been particularly helpful to users?
Project Argo was the biggest project that I worked on. I came in during the blueprint and I had a say in how things were configured and done. I had a chance to work with Finance, Payroll, DAs, HR, and other departments in the organization.
The next big project was Employee Central Payroll. This project changed the way HR and Payroll do business at WCM. Payroll Control Center was implemented which has automated the payroll process making it easier to manage on a biweekly basis. On the HR side, this project integrated the different systems and introduced the automated approval process we now have for system changes.
I also managed the Supplemental Compensation redesign where we updated the application that is used to pay doctors and some others in the clinical community for services performed at NYP. This was a complete re-design from the first system we implemented. We changed the look and feel of the application, while also addressing many of the issues users were experiencing.
I did the same for the Change of Funding application.
I haven't been here quite as long as you, but I have noticed so many improvements in SAP over the years.
Yes. We are constantly looking for improvements in all the modules.
What do you like to do outside of work?
I am a big family person – my family is the most important thing in my life. If I am not spending time with my mom, I am with my husband and my son or one of my sisters. I am one of five siblings, so there is always something going on in the family.
I also like hiking, biking, and traveling. I love nature. We choose one of those activities when the weather permits.
Carmen (left) with her sisters in Westbury Gardens.
Do you have a favorite spot that you like to go to?
We go to Massapequa Park in Long Island or places around the Hudson area. Long Island trails are mostly flat, so we like to go to the trails around the Hudson area such as Breakneck. That's the type of hiking I like, somewhere you can climb and go to the top of the mountain and look at the beautiful views.
When we travel, we like to try different places at least one a every year.
Carmen with her husband in Medellin, Colombia.
Do you have a favorite place that you've visited before?
There are many, but I loved Hawaii. And from recent trips, I loved Lake Como.
Carmen (center) with her son (left) and husband (right) in Portugal.
Oh wow, that sounds really nice.
And I am from Dominican Republic, and I love going back there too. It’s a place I keep in my heart. Every time I go there, I try to explore a different area I have not been to.
Who are women that you most admire?
The woman I admire the most is mom - for her kindness, selflessness in service to others, her honesty, hard work, curiosity about world, generosity, and great sense of humor. She is not only a mother to my siblings and I, but to many others that also call her "Mom."
Carmen with her mother in Boston.