What I Know About PeopleSoft: Formerly An Emerging Brand Now Its The Oracle Brand

I don't know much about Peoplesoft except that it became a big deal in 2000 to the institution (a community college) where I attended classes and worked as a part-time IT support tech. Honestly, I had no clue that it was a database or anything. All I remember were the grunts from tenured staff that they were having to learn a new system because someone was "moving their cheese." During that time, I was a member of a 3-person IT staff and we had regular meetings about the grunting, but only one of us (a senior staff member) had received training on PeopleSoft. It just so happened that particular individual liked having a monopoly on the information and seemed quite content to be delegated the job of training everyone else---essential personnel of course. I was just a student and fell into the non-essential personnel at the moment (as long as I was not needed to put out little fires then this was not something that would immediately affect my job). Therefore, I was enjoying my cheese for the moment.

I recall planning my move to Virginia Beach to attend college on campus therefore I only got the jist of what all the PeopleSoft brouhaha was all about. Essentially, it was being used for student enrollment, other registration tasks, and employee information. During that time, the concept of VoIP was also being thrown around as a requirement for deploying the PeopleSoft system. Other than that I was clueless.

So, I packed my bags moved to VA Beach and out of the IT field into the life of a commuter on campus and that of a debt collector. The next time I was to ever hear this name PeopleSoft was in a few job search requirements and later during news of Oracle's acquisition of this company in 2004-2005. I remember seeing upset employees resistance and I think picket signs disparaging Oracle for acquiring the company. There were talks of layoffs and downsizing and rumors that Oracle had acquired it's competition out of fear and planned to let the brand die by not providing support for the application. Some of the concerns seemed logical and valid while others did not make complete business sense.

Layoffs and downsizing are normal during mergers and acquisitions, but trying to kill off an established brand and application that had already been adopted by many users did not make business sense. If I recall vaguely, Oracle made a statement regarding continued support and plans to keep some of Peoplesoft's employees. I am a little shaky on the details therefore I decided to research it further to learn more about Peoplesoft and Oracle's acquisition of the company. What I learned was...(to be continued in another blog).