Modernizing IPPS-A, the U.S. Army's Largest, Most Complex Personnel System
CACI Case Study
More than one million U.S. Army personnel now have access to a modern, web-based tool that can effectively initiate, view, track, and manage human resource and pay transactions. The Integrated Personnel and Pay System-Army (IPPS-A) was built with support from CACI as the Army’s systems integrator and represents a revolutionary leap forward. IPPS-A eliminates 50 of the Army’s disparate legacy HR systems and streamlines the work processes required by the Army’s HR professionals by integrating multiple systems, standardizing complex data, ensuring user adoption, and maintaining personnel data security. The right team of experts, the best tools, and a proven approach made it all possible.
852,131*
Unique Users Since Inception
100,000*
Avg. Users Per Week
>50
Legacy HR Systems Eliminated
24/7
Data Accessibility
*As of October 2023
The Challenge: Managing Troves of Data from Siloed Systems
For the Army, consolidating its legacy human capital management systems and databases was the greatest challenge of its kind. The IPPS-A program was defined as a massive undertaking that needed to consolidate more than 50 disparate systems into a single, modern, integrated, user-friendly, web-based platform that would manage all aspects of personnel and pay for Army soldiers. Previously, legacy systems and databases were stove-piped and did not interact with each other. They were also designed at different times, based on aging hardware and software systems, and varied widely in business processes and functionality.
As the systems integrator for IPPS-A, CACI's responsibility was to deliver technology and best business practices to plan, design, build, and implement the modernized system. Having worked in lockstep with the Army since 2015 to modernize its HR system capability, CACI had a deep understanding of the challenge ahead.
CACI’s decades of experience in best-in-class and leading-edge human capital management platforms and the company’s unique technology roadmap coupled with the Army’s leadership and functional expertise enabled the team to forge a previously unattainable path.
“We firmly believe that every service member deserves personnel and pay management processes that are transparent, efficient, and comprehensive but that also leverage the latest technology to assist them with managing their daily lives. We took on this work with full commitment to the Army’s mission and were determined to address today’s data management challenges and tomorrow’s data security threats, ensuring readiness, and reducing risk to our nation’s soldiers.”
- DeEtte Gray, President,
Business and Information Technology Solutions
The Results: A Centralized Solution for Talent and Personnel Management
After months of planning and development, IPPS-A went live to select users in December 2022 and was deployed to all soldiers in January 2023. The latest IPPS-A release, known as Release 3, marked the first time in the Army’s history that soldiers across the active, reserve, and National Guard components of the Army have been on one enterprise-wide HR system, creating the largest, most complex Peoplesoft implementation across the entire U.S. government.
More than one million soldiers can now access their personal records, update their information, and manage their pay and benefits through a user-friendly portal. The system also provides Army leaders with real-time personnel data that will enable them to make better-informed decisions about the readiness and deployment of their units.
To accomplish this monumental effort, the Army and CACI leveraged many technologies, including PeopleSoft HCM, CRM, and ELM core technologies; KAFKA; AbInitio; and Oracle databases.
Working as a team to fulfill the Army’s requirements, CACI, the IPPS-A Government Program Management Office (PMO), and the Army Functional Management Division formed a strategic alignment and true partnership to ensure that IPPS-A became a model of success for the Army from both a collaboration and implementation standpoint.
IPPS-A is available 24/7 and makes that data accessible on multiple platforms, including hand-held mobile devices, to provide critical capabilities:
Total force visibility
Delivers visibility over the entire force and maximizes the potential of the Army’s soldiers to enhance readiness.
Talent management
Allows leaders to see soldiers’ knowledge, skills, and abilities to ensure the right person is in the right job.
Auditability
Ensures IPPS-A is secure, efficient, accurate, and auditable per congressional requirements.
Self-service
Empowers soldiers with visibility into their own personnel data, the ability to effect certain transactions themselves, and a means of self-reporting data, all in the palms of their own hands.
“In addition to our technology, the most powerful resource dedicated to IPPS-A is the Government PMO and the Army Functional Management Division who worked tirelessly to ensure this program succeeds. IPPS-A is now the authoritative, comprehensive source of Army personnel information. It has minimized the challenges of the Army’s previous, more complex ecosystem, which has been made possible by the Army’s highly capable HR team.”
- Mary Pollard, Vice President, Program Director
IPPS-A enables soldiers to view their digital selves in the palm of their hands. For digital natives, or the generation that grew up with technology, who make up nearly 95% of the Army’s active-duty enlisted soldiers and nearly 75% of its active-duty officers, IPPS-A’s capabilities are more aligned with their preferences and expectations.
“The men and women who protect this country need a stable, accessible system to enact simple things, such as submitting and gaining approval for an absence request,” said Pollard.
With Release 3, the Army now has a strong foundation of integrated personnel information. From here, IPPS-A will continue to evolve as the Army considers modernizing interfacing systems and integrating them into the IPPS-A solution, the continuing evolution of reports, queries, and dashboards, and leveraging new tools such as AI and bots.
“The HR data and scenarios are complicated and unique, just like the lives of our soldiers. We are essentially telling each person’s story in a digital format, and each story is distinctive,” Pollard continued. “We understand and appreciate the Army’s commitment to the IPPS-A program. The achievement of R3’s go-live was thanks to their vision and fortitude to stick with it. The future of IPPS-A is bright, and we look forward to continuing our partnership with the Army.”
End-to-end Human Capital Management Systems
CACI is a leader in Human Capital Management (HCM), and we understand the concerns facing organizations today.
CACI Completes Deployment of Personnel and Pay System to the U.S. Army National Guard
CACI International Inc has completed implementation of the Integrated Personnel and Pay System-Army (IPPS-A) for the U.S. Army National Guard.