Simplifying Processes and Enhancing Operations with Oracle Cloud
How organizational change management kept a $1.1B divestiture on schedule when a Transition Services Agreement was the ticking clock.
A private equity-backed acquisition carved out a midstream natural gas and NGL operator from a larger energy conglomerate for approximately $1.1 billion — creating a newly independent company with an immediate problem: it was still running on its former parent's Oracle E-Business Suite under a Transition Services Agreement whose renewal would have been prohibitively expensive. There was effectively one deadline: stand up a brand-new ERP before the TSA ran out.
The client chose Oracle Cloud ERP and committed to a six-month implementation covering Financials, Procurement, Project Portfolio Management, Expenses, and Tax. The legacy EBS environment had been shaped for an upstream, production-accounting operating model; the new entity was a midstream operator that needed standard, modern, best-practice processes — not a lift and shift of the old configuration.
As Change Management Lead, Taligens owned the workstreams connecting the systems integrator's configuration work to the client's end users: stakeholder engagement and change readiness, end-user training, UAT enablement, role and security mapping, and communications.
The Challenge
Three forces converged to make this more than a routine ERP project.
First, the TSA clock. Every month the client remained on the former parent's systems carried a fee and consumed a limited renewal window. A slipped go-live did not just delay value — it triggered real cash outflow and, if the TSA could not be renegotiated, meaningful operational risk.
Second, a fit problem. The legacy EBS environment had been built for an upstream, production-accounting company. The new company is a midstream operator. Chart of accounts, project structures, contract forms, and even user mental models had to be rebuilt to match the new operating model — not merely lifted and shifted.
Third, a net-new organization. The client was a new corporate entity with a workforce that had come from a larger parent. Employees who had spent years in one ERP's vocabulary now had to relearn their work in Oracle Cloud's. Support teams, subject-matter experts, and super-users all had to be identified and developed from scratch — with no existing training function, no established learning management system, and no change-management muscle memory.
The OCM Approach
Six months leaves no time for a textbook change program delivered in series. The OCM workstream ran as five parallel tracks — stakeholder engagement, training, UAT enablement, role mapping, and communications — each with its own cadence but all coordinated against the system integrator's design-build-test-deploy milestones.
The approach kept change management load-bearing throughout the engagement: not a reporting function or a slide deck, but the operational spine connecting the technical team's configuration work to the users who would have to execute it on day one.
The Three Workstreams
Change Readiness as a Managed Asset
A living stakeholder and change readiness assessment — maintained through go-live — drove training prioritization, communications sequencing, and super-user identification. When readiness scores lagged in any group, a targeted intervention followed.
A Curriculum Built to the Real Configuration
A full training curriculum built from scratch: task-level Quick Guides across all nine modules, Adobe Captivate simulations for high-volume transactions, an Oracle navigation primer, and role-specific job aids — paired with module-by-module role mapping to ensure every user had the right system access before go-live.
Three Audiences, Three Cadences
Executives received a concise status view tied to decisions they needed to make. Middle management received a rolling change-impact digest. Front-line users received "what's changing for you" content in the voice of their own managers — aligned to the client's emerging brand standards.
In the first two weeks we accomplished what most implementation projects accomplish in the first few months.
Go-Live & Hypercare
The go-live approach was built on three principles: nothing surprises a user on day one, every transaction has a Quick Guide waiting for it, and super-users are positioned to help their peers before the support desk is needed.
- Pre-Cutover Readiness
Stakeholder readiness confirmed at green across all impacted groups. UAT test scripts executed with ≥95% first-pass rate. Role assignments provisioned and spot-checked against the employee master.
- Cutover Weekend
Training content frozen; super-users briefed on the first-week transaction list. Communications desk prepared daily user-facing updates for the first days in production.
- Week 1 Support
In-module super-user coverage with floor walks for AR and AP teams during the first invoice and payment runs. Daily readiness checks with leadership.
- Hypercare — Weeks 2–4
Defect intake routed through the same channel as training revisions — fixes and guide updates shipped together. Quick Guides updated based on real user questions; the top ten became the desk-reference set.
- Transition to Steady State
Training assets and role-mapping workbooks handed off to the client. Administrator and super-user network stood up as the ongoing first line of support.
What This Engagement Delivered
The client stood up a fully owned Oracle Cloud ERP platform inside the six-month window required by the Transition Services Agreement, retiring its dependence on the former parent's Oracle E-Business Suite. Data conversions achieved a 99% success rate across core financial modules.
Users transacted on day one without consultant shadowing
Super-users, Quick Guides, and role mapping carried the load in production — the support infrastructure the project built was the one that was needed.
A training library built to be maintained internally
Delivered in a format the client's own team could edit and extend, reducing long-term dependence on outside consultants for system or process changes.
Role-mapping workbooks as a security baseline
The client's IT and security teams left the engagement with a clean, business-validated baseline for user provisioning — reusable for every subsequent system change.
TSA exit on time and on scope
The client came off the Transition Services Agreement without cost overrun or extended dependency on its former parent — the only outcome that mattered on day one of the engagement.
Is this kind of engagement right for your organization?
This work is built for organizations facing the following conditions:
- You are standing up an independent operating environment on an accelerated timeline.
- Users must be functional in a new system on or before a hard go-live date.
- Your change management scope includes training, UAT, and role mapping — not just communications.
- You need training assets your own team can maintain after the consultant leaves.
- Your organization has no established change-management or learning-management infrastructure to build on.
Ready to make your next ERP implementation stick?
Let's talk about how organizational change management can protect your timeline and build lasting capability.