The implementation project is done. The consultants have packed up. PeopleSoft or Oracle Fusion Cloud is live, and leadership has declared success.
Six months later, reality sets in.
The system works. But keeping it working? That’s turned into a full-time job for people who were supposed to be doing other things.
Quarterly Updates Add Up Fast
Oracle Fusion Cloud customers get new functionality every quarter. That’s genuinely good—you’re getting continuous improvements without major upgrade projects. But somebody has to review those release notes, figure out what changed, test your configurations, and coordinate the rollout. Four times a year.
Most organizations underestimate this when they move to the cloud. They plan for “some update management” and get a recurring operational commitment that doesn’t shrink over time.
PeopleSoft shops have more flexibility with PUM timing, which is nice until you realize you’ve fallen three cycles behind and now it’s a bigger project than anyone budgeted for.
The teams that handle this well aren’t doing anything magical. They just have dedicated people who know the system and aren’t getting pulled in twelve directions. The teams that struggle are trying to squeeze update management between everything else on their plate.
Your PeopleSoft Expert Is Probably Getting Recruiter Calls
Here’s something that keeps IT leaders up at night: the person who really knows your system has options.
PeopleSoft expertise didn’t appear overnight. The people who have it spent 15 or 20 years building it. They know where the bodies are buried. They remember why that customization exists. And recruiters know exactly how hard they are to replace.
Oracle Cloud is a different problem. The platform keeps evolving, so even experienced people are constantly learning. And the skills from managing on-premise systems? They don’t transfer as cleanly as you’d hope. Good Oracle Cloud people are hard to find, and when you do find them, they’re expensive.
Either way, you’ve got key-person risk. If your PeopleSoft admin wins the lottery tomorrow—or just decides to retire—you’ve got a problem.
The Math on “Just Maintaining” the System
Back-of-napkin calculation: a mid-sized PeopleSoft shop probably needs two or three people worth of effort just to keep things running. Help desk, updates, troubleshooting, security patches, the random emergency that always seems to happen right before a holiday weekend.
At $80K to $150K fully loaded per person, that’s $200K to $450K a year. And that’s before you do anything new. No improvements. No automation. Just keeping the lights on.
Oracle Cloud shifts some infrastructure work to Oracle, but you still need people managing configurations, integrations, and quarterly updates. The work looks different, but it doesn’t disappear.
Meanwhile, That Modernization Project Keeps Getting Pushed
This is where it actually hurts.
Your team has a backlog. Maybe it’s modernizing the user experience. Maybe it’s rolling out an AI assistant so employees stop calling the help desk for basic questions. Maybe it’s finally automating that process everyone complains about.
Good ideas. Real value. But they need the same people who are buried in tickets and patches and “can you just look at this real quick” requests.
So the modernization project gets pushed to next quarter. Then next quarter again. Some roadmaps have the same initiative “planned for next year” three years running.
What BYU Did Instead
Brigham Young University hit this wall a few years ago. They were moving Finance and HR to Workday, which meant reassigning twelve PeopleSoft administrators. But Campus Solutions was staying on PeopleSoft—they still needed support.
The obvious move was to hire replacements. They did the math and decided to try something different instead.
Six Gideon Taylor consultants now handle what twelve internal staff used to do. The cost dropped by half, and response times actually got better. BYU kept their existing ServiceNow setup, added Teams channels for quick communication, and set up bi-weekly reviews to make sure nothing slips.
Unused hours roll forward month to month, which matters more than you’d think. IT budgets don’t come with “use it or lose it” flexibility built in.
The Case for Not Doing Everything Yourself
PeopleSoft managed services or Oracle Cloud managed services aren’t about replacing your team. They’re about right-sizing what your team spends time on.
Hand off PUM cycles to people who do them constantly. Add support capacity without adding headcount. Get Campus Solutions and HCM and Financials expertise without trying to maintain all three internally.
For Oracle Cloud, it means someone else is tracking quarterly releases, identifying what matters for your configuration, testing, and coordinating deployment. Your team approves and focuses on actually using the new capabilities instead of just implementing them.
If You’re Running Both Systems Right Now
A lot of organizations are stuck in the middle—PeopleSoft for some things, Oracle Cloud for others, maybe migrating piece by piece. This is honestly the hardest situation to staff for.
Your PeopleSoft people don’t necessarily know Oracle Integration Cloud. Your cloud team may not understand why that PeopleSoft customization can’t just be turned off. And now you need integration expertise on top of both.
Working with one partner who handles both environments means you’re not playing telephone between vendors when something breaks at the integration layer.
Does the Math Work?
Usually, yes. Not because managed services are cheap—they’re not—but because specialists are faster.
Someone who does PUM updates across dozens of clients will finish yours faster than your team that does it once a quarter. Someone who troubleshoots Oracle Cloud issues all day has probably seen your problem before.
Add up what you’re spending on maintenance staff. Add the cost of vacancies when people leave. Add the projects that keep getting pushed because nobody has time. Compare that to managed services that handle the operational work while your team focuses on things that actually move the needle.
What Actually Matters When Choosing a Partner
Not all managed services are the same. A few things worth checking:
Do they actually know your system? PeopleSoft Campus Solutions is not the same as PeopleSoft HCM is not the same as Oracle Cloud HCM. “ERP support” as a generic offering usually means they don’t really know any of them.
Will they work the way you work? You shouldn’t have to adopt a new ticketing system or change your processes to fit their model. BYU kept ServiceNow. That mattered.
Do they know your industry? Higher ed has different peaks and compliance requirements than enterprise has different requirements than public sector. Generic support from people who don’t understand your context creates friction.
Can you start small? Some organizations need full L1-L3 support. Others just need help with quarterly updates. A partner who insists on the big package when you need something targeted probably isn’t the right fit.
Where This Leaves You
Oracle environments need ongoing care. That’s not a criticism of the platforms—it’s just how enterprise software works. You can do that work internally, you can hand it off entirely, or you can find something in between.
What you can’t do is pretend the work isn’t there. The updates keep coming. The tickets keep arriving. The people who know your system keep getting older and more likely to leave.
The organizations that handle this well think about it strategically: what should our internal team focus on, and what should we get help with? They’re not trying to do everything themselves, and they’re not outsourcing everything either.
That’s what managed services should actually be about. Not replacing your team—giving them room to work on what matters.
Want to talk through what this might look like for your environment? Learn more about our managed service offerings:
