Worcester Public Schools
Worcester Public Schools · Payroll & HR Teams

Workday HCM / PATT: The Road to Go-Live

Every date the team needs to hold between today and the first Workday paycheck.
As of Wednesday, August 6, 2026 · plan version Jan 27
8
days to finish
catch-up txns
39
days to
Go / No-Go
40
days to
config freeze
134
days to
GO-LIVE · Dec 18
155
days to first
Workday paycheck
Today · Aug 6
Augustclose out parallel
by Fri Aug 14 HR + Payroll
Catch-up transactions loaded
Round 1 is essentially done. The remaining work: load the hires, comp changes, step increases, degree changes, leaves, and terminations since the snapshot, so Round 2 tests against current data.
Mon Aug 17 Payroll
Parallel Round 2 begins
Four weeks, ends 9/11. The last chance to prove every Round 1 fix landed.
Fri Aug 28 Training
Training materials complete in MA4
Review them this month while SMEs are fresh, workbook season leaves no time in October.
Mon Aug 31 All leads
E2E testing signoff in MA4
Septemberdecision & freeze
Fri Sep 11 Payroll
Parallel Round 2 ends
Results feed straight into Monday's decision.
Sat Sep 12 Freeze
Data snapshot, delta tracking begins
The production build starts from data as of this date. Every transaction after it goes on the delta log for December catch-up. Get fall hires and corrections in before this date.
Mon Sep 14
GO / NO-GO DECISION
The one decision the rest of this timeline hangs on.
Tue Sep 15 Freeze
Config freeze · daily cutover meetings begin
Job profiles, comp grades, sup orgs, and pay/benefit setup lock (limited updates 9/16–18 only). Our daily-meeting attendee needs to be named.
Thu Sep 24 – Fri Oct 2 HR
Workbook Week 1, employee data
Pre-hire, positions, personal info, unions, education, certifications, payment elections, landing on top of peak fall hiring.
Octoberthe workbook crunch
Fri Oct 2 – Mon Oct 12 Payroll + Benefits
Workbook Week 2, benefits & comp
Comp, allowances, dependents, medical, retirement, FICA exemptions, W-4 / state withholding.
Tue Oct 13 – Wed Oct 21 Payroll
Workbook Week 3, payroll, security & misc
Thu Oct 22 · Fri Oct 23
All workbooks due
Critical workbooks 10/22, remaining 10/23. Hard dates, the tenant build starts from these.
Wed Oct 28 Payroll
Dry-run validation / mini-parallel
Novemberbuild & train
Thu Nov 5 – Fri Nov 13 Vendor
Implementation tenant build (config)
All month Training
End-user training window
The gap we close ourselves: timekeepers, approvers, payroll processors, HR staff. Materials were done in August, sessions must be scheduled now so day one isn't first contact.
Mon Nov 16 – Tue Nov 24 Freeze
Implementation tenant data load
Workbook content is locked. Corrections found now go to the delta log, not the load.
Wed Nov 25 – Thu Dec 3
Data validation & tenant sign-off
Our team checks its own data, the last look before production. Block real hours for this.
Decembercutover
Fri Dec 4 – Mon Dec 14 Blackout
Production build, quiet period
No config requests, no data corrections into the build. Full change blackout.
Tue Dec 15 Payroll
History & carryover loads · catch-up begins
Taxes, earnings, deductions, withholding orders, balances, one-day window. Transaction catch-up (everything on the delta log since 9/12) starts and runs through 1/1, straight through break.
Week of Dec 14 Training
Refresher for timekeepers & approvers
First time entry is go-live day itself, no practice period.
Fri Dec 18
GO-LIVE
Workday becomes the system of record. First time entry in Workday the same day.
The freeze rule of thumb: from September 12 to January 8, the default answer to “can we change this?” is no, log it for catch-up. The delta log is the team's most important artifact this fall: it is literally the to-do list for the two weeks before the first paycheck.
Friday · January 8, 2027

First Workday Paycheck

Catch-up complete 1/1, all hands for pre-check audit and issue triage that week. Confirm the HERA off-cycle fallback before this date, not after.

Payroll HR Training Freeze / blackout Major milestone

Dates from HCM_PATT_go live plan Jan27 (Microsoft Project, printed 7/31/26). Freeze-window interpretations drawn from the build schedule, confirm exact change-control rules at the 9/15 cutover kickoff.
End-user training window is a WPS recommendation, not yet on the vendor plan. ← Back to the Workday Training Portal