So I have started my internship at Whirlpool, and it has been extremely busy. I am working in the GIS (Global Information Systems) Finance group, taking a role in creating a new expense reporting system. SAP provides a Travel Management module that we are going to use, and I am going to take a role in configuring it and creating a web interface to it.
Monday
Today was orientation day, and I spent most of the day learning about Whirlpool and what type of company they are. I got my ID badge and laptop, and also managed to lock myself out of my own system 5 minutes after getting it. It was interesting to see that Whirlpool does about 18 billion in gross revenue, but only about 700 million or so in profits.
Near the end of the day, I was talking with Steve, my supervisor, about the project that I will be working on, which is basically a new expense reporting system.
Tuesday
Today was a day filled with meetings. Whirlpool is asking for various banks to give proposals for implementing a One Card solution, and I sat in on U.S. Bank’s proposal. This gave me a lot of good information about how different departments have different needs from the banks.
Later, I got to talk with Paulo, another person in GIS (Global Information Systems) Finance group about a new system that they are looking at to document requirements.
Near the end of the day, I was able to talk with Steve and Angela (the project manager for the new expense reporting system) about goals and project deliverables.
Wednesday
Today I was with Angela as she got me up to speed on the different activities that an administrator for the old expense reporting system needs to go through. I received an overview of expense reporting in general and also reviewed documentation about what the new system is suppose to be doing.
After Lunch, I went over to the Box Factory, which is one of Whirlpool’s locations, and talked with John Kauffman about what is role in the project is going to be and what he can do for the project. He was elected to be the lead technical architect for the project, which means he makes high level decisions on technical implementations for the project.
I then got to speak with Randy Fife, a web developer and fellow Purdue Alumni about the portal and how to get set up with it. They said that I would be able to access the development side of the portal and play around with it once I am given access.
Thursday
Today was my meet and greet for the GIS Finance group. We all sat together and talked about what each person’s role is in the group and they got to know me a little bit better.
At around lunch time we had a conference call with Murat which we discussed various items with the Travel Management tool.
After lunch, I went to Whirlpool’s Hilltop facility and discussed how the we are going to get data from the credit card companies (probably Visa) and how the SAP tool is going to work with it.
At the end of the day I sat down with two of the expense report administrators and was walked through how they currently do their job. Extensity is one of the tools that Maytag had used and it was pretty slick. The tool that Whirlpool uses, REEP (or as I refer to it, The Reeper), needed a lot of paper work and a LOT of manual processes. I am right now looking into how to make these people’s lives easier.
Friday
On my last day of my first week, I read up on ALE’s, IDoc’s and EDI’s. These terms have been used a lot by the technical team and I wanted to know what they meant.
Later in the day I had a lunch meeting with the whole team to discuss where we are at, where we are going and who is doing what. It was the first meeting with everybody on the team and I felt it was a very good one.
Summary
At the end of it all, I believe that I am finally getting a good grasp on what the project is, what I am going to be doing for the summer, and how all the pieces fit together. I will be working on creating the part that everybody uses, so my role is very, very important to the success of the project. I look forward to the rest of my weeks here at Whirlpool.