Part 1 of the “Rethinking PeopleSoft” Series

For years, PeopleSoft has been treated like a classic enterprise application; something you patch, maintain, and try not to break. It sits on its servers (or maybe VMs), it runs business-critical processes, and support means keeping it stable and compliant.

That mindset made sense 10 years ago. But in 2025? It’s time to rethink it. As cloud-native architectures, automation-first strategies, and integrated digital experiences become the norm, the old way of running PeopleSoft is holding teams back. The solution isn’t to rip and replace. It’s to reframe how we think about PeopleSoft, not as an application to support, but as a platform to build on.

From Application to Platform: What’s the Difference?

An application is built to perform a specific task. It has a specific set of features. It’s tightly scoped and user-facing. You maintain it. You support it. You don’t usually build with it.

A platform, on the other hand, is built to enable other things. It’s a foundation. It offers tools, APIs, frameworks, and services that developers and teams use to build, extend, and scale solutions. A platform isn’t just consumed, it’s leveraged.

When you treat PeopleSoft like an application, your mindset is:

“Keep it up. Don’t break it. Patch it when needed.”

When you treat PeopleSoft like a platform, your mindset shifts to:

“How do we enable developers? How do we deliver services that others can build on? How do we make this system part of our enterprise fabric?”

That shift changes everything from your automation strategy to your support model to how you approach customizations.

Why This Shift Matters Now

The world around PeopleSoft has evolved. Most orgs are now running hybrid workloads, building cloud-native apps, and pushing for faster, more flexible delivery models. Yet PeopleSoft often gets stuck in legacy mode, not because it has to, but because of how teams think about it.

In 2025, platform thinking becomes essential for a few key reasons:

• Cloud maturity: You’re likely already running workloads in GCP, AWS, or OCI. Treating PeopleSoft as a platform enables you to align it with the same patterns you’re using elsewhere, including IaC, CI/CD, observability, and more.
• Automation pressure: Manual patching and environment cloning are time-consuming. Platform teams automate everything. That saves time and increases consistency.
• Integration demands: Your enterprise isn’t siloed. HR, Finance, and Student Systems must connect to dozens of other applications. Platforms expose clean APIs, enable secure messaging, and build integration into the architecture, not as an afterthought. What You Gain: Speed, Visibility, Resilience

Reframing PeopleSoft as a platform isn’t just a technical change; it’s a strategic unlock.

You gain:

• 🔄 Developer velocity: Faster, safer customization using extension patterns (Drop Zones, Event Framework, Configurable Search)
• 🔍 Observability: Built-in monitoring, tracing, and alerting pipelines using tools like OpenTelemetry and Prometheus
• ⚙️ Automation: Terraform, Chef, and GitLab pipelines handling patches, refreshes, and even entire environment builds
• 📦 Scalability: Repeatable platform tooling that works across apps and environments, not just in Prod

This mindset doesn’t just make PeopleSoft better, it makes your team more strategic.

What’s Coming in This Series

This post is just the start. Here’s what’s ahead in the Rethinking PeopleSoft series:

• 🔧 Part 2: From Maintenance to Enablement
  • What changes in your team’s responsibilities, mindset, and skill sets when you adopt platform thinking?
• 🧱 Part 3: Customization Without Chaos
  • How to safely extend PeopleSoft using modern tools and patterns without setting yourself up for upgrade nightmares.
• 🗺️ Part 4: Building Your Platform Roadmap
  • A practical blueprint for turning your team’s vision into an actionable transformation plan.
• 🎯 Part 5: Sustaining the Shift
  • How to keep the momentum going, measure success, and build a platform culture that lasts.

If you’ve been treating PeopleSoft like a legacy app, this is your call to stop supporting and start enabling.

It’s time to build the platform your enterprise needs.