At BLUEPRINT 4D 2026, Adam Doyle and Matt Hahn shared a candid, practical look at navigating one of the biggest shifts facing Oracle Cloud customers today: the transition to Redwood user experiences across Customer Experience (CX) and Supply Chain Management (SCM).
Rather than presenting Redwood as a simple UI refresh, Doyle and Hahn positioned it as something much larger: a business transformation effort that impacts processes, governance, testing strategies, user adoption, and long-term Oracle Cloud operations.
Understanding HarbisonWalker International’s Oracle Cloud Footprint
Doyle and Hahn work for HarbisonWalker International (HWI), the largest refractory producer in North America, manufacturing heat-resistant ceramic products used in high-temperature industrial operations such as steel, cement, glass, petrochemical, and incineration facilities. The company operates approximately 20 manufacturing facilities and 20 distribution centers across the United States and Canada, creating a highly complex supply chain footprint.
That complexity is reflected in HWI’s broad Oracle Cloud footprint, which spans numerous SCM and CX modules. Some applications are already operating in Redwood, while others are in active transition or evaluation phases.
For Doyle and Hahn, the scale of the organization meant one thing immediately: Redwood could not be treated as a side project.
Why Redwood Became Impossible to Ignore
Like many Oracle Cloud customers, HWI initially deprioritized Redwood. The team admitted they viewed early Redwood announcements as future concerns that could wait while other strategic initiatives took precedence. That changed once Oracle established clearer timelines and customers realized Redwood adoption would eventually become unavoidable.
That realization forced the organization into accelerated learning mode.
Their first recommendation to customers trying to catch up was straightforward: start with the Oracle release notes and go back to the very beginning of Redwood feature introductions. Rather than selectively enabling exciting new features, Doyle emphasized the importance of reviewing Redwood functionality sequentially because many enhancements build upon earlier foundational configurations.
Skipping steps, according to the team, became one of the most common causes of implementation issues.
The Most Valuable Redwood Resources HWI Used
One of the strongest themes throughout the session was the importance of using Oracle’s ecosystem of documentation, events, and community resources effectively.
Release Notes and Cloud Success Navigator
HWI relied heavily on Oracle release notes and the Cloud Success Navigator to identify Redwood-enabled features, understand enablement requirements, and track module-by-module progress. The ability to export feature lists into Excel became especially useful for organizing implementation roadmaps and prioritization efforts.
The team stressed that the “Steps to Enable and Configure” sections inside release documentation were critical—not optional. Some Redwood transitions require only simple profile option changes, while others, especially in Order Management and Purchasing, involve detailed multi-step enablement sequences.
Oracle Cloud Customer Connect
According to Doyle, Oracle Cloud Customer Connect became one of the organization’s most valuable support resources.
HWI regularly leveraged:
- Product category forums for troubleshooting and peer collaboration
- The Idea Lab for enhancement requests and feature advocacy
- Oracle-hosted webinars and event replays
- Redwood-focused product channels in the Video Hub
The team developed a particularly effective habit: regularly searching Customer Connect for the keyword “Redwood” sorted by newest activity. This helped them proactively identify emerging issues, discover unresolved bugs, and monitor questions other customers were asking after each quarterly update.
They also strongly encouraged organizations to actively participate in the Idea Lab, emphasizing that enhancement requests need detailed business justification to gain traction with Oracle product teams.
Redwood Success Depends on Business Ownership
Perhaps the most important lesson from the session was that Redwood adoption works best when it becomes business-led rather than IT-led.
HWI intentionally avoided positioning Redwood as an IT-driven technical rollout. Instead, they pushed ownership into business leadership teams, allowing departments to define timelines, priorities, and adoption strategies while IT focused on enablement and technical support. That approach became especially important during HWI’s Redwood Sales transformation.
Rather than simply recreating existing CRM processes in a new interface, the organization used the transition as an opportunity to completely redesign workflows, simplify screens, remove unnecessary steps, and tailor dashboards to distinct user groups ranging from sales representatives to executives.
This business-led strategy improved engagement significantly because users viewed Redwood as a modernization initiative they helped shape—not just another mandatory IT change.
Leveraging Oracle Visual Builder Studio for Customization
Another major takeaway from the session was the strategic importance of (VBS). HWI used VBS extensively to customize Redwood experiences in ways that improved efficiency and user adoption.
Examples included:
- Adding additional fields directly onto Order Management header screens
- Embedding extensible flexfields (EFFs)
- Making fields editable or read-only based on user roles
- Defaulting values automatically
- Configuring role-based screen experiences
- Embedding Guided Journeys directly into workflows
One standout example involved redesigning Order Management headers to eliminate unnecessary navigation and allow users to complete data entry in a single location.
The team also highlighted the value of Guided Journeys, which allowed them to embed training materials, work aids, reports, and documentation directly into Oracle screens where users needed them most.
For organizations concerned about quarterly update maintenance, Doyle noted that VBS customizations have generally remained stable through updates, with relatively minimal rework required.
Automation Became a Major Redwood Advantage
While Redwood introduces change management challenges, HWI also discovered meaningful opportunities to improve automation and user efficiency.
Within Redwood Sales, the team implemented automations that:
- Automatically updated opportunity stages
- Triggered notifications to sales representatives
- Reduced manual clicks during quote-to-order processes
- Simplified spot quote workflows
- Applied conditional field changes dynamically
These automations relied heavily on action chains, event listeners, Ruby scripting, and JSON configurations.
The result was not just a modernized UI, but a streamlined user experience that reduced friction and simplified day-to-day operations for sales and customer support teams.
The Biggest Redwood Challenges HWI Encountered
The presentation did not shy away from Redwood’s difficulties.
Change Management Resistance
Doyle openly acknowledged that many users initially resisted Redwood because they viewed it as unnecessary disruption. Convincing business users to engage in testing and adoption remained an ongoing challenge.
Bugs and Missing Features
The team encountered numerous bugs, performance inconsistencies, and missing functionality compared to classic ADF pages. In several cases, Oracle confirmed that certain missing features were “working as designed,” forcing HWI to submit enhancement requests through the Idea Lab. Shipping was one example where certain saved search capabilities available in ADF were not yet replicated in Redwood.
Slow SR Resolution
The audience discussion also revealed a common frustration among Oracle Cloud customers: support requests that remain unresolved for extended periods.
Doyle humorously admitted that some service requests “languish,” joking that the team occasionally celebrates SR birthdays with cake.
Their recommendation was to explicitly reference “Redwood” in SR titles and descriptions to improve routing accuracy and reduce troubleshooting delays.
Practical Advice for Oracle Cloud Customers Preparing for Redwood
Throughout the session, Doyle and Hahn consistently emphasized several practical recommendations for organizations beginning their Redwood journey.
Stay Current With Quarterly Releases
Once organizations catch up on Redwood enablement, staying current becomes essential. Redwood functionality evolves rapidly, and new quarterly releases often introduce meaningful usability improvements and automation opportunities.
Use Parallel Deployments Whenever Possible
For modules that support both classic ADF and Redwood simultaneously, HWI strongly recommended enabling Redwood in production early and allowing users to operate in parallel environments.
This approach improved user acceptance testing because employees could complete work in Redwood while still falling back to classic screens when needed.
Slow Down During Configuration
Hahn warned that moving too quickly inside Visual Builder Studio often creates avoidable issues. Redwood configuration changes sometimes require time to fully render or propagate, and rushing between changes can create debugging headaches.
Engage the Business Early
The sooner business users become involved in testing, process redesign, and feedback cycles, the smoother the eventual transition becomes.
HWI repeatedly reinforced the idea that Redwood adoption succeeds fastest when business teams—not IT alone—take ownership of the transformation.
Redwood Is More Than a UI Refresh
One of the clearest messages from the session was that Redwood should not be viewed as merely a visual redesign.
For HWI, Redwood became an opportunity to rethink processes, improve automation, simplify workflows, modernize CRM experiences, and create more scalable Oracle Cloud operations moving forward.
The organizations that approach Redwood strategically—rather than waiting until Oracle forces the transition—will likely be in a far stronger position as Oracle continues accelerating its Redwood roadmap across CX and SCM applications.
And as Doyle reminded attendees, the “freight train” is coming either way. The question is whether organizations prepare now or scramble later.
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