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Jump to: navigation, search SAP implementation is the whole of processes that defines a complete method to implement the SAP ERP enterprise resource planning software in an organization. The SAP implementation method described in this entry is a generic method and not a specific implementation method as such. It is based on best practices and case studies from various literature sources and presents a collection of processes and products that make up a complete implementation method to allow any organization to plan and execute the implementation of SAP software.
Contents
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1 Introduction 2 Overview 3 Table of concepts 4 Activity table 5 Implementation processes o 5.1 Project preparation o 5.2 Sizing and blueprinting o 5.3 Functional development o 5.4 Final preparation o 5.5 Go live 6 Critical success factors 7 See also 8 References
[edit] Introduction
The implementation of SAP software, such as SAP R/3 is almost always a massive operation that brings a lot of changes in the organization. The whole process can take up to several years. Virtually every person in the organization is involved, whether they are part of the SAP technical support organization (TSO) or the actual end-users of the SAP software. The resulting changes that the implementation of SAP generates are intended to reach high level goals, such as improved communication and increased return on information (as people will work with the same information). It is therefore very important that the implementation process is planned and executed with the usage of a solid method. There are various SAP implementation methods. An example of how one company, Robert Bosch GmbH, implemented SAP R/3 over 10 years is available. This study shows that designing IT architecture is very critical in SAP implementation practices.
[edit] Overview
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FUNCTIONAL TEST CASE HIGH AVAILABILITY (HA) REQUIREMENT INSTALLATION DOCUMENTATION OPERATIONS MANUAL
SAP
SAP IMPLEMENTATION PROJECT PLAN SOLUTION STACK SOLUTION STACK PARTNERS LIST SOLUTION VISION STRESS TEST PLAN
TEST PLAN
TRAINING
TRAINING PLAN
A set of conditions or variables under which a tester will determine if a certain business process works (www.wikipedia.org) Requirements that describes the amount of time that the system needs to be available to satisfy the needs of the users. (Anderson, 2003) All documentation related to the installation of an end-to-end SAP solution (Anderson, 2003) The collection of current state system documentation, day-to-day and other regularly scheduled operations tasks, various installation and operations checklists and how-to process documents. (Anderson, 2003) SAP AG is the name of the biggest European software company. The head office is in Walldorf, Germany. SAP was founded in 1972 as Systemanalyse and Programmentwicklung ("Systems Analysis and Product") by five former IBM employees in Mannheim, Germany. (www.wikipedia.org) A comprehensive project plan that contains all products that are delivered whilst performing an SAP implementation project (Anderson, 2003) Set of software subsystems or components needed to deliver a fully functional solution, e.g. a product or service. (www.wikipedia.org) A list of all vendors that deliver the products that make up the SAP solution stack (Anderson, 2003) A vision of the future-state of the SAP solution (Anderson, 2003) A test plan that is focused at determining the stability of a given system or entity. It involves testing beyond normal operational capacity, often to a breaking point, in order to observe the results. (www.wikipedia.org) A detail of how the test will proceed, who will do the testing, what will be tested, in how much time the test will take place, and to what quality level the test will be performed. (IEEE 829) The acquisition of knowledge, skills, and attitudes as a result of the teaching of vocational or practical skills and knowledge that relates to specific useful skills (www.wikipedia.org) Consisting of training units, a training plan is the result of hierarchical decompositions of a training goal, tailored according to the learning preferences and prior knowledge of the trainee. A plan is the means by which the trainee satisfies the goal. (www.ece.eps.hw.ac.uk/) Technical Support Organization. The people that are committed to implementation and management of SAP. (Anderson, 2003) A chart that depicts the structure of the TSO. (Anderson, 2003)
The following table provides a summary of all of the activities that form the SAP implementation process. These activities will be described with more detail and elaborated with examples in the rest of this entry. Activity Sub-Activity Description Refine and communicate a SOLUTION VISION of the futurestate of the SAP solution, to sketch a design that meets both business and financial requirements. The focus should be on the companys core business and how the SAP solution will better enable that core business to be successful. Some of the guidance and key requirements for how to put together an ERP and SAP business case for ROI, business benefit, and success includes focusing on competitive pressures, value propositions, and how the solution enables success. Design and staff the key positions of the SAP Technical Support Organization (TSO), the organization that is charged with addressing, designing, implementing and supporting the SAP solution. Perform a COST OF OWNERSHIP ANALYSIS to determine how to get the best business solution for the least money i.e. to determine where and when the costs are incurred within the context of the SAP solution stack.
Design and initially staff the SAP TSO Perform cost of ownership analysis
Identify high Determine all HIGH AVAILABILITY and DISASTER availability and RECOVERY REQUIREMENTS, to plan what to do with later disaster recovery downtime of the SAP system requirements Select the best SAP hardware and software technology Engage SAP partners for all layers and components of the SAP solution stack SOLUTION STACK, based on a side-by-side sizing vendors comparison Staff the bulk of the TSO, i.e. fill the positions that directly support the near-term objectives of the implementation, which Staff TSO are to develop and begin installation/implementation of the SAP data center. Train the various members of the SAP TSO, like data center specialists, high availability specialist and network specialists Execute training and train the end-users to give all the required SAP knowledge and skills Build a new SAP DATA CENTER facility or transform the Setup SAP DATA current data center into a foundation capable of supporting the CENTER SAP SOLUTION STACK Perform Install the (My)SAP components and technological installations foundations like a web application server or enterprise portal. Round out Identify and staff the remaining TSO roles, e.g. roles that
Address Change Management Address SAP systems and operations management Perform functional, integration and regression tests
relate to help desk work and other such support providing work. Develop a planned approach to the changes in the organization. The objective is to maximize the collective efforts of all people involved in the change and minimize the risk of failure of implementing the changes related to the SAP implementation. Create a foundation for the SAP systems management and SAP computer operations, by creating a SAP OPERATIONS MANUAL and by evaluating SAP management applications.
Final Preparation
Go Live
Test the SAP business processes, by executing functional tests to ensure that business processes work, integration tests to ensure that the organizations business processes work together with other business processes and regression tests to prove that a specific set of data and processes yield consistent and repeatable results. Plan, script, execute and monitor SAP STRESS TESTS, to see Perform systems if the expectations of the end users, defined in service level and stress tests agreements, will be met. Plan, prepare and execute the CUTOVER, by creating a Prepare for CUTOVER PLAN that describes all cutover tasks that have to cutover be performed before the actual go-live Turn on the SAP system for the end-users
Design and initially staff the SAP TSO The first major step of the project preparation phase is to design and initially staff an SAP technical support organization (TSO), which is the organization that is charged with addressing, designing, implementing and supporting the SAP solution. This can be programmers, project management, database administrators, test teams, etc. At this point, the focus should be at staffing the key positions of the TSO, e.g. the high-level project team and SAP professionals like the senior database administrator and the solution architect. Next to that, this is the time to make decisions about choosing for internal staff members or external consultants.
The image at the right shows a typical TSO chart. Craft solution vision The second project preparation job is to define a so-called solution vision, i.e. a vision of the future-state of the SAP solution, where it is important to address both business and financial requirements (budgets). The main focus within the vision should be on the companys core business and how the SAP solution will better enable that core business to be successful. Next to that, the shortcomings of the current systems should be described and short but clear requirements should be provided regarding availability (uptime), security, manageability and scalability of the SAP system.
Accenture, HP and IBM. A simplified solution stack is depicted at the right, showing the many layers for which software and hardware has to be acquired. Note the overlap with the OSI model. Staff TSO The TSO is the most important resource for an organization that is implementing SAP, so staffing the TSO is a vital job which can consume a lot of time. In a previous phase, the organization should already have staffed the most vital positions. At this point the organization should staff the bulk of the TSO, i.e. fill the positions that directly support the near-term objectives of the implementation, which are to develop and begin the installation/implementation of the SAP data center. Examples are: data center experts, network infrastructure experts, security specialists and database administration experts. There are many ways to find the right people within or outside the organization for all of the TSO positions and it depends on the organization how much time it wants to spend on staffing. Training One of the most vital stages of the implementation process is training. Very few people within an organization are SAP experts or even have worked with SAP software. It is therefore very important to train the end users but especially the SAP TSO: the people who design and implement the solution. Many people within the TSO need all kinds of training. Some examples of these positions:
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SAP Network Specialists SAP Database Administrators SAP Security specialists Documentation specialists Et cetera
All of these people need to acquire the required SAP knowledge and skills or even SAP certifications through training. Moreover, people need to learn to do business in a totally new way. To define how much SAP training every person needs, a company can make use of a skillset matrix. With this matrix, a manager can identify who possesses what knowledge, to manage and plan training, by defining the height of expertise with a number between e.g. 1 and 4 for each skill for each employee. Setup SAP data center The next step is to set up the SAP data center. This means either building a new data center facility or transforming the current data center into a foundation capable of supporting the SAP solution stack, i.e. all of the technology layers and components (SAP software products) in a productive SAP installation. The most important factor when designing the data center is availability. The high availability and disaster recovery requirements which should have been defined earlier, give a good idea of the required data center requirements to host the SAP software. Data center requirements can be a:
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Physical requirement like power requirements Rack requirement Network infrastructure requirement or Requirement to the network server.
Perform installations The following step is to install the required SAP software parts which are called components and technological foundations like a web application server or enterprise portals, to a state ready for business process configuration. The most vital sub steps are to prepare your OS, prepare the database server and then start installing SAP software. Here it is very important to use installation guides, which are published for each SAP component or technology solution by SAP AG. Examples of SAP components are:
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R/3 Enterprise Transaction Processing mySAP BI Business Information Warehouse mySAP CRM Customer Relationship Management mySAP KW Knowledge Warehouse mySAP PLM Product Lifecycle Management mySAP SCM Supply Chain Management mySAP SEM Strategic Enterprise Management mySAP SRM Supplier Relationship Management mySAP HCM Human Capital Management
Round out support for SAP Before moving into the functional development phase, the organization should identify and staff the remaining TSO roles, e.g. roles that relate to helpdesk work and other such support providing work.
Address change management The next challenge for an organization is all about change management / change control, which means to develop a planned approach to the changes the organization faces. The objective here is to maximize the collective efforts of all people involved in the change and to minimize the risk of failure of implementing the changes related to the SAP implementation. The implementation of SAP software will most surely come with many changes and an organization can expect many natural reactions, i.e. denial, to these changes. To fight this, it is most important to create a solid project team dedicated to change management and to
communicate the solution vision and goals of this team. This team should be prepared to handle the many change issues that come from various sources like:
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End-user requests Operations Data center team DBA group Systems management
SAP systems and operations management Next thing is to create a foundation for the SAP systems management and SAP computer operations, by creating a SAP operations manual and by evaluating SAP management applications. The manual is a collection of current state system documentation, day-to-day and other regularly scheduled operations tasks, various installation and operations checklists and how-to process documents. Functional, integration and regression testing Testing is very important before going live with any system. Before going live with a SAP system, it is vital to do many different kinds of testing, since there is often a large, complex infrastructure of hardware and software involved. Both requirements as well as quality parameters are to be tested. Important types of testing are:
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Functional testing: to test using functional use cases, i.e. a set of conditions or variables under which a tester will determine if a certain business process works Integration testing Regression testing
Review and update all systems-related operations procedures like backup policies and system monitoring
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Assign ownership of SAPs functional processes to individuals Let SAP AG do a GoingLive check, to get their blessing to go live with the system Lock down the system, i.e. do not make any more changes to the SAP system
[edit] Go live
All of the previously described phases all lead towards this final moment: the go-live. Go-live means to turn on the SAP system for the end-users and to obtain feedback on the solution and to monitor the solution. It is also the moment where product software adoption comes into play. More information on this topic:
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Product Software Adoption: Big Bang Adoption Product Software Adoption: Parallel Adoption Product Software Adoption: Phased Adoption
5) Test the SAP hardware and software rigorously by testing your business processes, and to ensure that the end-users are ready to use SAP before going live, because there are many known projects that failed because of a lack of support and SAP knowledge. 6) Design and execute a Change Management Program by communicating as early as needed all the information that end users should have to accept the new technology and designing and executing a training plan in order to reassure a knowledge base within the organization.