How Business Readiness and Change Management guide the transformation of systems, processes, and people.
Fig. 1 Transformation of systems, processes and people
On November 26th 2020, bpExperts hosted a virtual Release Party presenting our new product, “Business Flows 4 Process Driven SAP”.
The meeting was organized in two breakout sessions. The first breakout session covered the SAP Activate Phases ‘Discover’ and ‘Prepare’ and focused on the top-down E2E design as well as the bottom-up analysis of existing SAP Landscape (technical redocumentation). The second breakout session covered the phases ‘Explore’, ‘Realize’ and ‘Deploy’ and focused on “Business Readiness and Change Management”: how Business Readiness and Change Management guide the Transformation of Systems, Processes, and People. We discussed with the participants in this session how this transformation journey can be aided by individual packages in business flows, packages which build on each other in many phases of this methodology.
One question raised by our guests was related to Business Roles: “How can Business Roles and related authorizations be defined in order to meet this variety of local requirements?”
Business Roles are a key link of the process and solution design with Change Management activities. Business Roles differ from user roles and job descriptions, as they are based on the nature of the performed activities and do not refer to any department structure or HR relevant specifications of jobs. Many companies are operating in various countries and with entities of different sizes. So it is important finding the right balance in the number of business roles.
In Business Flows 4 Process Driven SAP we now provide a Business Roles Library you can use as a reference. The included roles are a ‘best-of’ compilation suiting the purpose and scope of a typical SAP-related Business Transformation.
Business Roles and their related Business Processes form the basis and common terminology for change impact, training, authorization, segregation of duty (SoD) throughout the whole transformation lifecycle.
Change Impact Analysis reveals the requirements when deploying to local sites. Taking into consideration the operating models, scope of deployed processes as well as the local site structures the required Business Roles are mapped against the local situation (resources and skills) to generate the future operating model. The results need to be further processed (e.g. business readiness and training plans, authorizations) and identified issues (such as Segregation of Duty, lack of skills, re-organisational requirements) need to be addressed.
Another question raised was: “How to successfully prepare End-User training?”
One participant asked us how to avoid surprises in End User training on missing functionality, non-matching processes and poor acceptance of the solution.
We understand and emphasize that communication and expectation management need to be an integral part of any transformation initiative (all scales of projects: from process change, via tool change to large Business Transformation projects). Fundamentally we believe that the process-driven approach as represented in Business Flows 4 Process Driven SAP with early and active involvement of Process Experts and/or End Users is the key to success because it helps to set the context of requirements and expectations to the overarching strategy, transformation objectives and design principles. Early involvement helps buy-in and creating a sense of ownership.
Fig. 2 Individual work packages building on each other in Explore, Realize and Deploy Phases
The common success factor to all the above mentioned is to start with Business Readiness and Change Management activities very early. During project initiation and planning phases latest in early design stages. Identification of stakeholders, Process Owners and Process Experts not just with decision power, but also with good contacts and influence within the community of affected employees is vital. The involvement of selected key players, both supportive and critical thinking is the next step. Only then, all transformation activities can be supported and lead towards successful change.
In case you want to know more about our methodology, specifically how we have woven in the aspects of Business Readiness and Change Management, please reach out to us.
Best regards
Your bpExperts Team