frequently asked questions (faqs)
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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) by SAP ConsultantsTRANSCRIPT
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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) by SAPConsultantsMar 5, 2014 857 views 0 Likes 0 Comments
Every SAP Consultant may not be fortunate enough to get opportunity in
different types of projects like Implementation (Green Field & Brown Field),
Support, Maintenance, Upgrade and Business Consultancy etc. SAP Consultant
who has started their career as fresher and eagerly looking for an experience in an
implementation project would really wonder how will be an implementation
project. For that matter, everybody in our life has wondered to be part of an end
to end implementation project. There are so many questions in the mind of SAP
Consultants to know about different things within the projects, understand the
business processes and deliverables etc. In my entire life, I have come across
number of prospective SAP Consultants who are always eager to learn things out
of the projects. Everybody used to ask different questions what will be there in an
implementation, what kind of calls you receive in a support projects, how the
support calls are being handled etc.
Following are the questions posted to me by @Chirag_Shah (so many Chirags
Confused) which provoked me to write this blog. Therefore, half of the credit
must go to him. There were times when people are desperate to know the things,
but nobody around there to suggest and guide. It was really difficult life as not
sure where to start, how to read and what to practice etc. However, the things are
changed at a faster and the knowledge has been assimilated rapidly across the
globe with the invention of the internet. Now with the invention of social
networks, the information has become a revolution. People are sharing on a daily
basis through Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter etc. Now, fortunately, SDN also joined
in the same league with its new look and other extended. In this current world,
sharing knowledge is a privilege for number of people.
Probably, some of the following questions would help the Consultants and their
understanding.
What is end to end implementation?
RAVI SANKAR VENNAIndependent SAP Consultant / SAP Mentor / SCN Moderator
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In a nutshell, mapping and transforming the business process into SAP and
reaping the future benefits. There are number of stages required in an end to end
implementation. In the past implementation used to take longer times, however,
with number of methodologies the times are being drastically reduced. Most of
the consulting partners may also use the same objects / programs with other
clients, rather than reinventing the wheel. SAP has its own Accelerated SAP
(ASAP) Methodology, the other consulting partners or consulting companies may
have their own methodologies. Broadly, this end to end implementation consists
of the following phases:
Project Preparation
Business Blueprint
Realization
Final Preparation
Go Live and Support
Run (newly added by SAP)
Please refer http://service.sap.com/asap for further details.
How to start and what is the correct and inclusive path?
Like none of the two people are same in this world (except Bollywood movies ),
similarly, no two projects are same. Therefore, you cannot correlate the same
things with other projects. Every project is a fresh start and the requirements may
be different at the other client. Therefore, there is no standard / correct /
inclusive path you must go in order to complete the project. “Project” does means
that it is mix of number of uncertain activities, turning all these uncertainties into
deliverables is the real challenge in the project. “Project” always runs in three
boundaries, “Time”, “Cost” and “Scope” by maintaining the acceptable levels of
“quality”. As soon as you are at a new implementation site, try to meet as many
numbers of users as possible and discuss with them. You will realize number of
issues; it is always the duty of the consultant to quickly understand their business
processes. None of the business processes could be same.
What are the points that need to be taken care?
Proper planning of projects
Be meticulous at the time of collecting the business requirements (this is key
phase)
Proficient in understanding RICEF requirements (Reports, Interfaces,
Conversions, Enhancements and Forms)
Ensure that the all the items promised in the business blueprint are
configured / developed
Proper Testing has been done (Unit / Integration / UAT / Regression if in
scope)
Train the key users and educate the business users
Maintain Proper documentations
Ensure you have proper cutover strategy is in place
Master and Transaction Datas are loaded in DEV (Test Client), QA and Pre
production before loading into Production System, this would give you a
chance to refine or rectify data loading errors.
Ensure you have completed manual configuration if any (like FTXP tax
codes, number ranges, reset asset reconciliation accounts etc.)
Daily have meetings after go live and ensure you have documented all the
user issues meticulously. Ensure proper accountability to resolve these calls.
Discuss the progress on a daily basis.
Proper Segregation of Duties Matrix is in place (SOD) follow Sarbanes Oxley
(SOX) Compliance if your client is US related
Ensure that the roles / authorizations are being developed according to SOD.
What all important documentations are required?
There could be number of documents that are being prepared during the
implementation or a life of the project. Some of the important documents are as
follows:
Project Charter High Level document describes statement of scope, outline
project objectives, identify main stake holders and define authority of project
manager.
Project Plan as per PMBOK, "a formal, approved document used to guide to
execute both project execution and project control".
Business Process Documents (BPDs) This document sets out the guidelines
for documenting business process, which is collection activities that produce
outcome.
ASIS Templates Usually prepared by the business team, documenting the
present business scenarios (preSAP)
Business Blueprint A kind of legal document that binds both business as
well as consulting company to deliver the commitments, usually includes
GAP analysis.
Business Process Master List (BPML) List of high level business processes
of the client, usually used to monitor the progress.
Gaps Issue Register This entails the GAPs that can be fulfilled and its
impact on the project.
Configuration Document Configuration documents relating to various
business processes, shows how it is being mapped in SAP.
Functional Specifications Mostly written in a business language how a new
requirement has to be achieved.
Technical Specifications This contains the minute technical details of the
functional specification, prepared by developers with the help of fuctional
consultants.
Unit Test Documents This document is proof of the testing of the
transaction done in Testing Client of the Development Server
Integration Test Documents This document is the proof of the Integration
Tests done in the system (could include screen shots)
Test Plan Test Plan is a high level documents emphasizing how the test
activities are to be completed detailing scope, approach, resources and
schedule etc.
Test Scripts Detailed step by step document which are used for the purpose
of testing, these are very helpful to the testers in order to test the
transactions.
User Acceptance Test Documents These documents are proof of the tests
that are being conducted by the users.
Testing Issues Log (accountability required) / Defect Log This is a log
contains the brief description of the defect, accountable person, close date
etc.
Transaction User Guides (TUGs) / End User Documents These are end user
documents which are being used by the business users for future reference.
User Training Presentations These are power point presentations that are
prepared for the purpose of train the businessusers.
Risk Register Risk register is important document, this include anticipated
risk, probability, impact, countermeasures and risk owner etc.
Golive metrics This document summarises the end user experience, end
user satisfaction levels etc.
Post Golive Issues Log (accountability required) This is a log of every day
issues, accountable person and its status, until the project is handed over to
Support Team.
The above mentioned list is not exhaustive, but the minimum required for a
project.
What are the roles of various SAP consultants, Program Manager &
Project manager?
There are number of people involved from Consulting firm’s side:
Program Manager – Having authority to go or no go etc. kind of decisions,
could be budget holder for consultant budgets, any high level escalations may
goes to him / her
Project Manager – Responsible for day to day and overall management of the
project, very key person in administrative decisions / arranging the resources /
tracking the project.
Functional Leads – Mostly responsible for drafting business blueprints /
leading workshops / arranging sign offs / training the key users / monitoring and
mentoring various consultants / coordinating with technical team like ABAPers
etc.
Junior Functional Consultants – Configuration / Preparing configuration
documents / user guides / training normal business users / helping the users in
testing etc.
Technical Leads – Monitoring overall development / Mentoring junior
technical consultants / coordinating with Functional Team Leads
Junior Technical Consultants – Coding / Testing / Reporting to Technical
Leads
Basis Consultants – System Build / All system related activities / Resolving
any system issues / Ensure that the availability of system access
Project Management Office (PMO) – Looking after all administrative needs
of the project
How do SAP best practice can be useful in it?
SAP Best Practices are much useful when the Clients intend to go with Vanilla
type of standard configuration. In such cases, these best practices would much
useful. The consultants are much happy as most of the things are standard and
only requires minimal changes to the standard functionality of SAP. Using SAP
Best Practices would drastically reduce the cost of project and ensure adequate
quality. The other advantage is that it will give the benefit of the SAP Best
Practices, which are being used by number of clients across the industry. This
gives the confidence to the Client that numbers of other organizations are
successfully implemented by using this.
What are building blocks and how to make best use of it?
Whether you call it Best Practices / Building Blocks they are more or less the
same. This gives a good opportunity particularly for functional consultants in
order to practice in the demo / sandbox system. There more number of times that
you are going to practice the more confidence you will be getting. You also must
concentrate not only on the configuration but also on practising the business
process steps. This would help you to understand what is being expected from the
users.
The following links could be useful
http://help.sap.com/saap/sap_bp/baio_frame/BL_ERP606_EN_IN.html
http://help.sap.com/bp_bl604/BL_DE/html/Content_Library_BL_EN_DE.htm
http://help.sap.com/bp_bblibrary/470/BBlibrary_start.htm
http://help.sap.com/bpbaseline/
http://help.sap.com/saap/sap_bp/BBLibrary/General/How_to_download.pdf
Found following thread with summarization of various Finance materials /
documentations
http://scn.sap.com/thread/349500
Not sure if all the links in the above thread are working or not.
What is testing process and what is the correct time to switch on to
production server?
There could be different types of testing activities are expected. In general, you
will find the following types of testing:
Unit Testing – This is done by the Consultants mostly in DEV (Testing) Client
to check whether the transaction Codes are working properly or not
Integration Testing – This test is conducted with most realistic data with
number sequence of number of modules
Interface Testing – Testing of various interfaces at different points of your
projects. You should be clear when you need to test what interface.
User Acceptance Testing – One or more users would test the and sign off
whether the transaction codes are working proper or not. This would also include
a scenario type testing.
SAP Stress / Load / Performance Testing – This mainly to test whether the
system response time is acceptable / performance is as expected.
SAP Security / Authorizations Testing – This is to ensure that the end users
are only able to execute the transactions that are intended as per SOD.
SAP Cut Over / Dry Run Testing – This is just to simulate number of single
time events such as extraction of data from your legacy systems, validating the
data, data conversions etc.
Regression Testing This is to test whether changes to configurations has
made changes to functionality intended for.
There could be other different types of testing activities, but mostly, you would
observe the above.
Production server is the final hurdle. There is nothing like switch on to
production. As soon as the objects are being tested and signed off they will be
moved into Production. Therefore, Production will come along with you through
out the project.
What is the Process for proper Sign off?
There is no standard procedure for sign off. It is mostly the understanding
between the business and the consulting firm. However, mostly important
documents such as business process documents / business blueprints /
configuration documents / functional specifications / technical specifications etc.
are to be signed parties from both the end (business as well as consulting). They
will be binding on both the parties and you can treat them as a kind of legal
documents. Tomorrow if there is any deviation, then they can refer to these sign
off documents. Consulting Company should be able to deliver what they have
committed on these documents and the business should stick to what they have
expected. Therefore, these are very important documents for ascertaining the
accountability. Usually the sign off documents includes, project manager
(business side) business heads, key users from business side; delivery managers,
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Written by
RAVI SANKAR VENNA
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lead functional and technical consultant from consulting side.
What is the difference between Implementation project & Support
project?
Implementation Project is mostly transforming the whole business process and
mapping into SAP. As explained earlier, it could have number of phases. In most
of the cases, the support activity could goes to the same implementation partner
or could be other implementation partner depending on the business constraints.
Support Projects are mostly for longer duration may be 3 to 5 to 7 years usually.
These are being driven by various Service Level Agreements (SLAs) between
Client and the Supporting Organization. There may be different types of tolls used
like Remedy, Console etc. Remedy is a tool which is used in order to keep track of
issues / logs etc. whereas Console could be a password mechanism tool, where
you are supporting more than a single client, in such cases, remembering the
password is not possible. Furthermore, there could be number of people
supporting the same client at different shifts / time intervals, in such cases, this
Console would help them.
You can reach original on SCN at
http://scn.sap.com/community/trainingand
education/certification/blog/2012/08/28/frequentlyaskedquestionsfaqsby
sapconsultants
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Why the 8-Hour Workday Doesn't Work for You(and What to Do Instead)Oct 19, 2015 189,505 views 2,142 Likes 299 Comments
Any company trying to achieve more is constantly seeking ways to improve
employee efficiency and effectiveness, to find techniques to help their teams work
faster/smarter/better... they're constantly seeking an edge.
Then why do so many companies stick to the 8hour workday and why do so
many entrepreneurs do the same thing?
Good question, and one that Leo Widrich, the cofounder of Buffer, has helped
me answer. Here's our take on what's wrong with the 8hour workday and how
you can be a lot more productive without working longer hours.
The first thing we did when we started hiring awesome people for the Buffer team
was kill the 8hour workday. Why? Not only did it feel unnatural, it seemed
counterproductive to what we all wanted to accomplish in a given day.
Still, the average American works 8.8 hours every day. At least, those are
the official statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics:
Jeff HadenGhostwriter, Speaker, Inc. Magazine Contributing Editor
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That's fine... but knowing how long the average person works every day has little
to do with knowing how efficient or productive that workday and that
individual's output may be. With all the success stories of people working 4
hours a week to 16 hours a day it’s hard to know if there is an optimal workday.
So instead of going with my gut, I did some research on how to optimize work
time for success and happiness.
Let’s dig in:
Why is there an 8 hour work day in the first place?
The typical work day is approximately 8 hours, but how did we come up with
that? The answer is hidden in the birth of the Industrial revolution.
In the late 18 century companies wanted to maximize equipment usage by
running 24/7. Of course that meant people had to work more hours, so 10 to 16
hour workdays became the norm.
These incredibly long work days weren’t sustainable, though, and soon a brave
man named Robert Owen started a campaign to have people work no more than 8
hours per day. His slogan was, “Eight hours labor, eight hours recreation,
eight hours rest.”
Owen's efforts notwithstanding, it wasn’t until much later that Henry Ford
actually implemented an 8hour work day:
“One of the first businesses to implement this was the Ford Motor Company, in
1914, which not only cut the standard work day to eight hours, but also doubled
their worker’s pay in the process. To the shock of many industries, this resulted
in Ford’s productivity off of these same workers, but with fewer hours, actually
increasing significantly and Ford’s profit margins doubled within two years.
This encouraged other companies to adopt the shorter, eight hour work day as a
standard for their employees.”
So there it is: The reason we work 8 hours a day isn’t based on science. It’s just a
centuryold practiced based on running factories efficiently and is irrelevant in
today's creative economy. Today the right focus is on your energy, not
your hours, according to the author Tony Schwartz, who says, “Manage your
energy, not your time.”
Schwartz explains we all need to manage four different types of energies every
day:
Physical energy: How healthy are you?
Emotional energy: How happy are you?
Mental energy: How well can you focus on something?
Spiritual energy: Why are you doing all of this? What is your purpose?
Machines move linearly, humans move cyclically
For an efficient work day that truly respects our human nature, the first things to
focus on are ultradian cycles.
Generally speaking we can focus on any given task for 90 to 120 minutes. After
that a 2030 minute break is needed so we can recharge and be ready to achieve
high performance on our next task.
Here is a representation of the ultradian rhythm:
So instead of thinking, “What can I get done in an 8 hour day?” I’ve started to
think, “What can I get done in a 90 minute session?”
The foundation of a productive work day: Focus
Now that we know we should split everything in 90 minute chunks, it’s time to
break down those 90 minutes sessions further.
In a stunning research project, Justin Gardner our brain uses a twostep process:
1.) “Sensitivity enhancement”: Start by picturing a scene or setup and taking
it all in. Then focus on what needs your attention. Kind of like “a blurry photo
that slowly starts to come into focus,” describes Lifehacker.
2.) “Efficient selection”: This is how the actual zooming in on a task happens,
allowing us to enter into what Mihály Csíkszentmihályi calls “flow” state. That's
when our actual work on a task happens.
The following figure may describe it best:
In figure A, as our brain is presented with only one task, and we are able to
separate out distractors (blue) from what’s actually important (yellow).
In figure B, as we are presented with multiple tasks at once, our brain is
increasingly easy to distract and combines the actual tasks with distractors.
The key conclusion Gardner suggests is that we have to:
Stop multitasking to avoid being distracted in our work environment.
Eliminate distractors even when only one task is present
Sounds fairly obvious right? Still, doing it every day is much easier said then
done. Here are some handson tips.
4 Tips for Improving Your Productivity
For my daily workflow at Buffer I’ve made four distinct changes to better
implement the above research. Here's what works best for me:
Manually increase the relevance of a task: It can be hard to maintain
focus, especially if what you're doing doesn't have a deadline. Overriding
your attention system, and adding your own deadline together with a reward
can significantly improve task completion, according to researcher Keisuke
Fukuda.
Split your day into 90 minute windows: Instead of thinking about an 8,
6, or 10 hour work day, split your day into four or five 90minute windows.
That way you will have, say, four tasks you will get done more easily.
Plan your rest so you actually rest: “The fittest person is not the one
who runs the fastest, but the one who has optimized their rest time,” says
Tony Schwartz. A lot of the time we are so busy planning our work day that
we forget about “how” to rest. Plan beforehand what you will do to recharge:
Nap, read, meditate, get a snack, etc.
Allow zero notifications: One of the best ideas I’ve ever had was to
follow Joel’s advice on zero notifications. Having absolutely no alerts on my
phone or computer that breaks my focus has been a huge help. If you haven’t
tried it, try to turn off every digital element that could become an alert.
Now it's your turn: What do you think is the best way to structure your
work day?
I also write for Inc.com:
10 Reasons People Really Don't Like You (and How to Fix That)
75 Incorrectly Used Words That Can Make You Look Dumb
What Your Business Can Learn From Donald Trump
75 Inspiring Motivational Quotes About Success
Check out my book of personal and
professional advice, TransForm: Dramatically
Improve Your Career, Business, Relationships,
and Life One Simple Step At a Time. (PDF
version here, Kindle version here, Nook version
here.)
If after 10 minutes you don't find at least 5
things you can do to make your life better I'll
refund your money.
That way you have nothing to lose... and
everything to gain.
Featured In Productivity
Management, Optimizing Performance,
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Written by
Jeff HadenFollow
