This blog is the third in a series looking at OrgAudit, part of the SAP Org Visualization by Nakisa suite of applications that supports SAP HCM on premise Org Management.  The first blog post was an introduction and the second looked at building the business case. Now let’s look at the standard functionality.

Note: To view any image more clearly then just click on it.

Process

The process for improving data quality using OrgAudit is shown in the following diagram.  The process starts (in the top left of the diagram and moves clockwise) when data is extracted from SAP into the OrgAudit database.  The data quality rules are then applied to close and open (or re-open) errors which are stored in the OrgAudit database. 

Users can use the OrgAudit application interface to visualise and search the set of errors.  Each error exists because a rule has been broken, and each rule can have an associated suggestion for how to resolve the error. It could be a link to an intranet page, a document or even a link to another application to rectify it (e.g. Nakisa’s manager application, a WebDynpro application, HCM form).  Whatever the solution, data is updated using existing HCM processes. 

Another key feature is scoring.  See below for how scores are calculated, but the resulting value (0-100) is colour coded using traffic light (red, amber, green/RAG) coding to indicate the significance.

The process is cyclic; so next time the extract occurs the errors database is updated.  As historical data is kept, the trend can be monitored over time.

Standard SOVN Features

OrgAudit uses the now common and familiar SOVN interface.  As per other SOVN modules, the user can navigate the organisational hierarchy by dragging the chart background around (using the mouse) or by clicking on the navigation arrows.  They can also zoom, choose between 1 or 2 panes, change the layout style, change the contents of each chart box by using one of the available “views” and of course access the help.  There is also an accessibility mode which provides a text equivalent representation of the data so that the screen content can be read by a screen reader such as JAWS or Window-Eyes .  From 4.0, the ability to store private or public notes against any object is included.

Hierarchies

The application has three hierarchies available as standard:

     1.       Organization Structure Org Chart

          This shows the Org Unit to Org Unit to Position to Employee (O-O-S-P) structure (as per OrgChart).

     2.       Position Org Chart

          This shows the position to position reporting structure based on position to position (S 002 S) relationships in SAP (as per OrgChart).

     3.       Company Code Org Chart

          This shows a dummy root node with a box representing each company code below it (see below).

Each hierarchy can be expanded or collapsed to as many levels as you wish.  You can select any chart box to see more details about it in a details panel.

All the hierarchies in OrgAudit can be printed or exported as an image, PDF or to an image on a PowerPoint slide.  Additionally the ChartBook functionality found in OrgChart is now (from 4.0) available in OrgAudit meaning you can create an interactive PDF booklet of your organisation.

Details Panels

Clicking on a chart box, search result or link within another details panel opens the corresponding details panel.

Details panels exist for the following:

1. Org Unit.
2. Position.
3. Employee.
4. Company Code.
5. Error.
6. Audit Run.

The first four detail panels listed, show details of the object, errors related to that object (and ones below in the structure) and the score for that object (more on scoring shortly!).  The “Error” detail panel shows details about an individual error and the “Audit Run” detail panel shows details of the audit process; when it ran, active rules, and errors produced.

Search

Searching can be performed using one of the thirteen listings enabled as standard: Audit Runs. Errors by Audit Runs. Open Errors. Recently Closed Errors. Recently Opened Errors. Last Audit Run Errors. Errors with Recent Status Change. Stale Errors. All Errors. Company Code. Employee Listing. Position Listing. Org Unit Listing.

Note: “Recently”, “Recent” and “Stale” refer to a 1 month time period.

All the search results in OrgAudit can be exported to an Excel or CSV format file.

Dashboards

There is an initial dashboard page showing:

1. Trend Report on Detected Errors and Closed.
2. Average Response Time for Closed / Auto-Closed Errors.
3. Error Distribution by Object Type, Severity and Status.

Additional dashboard pages exist for: Error Detection Trend. Error Detection Distribution. Score on Company Code (12 months). Score on Organization Units (12 months). Average Response Time.

The availability of trends allows HR professionals to track the state of their data quality efforts over time.  E.g. How is company code X or organisation unit Y doing now compared to 3 months ago or to another company code or organisational unit?

Viewing Errors

The number, severity and type of error can be viewed directly in each hierarchy.  The quantity of errors shown relates to the total number of errors from this point down the structure. 

You can also use the relevant listings to find errors and drill through to the detail about an individual error in the Error details panel.

Error Maintenance

OrgAudit is more than a view only application as it offers the ability to track error maintenance using the status of the error.  What actions you can perform depend on the current status but include the ability to add a comment, mark it as in progress, and flag it to be ignored. 

Upon the next audit run, a rule may be auto-opened (if previously mark as closed but error is still apparent) or auto-closed (if error was not closed in OrgAudit, but the data has been corrected in SAP and hence the error is now resolved).  This data is held in the application database (and not in the SAP backend).

Rules

Included as standard in 4.0 are 48 rule templates along with the associated configuration to support using these templates as rules and visualising the results within your organisation. 

I doubt any organisation would want to use all of these exactly as specified, so be sure to allocate some time should be invested during the requirements gathering to understand each one and how relevant it is to your organisation.  The importance of each rule in relation to the others can also be controlled using weightings … which leads me nicely onto scoring.

Via the AdminConsole (Nakisa’s tool for administrating and configuring their applications) you can edit the rule as you create it from one of the 48 supplied templates, or define your own new template rules and then create rules based on these. 

Scoring

Scoring gives you the ability to rate objects against each other, both for comparing different objects or for comparing the same object over a period of time. 

In OrgAudit, the score is a value between 0 (all data is wrong) and 100 (no errors).  Each rule first calculates the percentage of correct records.  This percentage is then weighted against others within the same group (each group corresponds to one of the HR areas – PA/OM/CM) to give a total “Rule Score”. The sum of each rules weighting within a group has to total 100%.

Within the group (PA, OM, CM), each rule’s weighted score is totalled to give a “Group Score”.

Finally, each group is assigned a weighting and this weighting is applied to the group’s scores which are then summed to give a “Total Score”. 

In the image above, the three group (PA/OM/CM) scores are shown as well as the total score (87). Each score is colour coded and the default colours for each range of values are explained above.

Print and Export

As per OrgChart, the charts can be printed or exported (to image, PowerPoint embedded image or PDF). The wizard used in each is similar and allows for the customisation of the header, footer, paper size and orientation. You can also add images and notes. Usefully you can save these output preferences to a template which you can save then load each subsequent time which gives quick and consistent outputting.

As mentioned previously the results of a search can also be exported to a CSV or Excel file.

Summary

OrgAudit offers strong functionality for proactively managing data errors over time.  In my next blog post I’ll look in more detail at some of the technical aspects of implementing OrgAudit including how to initially setup the application.

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