This is the second post about our implementation of SAP Business One Version 9.0 at a 13 user Wholesale Distribution organisation.
Once the we had mapped out and agreed our As Is process flows it was time to design how we want to work going forward. Each member of the project team has a demo version of SAP Business One installed on their machine and have been advised to familiarize themselves with the functions & processes and start thinking about how they can improve the way they work. Change Management is key to success in any project so my role has been to sit with people, show them various aspects of the functionality and keep the mood positive that SAP is going to make their jobs easier and keep everyone up beat about the project. I also distributed loads of SAP branded pens to every member of staff to keep the brand presence in people's minds. The pens are great to use so are very popular!
We then set aside 4 days to openly discuss how we want the system to be set up & configured and how we are going to improve our own processes. We ran workshops with our SAP Integration Partner on Sales Quotations, Sales Orders, Purchasing (stock and non stock), Production, Stock including BOMs, Warehouse Management and Finance / Reporting. I felt it was important to include all members of staff from the relevant departments and everyone was encouraged to get involved and make suggestions - The outcome was that we now have enhanced processes which mean less duplication of work, less printing and filing, more visibility of what is happening in the business and some detailed reports that will save time currently spent hunting for information. The SAP Busienss One system is easily configured so any extra fields or function buttons can be added easily by the SAP partners and by ourselves going forwards.
The sessions were written up and To Be processes mapped out in Visio and distributed to all staff to keep the momentum on the project and remind them what has been agreed.
To save costs on the project we agreed we would write up most of the project blueprint document with a template supplied by our parnters. This document is like an architects plans for a new house and details exactly how SAP will be configured and how it will fit with our processes before the partners go ahead and get to work. It is easier and cheaper to change somehting on paper than once it has been configured in SAP!
We are now moivng in to the next phase of the project. SAP is configured to our specifications and I have the unenvialble task of extracting and cleaning all master data from an old Fox Pro database for upload to SAP. I will blog about this next phase in approx 6 weeks.
Any questions or if anyone has any tips for me please post below.
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