HR Renewal – FAQs
What is HR Renewal?
HR Renewal is part of SAP’s HR core renovation program, which is aimed to boost productivity of HR Professionals and increase HR efficiency.
This program shows SAP’s commitment in investing heavily in core HR on-premise, so that customers can leverage their existing systems, even when SAP is enabling the HCM transition to the cloud.
HR Renewal has many functional and UX improvements. Notable improvements are additional of HR Professional Role, and the new user interface option for (P&F) forms development based on WebDynpro for ABAP.
What is HR Professional Role?
HR Professional role is part of HR Renewal. Following are some of the features:
Role-specific start pages
– Important action items, Frequently used applications (favorites, top-x lists), Collaboration and subscribed feeds, etc.
Easy Web UI
– Selected PA/OM data details, Tailored single activity to edit selective data (e.g., change employee and organizational data attributes), Combined data OM/PA data maintenance for single-step processes (e.g., hiring, transfer, promotion, organizational changes), Mass data change activities (e.g., mass hire, mass change of job assigned to positions)
PA + OM UI Harmonization
– Harmonized navigation pattern across PA and OM (Search, Structure), Harmonize UI for combined data changes, single activities, display data details and mass data changes
User Productivity features
– Save as Draft, Favorites, Recently used
Analytics/Reporting and Data Quality Tools
– Ad hoc reporting, Embedded analytical content directly within applications
Collaboration
– Light-weight collaboration features to allow users to communicate with other users from within the new Web applications about their tasks
Additional interface for HCM P&F
– Design time leverages SAP Floor Plan Manager (FPM) to develop WD ABAP forms, New “start applications” for corresponding WD ABAP forms makes launching forms more efficient (e.g., reduce clicks)
PA + OM UI Harmonization example:
PA change in Employee Profile
OM change in Position Profile
How does the new UI improvements help the users?
The newly redefined navigation helps the users work more effectively and efficiently.
It enables quick navigation with fewer clicks to the content. Information is organized, prioritized and better accessible to the user. Fast data entry aids like cut, copy, paste and user friendly capabilities like search and save as draft provide better usability.
Is the HR Professional Role and HR Administrator Role the same?
No. HR Administrator role provides the HR users ability to initiate, execute, and check HR processes such as hiring an employee or an organizational reassignment, Edit employees’ master data, Manage the Digital Personnel File etc. HR Admin was available to customers prior to HR Renewal.
HR Professional role is new and was released as part of HR Renewal. It has more functionality and has the new improved UI.
What are the minimum requirements to implement HR Renewal?
HR Renewal will require ECC 6.0 and Enhancement Package 6 (EHP6) as a pre-requisite. It is delivered as an “In-advance” or early shipment of Enhancement Package 7 (EhP7).
How do the end users access HR Renewal? NWBC or Enterprise Portal?
HR Renewal could use NetWeaver Business Client or Portal. In general, NWBC is more obvious choice if all services deployed are built in Webdynpro ABAP. If a customer has a mix of WD Java and WD ABAP services, Enterprise Portal is a better choice. Choice between NWBC and Portal is based on many factors. Non-SAP content published for the users, browser support, branding requirements etc are few.
The Landing page is currently available for NWBC 4.0 only.
Is Netweaver Gateway required for HR Renewal?
Mostly Yes. HR Professional Role is a major new feature in HR Renewal. The new SAP UI5 based Landing Page for HR Professional Role is one of the major UX improvements. The Landing Page requires NW GW to be installed and configured.
However, HR Renewal comes with a lot of updates on other components like ESS\MSS. Customers will immediately benefit from those functionality enhancements even if HR Professional Role and Landing Page are not configured and used. So currently NW GW is not required if HR Professional Role and Landing Page are not used. But this may change in the future when SAP rolls out HTML5 Landing pages for ESS and MSS.
Does Netweaver Gateway require separate licenses?
No. According to SAP, there is no extra license cost for NW GW when it is used only with SAP delivered HR Renewal functionality.
Here are few useful references:
http://scn.sap.com/community/erp/hcm/blog/2012/06/01/new-sap-hcm-functionality–hr-renewal-10
http://scn.sap.com/community/erp/hcm/blog/2012/10/10/sap-new-hr-renewal-functionality-and-roadmap
Hi Anil,
Thanks for the informative article. I have a question around NW GW. If a customer decides not to implement NW GW then HR users will not see any obvious benefits from HR Renewal since Landing page will be missing, is that correct ?
What kind of skills set one would require to install NW GW ?
Thanks
Sanghamitra
Hi Sanghamitra,
Thanks for your comments.
Most of the UX improvements are in the HR professional role and Landing Page. Without implementing NW GW the customer will not get the full benefits of HR Renewal. Currently (as of FP3) ESS and MSS do not use Landing page. This will change very soon, as SAP is in the process of building landing pages for ESS and MSS roles.
One of the cases where a customer will benefit from HR Renewal even without landing page is - if they are looking for a HCM P&F solution using FPM forms (non- Adobe). HR Professional role is not a requirement to implement FPM forms.
Also, there are few good improvements in ESS/MSS services.
Following are the high level tasks involved in the deploying HR Renewal and activating the landing page.
1.Install HR renewal
2.Activate business function
3.Activate OData Services
4.Maintain SAP Gateway OData Services (Configure ICF nodes)
5.Maintain Customizing settings (IMG)
6.Copy/build Composite Role
Skills needed for NW GW are basis installation and technical knowledge in activating and maintaining OData Services(steps 3 and 4).
Thanks
Anil
Thank you Anil ! Your answers were helpful.
Thanks
Rinky
Hi Anil - I have had the following questions from a customer on the reporting in HR Renewal and was wondering if you are able to help
The person needs to know Renewal/EHP6 ODP reporting functionality well (to have implemented it or if this is not possible to have good information relating to where it has been implemented). They need to know key characteristics such as What are the key system architectural considerations? such as, How many consecutive users running reports can it cope with when run within particular types of server environments and technology? What are the considerations (and SAP test findings) regarding run time of reports etc? I believe sizing generally is a key consideration regarding whether the technology is suitable for implementation within a certain organisational environment.
In the UK the HCM team at SAP has not implemented HR Renewal and so your advice would be greatly appreciated
Many thanks
Good first blog Anil and always great to see new people contributing to the SAP SCN HCM community. Thanks for the link to a few of my previous blogs as well.
Thanks Jarret for your comments. Your previous blogs linked are very valuable references for HR Renewal anytime. And that is the same with blogs from Robert Moeller.
I really like what SAP is doing with HR Renewal. I have been working with all self-services versions starting from early ITS. Had done many customizations to improve usability. Now I see clients getting excited about UI improvements from SAP. That is exciting!
Regards
Anil
Hi Anil,
Congratulatiosn on your 1st blog. I think you have addressed the right questions that a first time reader of HR Renewal would have.Thank you for sharing your expertise with the community.
Warm Regards,
Jyoti
Thanks Jyoti for your comments.
I like your blogs and tweets. Thanks for sharing your SuccessFactors expertise with the community. Waiting to get your book.
Regards
Anil
Nice blog
Thanks Andy.
Hi Anil and thanks for the blog!
Do you have any details on the Internet Explorer compatibility requirements for the new landing page....is it working with IE10 alrealy and what about prior versions?
Thanks,
-Shayne
Hi Shayne,
Thanks for the comments. IE9 is required for landing page to work (as of the latest version. HR Renewal 1.0 SP10, which has FP3). We do not have IE10 compatibility requirements yet. Out of my curiosity, I tired the current HR Renewal version in NWBC for HTML in IE10. It did not work.
I will let you know as soon I find this info.
Regards,
Anil
Hi Anil,
If I install the HR Renewal Add-On, is there a possibility not to activate and use it right away? We need for our existing ESS/MSS to continue working as it currently does after an EHP7 update, and want to activate HR Renewal and other new features later Is it safe to go ahead and put in the HR Renewal Add-On now and leave it idle, or do I need to wait and install the add-on at the time we will actually use it?
Warm Regards, CM
Hi Clifton,
Once you deploy the HR Renewal Add-on components, you need to activate the business functions (thru switch framework) and do some configuration to make it work.
You can deploy the add-on components and choose not to enable the switch right away. My understanding is that, your existing ESS/MSS functionality should not have any issues unless they are very old that your regular Ehp6 or Ehp7 upgrade forces you to upgrade them. But I haven't tested this scenario myself.
I have seen SAP documents confirming that older versions (pre HR-Renewal) of ESS/MSS are supported even after HR Renewal is deployed. If you like to have have one of those documents, please send me a direct message with your email id. I can send it across.
The best way to confirm this obviously is to deploy in a sandbox system first.
Thanks
Anil
Hi Anil,
Is it possible for end users to access HR Renewal through our corporate portal (non sap) directly other than NWBC / SAP Portal.
Regards
Vasu
Hi Vasu,
SAP's recommended approach is to deploy HR Renewal thru NWBC or Portal. But it is possible to access the pages directly thru UI5 framework. There are few technical considerations to make that work.
thanks
Anil
Dear Anil,
some technical question for understanding better the HR Renewal functionalities:
- Renewal is able to natively manage custom fields present on the standard infotype or you need to customize the Web Dynpro?
- Renewal is able to natively handle the custom infotype present on the standard actions?
- the collaboration tools is included in the renewal in terms of licenses or license must be pay ad hoc (under SuccessFactors licences)
Thanks for your help
Gerardo
Hi Gerardo,
The custom fields have to be added in the Webdynpro or the UI5 page depending on which the application it is.
HR Renewal is at no additional cost with your ESS and MSS licenses. Collaboration tools are licensed separately.
This is just a guidance. Only SAP account executive can give you the actual numbers.
Thanks
Anil
Hi,
Is it possible to customize the landing page?
For example: Adding a specific icon (company logo) somewhere?
Thanks
Nice article Anil. Thank you. I have question ; do you know if HR Processional role can be modified to update any PA infotypes like Benefits infotypes ? or Is there any solution for Benefit Admin role in HR renewal? please let me know.
Regards,
Ken