Integration Center – A viable and flexible alternative for LMS Connectors !
‘Integration Center’ is one of the powerful innovations/extensions added to SuccessFactors in recent times.
What is Integration Center (IC)?
When Integration Center (IC) was first introduced in Q2 2016, its primary objective was to enable HR Admins to build, run, schedule and monitor simple File-based Outbound integration. It is easy to build integration quickly and easily through a guided workflow. Predefined templates are available to give a kick start.
It has come a long way since and effective Q1 2017, you can use Integration Center to build Inbound Integration as well !
I have seen many of my existing clients use Integration Center to primarily build simple outbound integration for Benefits vendors and interfaces with other internal legacy applications that require basic employee data on a regular basis and IC serves this purpose effectively.
One of my key SuccessFactors focus area is – Learning. I have been involved with many SuccessFactors Learning implementations and one of the challenges I have seen recently (after Employee Central) is related to the amount of Data Fields customers wanting to move from BizX to LMS.
SuccessFactors Connector files are not that easy (read User Friendly) to work with not only for HR/HRIS Admins but for Application consultants as well. I am sure you will agree with me on that if you have used SF User Connector in the past !
I was pretty excited when I configured and used Integration Center and explored its capabilities. Considering SuccessFactors Learning has its own database and requires a file feed from BizX like other third-party applications, I have been planning to use Integration Center to build an Outbound Integration from BizX to SuccessFactors LMS and let go of the not so user friendly Connector. I had the time and chance finally.
Here are some steps and guidelines to build an integration using Integration Center.
Concept of Integration Center
- Type in ‘Integration Center’ in the Tools search area. You will see Integration Center Landing Page. Select ‘My Integration’.
2. On the My Integrations page, choose Create 
Scheduled Simple Flat File Output Integration
3. Selecting the right Entity is important for integration built with Integration Center. The starting Entity becomes the parent entity at the top and creates relationship between other entities. Since we are sending User Data, we will select entity ‘ User’.
4. The entity User contains information about system user including Personal and Organizational information.
Select the Fields you want to send to LMS. The system immediately shows data values for selected fields as shown in the figure below. You can also click on the ‘Add’ field icon to add additional fields at this stage.
One big advantage of using Integration Center is the capability to get any data fields from any portlets and send it to LMS. In the regular LMS Connector, only fields from UDF (User Data File) can be mapped to LMS fields.
5. You can right click on any Field/Column to change the Label on the go, move the field to left/right, delete the field etc.
6. One great benefit of using the Integration Center instead of the UDF (Employee Data File from Export) is that : You can send any data fields (standard or Custom) to LMS without having to add it to the User Data File or UDF model in Platform.
Note : For Employee Central Customers, to send additional fields (other than those in UDF), you have to map each field from the respective Portlet via ‘Configure Business Configuration’ transaction to a custom field in Platform side.
7. Once you have validated that all fields are added, the next step is to add a Filter if needed. This is helpful if LMS is live for a certain country/division/department only and needs to receive only a subset of the Employee data e.g. only for a certain Division or Department or Country.
8. Once Filter is added, the next step is to provide the Destination Settings (of the SFTP folder where this file will be saved. You can give a File name and your SFTP details in this step.
9. The next step is ‘Scheduling’. You can define the scheduling parameters i.e. how frequently the file will be run. Don’t forget to click on the ‘Save’ icon before clicking ‘Next’.
10. The final step is to review and run the file/schedule the job. Add the job schedule details and emails of LMS Admins or HR Admins that needs to be notified.
11. Before you submit the job, you can review the details in the last step as shown below.
12.I am not covering the necessary configuration steps required in LMS in this blog. However to process this file in LMS, you still have to complete the Connector mapping and schedule a Job in LMS get this file from required SFTP destination and process .
Using the same process with Integration Center (IC), you can send Employee data to any external vendor. Multiple Folders can be created in SFTP /Outgoing path and the external vendor can pick these files and process at their end.
IC is great tool to empower HR Super users without having to depend on technical programming/coding skills set.
Neat idea thanks for sharing will try this for sure
Thanks Sandeep ! Please let me know how it goes !
Hello Rinky,
Great blog, have been waiting for something like this for a while.
I assume that there is also a way to configure the LMS connector to not expect the dual header line that the UDF export provides, as we cannot do this in the IC according to my knowledge? If so, can you perhaps shed some light on that since that was thus far my biggest concern for switching to the IC.
Thanks!
Great question and I should have mentioned this in my Blog but I missed it. To use two headers, you have to define the Integration type as EDI Stacked. You can select that in Step #2 or in the following screen by selecting 'Integration Type'. The first section would be first header, second section would be second header and another for main entity values.
I am not sure of any other method. @Sreelatha N, please share your experience if you used other methods.
Hi! great information, unfortunally I tried to do it, and didn´t get it. Could you please share some screen for the example? Thanks!
Hi Natasha,
it is possible, check this blog: https://blogs.sap.com/2018/03/25/exporting-benefits-from-employee-center-using-integration-center-edi-format/.
The IC Handling for EDI format is a little bit strange... but at the end it works with double header.
Best
Chris
Hi Rinky, Thanks for sharing the information. The Standard Employee export will take care of full chunk of data from EP to LMS. It is useful not only in the scenarios where client would like to user filters for department it will also cover the scenario like difference of license sold i.e. EP 35K and LMS 20k which we are very often we are coming across. We had implemented this to our customers. but while create IC we should be very careful of handling the scenarios of hire, retire and terminated as well. To take of this scenarios I heard something in the roadmap not sure.Thanks
Hi Sreelatha,
Thank you ! Yes its very helpful for Global customers. We have been hearing off late about the EC-LMS integration. May be in the next release. I don't have much insight into that.
Hi Sreelatha, Can you please share your experience with the two header output. I have shared one way that I have used with Francois in the above comment. There might be other ways and I am also curious to explore how other customers are approaching this.
Hi,
Good Article! I'm trying to use IC to send the LMS information on People Profile (Completed Courses) to SAP ERP but I'm not able to locate that background. Any idea??
Thanks
Hi Max,
Are you trying to send Background data ? I don't think that's available yet. However looks like that may be available in the next Q3 release.
-Title of this article is a bit misleading. I thought you were able to upload data from IC without using the connectors. But it seems this is only for exporting and you still need the connector to upload data.
-Any idea if/when SF is going to add LMS-data into IC?
Hi Anne,
You are right ! IC will only help one-way i.e. extracting data from SF. I am also eagerly waiting to see when LMS related entity would be available in IC. Seems like SAP was focusing mainly on Recruiting and Onboarding recently. Now that its taken care of i.e. most entities for RCM/ONB is now available in IC, I feel the next in line may be LMS. If I find out more from Q3 IRR, I will definitely share
Hi Rinky, great article and clear presentation. We've been playing around with this for a little while and agreed there are certain scenarios where it could be useful. However I seem to remember some comment in the last LMS IRR, to the effect that EC user data integration with Learning will be productized further, pretty soon. Did you catch that as well?
It was great to meet you at ASUG in Chicago, BTW. 🙂
-Chris
Hi Chris,
Thanks for your kind comments ! Yup I have also heard about the LMS-EC integration. Hopefully will hear more this week in the Q3 IRR. It was good to see you in Chicago !
while working on Organization connector we have the hierarchy as
Department-->Division-->Business Unit coming from EC to LMS but our header file only has 3 fields,
Has anyone covered, how to manage the levels when your starting entity is department and still cover the 3 levels in integration centre? Any suggestions are welcome.
Hi Rekha,
You can always use a transformation rule in the connector to default one value to the other. Also use Custom Fields to get the additional values from EC.
Hi Rinky
Thanks for sharing the info.
Is there options available to do general Transformation in IC ?
Thanks
Hi Anshul,
Please elaborate 'general transformation; 🙂 . You can always use the available entities to update or mass update data i.e. download a template, add data and upload. It will overwrite the tables.
Hi, Rinky - Though we are not using integration center here for LMS but for data extraction to third party systems, do you know how I can use multiple entities if the object selected does not have the navigation associated.
for .e.g. I have selected PerPerson as my starting entity and now I would like to relate this to RBPRole to know whether the person is part of a particular RBP or not
is the above feasible with integration center?
Thanks in advance for replies
Regards
Rajesh
Yes very much ! You can join multiple entities and the system by default suggests touch points. If you play around with the system, its pretty user friendly.
Hi Rinky,
Could you share a doc wherein we could 'join multiple entities'.
Thanking you in advance
Pratap
Hi Rajesh, were you able to relate starting entity with more fields.
Appreciate if you could send me an high level document showing how to connect entities.
Hi Pratap,
You can refer to the Integration Center guide available in help.sap.com. Just type in 'Integration Center' and you will see the guide. Its a huge document and I can't attach it here.There isn't a specific document for entity joins.
You can join multiple entities by clicking on the + sign in the 'Configure Fields' step.
Thanks Rinky, appreciate your help.
Just downloaded the guide and will read through it.
I tried the + sign in the 'Configure Fields' but still having trouble adding other entities, my Starting Entity is "User". Probably in my test system there could be some config missing.
Hi Rinky
Is there any way to schedule the job hourly or minutes based. My client wants to schedule the job for every 30 min or hourly.
Best Regards
Raaj
Hi Raaj,
Good point. I don't think there is an option to schedule it hourly yet. The only options are Once, Daily, Weekly etc. However, let me check and get back to you.
Rinky
Hi Rinky!
Thank you for your experience!
I created the same integration, and it works a few times, but now I can’t upload the data to the LMS. User Connector SF usually gives the status “FAIL – FAILURE”. Do you know why it can be?
Regards, Anastasia
Hi,
I think your solution to create a Scheduled Simple File Output Integration is not working for the UserConnectorSF is expecting 2 headerlines;
You should build your file with the second option Scheduled EDI/Stacked File Export where you have the possiblitity to add a second header line.
Another problem I see when you use User as your starting entity is that you will not select inactive users. So in LMS you will not update the user to inactive status when they leave the company.
Currently we are investigating whether we can create a Scheduled EDI/Stacked File Export that can be used to replace the Employee Export file.
Will share the outcome, when this is successful.
Hi, have you managed to replace the employee export file with the Scheduled EDI/Stacked File
Cheers
A
I found a solution to show terminated employees on the integration.
https://userapps.support.sap.com/sap/support/knowledge/en/2324204
Hi Rinky
Can we use single header to LMS connector, if yes does that mean we use USER connector and not the USEF SF connector?
Regards,
SID