Several years ago, the company I was working for - a large, multinational energy company - purchased
SAP Enable Now as a replacement for Oracle UPK, which had reached the end of support. As their primary UPK resource, I was given the task of implementing, configuring, and 'bedding down' their new SAP Enable Now system. Oracle UPK was a comparatively simple product, which could only be used for recording and delivering simulations, and my brief was to "give us what UPK could do" - no more, no less.
So I set up templates, developed processes for recording, editing, and publishing simulations, and trained people in various parts of the organization on how to use SAP Enable Now. The corporation was happy, and before long we had 8,000 simulations. Many of these were converted from existing UPK simulations for heritage projects, but a fair number were created from scratch, for greenfield projects and new developments. And almost all of them were for SAP ECC 6.0 applications, which was the main driver.
Of course, after spending a couple of years as the point-person for the company's SAP Enable Now implementation, I knew there was much more the product could do beyond just creating simulations. But before I got the chance to start socializing those possibilities, COVID hit, 'downsizing' was rife, and my position at the company was eliminated.
A RETURN ENGAGEMENT
Fast-forward 18 months, and in a twist of fate I was hired back to the same company as a training developer - but to a part of the organization I hadn't previously been exposed to. I was brought in to update some existing training material that had been developed in a mixture of PowerPoint and Articulate 360. When I started back, my new boss was about to purchase a license for Articulate 360 for me so I could do the work, when I mentioned SAP Enable Now. They hadn't even heard of it - probably because all the material developed in SAP Enable Now was for the company's SAP systems, and this group did not use SAP. They also didn't think they needed
simulations, as their training was more conceptual and procedural, and not strictly application/transactional. Nevertheless, I felt SAP Enable Now was a tool that met their needs perfectly.
So I leaped in with both feet, and re-built their existing training material using SAP Enable Now's
courseware capabilities. And where the courses I was updating were largely 'page-flippers' with a small amount of 'click here' type of actions, I was able to use the full Book Page functionality to add interaction, animation, and even audio, and delivered high-quality eLearning modules that were much more engaging. Of course, the client was delighted with the result, and immediately set me to work re-doing other courses they had, in the same format.
In the process, I was able to consolidate material that had previously been developed in disparate tools - PowerPoint, Articulate, and a little Adobe Presenter (all of which required their own developer licenses) into a single tool: SAP Enable Now. And, most importantly, this was a tool they already had - licensed, and paid for! I also found that although my new group wasn't using any SAP systems directly, they were using a third-party software application that they needed to train their users on. So I built simulations for that - which proved very fortuitous when the development instance they used for training was out of commission for several weeks following a problematic upgrade.
BREAKING NEW GROUND
What I found most interesting (although personally not surprising) in all of this is that SAP Enable Now had been available within the company for several years at this point, and was being used fairly effectively - just only within its original scope. There was so much more potential that had remained untapped until I came back and showed them how the
same product could be extended into additional areas - both for additional types of training material, and for additional (and non-SAP) systems.
And although they may not realize it, the company isn't quite done with their SAP Enable Now journey, yet. The company is still on SAP ECC 6.0, but eventually they will likely move to S/4HANA. And when they do, SAP Enable Now will be there for them, through the mighty (and as yet untapped by them) Web Assistant component, which can provide them with context-sensitive, in-application help - and access to the existing simulations and courseware - all directly from within the application itself.
SAP Enable Now truly is the performance support tool that can grow with you, and keep rising to meet your evolving needs. So if you already have SAP Enable Now, look to see if you're using
all of it, and using it everywhere it
can be used. You may find you have a more powerful and and useful tool than you thought, already at your disposal!
For more information on SAP Enable Now, please visit the SAP Enable Now info page.
