Preparing for the SAP HCM implementation project
This note is addressed to the business, customers who are starting to think about introducing a new system, be it SAP or non-SAP. I managed to work on the part of the customer, on the part of consulting (not just SAP), which gives a slightly wider understanding of the problems on both sides. I also want to note that problems, or let's call it tasks, are the same for any country. I can judge by the work on projects in the USA, Norway, Hungary, Russia. Exclusively my experience.
Almost all customers declare the main task of implementing a system to unify processes, workflow and methodology. The implementation of the system should solve the problem of unification, since the project provides external incentives in the form of consultants and a limited project budget when it is necessary to quickly change and change. The customer expects by default from the consultant best practices that do not exist. Let's be honest - the best practices are how the business has grown to its current state. It is impossible to transfer the practices of one company to another; these will not be the best practices, but the practices of that other company. But it is convenient, because it allows you to see, or rather peek, and how it is done in others. Human curiosity, when you can’t think of it yourself, so you follow ideas to your neighbor and improve them for yourself.
Within the framework of the project, consultants rely on project objectives and require the business to be unified. It turns out such a situation when the business itself is asked to settle down on its own and give money to strangers for it. I also motivated myself in my time to go to the gym - once I paid for it, then “I want to go”. Unification itself is also not a very clear process. Imagine a big business, where there are many companies, different functions, different management hierarchies. A simple example: a large factory for tens of thousands of personnel and a tiny company with sellers of products for export. And this is all within the framework of a single project scope, where there should be unified processes, documents and methodologies. For some, the smallest change will be affected by numbers, funds, the effectiveness of the closing period, others will not notice at all. And the abolition of one of the premiums for the first will be held simply by another type of accrual, and the second may bury the motivation of the sellers. Because unification.
Reporting, especially internal, is another stone in the garden of both sides. Business says that reports are needed, usually in prescribed forms, and consultants offer "some strange uploads from the system in a crooked format." There is a conflict of principles and progress, in which the prevailing practice at the enterprise in document flow usually wins. If the certificate on physical volumes should lie every morning with the foreman on the table, then no system will help until the head starts to open the system in the morning. In the West, this practice is less common when the customer requires the formation of paper reports. People work with modern technologies longer and more, so paperless workflow is developed and the projects run easier. Of course, this does not apply to legislative reporting.
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Methodology is the largest amount of work on a project. I will say in secret that they often talk about the need to unify processes, but in practice processes take about 10 percent of the real work on unification. The main thing is paper and calculations, and often it is connected with the requirements of the law, while the processes are practically not regulated by laws. By methodology, I mean the algorithms for calculating certain quantities, the rules for filling in reports and output forms. At the entrance to the project, the customer likes to operate with numbers 80/20, 70/30 or other specific values ​​that measure the result of unification. On the one hand, what's the difference how many payment types there will be, is it just a reference book? On the other hand, it is necessary at all levels to understand what is the wage fund, what is personnel costs (this concept is usually broader than the wage fund). In my understanding, the ideal unification tends to zero, to simplify to the maximum level that does not contradict the law and the goals of the business.
Within the framework of the project, when it comes to the unification of the methodology, a lot of HR-related issues arise in the field of tax accounting, business economics, accounting, and legal. Often, these areas do not have a single holder who can decide on uniformity from its height. Each unit is brewed in its own juice, which is revealed in discussions of the same catalog of payment types (I apologize for the banal example, but this is the sore point in all SAP HCM projects).
In Western practice, I have met this approach. There is the main part of wages - salary or tariff. Its formation is established by a single algorithm for all categories of employees, regardless of the method of accounting and the nature of work. All units understand this basic part in the same way. The motivational part (bonuses, allowances, bonuses) is formed of several basic types of charges, which are called common words (for example, “Award for results”, “Premium for quality”, “Allowance for working conditions”, etc.), and what’s inside these Charges are given at the mercy of each unit. So "The prize for the result" among sellers contains one meaning, the workers have another, the TOPs have the third. It does not matter how this value is considered. From the point of view of personnel management, this is one amount that must be calculated and provided by the responsible unit. Nobody cares how this unit calculates and manages this accrual, since it is the direct responsibility of the head of the same unit. Such a solution fits perfectly into the concept of unification: the number of algorithms in the HR focus area is minimal, the motivation of each group of personnel is determined in the area of ​​the respective enterprise or department, the fund has a common understanding, the headache HR tends to zero, since the function is decentralized. Lack of automation? By no means. Since each division or enterprise lives at its own pace (its own motivation system, its own indicators, its own speed of work and evaluation of results), each division is independently concerned with the tools for the effective performance of this function. Someone needs Excel once a year, while others need online integration with production systems. But these tasks are transferred to the area of ​​responsibility of this unit, and it is better for HR to know how to accomplish this task effectively.
Action plan for preparing for the SAP HCM implementation project
Break to build. This approach is often used in building integration between systems. Turn off one system and see what happens. If nothing happens, then this system or connection is not needed. In practice, this means the systematic shutdown (disposal) of steps to transfer reports from one department to another, reducing the use of certain directories (wage types, schedules, time data, NSI). Very often, when a new system is introduced, a business wants to transfer all that is. But no one can say for what. For one reason or another, many analyst were implemented years ago for a specific case, which is no longer relevant, but this analytics is still being filled out by inertia. What management decisions are made today based on this analytics?
Formation of reports and documents is often due to the fact that the people who receive these documents are not equipped with automated workstations . The most typical example is the passport and security services. Eternal applications on paper signed by the responsible official. Maybe you should give them the opportunity to sometimes play solitaire on the PC? The cost of an automated workplace may be cheaper than paperwork.
Processes . Perhaps this is the most popular word in the implementation. Everyone wants to simplify, unify processes. If you look at the processes after the introduction of SAP and before, then the differences will not be as much as the noise around it. To unify processes without being tied to the system is very simple. We take the simplest version of the process and the most difficult (as above in the example with the factory and sellers). We look at how they differ (with a high degree of probability the differences will be in the number of communications and output forms), we bring the processes to the most complex in all enterprises. And then we take a bite off the steps according to the first principle “break to build”. No need to build beautiful diagrams and poems - in real everyday life, no one looks into these multi-volumes. A simple Excel table will help.
Papers . The second topic after the methodology. Papers are all that the law does not need. In one company an experiment was conducted with the withdrawal of printers. People physically could not print documents. Six months later, the number of documents by e-mail decreased significantly. Instead of “where is the report?”, The question “where to look?” Appeared. I believe that there are documents that cannot be unified. For example, additional agreements to employment contracts. It is enough to rework documents on the most massive cases and unify and automate them. All the rest is beyond the scope of the project and unification as in the situation with the award for the result. With mass recruitment and hiring in the retail business, documents are easily unified and automated, but why do this for industrial giants?
People and project . This is the most sensitive topic. Every manager knows that people perceive painfully changes. Even a rearrangement of the table in the office can be considered a declaration of war, disrespect for the best years of life given to the enterprise. Starting a project to introduce such a system, and this is a big project, every participant from the business side morally feels that it is temporary and against it. Even the project manager has concerns that after the project his role will end and he will not be needed by the enterprise. Before the start of the project, people should have a clear understanding of what will happen to them after the completion of the project. Any project is stressful, this is additional work, which is different from the usual one. Many project participants view this as additional load, which is not compensated. It is necessary to think in advance about the motivation of people to work in the project effectively, and not from the sticks "otherwise we will dismiss."
Communication or "a talk . " Many managers became leaders because they started or were able to talk. Correctly formulate and communicate your thoughts to the interlocutor. When the project starts, then forget about it. The project involves the involvement of more people than we are used to seeing daily. There is a new barrier that needs to be overcome in order to achieve a result. But bad luck - no motivation. Why go and talk to someone, if personally it will not give me anything. With your supervisor or subordinates - always welcome, as the incentives are clear. And then there are completely different people (both in business and external consultants), the results of communication with which do not foresee any motivation. As a result, we see a constant lack of information for all project participants at all levels. To reduce potential risks due to communications, even before the project, you need to build communication rules. Not formal regulations who, where, why and when, but something else. In practice, this may be the organization of project initiatives that, in a strategic plan, will lead the participants themselves to an understanding of the need to introduce a new system. Previously, enterprises had such things as “racouches” - rationalization proposals, the implementation of which would make an enterprise or a process somewhat better. This is a project initiative that can involve a large number of people without announcing a project, thereby preparing both the team and the business for change.
The most important thing , from my point of view, as it was repeatedly noted earlier in other articles, is to convey as accurately as possible the goal of implementation to the largest number of people in the company.
Almost all customers declare the main task of implementing a system to unify processes, workflow and methodology. The implementation of the system should solve the problem of unification, since the project provides external incentives in the form of consultants and a limited project budget when it is necessary to quickly change and change. The customer expects by default from the consultant best practices that do not exist. Let's be honest - the best practices are how the business has grown to its current state. It is impossible to transfer the practices of one company to another; these will not be the best practices, but the practices of that other company. But it is convenient, because it allows you to see, or rather peek, and how it is done in others. Human curiosity, when you can’t think of it yourself, so you follow ideas to your neighbor and improve them for yourself.
Within the framework of the project, consultants rely on project objectives and require the business to be unified. It turns out such a situation when the business itself is asked to settle down on its own and give money to strangers for it. I also motivated myself in my time to go to the gym - once I paid for it, then “I want to go”. Unification itself is also not a very clear process. Imagine a big business, where there are many companies, different functions, different management hierarchies. A simple example: a large factory for tens of thousands of personnel and a tiny company with sellers of products for export. And this is all within the framework of a single project scope, where there should be unified processes, documents and methodologies. For some, the smallest change will be affected by numbers, funds, the effectiveness of the closing period, others will not notice at all. And the abolition of one of the premiums for the first will be held simply by another type of accrual, and the second may bury the motivation of the sellers. Because unification.
Reporting, especially internal, is another stone in the garden of both sides. Business says that reports are needed, usually in prescribed forms, and consultants offer "some strange uploads from the system in a crooked format." There is a conflict of principles and progress, in which the prevailing practice at the enterprise in document flow usually wins. If the certificate on physical volumes should lie every morning with the foreman on the table, then no system will help until the head starts to open the system in the morning. In the West, this practice is less common when the customer requires the formation of paper reports. People work with modern technologies longer and more, so paperless workflow is developed and the projects run easier. Of course, this does not apply to legislative reporting.
')
Methodology is the largest amount of work on a project. I will say in secret that they often talk about the need to unify processes, but in practice processes take about 10 percent of the real work on unification. The main thing is paper and calculations, and often it is connected with the requirements of the law, while the processes are practically not regulated by laws. By methodology, I mean the algorithms for calculating certain quantities, the rules for filling in reports and output forms. At the entrance to the project, the customer likes to operate with numbers 80/20, 70/30 or other specific values ​​that measure the result of unification. On the one hand, what's the difference how many payment types there will be, is it just a reference book? On the other hand, it is necessary at all levels to understand what is the wage fund, what is personnel costs (this concept is usually broader than the wage fund). In my understanding, the ideal unification tends to zero, to simplify to the maximum level that does not contradict the law and the goals of the business.
Within the framework of the project, when it comes to the unification of the methodology, a lot of HR-related issues arise in the field of tax accounting, business economics, accounting, and legal. Often, these areas do not have a single holder who can decide on uniformity from its height. Each unit is brewed in its own juice, which is revealed in discussions of the same catalog of payment types (I apologize for the banal example, but this is the sore point in all SAP HCM projects).
In Western practice, I have met this approach. There is the main part of wages - salary or tariff. Its formation is established by a single algorithm for all categories of employees, regardless of the method of accounting and the nature of work. All units understand this basic part in the same way. The motivational part (bonuses, allowances, bonuses) is formed of several basic types of charges, which are called common words (for example, “Award for results”, “Premium for quality”, “Allowance for working conditions”, etc.), and what’s inside these Charges are given at the mercy of each unit. So "The prize for the result" among sellers contains one meaning, the workers have another, the TOPs have the third. It does not matter how this value is considered. From the point of view of personnel management, this is one amount that must be calculated and provided by the responsible unit. Nobody cares how this unit calculates and manages this accrual, since it is the direct responsibility of the head of the same unit. Such a solution fits perfectly into the concept of unification: the number of algorithms in the HR focus area is minimal, the motivation of each group of personnel is determined in the area of ​​the respective enterprise or department, the fund has a common understanding, the headache HR tends to zero, since the function is decentralized. Lack of automation? By no means. Since each division or enterprise lives at its own pace (its own motivation system, its own indicators, its own speed of work and evaluation of results), each division is independently concerned with the tools for the effective performance of this function. Someone needs Excel once a year, while others need online integration with production systems. But these tasks are transferred to the area of ​​responsibility of this unit, and it is better for HR to know how to accomplish this task effectively.
Action plan for preparing for the SAP HCM implementation project
Break to build. This approach is often used in building integration between systems. Turn off one system and see what happens. If nothing happens, then this system or connection is not needed. In practice, this means the systematic shutdown (disposal) of steps to transfer reports from one department to another, reducing the use of certain directories (wage types, schedules, time data, NSI). Very often, when a new system is introduced, a business wants to transfer all that is. But no one can say for what. For one reason or another, many analyst were implemented years ago for a specific case, which is no longer relevant, but this analytics is still being filled out by inertia. What management decisions are made today based on this analytics?
Formation of reports and documents is often due to the fact that the people who receive these documents are not equipped with automated workstations . The most typical example is the passport and security services. Eternal applications on paper signed by the responsible official. Maybe you should give them the opportunity to sometimes play solitaire on the PC? The cost of an automated workplace may be cheaper than paperwork.
Processes . Perhaps this is the most popular word in the implementation. Everyone wants to simplify, unify processes. If you look at the processes after the introduction of SAP and before, then the differences will not be as much as the noise around it. To unify processes without being tied to the system is very simple. We take the simplest version of the process and the most difficult (as above in the example with the factory and sellers). We look at how they differ (with a high degree of probability the differences will be in the number of communications and output forms), we bring the processes to the most complex in all enterprises. And then we take a bite off the steps according to the first principle “break to build”. No need to build beautiful diagrams and poems - in real everyday life, no one looks into these multi-volumes. A simple Excel table will help.
Papers . The second topic after the methodology. Papers are all that the law does not need. In one company an experiment was conducted with the withdrawal of printers. People physically could not print documents. Six months later, the number of documents by e-mail decreased significantly. Instead of “where is the report?”, The question “where to look?” Appeared. I believe that there are documents that cannot be unified. For example, additional agreements to employment contracts. It is enough to rework documents on the most massive cases and unify and automate them. All the rest is beyond the scope of the project and unification as in the situation with the award for the result. With mass recruitment and hiring in the retail business, documents are easily unified and automated, but why do this for industrial giants?
People and project . This is the most sensitive topic. Every manager knows that people perceive painfully changes. Even a rearrangement of the table in the office can be considered a declaration of war, disrespect for the best years of life given to the enterprise. Starting a project to introduce such a system, and this is a big project, every participant from the business side morally feels that it is temporary and against it. Even the project manager has concerns that after the project his role will end and he will not be needed by the enterprise. Before the start of the project, people should have a clear understanding of what will happen to them after the completion of the project. Any project is stressful, this is additional work, which is different from the usual one. Many project participants view this as additional load, which is not compensated. It is necessary to think in advance about the motivation of people to work in the project effectively, and not from the sticks "otherwise we will dismiss."
Communication or "a talk . " Many managers became leaders because they started or were able to talk. Correctly formulate and communicate your thoughts to the interlocutor. When the project starts, then forget about it. The project involves the involvement of more people than we are used to seeing daily. There is a new barrier that needs to be overcome in order to achieve a result. But bad luck - no motivation. Why go and talk to someone, if personally it will not give me anything. With your supervisor or subordinates - always welcome, as the incentives are clear. And then there are completely different people (both in business and external consultants), the results of communication with which do not foresee any motivation. As a result, we see a constant lack of information for all project participants at all levels. To reduce potential risks due to communications, even before the project, you need to build communication rules. Not formal regulations who, where, why and when, but something else. In practice, this may be the organization of project initiatives that, in a strategic plan, will lead the participants themselves to an understanding of the need to introduce a new system. Previously, enterprises had such things as “racouches” - rationalization proposals, the implementation of which would make an enterprise or a process somewhat better. This is a project initiative that can involve a large number of people without announcing a project, thereby preparing both the team and the business for change.
The most important thing , from my point of view, as it was repeatedly noted earlier in other articles, is to convey as accurately as possible the goal of implementation to the largest number of people in the company.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/334928/
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