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Shouldn’t this just work?

I’ve heard that from every client I’ve ever worked with: Shouldn’t x/y/z just work? Why does SAP make it so hard? And I’ve heard it from many consultants I’ve worked with. Coming from clients, I can understand it since it’s not their job to know the software inside-out (though maybe SAP could do a better job educating them on the software’s capabilities). But coming from consultants, it’s painful to hear because it shows that they don’t have any real mastery of their profession. And even when I don’t hear it directly, I see the imprints that lack of consulting knowledge leaves in the client’s software.

For example, I was helping a client solve a problem they had with their 401k calculations in payroll. They described it to me, and mentioned that their implementation consultant wrote some custom rules in payroll to try to fix the issue. But it still wasn’t working correctly for their plan requirements. They had to manually monitor and fix employee paychecks and their plan funding and reporting process was much more complicated all because they were working around this error.

I know that SAP’s standard functionality works fine for all but the strangest 401k plans, so my hunch is that someone made a configuration mistake. Once I was able to get into their system to take a look around, I saw the problem: one wagetype’s cumulation class was setup incorrectly, leading to some weird results in the 401k wage base. One wagetype attribute - a simple one - was setup incorrectly and instead of identifying that and fixing the source of the problem, their consultant created a lot of complexity and still didn’t fully resolve the problem.

That consultant’s lack of knowledge created the issue, and their lack of knowledge couldn’t fix it either. The client didn’t know any better about the technical details; but they did know that they paid good money for the software and services, expecting it to be able to calculate 401k contributions. And they were puzzled about why there were issues with it. It’s 401k after all, practically everyone in the US has 401k plans so how could it be that they were having issues?

I could write similar stories about most every module of the SAP HCM software. The software works; too often it’s poor implementation consulting that breaks it. In my younger days I was more critical of the SAP HCM software than I am now, and that was justifiable when the core module was growing and evolving. Now, I’m OK with the software. It works, it isn’t perfect, but it’s good. Experience has shown me that the value clients get from SAP HCM is only partially due to the software; much of the value has to do with how it is implemented.

And that leads me to being more critical of the SAP HCM consulting profession. The barriers to entry are very low; there isn’t much to keep someone from saying they are an SAP HCM consultant. There are plenty of ways and incentives to puff-up a resume to make it look much better than the real, underlying experience supports. The chase for the lowest cost and highest margin consultants also has negative impacts on implementations - clients are better off selecting consultants who provide high value. And while I admire the efforts to build a robust consultant certification scheme, that will take years to gain traction with clients.

So yes, the software does work. It isn’t so complicated... when you have a team who knows the software well and can translate your business processes and practices into ways that provide more value than where you came from.

I recently switched from a Windows laptop to the MacBook Air by Apple. I was a Mac fan since the original little Macs that I used in college in the 80’s. In the early 90’s I even had the Powerbook - remember that dark gray clamshell portable Mac with the trackball? And then when I started consulting, I went with Windows laptops - it worked better with the SAP software and it fit into the corporate networks of my clients. But I really missed the Mac design; it just worked.

Fast forward to 2011, and my whole family has gone Apple - iPhones, Macbooks, Apple TV’s, Time Capsules and so on. Everyone except me - I’m still working with my 5 year old Windows laptop. My older son, pretty much an Apple geek (and I’m so proud of that!), reminds me that I can actually run Windows on a Mac if it’s ever needed. I see how easily their MacBooks work, how well they integrate with networks, with everything. They just work. So this summer, I got the new MacBook Air laptop. And I love it! Why do I love it? It’s light, powerful, functional, and it just works without hassle.

This is an SAP HR podcast though; what do MacBooks have to do with that? Well, there’s a good lesson here - hang in there with me. One big reason the Apple products are becoming so popular is because of their design quality. Design isn’t just how the products look; in fact, I think design is all about how things work. In most cases, the way they look is a product of how they work. Form follows function, I suppose. Apple pours lots of money into ‘how things work.’

I think with SAP HR projects, we don’t put enough emphasis on design - on how this thing is supposed to work. Design, in SAP HR projects, often gets cut short. We are eager to move into construction - let’s build this thing! Now, I’m all for prototyping and iterative development practices, but that doesn’t mean we can short-cut the design. Not at all! I am saying that when we put the right effort and resources into design, we will get a much better end result.

Better design means fewer errors later in the project. Better design means fewer change requests, it also leads to more consistency which further leads to easier training and a better user experience. Better design means less ‘design by discovery’ later in the project when we are constructing and unit testing. Better design means we will have fewer errors when we get to system integration testing, user acceptance testing and even parallel payroll testing. Yes, payroll also benefits from good design practices. Better design means our data model easily supports our process, reporting and authorization requirements.

So why isn’t there enough emphasis on good design practices for SAP HR projects? Here are a couple reasons though I’m sure we could all think of more. First, I think that too often, we don’t have the right resources involved in the design, or ‘blueprinting’, stage. We need business partners who know what they want and can make decisions about how the work is done. We also need consultants who are conversant and knowledgable in both the system and the business processes. And we need a clear focus on getting to deliverables - it’s far too easy to get into endless loops at this stage. Good design requires the right people who can commit their time to the task.

Second, too often we accept poor or incomplete design so that we can make the deadline, saying that we will work it out later. Whenever we say ‘we can work that out later’ we need to be really sure about the impact of that on other areas of the project and the availability of the resources we will have ‘later’. Often, ‘later’ we are all focused on other deadlines, so that design that we said we would do ‘later’ gets compromised. Then we don’t have time to come back and do it the right way, and we end up with something that doesn’t quite work right.

So for your next SAP HR project, consider how you’re going to do the design stage. Do you have the right people in it? Are you focused on the deliverables? How will you ensure you get good, complete designs? Good design leads to good products - whether it’s a MacBook or an SAP HR implementation.
 

This podcast sort of has two parts - one for consultants and one for clients - but each can learn from listening to the whole thing. Now, let's talk about the value of getting - and using - feedback for your SAP HCM projects.

For consultants - feedback is critical to your learning process, and while there is feedback during the project it is only after cutover that you can get the really valuable feedback on how your work actually performed in a real environment. Things that seemed like good ideas during blueprint/construction, or that seemed to work just fine during integration testing might not work so well in the real world of production SAP HCM processes and data. You will learn and benefit from getting that feedback from your clients and integrating it into your future work.

For SAP HCM clients - make sure you have a part in the client selection process and look for consultants who have some production SAP HCM experience. And get a few independent Quality Assurance (QA) reviews during your project; getting this independent feedback will benefit both you and your lead consulting firm. Remember that you are the client, you are in control of the consulting relationship, and you will have to live with the results of your SAP HCM projects.