Any suggestions on Initial Project Planning & Kick-Off

[Former Member]

<a href="https://www.sdn.sap.comhttp://www.sdn.sap.comhttp://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/forums">Paul Wilson</a> suggested that we start a series of discussions for the different phases of the SAP OCM process.

In response to Paul’s suggestion, I am kicking off a thread on this topic. Others threads on the other phases will follow.

The process steps for Initial Project Planning & Kick-Off from Paul's prior posting are listed below.

1.1 Initial Project Planning and Kick-Off

1.1.1 Transition from Discovery and Evaluation

1.1.1.2 Review Discovery and Evaluation Documents

1.1.2 Enterprise Strategy Framework

1.1.2.1 Review All Required Strategic Documentation

1.1.2.2 Conduct Executive Workshops

1.1.2.4 Review Workshop Results

1.1.4 Project Charter

1.1.4.6 Develop Organizational Change Strategy

Any suggestions on what has worked well would be appreciated. Also, feel free to include things that have been tried that were less than successful.

From a real world perspective, I would be interested in discussing to whom and how Change Strategy has been presented by other OCM Consultants. I would also be interested in discovering how often OCM Consultants actually conduct Executive Workshops during this phase of the project.

I am looking forward to learning and sharing with the group.

Caryl Barclay

SAP OCM Change Management Principal

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Caryl,

I have not had extensive experience ( >1 ) but heres my input. I may be missing some info but hope this helps someone.

Typically during the project Initiation phase, we work on getting the project charter, business case, Scope Statement, Project plan schedule etc.

So with respect to OCM, during the prep/initiation/kick off stage -

1) Producing Change Charter – This helps to set the framework for the OCM. The Change Charter sets ambition, scope and initial attributes of the organizational change process for the entire project.

Key Deliverables during this step are OCM Plan, Purpose and Objectives

2) Business Readiness - provides the decision makers with an initial assessment of the readiness of the business to embark on the project given the scope of change defined in the business case (deliverable from Project Initiation). The assessment comprises a high level view on which stakeholders will be impacted and how dramatic the change is going to be seen from the business organizations side. We would try to include any information on the company's previous change experiences.

Key Deliverables during this step –

a) Initial impact assessment

b) Stakeholder map and business readiness. (we would need to conduct meetings, interview etc )

3) Change Management Organization – Defining change management organization is a very important as it sets the guidelines on how the proj org should be set up to meet the objectives in change charter. It helps to ensure that our leadership forces driving the changes to the business are leveraged to the maximum potential. In addition, it sets the direction for the OCM team to support the program sponsors and steering committee members in a structured manner.

Key Deliverables during this step Sponsorship Strategy (high level document).

4) Communication plan- The communication framework defined here will be followed through the project lifecycle. Hence this is a very critical step in the OCM Initial/Kick off Phase. Typically one would need to identify the target audience and align them with the initial stakeholder mapping/impact assessment, work with the client teams to find out the messaging strategy guidelines if any (if they don’t have then define one), Identify communication feedback loops, and the timeline/key messages for all communications throughout the project.

Key Deliverables :

a) Communication Plan

b) Communication Strategy and Framework.

5) Organizational Alignment Strategy - ensures that considerations has been made as regards to how radical changes to processes and organization the program sponsors wants to allow or encourage in order to achieve a coherent design of system, process and organization. If Organizational Alignment strategy is given low priority, the project team will end up in in-efficient discussions Or some times totally ignores the aspect of organizational alignment with a resulting gap between the system set-up and the processes by which the company is actually run. So, the business will still be operating but will miss out on realizing the full business benefits of the project. O rganizational Alignment Strategy Document is the key deliverable at this point.

[Former Member]

Hi Caryl,

Swaty has covered most of the essentials. Please find my input below:

Formation of change management team (involve business users as well........better buy in)

Align CM plan to match the Upgrade project plan - (This will go a long way in keeping the project on track)

Training strategy (power user and end user training methodology)

Business Impact Analysis

Steering committee meeting to be conducted by CM for entire project team and business

Workshops to be facilitated by CM

Feedback and measuring the success of the change (This is where most CM projects fail as they do not have an assessment mechanism.)

Regards,

Roshik Shenoy

[Former Member]

Caryl,

I would suggest that the OCM (Org Change Management) representative should conduct a complete Roadmapping exercise during the Project Prep (beginning) of the SAP Project. It would be best to invite all major players in the project to this session. You can then list the project Milestones across the timeline of the project on a horizontal line and then synchronize your Stakeholders activities (vertical) in a "bottom-up" approach. Later in the session you should also identify the "top down" management support and communications that will drive this project. This session will map out and create your steps and strategy throughout the Blueprint/Realization/Final Prep/Go-Live & Post Go-Live phases of your project. Because of the level of participants in this session, you will create instant "Buy-in" from managment and the PMO. This Roadmap will be the basis of the OCM Best Practices requirements identifying Communications; Leaders & Stakeholders; Business Readiness; Org Work Design; Team Effectiveness; Training & Support.

It is most important that you include "Supervisors" of the End Users in this exercise, as they are often forgotten in the process and they can become your largest group of "resisters". It is also critical that you ensure that the Post Go-Live Activities show how you plan to sustain the change and create metrics for the business in the future.

John Davis

[Former Member]

Hi Caryl

The steps of project planning are there in the books. In the drawing board it appears perfect but you will not realize that you are going to be victim of your inaction. The key of any SAP implementation is to determine whether your business really needs it. In many organizations the top management decides to have an ERP system installed and they presume that ERP solution is the panacea of all of their problems. True the project is to be top driven but the end users must be convinced why they are doing it. For some countries it involves a big cultural change too.

The starting point should be how adequately you are able to justify your investment. The Business should determine and more importantly predict the benefits beforehand. This is very crucial. Without a system in place you have to forecast the key benefits. To do this an organization requires visionary leadership. Such leaders need to be nurtured in the organization. The age old organizational hierarchy may need to be redefined to pave way for Team concepts. From Change Management perspective you can have various initiatives but the fundamental challenge is to establish a system where narrow individual concerns would always be negated by the broad vision for which every one would be working.

These are random thoughts that surfaced from my experience.

[Former Member]

Hi Alok,

I agree completely that an adequate, realistic business case is critical to properly setting project expectations and to achieving "success". Generally, determining the cost piece is much easier than estimating benefits, but both are critical. On the benefits side you also have both the "hard dollar" benefits (actual expense reductions) and the "soft dollar" benefits (productivity improvements, better customer service, etc.) that can be almost impossible to quantify but do add "value".

I also agree that you need to take a look at both the individual impact and the enterprise impact of a project. In many cases, the work load may shift with a systems implementation. Information may be captured earlier, meaning more work for individuals at the beginning of a process, but bring productivity gains to individuals working later in the process stream. It is critical that benefits be explained to provide an explaination of why the project is going forward. From a siloed perspective, a project may just not seem to make sense.

Thank you for participating on this thread.

Caryl

[Former Member]

Hi

Interesting thread. Success of SAP implementation and benefit derived largely depends on how you adapt yourself to the demanding needs. Basically people have to be discipined and there must be some mechanism to monitor. Users must understand that this project is being driven by the top management and there is no margin of error. My implementation experience says that if top management owns the system there is no doubt why an organisation would not derive benefit out of SAP implementation.

Keeping this in mind Kick -off & project planning should be done with involvement from all users. Change Management has mainly two dimensions 1. Attitudunal 2. Business Process Change.

Change Management workshop for business processes are normally done by the ERP core team. Parallely the process of behavioural change management is equally important and has to be addressed. Carrot & Stick policy may not work everywhere. I have seen after implementation many functionalities of ERP remain unutilised and in the process organisation have spent lots of time & money. It is important that during project Planning the Functional Requirement specifications are drawn carefully . Nice to have features should be included if you can really make your users use it.

Let the discussion continue. Award points if you find it helpful

Regards

Alok