Moving – almost everyone has done it at least once. On average, people move every seven years and every time it is a big event. The same applies when it comes to the transition to S/4HANA and enabling new innovations. Moving to S/4HANA will be a digital transformation for the company leading to a different or new way of working, adapting or optimizing business processes and opening the door for innovations such as AI, Blockchain and Machine Learning.
There are many ways to move your SAP landscape to S/4HANA. In this article I want to discuss the conversion approach and examine the financial aspects. The approach is designed for customers who want to bring their business processes to the new platform and implement the latest innovations.
This means making well-considered choices, looking at the core elements such as finance, supply chain, project management.
The steps below are part of a possible conversion approach:
- Transition Approach
Preparation is an important aspect of the conversion. With tools and methodologies, you can analyze system software requirements, infrastructure requirements, functional implications, necessary custom code adjustments, and application data migration requirements. Based on the results, you gain insight into the dependencies and challenges. - Sandbox Conversion (Trail)
I recommend making a copy of your production environment to prepare for conversion. With a runbook, you can analyze the amount of data and problems that need to be solved. The runbook facilitates the easy walk of the migration activities. - Legacy Data Impact Assessment
Data inconsistencies are a challenge, especially within the financial division. Personally, I use a number of tools to find the inconsistencies and, based on business needs, discuss the best approach to resolve them. - custom code
While standard codes are transferred from one software to another, custom codes are more complex. Keep this in mind: analyze the modified code and get advice - Conversion execution
Once the technical steps are complete, walk on S/4HANA. Follow-up activities still need to be performed to ensure proper business usage. After the configuration is prepared after the conversion, the system can be released for the customer to perform testing. - End User Testing
After the preparation and the runbook walkthrough, it is important to follow a clear test approach. My advice is not to underestimate the importance of this exercise or take too little time or you could end up paying the price for the S/4HANA .
If you would like to know more about the digital transformation to S/4HANA, please get in touch.
