SAP Activate methodology

The SAP Activate methodology is SAP’s content rich, agile methodology for the implementation
and/or upgrade of SAP solutions across industries and customer environments. Built on our
experience from tens of thousands of SAP projects, SAP Activate Methodology provides pre-built
implementation content, accelerators, tools, and best practices that help consultants to deliver
consistent and successful results across industries and customer environments. The SAP Activate
Methodology can be run for distinct projects or as a component within the SAP Premium
Engagement.

The phases of SAP Activate provide support throughout the project life cycle of SAP solutions.
Underlying these phases is a series of value delivery and quality checks to make sure that the
solution, as implemented, delivers the expected value. The diagram below illustrates the phases of
SAP Activate Methodology.

The SAP Implementation Methodology

Build Smart, Run Simple

SAP implementations and upgrades require a disciplined approach to project management. The
SAP Activate methodology aligns with best practices recommended by the Project Management
Institute (PMI)*, making it possible to minimize risk, streamline and accelerate the implementation
project, and reduce the total cost of implementation or upgrade.

SAP Activate methodology incorporates a standardized work breakdown structure that helps project
managers to define and manage project work in a deliverable-oriented, outcome focused manner. It
is structured around these key project work streams:
 Project management
 Solution Design
 Solution Configuration
 Solution Walkthrough
 Integration Preparation

*
* This includes the Project Management Institute’s A Guide to the Project Management Body of
Knowledge.
 Customer Team Enablement
 Data Migration
 Integration Setup
 Solution Testing
 Solution Adoption
 Support Readiness
 System Management
 Custom Extensions Management
 Cutover Management

During each methodology phase, the project team produces prescribed set of deliverables that
serve as inputs to subsequent phases. SAP Activate methodology provides example of key project
deliverables, including procedure description explaining how to prepare and complete the
deliverable. SAP Activate methodology also provides accelerators for each phase and work stream.
These include templates, questionnaires, checklists, guidebooks, and other tools that facilitate the
efficient, consistent, and repeatable delivery of SAP implementations and upgrades.

Stay in Step with Updates in Solution Technology

SAP continually invests in updates to the SAP Activate methodology. These updates help us keep
in step with developments in solution technologies, providing the tools needed to get the software
up and running quickly, and to keep it operating at peak levels. SAP has enhanced the most recent
version of SAP Activate methodology to:
 Help customers integrate their business processes and objectives with their IT solution
 Reduce total cost of implementation by starting implementation with SAP Best Practices or SAP
Rapid Deployment Solutions.
 Accelerate solution design through pre-assembly of the project environment in the SAP HANA
Enterprise Cloud environment.
 Provide best practices for business process management (BPM) including streamlined solution
validation and solution design.

Promote the Delivery of Value throughout the Solution Life Cycle

SAP customers invest in SAP with the expectation that it can deliver value to their business.
However, without proper scrutiny, implementation or upgrade projects can lose their focus on
delivering business value. SAP understands this and has enhanced the SAP Activate methodology
to maintain the transparency of value delivery throughout the life cycle of the SAP solution. The
methodology defines a consistent process that keeps the focus on value delivery in every phase of
the project. At a high level, this process:
 Identifies and quantifies business value objectives
 Establishes project tracking, and reporting mechanisms for value delivery
 Tracks and reports the effectiveness of value delivery in the project
 Continues to track and report value delivery throughout the solution’s life cycle

The value delivery process keeps the project focused on delivering a solution that adds value to the
business and helps SAP’s customers to achieve their business objectives.
Prepare

The purpose of this phase is to provide the initial planning and preparation for
the project. In this phase the project is started, plans are finalized, project
team is assigned, and work is under way to start the project optimally.

Key Prepare Activities

 Define project goals, a high-level scope, and a project plan
 Identify and quantify business value objectives
 Secure executive sponsorship
 Establish project standards, organization and governance
 Define and secure approval for the implementation/upgrade strategy
 Define roles and responsibilities for the project team
 Validate the project objectives
 Establish project management, tracking, and reporting mechanisms for value delivery
 Develop a project team training strategy, and start project team training
 Document all initiation activities in the project charter
 Pre-assemble (or establish) the project environment, infrastructure, and IT systems including
SAP Solution Manager
 Prepare for the Explore phase

Typical deliverables and milestones for the Prepare phase

Deliverables Typical Milestones and key decisions

 Detailed project scope document  Project scope defined

 Cost and benefit validation  Project team staffed and trained
 Project organization and governance  Project team organization, responsibilities, and
 Implementation plan and rollout strategy location established
 Project schedule, budget and management plans  Rollout plan mandates and constraints defined
 Project standards and policies, including ICC**  Policies for to be organization defined
 Solution adoption approach including  System retirement objectives, mandates, and
organizational change management roadmap and constraints defined
training strategy  Development environment including pre-assembly
 On-boarding of project team established
 Project infrastructure  Training budget and approach agreed
 Technical infrastructure requirements and sizing  Key stakeholders for communications identified
 Data migration approach and strategy  Implementation plan defined
 Pre-assembled development infrastructure

Explore

The purpose of this phase is to perform a fit/gap analysis to validate the

solution functionality included in the project scope and to confirm that the
business requirements can be satisfied. Identified gaps and configuration
values are added to the backlog for use in the next phase.

Explore Activities
 Prepare, setup and conduct solution validation workshops
 Refine business requirements
 Identify master data and organizational requirements
 Confirm to be business processes
 Define functional solution design, including a gap analysis in solution design workshops
 Associate business requirements to the process hierarchy and the solution components
 Obtain business sign-off on delta requirements and design documents
 Collect end user information, analyzing learning needs, and developing a learning deployment
strategy
 Establish project management, tracking, and reporting for value delivery

In the Explore phase, industry and solution experts from SAP lead a series of structured show-and-
tell and solution design workshops. The goal of these workshops is to review the best practice
functionality of the SAP solution, identify delta requirements or gaps and document the conceptual
design of the to-be delivered SAP enterprise solution. The team documents all functional and
technical requirements, project issues, and gaps in SAP Solution Manager.

Typical deliverables and milestones for the Explore phase

Deliverables Typical Milestones and key decisions

 Baseline system ready for Solution Validation  Solution prototype baseline system for Solution
workshops Validation workshops ready
 Solution Validation workshops, including Gap  Solution walk-throughs completed
Validation service**  Completed business process design
 Documented design, including:  Completed functional gap analysis
 Project plan update  Mapping of process to solution completed
 Process definition document  Defined IT landscape and technology design
 Process flows  Organizational Change Management
 Solution design documents Communications plan defined
 Functional specifications  Project team trained
in SAP Solution Manager, based on SAP standards  Phase quality assessment conducted
 Prioritized and estimated Backlog document with
requirements and solution gaps
 Change impact analysis and communication plan
 Legacy data migration design and plan
 Technology design and setup
 Test strategy and plan
 Inventory of gaps including interfaces and
conversions
 Release and sprint plan including confirmation of
go-live date
 Learning needs analysis and deployment strategy

Realize
The purpose of this phase is to use a series of iterations to incrementally build
and test an integrated business and system environment that is based on the
business scenarios and process requirements identified in the previous phase.
During this phase, data is loaded, adoption activates occur, and operations are
planned.

Realize Activities
 Establish the solution landscape
 Implement the solution in the development environment using incremental build in time-boxed
iterations
 Conduct overall end-to-end testing of the solution within the QA environment
 Setup production environment
 Prepare for data migration and data archiving
 Conduct performance testing
 Conduct project team and key user training
 Finalize end user training materials and documentation
 Track and report on value delivery

During Realize phase, the project team uses a series of iterations to incrementally configure, test,
confirm, and document the entire end-to-end solution and to create legacy data conversion
programs. The project team actively works with business representatives to ensure good fit of the
built solution to the requirements from the backlog.
Project team releases results of multiple iterations to the business users to accelerate time to value
and provide early access to finalized functionality. Each release is thoroughly tested in end-to-
end integration test and user acceptance test.

The project team documents the configuration decisions and solution in the SAP Solution Manager
tool. They also document all development – including interfaces, integration points, data
conversion programs, reports, and any required enhancements – in SAP Solution Manager.
Once these activities are complete for particular release and the team has obtained business
approval, they make the release available in the production environment.

Typical deliverables and milestones for the Realize phase

Deliverables Typical Milestones and key decisions

 Organization alignment and user enablement  Solution Configuration completed in each iteration
 Technology setup for quality and production  Business users reviewed and accepted
environment including security and authorizations functionality
 Solution configuration and tests  Integration testing of a release complete
 Business process procedures  Data Migration testing conducted
 Development/testing of enhancements and  Project team and key users trained
extensions like interfaces, forms, workflows,  End user system infrastructure ready
conversions, or reports  User acceptance testing completed
 Evaluation and enhancement of security/controls  Technical testing completed (including
 Technical Quality Assurance performance, load, high-availability)
 Integration Validation**  Phase quality assessment conducted
 Preparation/delivery of train-the-trainer course  Readiness for production release confirmed
 End user training system environment
 Data migration conducted
 User acceptance test
 Technical operations setup plan, including OCC**
 Cutover and transition plan

Deploy

The purpose of this phase is to setup the production system, confirm

customer organization readiness, and to switch business operations to the
new system.
Upon initiating Deploy phase, the project team has already confirmed (through integration testing in
the Realize phase) that all systems are functioning correctly and there are no remaining integration
issues to resolve. Thus the team prepares for transition to productive business operations in the
new environment, switches on the new solution and conducts the solution adoption and post go-live
support activities.

Deploy Activities
 Finalize the solution and its supporting tools and processes for production go-live:
 Resolve all crucial open issues
 Conduct system tests
 Check that system management is in place
 Proceed with cut-over activities, including data migration
 Execute transition and cutover plans including organizational change management (OCM) plans
 Complete all scheduled end user training
 Identify and document all issues encountered in the transition to the new solution
 Monitor business process results and the production environment
 Establish OCC** or a “extra-care” center of excellence for support that provides:
 Production support processes
 Exceptional business monitoring processes
 Extraordinary technical support
 System enhancements
 Track and report on value delivery

Typical deliverables and milestones for the Deploy phase

Deliverables Typical Milestones and key decisions

 Organizational and production readiness check  Data conversion completed

 Pre go-live user training delivery  End user training completed
 Technical and system testing, as necessary  Production environment fully set up
 Setup operational support organization, including  Support organization established
OCC**  Organization readiness for transition confirmed
 Cutover to production including  Go/no-go decision secured
 Cutover plan update  Go-live activities conducted
 Cutover simulations  Post production support via “extra-care” provided
 Data migration  Project closed
 User IDs and profiles created
 Help desk and technical support operational
 Operational and live production system
environment
 Post Go-Live support provided, including training
 Project closing including lessons learned

Run

The Run phase keeps the system available and performing at the high levels
required to support business operations. During the system implementation,
the project team put in place an initial set of SAP operation standards. Now in
the Run phase, the live system is assessed to identify opportunities to further
optimize the system by applying additional standards.
Run Activities
 Run the implemented SAP solution
 Assess operation standards to optimize solution operation
 Set the standards for tool use
 Transition the optimized system to production
 Continue value tracking and reporting

Typical deliverables and milestones for the Run phase

Deliverables Typical Milestones and key decisions

 An assessment of standards for optimizing  Identification of operation standards for optimizing

solution operation, including: solution operation conducted
 Scope  Design, setup and operation of SAP operations
 A project schedule for implementing standards completed
 For each relevant operation standard:  Tool implementation (primarily SAP Solution
 A design of processes, organization and roles, Manager scenarios for operation) completed
and a blueprint for tool use
 Setup of processes, tools, organization, and
roles
 Transition into production
 Training and rollout

** Deliverables, milestones and activities are only applicable in SAP Premium Engagements.