Thinking
about investing in SAP Software? Are your
in-house and/or legacy systems failing to
cope with the ever-demanding change in the
marketplace and in the way your customers,
suppliers and partners want to interact with
you? You know that you need to change your
IT Systems but you are struggling to articulate
to you superiors the “why”, “how” and the
“value” of your idea – which essentially means
you are having difficulties to receive the
necessary funding. Or maybe you are required
to build a business case for the transformation
and provide your executives with a high level
roadmap? How will you go about ensuring that
the identified value of the IT Solution is
actually realised? How can you track the value
generation or measure it once the solution
goes live and there after? If those are the
scenarios and questions would like to have
played out and answered, you came to the right
place.
In
a series of short articles I will try to offer
you some the experience I have gained from
the development of numerous major IT investment
and business transformation justifications
as well as SAP centric IT Strategies and Roadmaps
for some of the largest of SAP’s existing
and new customers globally. Having said that,
the information and experience I’m about to
share is just as applicable to a small and
medium size enterprise. In essence the process
of building a business transformation business
case and IT strategy roadmap is the same for
either sized business.
Walking
you through the process of building the SAP
Business Case and Roadmap, I will point out
any publicly available SAP-specific and non-SAP
tools as well as advise you of SAP Services
available assist you on your way. Hopefully
these articles will help you in the development
of your business case and roadmap.
In
Summary, we answer two very broad questions...
Business Case Fundamentals – What
is a great business case and what must it
contain?
- The
concept of the Value Life-Cycle
- The
Four Reasons for a Business Case
- Investment
Justification
- Management
Buy-In
- Blueprint/
Solution Architecture Guideline
- Basis
for a Value Realisation Framework
- Written
simple an focused on clear value-oriented
messages
- Written
in language the Business understands
- Providing
answers to five fundamental questions:
- What
is wrong today?
- What
do we need to change?
- How
are we going to change?
- What
is the impact of changing?
- Benefits
- Costs
- NPV/
IRR/ MIRR/ Payback/
- What
are the risks of changing?
How
do I build a great Business Case?
- Identify
“high-ranking” Business Sponsors and
seek formal process for regular feedback
and opportunity to present progress
and encountered issues
- Define
Issue resolution process with Business
Case Sponsors
- Agree
on an approach, deliverables and timelines
with your Business Case Sponsor
- Identify
Business Function Scope
- Identify
all relevant Stakeholders (internal/
external)
- Communicate
to the Stakeholders the High Level
Approach for the Development of Business
Case and Roadmap and inform of workload
requirements to the business
- Identify
existing Pain Points/ Issues in the
Business Functions and its Processes
- Identify
current Impact of those Pain Points/
Issues
- Identify
Industry Best Practices
- Identify
IT Solution Enablers are to fix current
Pain Points
- Identify
Quantifiable and Qualitative Benefits
of New IT Solution
- Identify
the Cost to Implement the IT Solution
- Identify
Risks and appropriate Mitigation Strategies
- Develop
an Implementation Roadmap based on
Project Dependencies, Value, Risk
and Organizational Appetite for Change
- Compile
the Executive Summary – A Message
Clear as Crystal
- Presenting
the Business Case and Roadmap to C-Level
Execs and Board Members – Seeking
Approval and Funding
- Circulate
or “socialise” the business case a
few weeks before the Sponsor-level
presentation to create awareness,
management buy in and receive first
feedback – based on the feedback correct
any misunderstandings in your document
as well as clarify any uncertainties
before presenting to the Executives/
Board Team