Keys For Optimal SAP Sales Order Management

Keys for optimal SAP sales order management
With sales order management technology changing

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Pitfalls in SAP sales order management common to many Consistent data key for optimal SAP sales order management, experts say
at a lightning pace, companies are rapidly trying to keep up with and implement the latest software. But sometimes in the race to put in a new process, salespeople arent properly trained on how to use it, resulting in a breakdown in the system. Read this SearchSAP.com E-Guide to learn: How to implement a sales order management technology tailored to your current sales process Common challenges when implementing sales order management techonology Why consistent data is key for optimal SAP sales order management
Pitfalls in SAP sales order management common to many

By: Katie Zezima, Contributor While no one in business wants to make mistakes, when it comes to managing sales orders with SAP, companies can rest assured that others are likely grappling with similar problems. The mistakes youre making are the mistakes every other company is making, said Gil Magana, founder and president of CRMintel LLC, a Dallasbased consulting firm. Inadequate training With technology changing at a lightning pace, companies are rapidly trying to keep up with and implement the latest software. But sometimes in the race to put in a new process, salespeople arent properly trained on how to use it, resulting in a breakdown in the system.
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The training is not done adequately or efficiently, said Joshua Greenbaum,
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principal consultant at Enterprise Applications Consulting in Berkeley, Calif. So theres a lot of people who are staring at a screen not completely understanding it. The best solution, Greenbaum said, is to make sure all stakeholders are on the same page when SAP is implemented and that users are shown the proper way to manage not just their contacts, prospects and leads, but the sales order itself. Companies should invest in high quality, one-time training seminars so that users learn the most effective way to handle the system and dont need to relearn the basics later on. The most common mistakes are going to be related to poor training more than anything, Greenbaum said. The software is pretty effective software. Process over technology Companies often make the mistake of implementing a strategy based purely on technology rather than trying to define the sales process and tailor their software to it, said Greg Langston, vice president of sales at the Harris Products Group, a subsidiary of the Lincoln Electric Company, in Mason, Ohio. If you do that, you just automate a dysfunctional process, Langston said. The key is to make sure it works on paper first. Once it works on paper, even though its tedious, it guarantees a better result. When Harris Products launched SAP CRM, Langston first clarified expectations and weekly metrics for his salespeople -- like entering itineraries and sales calls-- and worked them into his SAP system. You need to be very specific in terms of your expectation, Langston said. Just be prepared to stick to your guns when it comes to convincing superiors and subordinates that streamlining does help business.
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Its like walking through glass to get it implemented, he said. Youre
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changing the status quo. Customization overload One benefit of SAP is that organizations can build out their own applications onto its stable base. But some companies tend to go overboard with the extras, leading to confusion among users, data that is difficult to access because of additional layers and repeated processes. Something Ive been saying lately, especially when doing consulting, is try and stay as vanilla as possible when it comes to SAP applications, said Tom Leddy, the principal engineer for SAP CRM at OfficeMax in Naperville, Ill. For example, in his prior work as a consultant, Leddy had a client company that customized its system to hide fields and menu options in an attempt to streamline business. In the end, the business would have benefited from the hidden fields: It had to spend time undoing the customization, he said Data duplication/data quality With orders constantly pouring into the centralized SAP system, there is potential for signals to get crossed, creating data duplications that go unnoticed and hurt recordkeeping. The biggest potential for duplicated data comes when the data is fragmented -- for example, if someone in marketing enters a sales clients name into the system without checking to see if it is there already. Magana said some employees sometimes want to keep their client lists to themselves, for fear others could see them and the customer relationship theyve built up could be altered, and do not enter it into the system. However, by not having the data in a centralized system, it can negatively affect data quality, leading to problems for both company and client.
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If data is centralized, Magana said, everybody has access to the same information. Its transparent across the organization, and youre able to make the types of decisions you need to deliver on the requirement that are necessary to provide value. But those decisions must be based on accurate data. If they feel they cant trust the data theyre getting from the system, they feel like theyre not going to be very efficient to do the jobs they have to do, Magana said. Changing the entire system can take time, he said, and he recommends that users at the grass-roots level speak to managers and executives about the issues surrounding data duplication and management. While SAP has an application that can help, Magana suggests companies also take proactive measures to prevent duplication. There needs to be an organization, whether through business processes or systems reengineering, to design something that tries to keep the data as clean as possible at all times, Magana said. It ensures data is not always at 100%, but 90 to 100% is better than most organizations have, anyway. Its just not a priority.
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Consistent data key for optimal SAP sales order management, experts say
By: Todd Morrison, News and Features Editor Effective use of SAP sales order management requires close attention to the rapidly evolving sales channels available -- and integrating those channels across the SAP landscape, according to analysts and SAP representatives alike. For example, a customer who orders a product online needs to be able to return an order in the store if needed.
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Yet, while that kind of versatility is great for the customer, it adds complexity to the order management process. It can also add up to headaches for the company if the various records arent consistent across the entire sales order management system. There could be different records for a customer who ordered online, or using a mobile device, or even through a call center, said Prashant Dube, product manager for SAP CRM. You could have the same customer in five different channels, Dube said. And they could all be treated differently. To avoid those problems, organizations using SAP sales order management need to make sure theyre creating single records -- single versions of the truth -- for their products, customers and orders via a centralized database. One way to do this is by using the single order management application within the sales order management system. That way, the data stays consistent, irrespective of channels, according to SAP. If theres no central repository, Dube said, its a big problem for the order and the consumer. Start small and plan for testing the sales order management system Companies implementing SAP sales order management need to include at least a week of testing before its actually deployed, according to Jeanne Hedman, lead SAP consultant with Panorama Consulting Group LLC based in Denver. Companies need to ensure the new sales order management system recorded the same number of orders, and the same number of shipments, as the existing system.
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Additionally, companies using order entry systems like electronic data interchanges need to be certain the new system is talking to their partners systems, according to Hedman. You do have to work with your customers, she said. Organizations starting with a new sales order management system should use it only for a relatively simple product at first and gradually add other products to the system, according to Michael Dunne, an analyst with Gartner Research Inc. Dont cut your teeth on the most difficult thing, he said. Make sure the version fits Its important that companies deploying SAP sales order management make a thorough assessment of their business needs and processes and use that information in getting the version that most closely matches their business model, according to Dube. After all, there are big differences in how companies operate, even when it comes to contracts. Whereas a chemical company might use contracts to supply a customer on an as-needed basis, a telecommunications firm relies on more long-term contracts with its customers that can last years. And there are some cases when the contract itself might not be applicable, Dube said. End-to-end metrics Its a mistake to apply metrics to individual departments and processes within the sales order management system at the silo level warned Craig Le Clair, analyst with Forrester Research Inc. The advantage of SAPs sales order management system is that it spans the entire order management process, he said. That means that companies should see to it that the metric theyre using for order execution check that is
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applied to the entire system giving them a single version of the truth, once again.
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Whats needed is to look at more end-to-end order metrics, Le Clair said. Those overarching metrics include the percentage of orders fulfilled on time to the percentage of accurate orders captured, according to Le Clair.
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