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ERP Application Lifecycle Management (ALM): 10 Reasons Why ERP Change Management Has Outgrown Helpdesk Software

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ERP Application Lifecycle Management (ALM): 10 Reasons Why ERP Change Management Has Outgrown Helpdesk Software E NTERPRISE C HANGE M ANAGEMENT ERP Application Lifecycle Management (ALM): 10 reasons why ERP change management has outgrown helpdesk software. Advances in ERP applications combined with complex implementations are challenging ERP specialists to manage change faster with fewer errors. As business-driven changes come faster, many ERP managers are struggling to break the ROI barrier for their ERP applications. Helpdesk-centric CM strategies do little to address the needs of complex ERP support and upgrade tasks, and increase the organization’s exposure to unmanaged and unauthorized ERP changes. Now, process-based CM/ALM capabilities are providing the ability to bridge an ERP from the implementation project to Level 2 production support with much less risk, while reducing ERP ownership costs (TCO). Introduction ERP Applications are driving Enterprise Architecture Change Companies using Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) applications are making large investments in the future. It is said that implementing an ERP application The best Enterprise can be compared to “re-wiring the Enterprise Central Nervous System”. These Software for your Enterprise Applications carry a hefty price tag and require months of preparation company, the best prior to final testing and rollout. Enterprise IT architects plan the enterprise data consulting effort to architectures using key ERP data stores, including Oracle’s Trade Community help configure Architecture (TCA). Next generation ERP apps will introduce new technology-- workflows to match Web services, integrated analytics, business-activity monitoring, portals, data your needs, and a hubs, and repositories--all of which must be mastered to be used effectively. serious investment in the future. Every At the heart of the primary ERP vendors’ redevelopment efforts is the adoption of business has its own service-oriented architectures, Web services standards, and business process way of dealing with management technology. SOA and BPM, the vendors say, are critical to making change. How you their applications more modular and easier to adapt as needed. respond can mean the critical difference Why do so Many ERP Implementations Fall Short of Expectations? between paying for it Since ERP projects were monitored to evaluate their success rate and resultant - or profiting from it. business impact, the majority of these implementations since 1995 (65%-75%) missed original expectations, coming in late and over the initial budget. Most companies simply underestimate the amount of change associated with deploying and operating Enterprise Applications. Once in operation, there is a constant stream of changes driven by the business, numerous patches from the application vendor, and literally hundreds of minor and maintenance changes each year. The cost for this underestimate can be significant, and can often exceed the cost of the Enterprise/ERP Application software. Change Management (CM) errors cost time and money, result in miscommunication, and erode user confidence. E R P A PPLICATION L I F E C Y C L E M A N A G E M E N T (ALM): 1 0 REASONS WHY E R P CHANGE MANAGEMENT HAS OUTGROWN HELPDESK SOFTWARE . Redefining IT Change Management to Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) This article explores CM/ALM (Change Management/Application Lifecycle Management) for Enterprise Applications throughout the Application Lifecycle, highlights common mistakes made, provides an understanding of the magnitude of the challenge, and shares some lessons learned. It is surprising that the complexity of the average applications environment does not compare favorably with the typical level of CM/ALM automation used to manage changes in these environments. Companies invest heavily in Enterprise Applications, employ experts for several months to configure the application, and then typically use inadequate software that is not Sarbanes-Oxley compliant for Change Management. This is often an expensive mistake that can easily be avoided. Business-oriented Change Management has become the preferred approach for ERP projects to address the widespread business process impact. As such, there has been a certain amount of confusion between Organizational Change Management and that in the IT lexicon, where Change Management is discipline associated Application Software and Configuration Changes (along with software configuration management, issue & defect management, release management, etc.). Rather than approach application change as separate events, these events are in fact part of a series of processes. To address the full scope of IT change management activities and IT Governance, Enterprise Software Management vendors are delivering the next wave of process-based solutions for managing change to Enterprise Applications, now referred to as Application Lifecycle Management (or simply ALM). The ALM Mandate: Application Management & Change infrastructure should mirror processes defined not simply to monitor change, but to facilitate change. ALM solutions target embedded productivity and compliance through change governance for Oracle E-Business Suite (EBS). As such, integrating the Source Version Control with Issue/SCR Management and Release management are key distinguishing characteristics to more traditional CM solutions. These solutions are aimed at easing compliance and change governance challenges, including change auditing and security, and application enhancements. ALM delivers the simple, powerful and persuasive answer for change theorists: foundational controls. That is, enforceable processes that clearly governed how change would be defined, monitored and thus implemented. Top-tier performers are not merely change embracers or early adopters; they identified and enforced “process commandments” that constrained wasteful behaviors while reinforcing productive discipline. Identifying Core CM/ALM Disciplines One example of a core process discipline in the organizations that consistently outperform when it comes to change is effective integration of the Issue/SCR Management, Version Management and Release Management processes. Maintaining version control for all custom objects in the production database, or implementing version control software is an example of a high-impact control—call them process enforcement controls—that gives IT leaders greater leverage over their process investments. The bottom line is that these process tools make good developers better and faster at doing what they do best. For example, when developers have ready access to earlier versions of custom objects, using intelligent compare utilities to identify changes across revisions, they are much more likely to perform more accurate impact analysis. When you provide these process enforcement tools across development teams, you then create a more fluid transition process that significantly reduces the propagation of errors. C OPYRIGHT © 2 0 0 6 I NTERNEXT G R O U P , L L C 2 O F 1 2 E R P A PPLICATION L I F E C Y C L E M A N A G E M E N T (ALM): 1 0 REASONS WHY E R P CHANGE MANAGEMENT HAS OUTGROWN HELPDESK SOFTWARE . Understand the Objective of ERP Applications For a large percentage of ERP customers, an ERP implementation has been the most complicated and costly software project they have undertaken. Companies have made big investments in ERP software, and leading CEO’s now want to see IT contributing more to the bottom line – producing higher value at lower cost. Notwithstanding, patches and new releases create ongoing support and business adaptation challenges that can chip away from the returns on ERP investments. Unmanaged changes to ERP applications have generated some of the most recounted project horror stories. Consequently, ERP Change Management is becoming the focus of attention in many IT organizations. Enterprise applications are intended to: A key variable in determining the Total • Standardize individual, workgroup, and corporate Cost of Ownership (TCO) Business Processes throughout the enterprise. for your ERP application • Leverage corporate data from “End-to-end”. is to manage and control • Make changes in Business Processes easier and give the the cost of incremental company a “competitive edge”. changes. • Increase employee interaction and reduce duplication of effort Changes are inevitable. Most companies adapt their business processes for their ERP, but initially find it easier to reduce the impact of the organizational change by customizing and extending the ERP functionality to provide legacy system capabilities that are considered to be business critical. The magnitude of these collective changes is more than most companies can effectively manage. Staffing levels required for steady-state support operations quickly become overwhelmed because the roles they have traditionally played must take on significantly more responsibilities, and the roles in the ERP environment are very different from legacy system administration functions. ERP Application Lifecycle Management: Level 2 vs. Level 1 Support Until recently, IT Change Management had traditionally fallen within the domain of a helpdesk or service desk-based operation. Largely due to the widespread install base of helpdesk software, it became a de facto standard for Level 2 ERP support specialists. Unfortunately, most helpdesk software does not address the wide variety of issues that are encountered, nor does it facilitate the interaction between the business user and Application support specialists. Experience shows that this issue would pose a critical shortcoming to implementing
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