cazh1: on Business, Information, and Technology

I've received input from ten companies so far - large and small, with all sorts of ERP systems. If you care to add some information, I'll thank you in advance, and add it (sufficiently anonymized) to the summary results document (download from here).

Here are some of the findings / observations from the summary ...

Master Data Domains

The types of Master Data called out included the usual suspects - Customers, Vendors, Finished Goods, Employees. Others mentioned include Metadata, Packaging / Tooling (components), and Indirect customers (like Payors in managed care, or Buying Groups in B2B). The primary systems in scope included SAP, Oracle, JDEdwards, and QAD, joined by an eclectic mix of legacy systems and point solutions. Secondary systems called out included Siebel, JDA/Manugistics, and ADP (payroll) - plus more legacy / home grown / departmental apps.

Master Data initiatives varied, based on where the "current pain" is - R&D / engineering, CRM / Customers / Contracts / Pricing, and Finished Goods / Logistics were named by different companies as their particular focus areas. Other important considerations were things like geography (North America vs. ROW), and business structure (Enterprise vs. business unit vs. local plant).

A significant determinant of how folks thought about this problem was how their ERP is implemented - in a fully integrated "enterprise" (Finance, Order Management, Supply Chain, etc.) - and/or how the instances are divided (all enterprise, by location (geography) or by business unit).

Note, however, that relatively few respondents are concerned with synchronizing data across multiple instances - a popular callout / feature of some MDM solutions. they will speak of "integration", but a focus of the conversations were all around quality and process, not synchronization.

An interesting frustration from some of the respondees; the ERP system(s) do not capture all of the required attributes for an item, so these additional details are kept in a separate, siloed system. Easy examples would be specific attributes (like shipping material specifications), but there were multiple instances where [so-called] Master Data is calculated with complex formulas / rationale, so an Excel component is required (typically in the area of pricing / quoting details).


Size & Scope of Master Data

Predictably, there was a great variation in the responses - 100s to 1000s of customer, vendors, finished goods. However, the interesting trend was the notation that 10s of people (relatively large numbers, based on size of the company), were "responsible" (i.e. "did some of the data entry"). Could this be why there is interest in MDM and an MDM organization? Apparently, Master Data is often managed like a wiki - everybody is an editor.

Most organizations have no metrics in place; a few can speak to "data police", folks that actively monitor the data looking for issues. Best examples cited included "Health Check measures" (does data fit set of established guidelines / tolerances); vendor audits, and [results of] scrubbing (ex. Name And Address data against external sources).

When asked about the business benefits of a Master Data Management effort, most companies left this blank or said "none". I generally got the sense that hard benefits are difficult to quantify; notable exceptions seem to come from past pain. Some organizations spoke to inventory reductions and transportation savings - both derived from more accurate supply chain data, which is facilitated by clean, consistent, complete Master Data.

Master Data in the Organization

Many companies keep control / accountability at the functional area. However, companies with "enterprise ERP" implementations (full integration of Finance, Order Management, Supply Chain) typically call out ownership at the Enterprise level. It's not about the size of the company or the recency of their implementation - it's the degree of integration within the primary ERP.

Organizational specifics were tougher to get at - depending on how the company managed their master data. Generally speaking, companies that manage Master Data at a functional level (Customer Service, Purchasing, Finance) have organizational clarity. However, folks that say they manage at the Enterprise level had the wispier definitions for Title and Accountability

Of note: centralized MDM teams rarely manage the bigger projects (implementations, acquisitions, or special projects with large MD components) - but they will (out of necessity) participate. None of the respondents look to these organizations / people for project management skills. However, there were some good callouts for the communication / change management skills required for the role, especially where the group has to review implications of adds / updates [of Master Data items] with multiple groups that will/may be impacted.

Scope of Responsibilities

An interesting, consistent set of answers in this area; "Yes, we take ownership and accountability - but no, we can't measure it". To be fair, not all companies had that clarity of ownership, but the lack of sharp, clear quality metrics is noticeable. Content, Quality, and Governance are consistent in all of these companies … consistently not-well defined, not well measured.

Positives & Challenges

Funny how best practices in one company are challenges in another. There are two recurring themes throughout the responses; Quality and Complexity. The latter is interesting; this was the first point in the survey where the difficulties of Finished Goods Master Data were raised. Many companies call it out as a large challenge; all of them cite the complexity, the multiple facets (manufacturing, packaging, warehousing, transportation, pricing, costing) and the cross-functional nature

Full Results

The summary results document is available for download from here; I will add a version date on the page and keep it up to date as additional surveys come in.

Questions? Comments? Suggestions? Let me know ...

Previously ...

• Three Business-Case Arguments for Agile, & The Moose On The Table (January 14, 2008)
• Five More Realities for Driving Business Value from Technology (January 30, 2008)
• Success, Failure, and Insights after 12 Months of Internal Web 2.0 (March 10, 2008)
• Optimizing the Wrong Part of Knowledge Management (March 16, 2008)
• The Right Web2.0 Tool for the Audience (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook) (May 9, 2008)
• Facilitating Innovation: Establishing an Environment of Possibilities (August 22, 2008)
• Location, Location, Location: Terminology Confusion in ERP Projects (April 11, 2009)
• Who owns Master Data in your company? (May 30, 2009)
• Bootstrap Market Research: Master Data Management (What, Who, How) (November 30, 2009)

Technorati Tags: best practice, collaboration, CRM, documentation, ERP, hands on, Knowledge Management, SAP, supply chain, tech management, wiki

Invisible Technorati Tags: cazh1, James P. MacLennan, jpmacl, MacLennan

New Collaboration Tools need Lead Time & Practice: Eight months ago, sharing files by e-mail and ad-hoc, unstructured meetings were the norm. To be fair, we were working smaller projects with teams of 10-20, and usually in no more than two locations. Over the past few months, as we were teeing up for Big Go-Live #1, we've been introducing the newer tools in small bits. For Go-Live Weekend, the team was already familiar with going to SharePoint for status updates, or recording a new Issue in the SharePoint list. The mechanics were old hat, and folks didn't need to think about it - which was nice, since we need them thinking about their Tasks. If we introduce new collaboration tools with little lead time before the Big Go-Live #2, Tasks will be interrupted with people struggling to remember how to communicate.

In the right setting, collaboration tools can clearly add value - even for the most conservative jaded technology users. However, you can't introduce something so new and expect people to "get it" in the short term. Better approach is to introduce the new tools early in the process, when there is no pressure. This lets the team build familiarity, understanding, and skills by the time you need to rely on these tools for critical communication.

Previously ...

• Dueling Collaboration Portals (November 23, 2008)
• Low Tech SharePoint Hack: Project Status Indicator (March 14, 2009)
• Location, Location, Location: Terminology Confusion in ERP Projects (April 11, 2009)
• Five Stages of Twitter Relevance (April 21, 2009)
• Over / Under Communication for Project Managers (June 29, 2009)
• Real Business Users and SharePoint (July 14, 2009)

Technorati Tags: collaboration, entrepreneur, innovation, Knowledge Management, people management, project management, SAP, Social Networks, twitter, Web 2.0,

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Where do these great analogy ideas come from? Full credit - I got this one from a speaker at the SAP Research Center in Palo Alto, last spring.

A company is like a sphere.

As it grows, volume increases much faster than surface area, and the large a company gets, way more people get embedded and hidden from the end customer than are on the fringe, in customer-facing roles.

As a general rule, this is a bad thing. Well, maybe a less-than-optimal thing - what percentage of your corporate attention span is customer-focused?

Our Challenge is to poke some pockets into the surface, and get more surface area exposed to the outside air.

• Will this help a company go farther? It seems to work for golf balls ...
• Will this make the company more human? Perhaps, in a self-fulfilling / reverse fractal kind of way ...
• Will rough edges generate incremental profit? Some counterintuitive friction ...

Previously ...

• Heisenburg KM (July 13, 2004)
• Customer DNA - A Different Take on Understanding Markets and Networks (June 11, 2005)
• Misapplying the Pareto principle (January 7, 2006)
• Interesting How the Mind Works (October 1, 2007)
• Innovation That Matters - Substance Over Style (January 12, 2008)
• Failing Faster (June 14, 2009)

Technorati Tags: business value of IT, CRM, entrepreneur, innovation, Knowledge Management, marketing, people management, SAP, Social Networks, Web 2.0

Invisible Technorati Tags: cazh1, James P. MacLennan, jpmacl, MacLennan

I've had to respond to this question, inside and outside of the company, in a number of different conversations over the past few days. It's interesting, because this is one of those conversations where semantics mean a lot - what people say is just as important as what people don't say. I only mean that people assume their listeners have precisely the same understanding of the concepts - which is often a mistake.

Case in point - who owns the Master Data? It seems obvious to many IT folks, having dealt with ERP and data warehousing in the past,  that the business owns the Master Data - it's their business, right? Then why so often does the business look to IT to take the lead on cleansing / populating / defining / loading Master Data?

Business owns the Master Data

... they make the decisions on specifics. What should the next item number be? How should we structure the routings?  Who defines the standards for bin / storage location / building / plant / campus identifiers? What is the desired format for capturing customer street addresses consistently? How will we set up the chart of accounts?

The business knows that who and the why of Master Data.

On the other hand, and in most companies ...

IT pwns the Master Data

Yes that is the correct spelling. For those who don't know, it’s a hacker term; when I pwn the system, I have a root, I have a system admin access. I understand the technical underpinnings and details - I know how everything fits together. I know how to do anything I want with the system.

In Master Data terms - IT understands the data architecture and the interdependencies. They know all the transactions required to enter data into the system, and what security roles are in place to limit access to those transactions. IT also has tools and knowledge on how to extract data from the database and batch import data en masse.

IT knows the what, when, and how of Master Data.

What does that mean?

When an organization needs to get its Master Data in shape, it's going to be a team effort between business and IT. The business must take the lead, making and clarifying decisions and driving the details. But IT absolutely needs to be right by their side, helping with the mechanics. 

Previously ...

• Putting Data into Context (February 28, 2005)
• Bug bad, bug good, bug Bug (May 18, 2005)
• Customer DNA - A Different Take on Understanding Markets and Networks (June 11, 2005)
• Answering questions with questions is a quick path towards irrelevance (December 4, 2005)
• War Stories from the Change Management front (August 21, 2006)
• I Think I'm Learning SAPanese ... (November 22, 2008)
• Location, Location, Location: Terminology Confusion in ERP Projects (April 11, 2009)

Technorati Tags: best practice, design, people management, project management, SAP, tech management,

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Yesterday at work was "catch-up day" from a week at SAPPHIRE 2009, the annual user conference for SAP. As with the JDA/Manugistics conference earlier this year, there were concerns that attendance was going to be low, because so many companies are limiting travel expense. At the conference, I did hear that attendance was only was 60% lower than last year.

Conferences like this are great opportunities for IT to do a ton of learning - about the specific technology, of course, but also about the state of mobile computing and collaboration, tools that we are apparently trying to get the rest of the business world to adopt. Experiential learning, real-world experience - always better to talk about something that you know works / doesn't work in a practical setting. (No, I don't suggest you replace Quicken with SAP at home, although that might be a growth area for BbD).

Twitter at a Conference

I wrote up my trip report / internal blog entry yesterday (Friday), but I was twittering a lot during some of the sessions, so it was an easy write up - I just cut-and-paste from my personal timeline. Using the Blackberry during the conference was a pretty good experience; I could take fairly detailed notes on what was being said - plus, I can throw out passing Tweets on the way. Near-real time knowledge sharing - very nice for folks in the Tweeterverse, watching the information go by.

Unfortunately, it's a bit difficult to engage in a Tweet-versation with these client devices; the screen is too small, and you only see what you are typing. I did, however, latch on to the #sapphire09 hash tag to come up with a workable monitoring process. I found that search.twitter.com presents a decent RSS feed, one that the Blackberry browser consumes quite nicely. I don't know if this is a "native" RSS reader in the blackberry, but it worked amazingly well - I made a passing mention of one of the sessions I attended, and someone asked for more detail - so I ended up tweeting almost every slide.

Apotheker

The Tuesday morning address by Leo Apotheker started with some doom and gloom about the economy, but that was just a lead-in to SAP's new branding message of promoting "clarity" for the enterprise; making pertinent business information easy to access, easy to see. Some of my tweets from the speech … I clearly (sic) have a different editorial style ...

• Apoetheker starting with the doom and gloom #sapphire09 7:38 AM May 12th
• My inner cynic is subsiding - I actually like the appeal for "clarity" #sapphire09 7:42 AM May 12th
• Are "clear enterprises" like "glass houses"? (Sorry, cynic is back) #sapphire09 7:44 AM May 12th
• Is he about to say sap could have prevented the economic collapse? #sapphire09 7:56 AM May 12th
• Ah, just the story of how goldman sachs did ok because they actively manage risk #sapphire09 7:57 AM May 12th
• We need a simple example of how a manufacturer manages risk #sapphire09 7:58 AM May 12th
• SUGEN KPI Framework for enterprise support - nice focus on transparency #sapphire09 7:59 AM May 12th
• Props - a pretty effective live demo of a blackberry enabled work process #sapphire09 8:03 AM May 12th
• The carbon footprint app looks interesting - this is a recurring theme for recent presentations for me #sapphire09 8:17 AM May 12th
• I think its a harsh. retroactive self criticism when this "speedy query" demo admits that a simple query would take 'weeks' #sapphire09 8:27 AM May 12th
• SRO crowd at presentation for information "dashboards" - yet another recurring topic, still unmet need #sapphire09 1:11 PM May 12th
• Sap guy was apparently unable to say "eat our own dogfood", too closely related to microsoft hhh #sapphire09 1:19 PM May 12th

The most interesting areas of Leo's conversation had to do with the metrics being created by SUGEN (not), a collection of all the national user groups (like ASUG). SAP continues to get lots of pushback from the customer base about their increased support fees, and these metrics are going to allow us all to see how SAP is performing.

Plattner

The Wednesday morning address by Hasso Plattner, one of the founders of SAP and a pretty interesting guy, started out like a technical lecture at engineering school about in-memory databases and columnar data. By the end, it had transitioned to a Business Objects demo and a tool "easy enough that a CEO can use it".  Here are some tweets from that speech …

• Hasso on speed [sic] - spotlighting the reams of data and the need for decent access tools #sapphire09 7:44 AM May 13th
• Hasso is very professorial - if it weren't for the subject matter, methinks more would pass on the talk #sapphire09 7:53 AM May 13th
• Ok, reading other #sapphire09  tweets now - is a shoe dropping right now? Re sap and hardware ... #sapphire09 7:57 AM May 13th
• Someone should register spaghettibeforecooking.com #sapphire09 7:59 AM May 13th
• Maybe hasso's point is that clarity / speed yap from yesterday is not smoke and mirrors - solid tech supporting this sales stuff #sapphire09 8:16 AM May 13th
• Insert only - like the old one-write accounting systems - ledgers in pen. Make a mistake, back it out. Complete auditability #sapphire09 8:19 AM May 13th
• Is insert only / read only db stuff analogous to RISC chips? Who needs elegance when you think Real Fast. #sapphire09 8:20 AM May 13th
• Head-snapping shift from professor to jester #sapphire09 8:23 AM May 13th
• Hasso rips on EIE processing (everything in excel) #sapphire09 8:24 AM May 13th
• Oh, I think he just said he is talking about t-rex #sapphire09 8:29 AM May 13th
• Hasso is definitly tech at heart, rips into classic demo style of demo on mini data set #sapphire09 8:30 AM May 13th
• hasso's enthusiasm is honest, like the literate engineer given a moment of exec management's attention #sapphire09 8:34 AM May 13th
• Awesome animated pipeline #sapphire09 8:41 AM May 13th
• Boy he started slow but has he hit stride in last 10 min #sapphire09 8:43 AM May 13th
• Table scans not considered harmful #sapphire09 8:48 AM May 13th

This was pretty interesting technology - high-speed, insert only databases. Not sure what that means for the long term of our existing databases, data warehouses, and hardware. But hey, it's only capital - right?

Elsewhere On the Web

• General interest / watchfulness towards the SAP strategy, as the company faces questions like technology platforms, support fees, and a new CEO …
• Fortune magazine’s totally non-technical take on Leo Apotheker …
• Vinnie Merchandani’s summary of show hilights, plus insights on SAP’s long-term strategy
• SAP and Social Networking – I didn’t catch these presentations / conversations, but many are writing / tweeting about it …
• Definite focus during the week on Business Objects … it actually looks pretty good …
• Some summary comments from ZDNet …

Previously ...

• Two observations from SAPPHIRE (April 24, 2007)
• Supply & Demand and Expectations for SAP talent in the US (April 30, 2007)
• Innovation That Matters - Substance Over Style (January 12, 2008)
• Five More Realities for Driving Business Value from Technology (January 30, 2008)
• The Innovation Generation - Communication Styles (April 1, 2008)
• Opportunistic Insights from the RSS Stream (June 5, 2008)
• On the Road: Business Travel, Fall 2008 (October 13, 2008)
• Field Notes: Video Conferencing for Business Conversations (March 22, 2009)
• Five Stages of Twitter Relevance (April 21, 2009)

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Have you ever experienced the clash of terminology that results when supply chains are brought together, due to acquisition or merger? The typical scenario: different groups using multiple terms to describe where product is manufactured at and shipped from; folks use terms like "location", "plant", and "site" interchangeably, and confusion can result - are we talking about SAP configuration? Wide-area network architecture? Rollout plans?

To communicate effectively, it helps to clarify things. Here is a starter list of terms from projects I've been involved with. Care to add / edit the list?

Generic Terms

A building is what it sounds like - four walls and a roof.
A facility could refer to one or more buildings.
A campus is a generic term for a group of buildings.

Specific Terms - ERP

In SAP, a Plant is a place where materials are produced, or goods and services are provided. A Plant is made up of one or more buildings.
In some Warehouse Management Systems (WMS), a Warehouse refers to a single building. In SAP, a Warehouse is a collection of Storage Areas; a building can contain multiple storage areas, and a warehouse can span multiple buildings.

Specific Terms - WAN

A Site typically designates a point-of-presence to the Wide Area Network (WAN) - a cluster of WAN devices that connects one or more buildings to the network.

Details!

A Chinese proverb states, "Wisdom begins with calling things by their right names." When bringing companies and cultures together, project managers need to pay special attention to the words; we must be very precise with our language, so everyone understands that we are all talking about the same thing.

Previously ...

• Excellent series of posts for PMs communicating with non-techs (March 26, 2005)
• Bug bad, bug good, bug Bug (May 18, 2005)
• Need to watch my terminology (August 16, 2005)
• Thoughts on Why Tech Folks Hate Documentation (July 8, 2006)
• Communication is the responsibility of ... (August 19, 2007)
• The Five Fundamental Rules of Project Management (October 15, 2007)

Technorati Tags: best practice, documentation, Knowledge Management, project management, SAP, supply chain

Invisible Technorati Tags: cazh1, James P. MacLennan, jpmacl, MacLennan,

Today's best conversation was with Christopher Young, of B2BSX, a startup software exchange where corporate IT departments can buy and sell their development efforts, and make a little cash to offset stressed budgets. It's an interesting idea, and spawned some ideas in a couple of different directions.

Andy Hardy, IT Director

Every company I've worked for has toyed with the idea of selling some of their custom-developed stuff - well, every company except the first one, since it was a software development house (we weren't playing around). My "growing up" years as a developer have really jaded me on the idea of selling the deliverables from IT- or business-funded projects, typically for one simple reason - everyone underestimates technical support.

Operating systems change, DLL or JVM dependencies must be managed, and no one reads the manual - they all want support over the phone. Unfortunately, wide-eyed project sponsors or IT directors with dreams of P&L responsibility see COGS limited to the price of a CD, and revenues that match their ERP packages - it's not that simple.

Vertical Open Source

A solution, as presented by B2BSX, is to tweak the open source model a bit, offering source code for specific customizations, at low cost (well, much lower that building it yourself, I would assume). No long term warranties, no 1-800 support lines, you are on your own - but you are getting pre-built solutions that you can adapt into your own business, jump-starting your efforts with a basic shell, and adding your own refinements later.

I think of it as highly verticalized open source - sounds like they are limiting things to SAP right now, and I'd expect to see very specific solutions listed. By vertical, however, I'm thinking about reports / queries / wrappers that are very specific to a particular type of industry - the "long tail" of software niches, where most IT departments really do need to tweak that "collection of best practices" you were sold. I'm expecting to see stuff that is too specialized for a global software company to bother adding to their product.

<aside> Maybe the "long tail" of ERP requirements is where the untapped value is for those guys ... </aside>

Custom Often Means Really Custom

Of course, there are still predictable hurdles for this model - not the least of which is the fact that this stuff is written by corporate IT. Hey, most of us have short deadlines and long backlogs, and little experience developing flexible software architected for iteration and flexibility. "Hard Coding" stuff is an academic Bad Thing that is often required to git 'er done (yes, I went there ...). Chris characterized this as software with tentacles, reaching all over your portfolio and gripping on tight - makes it tough to pull out and wrap into a nice package.

There may also be IP concerns - something to work carefully through with your legal department. Note: don't think that Legal has little to offer here, because every company should have some concern about IP and competitive advantage, even if you are not in the software industry. You should be maintaining control of your software IP when you customize COTS or contract work out - now might be the time to leverage it!

We're All from Missouri

I have no idea yet whether this exchange idea makes sense - but it could be just the time to look into this. We're all under budget pressures, and Mr. Young tells me that once you get the basic relationship set up, putting software out there takes very little effort.

Maybe this is where the real future of ERP is going. What if our maintenance fees kept increasing, but the acquisition costs plummeted - all the money is in the add-on services? The Xerox model, where you give away the copiers and sell toner and paper? Gives a whole new meaning to the term "copy protection" ...

Previously ...

• Driving cost savings with packaged software vendors (February 23, 2005)
  
• What should "open source" really mean to me? (1/2) (October 22, 2005)
  
• What should "open source" really mean to me? (2/2) (October 24, 2005)
  
• Open Source as bargaining chip - driving business value of IT (October 30, 2005)
  
• Open Source Insights on Enterprise Software Business Models (March 14, 2007)
• Integrated Supply Chain Benefits Go Beyond the Internal Stuff (November 11, 2007)
  

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Spent time at an industry conference last week (ain't Boston great!), and heard the term SAPanese - that special language SAP users learn when immersed in worlds of Walldorf and their ubiquitous software. It's not unique to SAP - lots of software companies develop their own vocabulary. Heck, IT "geeks" are famous for it - even the various functional units within the business develop their own shorthand, terms to help speed communication with "those in the know".

Here are some of my favorite snippets of SAPanese ...

Abapit: (verb) To make something better using ABAP. Usage: "This program simply isn't working properly; we should abapit instead!" (source: Mitch Betts)

Bee-Eye: (noun) SAP's data warehousing platform, Business Intelligence. Not intended as an oxymoron ...

BobJay: (noun) SAP's latest growth-by-acquisition play - Business Objects (BOBJ). Usage: "They keep throwing Bobjay at us, but we're still digesting Bee-Eye"

Boppy: (noun) From BAPI - the Business Application Programming Interface. Usage: "Give me the right boppy and I can get the data in there ...". Note: Most programmers are aware of multiple APIs, for a variety of web services, application platforms, etc. - but no one calls them "Oppy's" ...

Firt: (noun) Finished goods. From FERT, SAP's standard abbreviation (in German, fertig is 'finished')

Halb: (noun) Work in Process. From HALB, SAP's standard abbreviation (in German, halbfabrikat is 'semi-finished product')

Heisman: (verb) An accountability dodge. When software support is asked to help with a problem, and you happen to mention we're dealing in an area that's been customized, you are given the Heisman - held at arms length and told it's beyond the scope of support. (image source: Kelly West / Statesman)

Row: (noun) Raw materials. From ROH, SAP's standard abbreviation (in German, rohstoffe is 'raw materials')

I google'd around, but didn't turn up much ... any additions?

Previously ...

• I have nothing to say and I am saying it and that is poetry (April 6, 2005)
• Tech shorthand, a minor interest (June 3, 2005)
• Euphemisms, and a career-extending paradox (July 11, 2005)
• Need to watch my terminology (August 16, 2005)
• A clash of languages over IM (bilingual? trilingual? quadlingual?) (December 22, 2005)
• Three Best TLAs of all time, the hegemony of Excel, and the Intuitive Front End (August 12, 2006)
• Funny, how techies talk to each other (September 11, 2006)
• Buzzword Management ABCs (March 16, 2007)
• The Innovation Generation - Communication Styles (April 1, 2008)
• Politically Correct Euphemisms in IT - Translated! (May 26, 2008)

Technorati Tags: Knowledge Management, people management, presentations,
SAP,

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