The SAP Activate methodology supports project teams in the deployment of SAP solutions to In cloud, on-premise, or hybrid environments. Customers can follow on their own, with SAP or with SAP partners.

SAP Activate has imbibed the 40 plus years of implementation experience that SAP has with its customers. The distinct among them can be jotted down as follows:

• Start with best practices: Use Ready-to-Run business processes
• Cloud-ready: Leverage the flexibility and speed of cloud
• Validate solution: Validate best practices with fit/gap workshop and capture data
• Premium engagement ready: Build and run fully supported via SAP control centers
• Modular, scalable, and agile: Structured project to deliver solution directly
• Quality built-in: Identify the risks early with a total quality approach

Let...

The main objective of the fit/gap analysis is to identify any capture Delta business requirement and gaps, which might not have been captured in the preactivated or preassembled solution (sandbox). At the end of the analysis, it is expected that the team has finalized and gotten the approval for scope baseline to proceed into the realize phase.

This ensures that implementation meets customer's business needs and the customer's solution is aligned to SAP standard processes. It also provides an opportunity to relook and discuss the solution design, prioritized Delta requirements, and gaps. A good gap analysis reduces the need for rework during the realize phase. With fit/gap analysis, the purpose is also to validate the predefined scenarios, processes, and enhancements, and identify potential gaps between the delivered product and customer requirements...

The SAP Activate methodology is structured into phases, workstreams, deliverables, and tasks.

As depicted in the following diagram, the structure elements are:

• Phase
• Workstream
• Deliverable
• Task:

In addition to these elements, the SAP Activate methodology contains a workstream that is assigned as an attribute to tasks and deliverables:

Let's discuss each structure individually and find out how they work together. We start with the phases of SAP Activate in an on-premise project.

The SAP Activate content is time-wise structured into phases. The phases provide support throughout the project life cycle. Each phase has a series of value delivery and relevant checks to make sure that the solution delivers as per the expectation. The project phases of SAP Activate...

Governance has become a more widely used term in recent years to the point that common usage now implies a strong personal responsibility as well as a role of authority. Governance refers to a set of policies, regulations, functions, processes, procedures, and responsibilities that define the establishment, management, and control of projects, programs, and portfolios. As per PMI-PMBOK: "Project governance provides a framework in which the project manager and sponsors can make a decision that satisfies both stakeholder needs and expectations and organizational strategic objectives or address circumstances where these may not be in alignment."

With project governance in place, the decision-making and escalation steps to resolve issues are easier to follow. It describes the flow of information between the project and all stakeholders...

In this chapter, you learned the main characteristics of SAP Activate, such as: start with best practices, be cloud-ready, carry out solution validation, and be premium engagement ready. We explored our concept of solution validation workshops (A/B) and how they help to do a gap analysis. This will be further discussed in the later chapters and we will see how it can be used for aligning the business and customer's needs. Structures and phases in the SAP Activate methodology were also discussed in detail and we also looked at the governance aspect of SAP Activate.

In Chapter 3, Use Case Scenario for SAP Activate, we will see phase by phase the details of various use case scenarios for SAP Activate. We will go into detail how the methodology can be used for new implementation (In cloud and on-premise), system conversion, and landscape transformation.