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Microsoft Dynamics AX Implementation Guide
Microsoft Dynamics AX Implementation Guide

Microsoft Dynamics AX Implementation Guide: Your all-in-one guide to exploring and implementing Microsoft Dynamics AX

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Profile Icon Yogesh Kasat
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$19.99 per month
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Half star icon 4.5 (15 Ratings)
Paperback Sep 2015 348 pages 1st Edition
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Arrow left icon
Profile Icon Yogesh Kasat
Arrow right icon
$19.99 per month
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Half star icon 4.5 (15 Ratings)
Paperback Sep 2015 348 pages 1st Edition
eBook
$9.99 $47.99
Paperback
$60.99
Subscription
Free Trial
Renews at $19.99p/m
eBook
$9.99 $47.99
Paperback
$60.99
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Free Trial
Renews at $19.99p/m

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Microsoft Dynamics AX Implementation Guide

Chapter 2. Getting into the Details Early

We will be discussing the techniques that are helpful in the analysis phase along with a few examples. In this chapter, you will learn the following topics:

  • Requirement gathering techniques
  • Conference Room Pilot (CRP): This is an early validation for completeness of the requirements and proposed solution

You need to dive deeper to understand what you are up against. One of the common reasons why projects fail to deliver on time is that the requirements keep on bubbling up at a later stage. You should ensure that you have the right resources on board before you start discussions on requirements. It is the foundation for your project. Projects will fail if the requirements are incomplete, if the right analysis was not done to understand them correctly, or if you neglect to push back on requirements that do not add any value. All these cases will result in more work (often rework) and will impact the quality and timeline of the project.

It becomes...

The requirement gathering techniques

Consultants use different techniques for gathering requirements. Each has value in certain circumstances, and in many cases, you need multiple techniques to gain a complete picture of the requirements. The following diagram shows some common techniques used for requirement gathering for ERP systems.

The requirement gathering techniques

Listening is the first step in the requirements-gathering phase; you need to listen to the customer to understand what they need. We will now talk about the tools you can use at this stage to make listening or the information collection process smoother.

The tools to use at this stage

  • Questionnaire
  • Pre-existing business processes
  • Calculations and examples
  • Existing templates and formats
  • Walkthrough of the existing system

Questionnaire

Prepare questionnaires to collect information and let the business SMEs fill them out. At this stage, you are giving them an opportunity to provide you with the details of what the business needs and with their view of the requirements...

Conference Room Pilot (CRP)

A picture is worth a thousand words. Similarly, a good CRP is an effective way of communicating the solution in a language that business SMEs will understand. It will help confirm your understanding of the requirements and get an early feedback on the proposed solution.

Why is CRP needed?

Use Conference Room Pilots (CRP) to model business scenarios, get early feedback on the solution, and progressively refine the scenarios through a series of CRP workshops to gain the business SME's acceptance, as shown in the following diagram:

Why is CRP needed?

Considerations for CRP success

Followings are the key considerations for successful CRP:

  1. Focus on modeling business scenarios rather than individual requirement fit-gap.
  2. Dynamics AX is a very configurable solution. You may have multiple options to choose from in the solution. Present those options to the business and help them pick the right solution.
  3. Identify missing requirements through solution review and solution gaps.
  4. Schedule multiple...

The Fit/Gap analysis

One of the key deliverables from the analysis phase is a Fit/Gap document. CRP allows you to review the business fit of the standard processes configured within Dynamics AX and also gets the feedback on the proposed solutions for Gaps.

  • You can leverage the business process modeler in Microsoft Lifecycle Services (LCS) for complete business processes. Having this created in LCS means that the overall business process is analyzed, and providing access to the LCS project increases knowledge of the gap.
  • It is important to remember that this is a FIT gap session and Fit should also be analyzed.
  • Often at times, you will find gaps listed that aren't really gaps, as the solution can handle the requirement.
  • Another time to revisit and negotiate items that are causing a lot of customization work and can be avoided.

The implementation strategy

On global rollouts, single-instance versus multi-instance is a key implementation decision. Leverage the following pointers to decide:

  1. Localizations / countries / legal requirements
  2. Security, data privacy / SOX
  3. Connectivity (network latency) / performance
  4. Maintainability / deployment / downtime for maintenance
  5. Risk management for solution conflicts
  6. Costs: licensing, support, upgrade
  7. Shared services, intercompany transactions, master data management
The implementation strategy

Key deliverables from the analysis phase

Following are the key deliverables from the analysis phase:

  • Business Requirements Document (BRD)
  • Implementation strategy
  • Solution blueprint and Fit/Gap
  • List of change requests and disposition (approved versus rejected or deferred)
  • Project plan baseline: Alignment to the project plan based on the approved changes coming out of the CRP and updated BRD

The requirement gathering techniques


Consultants use different techniques for gathering requirements. Each has value in certain circumstances, and in many cases, you need multiple techniques to gain a complete picture of the requirements. The following diagram shows some common techniques used for requirement gathering for ERP systems.

Listening is the first step in the requirements-gathering phase; you need to listen to the customer to understand what they need. We will now talk about the tools you can use at this stage to make listening or the information collection process smoother.

The tools to use at this stage

  • Questionnaire

  • Pre-existing business processes

  • Calculations and examples

  • Existing templates and formats

  • Walkthrough of the existing system

Questionnaire

Prepare questionnaires to collect information and let the business SMEs fill them out. At this stage, you are giving them an opportunity to provide you with the details of what the business needs and with their view of the requirements...

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Key benefits

  • From project kick-off to go live and upgrade, learn what to expect in each phase of the project
  • This book guides you through the entire journey of a Dynamics AX implementation project, helping you to avoid the common pitfalls and adapt industry knowledge and best practices for your own project
  • This one-stop guide is packed with key tools and techniques to aid your Dynamics AX implementation

Description

Microsoft Dynamics AX is Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software that supports multi-site operations across various countries, providing international processing within the company. It is an ERP solution with a lot of features and functionality, and it provides support across the fields of financial, distribution, supply chain, project, customer relationship, HR, and field service management. This book is all about simplifying the overall implementation process of Dynamics AX. The purpose of this book is to help IT managers and solution architects implement Dynamics AX to increase the success rate of Dynamics AX projects. This all-in-one guide will take you through an entire journey of a Dynamics AX implementation, ensuring you avoid commonly-made mistakes during implementation. You’ll begin with the installation of Dynamics AX and the basic requirements. Then, you’ll move onto data migration, reporting, functional and technical design, configuration, and performance tuning. By the end of the book, you will know how to plan and execute Dynamics AX right, on your first attempt, using insider industry knowledge and best practices.

Who is this book for?

This book is for IT project managers, solution architects, and consultants who are planning to implement or are in the process of implementing or upgrading Dynamics AX. To use this book, you must have a working Dynamics AX system in place and must be familiar with the basics of Dynamics AX.

What you will learn

  • Prepare for a great start with effective project management and planning from the beginning
  • Gather details early using effective requirement-gathering tools and techniques
  • Gain tools and techniques for effective infrastructure planning and hardware sizing
  • Get to grips with integration and data migration through planning and strategy
  • Familiarize yourself with the reporting and BI tools
  • Master functional and technical design to customize existing features and designs in your own projects
  • Manage your configuration and you're your configuration from one environment to another
  • Learn industry's best practices and recommendations on customization development and performance tuning

Product Details

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Publication date, Length, Edition, Language, ISBN-13
Publication date : Sep 18, 2015
Length: 348 pages
Edition : 1st
Language : English
ISBN-13 : 9781785288968
Vendor :
Microsoft

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Product Details

Publication date : Sep 18, 2015
Length: 348 pages
Edition : 1st
Language : English
ISBN-13 : 9781785288968
Vendor :
Microsoft

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Table of Contents

15 Chapters
1. Preparing for a Great Start Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
2. Getting into the Details Early Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
3. Infrastructure Planning and Design Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
4. Integration Planning and Design Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
5. Data Migration – Scoping through Delivery Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
6. Reporting and BI Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
7. Functional and Technical Design Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
8. Configuration Management Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
9. Building Customizations Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
10. Performance Tuning Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
11. Testing and Training Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
12. Go-live Planning Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
13. Post Go-live Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
14. Upgrade Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Index Chevron down icon Chevron up icon

Customer reviews

Top Reviews
Rating distribution
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Half star icon 4.5
(15 Ratings)
5 star 73.3%
4 star 13.3%
3 star 6.7%
2 star 6.7%
1 star 0%
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Srinivas Somayajula Oct 02, 2015
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
It is a pleasure to see stalwarts whom I have worked personally with making their experience count and sharing the knowledge in the small world of Dynamics. I have taken a glimpse of the copy and I'm pretty sure that it worth every dollar spent on it.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Madhu Babu Rapolu Jan 06, 2016
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
Outstanding coverage!!! Book touches almost every aspect of the Dynamics AX implementations.While reading the book, you will surely think at least once, ‘Yes, this is the part I missed in my implementation’ or ‘I should have done it like this’.Every Dynamics AX Professional must read this. A must read even for customers who are already using Dynamics AX and surely for potential customers who wants to implement Dynamics AX or in process of implementation.Yogesh and JJ, this is a tremendous contribution to Dynamics AX community. Great job!!! Looking forward for next versions of the book...
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Satish Panwar Dec 09, 2015
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
Yogesh and JJ have put together consolidated view of entire lifecycle for Dynamics AX project. This book is very good read for anyone connected with Microsoft Dynamics AX irrespective of their roles. It content is bound to help PM, solution architects, developers in multiple ways. Great job. I highly recommend it.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Murray Fife Sep 27, 2015
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
Yogesh Kasat and JJ Yadav have distilled everything that someone needs to know as they are implementing Dynamics AX into 312 pages, and they cover everything from choosing a partner, to planning the project, from designing the infrastructure to migrating data. There are even sections in there on reporting and customizing Dynamics AX.I love this book.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Rahul M Feb 01, 2016
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
This book is my amongst my favorite knowledge repository for everything about Microsoft Dynamics AX, implementations and how to help the investment yield the right benefits.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
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