Challenges of becoming a new age business with S/4HANA

S/4HANA is a useful enterprise resource planning platform that allows your organisation to manage its internal processes but migrating to the software from SAP ECC (ERP Central Component) can be difficult. In this article, we look at the challenges which come with migrating to S/4HANA, alongside how to overcome these issues.

What is S/4HANA?

S/4HANA is an enterprise resource planning (ERP) software package devised by SAP which allows organisations to monitor their business data and modify specific practices in various ways. For example, your company might use this platform to check customer demands via comprehensive analytics; they may act upon this information to radically transform their approach. This is a significant innovation upon SAP’s own ERP Central Component and ensures a smoother overall experience.

This solution is available on-premises or as a cloud-based version, with the latter also incorporating many of the resulting benefits of cloud computing. For example, S/4HANA Cloud offers continuous upgrades and makes use of real-time analytics with potentially faster processing than your current network would provide. Either of these platforms gives detailed information about your company – though you may encounter issues if migrating from SAP’s previous ERP system.

How is S/4HANA unlocking new benefits?

The main way that S/4HANA benefits businesses is by showing them a holistic view of their organisation and its processes, allowing them to make confident decisions with the help of accurate data. Master Data Governance is a key part of S/4HANA, and makes it possible for company leaders to assess the company’s use of information at every stage. Every business takes on a significant amount of risk when they make choices that could affect its future. The S/4HANA platform mitigates this risk – and ensures that each decision is for the firm’s benefit.

What are these benefits?

The benefits of S/4HANA include:

• Simplified tasks: The platform’s built-in processes are able to match virtually any sector – allowing the firm to save time through diverse apps that suit tasks such as logistics and finances.
• Intuitive UX: S/4HANA boasts a refined user interface and experience across multiple devices; which makes it much easier for your company to adapt the solution to its specific working model.
• Cost-effective: By showing a number of ways that your company might improve its approach, you can devote more time and energy to other processes, allowing you to cut down on costs.
• Faster decision-making: S/4HANA’s analytics help you make decisions faster, letting you adjust to the market in a way that shows your devotion to every customer and increases profitability.

Challenges of S/4HANA migration

However, there are also a number of challenges that come with migration from SAP ECC to S/4HANA, such as:

Poor data quality

S/4HANA can only make the most of your data if it’s accurate and healthy; low-quality or incorrect information can make it difficult to take advantage of the platform’s analytics. Though S/4HANA offers built-in governance, this feature has limited use for substandard data.

Data governance

To expand upon this, manual data governance can be a time-consuming procedure which involves assessing all available company data and determining any issues. You might need to utilise automated data solutions, especially for the firm’s master data as this is particularly sensitive.

Organisational communication

Communication is paramount when migrating your organisation’s ERP strategy as this helps keep everybody in the loop about updates to their data. If communication silos emerge between departments, they can struggle to adapt to these changes – a company-wide introduction to S/4HANA is essential.

Individual complexities

Every organisation conducts their business in a way which matches its specific culture and its unique place in the market. Though S/4HANA offers a strong general base for any industry, teams might find it quite difficult to customise this solution to their requirements.

How to overcome them

Data migration can be challenging for any company, even if the end results offer tremendous benefits. In order to counter these problems and help S/4HANA reach its full potential, you may benefit from an automated data governance solution, such as Maextro, This boosts the firm’s data governance through comprehensive rule-based engines and a suite of data quality tools- like duplicate data checkers. Simply put, it lets you improve the quality of individual data sets, making the analytics more accurate.

An MDG solution also accounts for the differences between sectors and specific companies – which allows you to customise your SAP ERP package further. These platforms emphasise the user experience at each stage; this simplifies the individual processes for users who would otherwise struggle. By incorporating automated master data governance into S/4HANA, you can gain a much better understanding of how your business uses data.

S/4HANA is a powerful tool for any company; one that you must approach in the right way in order to reap the most benefits. When migrating to a new SAP ERP solution, automated data governance could make the overall experience more efficient while ensuring your information is always high-quality.