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SAPbiz - January 13, 2009

2009 Support Pack Update Project - Lessons learned

Participants should brainstorm everything they felt was successful during the project life-cycle (the "Wins") as well as everything they felt could have been done more efficiently or effectively (the "Challenges") including a recommendation for remediation. This can include but should not be limited to Communications, Governance, Process, Project Mgmt, Risk Mgmt, Sponsorship, Staffing Levels, and Teamwork.

Communication - Tools that included Meetings, Emails, SAP Gui & Web messages, Conference bridge line, Status check-in line and the Project Wiki were utilized to communicate project status, roles and responsibilities and system and service outages.

Was the appropriate volume/frequency of communication provided?

Was the information accurate and complete?

What worked well? Where did you see opportunities for improvement?

Wins - Communication

  • WIKI good. Used it. Good to have meeting notes.
  • No negative feedback from community.
  • VPF sent business impact info.

Challenges - Communication

  • Highlight test database more. Which test environment to use to test? Hard to find, confusing.
  • User newer version of Wiki.
  • Not everyone got cutover weekend updates. Make it voluntary if interested. Sign-up roster. 
  • Expected update for each step - not sure if steps 1-x done.
  • Some confusion about UAT start and end dates. Then took 2 days for Lisa to do closing. Delayed due to fixing issue. Show FI close in the schedule from the start. 
  • Explore what other testing can continue while close in progress. But have to keep close accurate.
  • No idea what is in the enhancement packs. Didn't know it was on the Wiki.
  • Send final documentation (validation steps, weekend schedule, ...) earlier.

Schedule - The project schedule was primarily based on prior years experience and it's start and finish times were restricted to a window whose  start is dependent on the time packs are made available by SAP and whose finish be completed before the start of the new Payroll year. Although not entirely flexible, there might be some opportunities to change details within our schedule.

Could combining Systems Integration Testing with User acceptance testing become the rule vs. an option?

Could the development/transport freeze time be reduced provided process owners were available to validate and approve changes outside of the normal business hours? (i.e. nights and/or weekends)

How significant was the impact of bringing down production at noon on the Friday of the cut-over weekend?

                   Project Plan

    • (September - October) - Plan, create master script catalog, improve test scripts, move pending work to production
    • 10/05/2009 - Last date to implement projects until freeze ends on 12/24/2009 (Except Open Enrollment & Union Structures)
    • 10/19/2009 - Production snapshot at end of day - will be used to refresh dev & test environments 
    • 10/22/2009 - Last date to implement support & enhancement changes until freeze ends on 12/24/2009
    • 11/03/2009 - 11/08/2009 Unit Test
    • 11/09/2009 - 11/22/2009 System Integration Test (SIT Task List)
    • 11/23/2009 - 12/09/2009 User Acceptance Test
    • 12/11/2009 - 12/13/2009 Golive Weekend
    • 12/24/2009   Development Freeze ends

Wins - Schedule

  •  Friday noon well advertised. Worked well. Friday better than Monday.
  •  Could compress test time, maybe cut days or a week off UAT, but current schedule allows for issues, absences. 
  • Freeze period not a problem. Criticals can go during freeze.

Challenges - Schedule

  •  

Testing Tools and Materials - Test Cases were located on the Wiki and Request Tracker was utilized for reporting issues. The SAP SH2 environment was updated with the support packs and was refreshed with a snapshot of production data taken on October? 

Were your documented test cases available, current and complete?

Was the test environment adequate for testing all critical business functions?

Was the appropriate data available for processing test scenarios?

 Was Request Tracker an effective tool for logging issues?

Wins - Tools & Materials

  • Good to have central repository of all test cases.
  • Test environments, recently refreshed good.
  • RT worked fine. No issues in reporting problems.
  • Liked scenario testing. Do more in the future.

Challenges - Tools & Materials

  •  Too many test cases. Go with downloaded list organized by business owner.
  • Plan intermediate state testing earlier.

Other (Governance, Process, Project Mgmt, Risk Mgmt, Sponsorship, Staffing Levels, and Teamwork)

Were the correct decision makers involved?

Was there cooperation across different business areas where true integration testing was needed? 

Did the project have the right teams assembled with the appropriate team members?

Wins - Other

  •  Gill representing facilities worked.

Challenges - Other

  • Steering committee IS&T heavy, business owner light. Gerry O'Toole, Wayne Turner. 
  • Or Christine & Gillian are steering committee.
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