Experiences and Results

Influence the Thinking of the Development Personal

In the long term, the most important result, but also the one most difficult to prove, is the change in the thinking of development personnel. Rather than concentrating purely on the implementation of new functions, many software engineers felt it was an enriching experience to incorporate improvements in their products as a result of observing users in their work situation. One indication of this change in their thinking, for example, was that many development groups, on their own initiative, asked for help in the use of the user-oriented development methods and often used the methods independently. These indications of a change of thinking are all the more important because the use of usability methods must become second nature in future if we are to be able to speak of the project as a lasting, permanent success. In EnjoySAP there was a pause for breath as far as creating new functionality is concerned, since no additional functionality was incorporated in the R/3 System. In future, this will not be the case. In other words, the development teams will be obliged to adopt a user-oriented procedure while working under the pressure of having to produce new products with new functionalities on schedule. The response of teams developing completely new, WWW-based applications in the mySAP.com project was very encouraging in this respect. But only the next few years will show whether there has really been a permanent change of thinking.

The incorporation of user-oriented methods into the development process has indeed resulted in more usable application systems. The results so far published have been encouraging. In addition to the subjective satisfaction with the visual design reported by pilot customers, the results in [Steffens et al. 2000Mannheim; MetaGroup] are an expression of the improvements in the interaction design. From the user’s point of view, significant progress was made as regards ease of learning and efficiency in use.

EnjoySAP was the prerequisite in several respects for the success of the Internet initiative mySAP.com, which has been a strategic objective of SAP since the spring of 1999:

• WWW-based application systems. It would be very difficult to design user-friendly new application systems if the development teams had not gained experience of methods such as site visits and user days as part of EnjoySAP. Within the framework of mySAP.com, they have helped to develop usable new functionality right from the start. In spite of the additional burden on the software engineers in terms of having had to learn new Internet programming techniques, the user-oriented methods are being used during the development cycle.
• New user groups. The new application systems are also to be used as a tool by occasional users who do not belong to the classical user group of clerks or administrators and who have often never before come into contact with the R/3 application system. Site visits are therefore indispensable to find out what the requirements are, because many software engineers do not have the required knowledge based on experience and first have to build up know-how in relation to these users and their requirements. Site visits accelerate this learning process.
• User roles. The starting point was the definition of user roles begun with EnjoySAP. The question as to which R/3 functionality purchasers could use in order to do their work effectively described the perspective from which roles were described. The question was developed further for mySAP.com: "Which tools (functionality) and information are required by purchasers to do their work effectively, and how can they access them easily?". The working situation of these user types is thus observed from a perspective that takes everything into account. In the past, customers also found gaps in functionality and communicated this to SAP. Since EnjoySAP, the approach has become more proactive, and analyses are carried out to establish, for example, which new functionality of the Treasury application component brings added value for the user role of "foreign exchange trader", how this functionality can best be provided (by development in house or by providing solutions from other vendors) and what the requirements of people in the user group are. The user role also ensures that functionality is developed first for those user groups that are of strategic importance.
• User-oriented integration of tools and information on the mySAP.com Workplace Business Desktop. The user orientation propagated in EnjoySAP led overall to a change of thinking. As a result, the task is no longer seen as merely to offer tools characterized by their usability and the fact that they are tailored to meet requirements. What turned out to be at least as important was better provision of targeted information geared to specific roles, such as stock exchange quotations, raw material prices, access to product catalogs, deviation warnings, etc. This finding from EnjoySAP has been rigorously implemented in mySAP.com in that the mySAP.com Workplace offers users a WWW-based business desktop on which they can collect all the information and tools that they require to fulfill their roles. In this sense, EnjoySAP was thus responsible for getting mySAP.com off to a good start [MySAP.com 2000].

Source:  EnjoySAP - Success Factors