This month I was invited to present at a SAP Australia User Group (SAUG) conference in Melbourne on the topic of optimising SAP user experience (UX). The reality for the primarily on-premise ERP customers in the SAP ecosystem is a far cry from where SAP would like them to be. Whilst SAP senior executives enchant customers with demonstrations of its new ‘Fiori’ user experience, many will return to their workplaces and log into an old SAP GUI experience which dates back to the 1990s. Indeed, some customers may well be implementing a new SAP solution right now, using that very same SAP GUI experience.
The challenge I see for the SAP ecosystem is that, whilst SAP itself may endeavor to reinvent it’s technology foundations and push solutions to the next generation, there is a level of inertia in skills, attitudes and mindsets that prevents SAP systems from evolving. That is essentially the theme of this presentation. The challenges which the SAP ecosystem faces are less about tools and technology, and more about people and mindsets.
Click on the image above to view the presentation.