This was developed from a recent SAP BusinessObjects Webi project we undertook for a large high tech manufacturer. I conducted an interview with Douglas Ayers, the lead consultant on it.
Given your experience on this project, what are the SAP Webi Roles you see being used. Can you discuss both the SAP Partner consulting team and the business team members.
Roles:
- Business User who dreams up the original report they need.
- An interface person on this end (software engineer (me)) who translates the need into a software requirement document or a design mockup.
- Similar interface person on that end who does the same thing as the software engineer on this end.
- A SAP BW person to install business content on that end. I have not seen any custom development yet.
- A BO expert on that end to develop the universe and webi
- Testers on this end to make a test plan
- Testers to run the test
- Managers on this end to argue with the development manager on that end that the damn report don’t work.
- A defect tracking system to keep track of the bugs found
You now know how long this project has taken and is taking to complete.
Can you give me some project estimation guidelines.
Rules of thumb based on what you have seen here.
Effect of having the teams working remotely versus potentially having them in one spot on project estimates.
- Well they have 3 releases a year about. So I think as a project estimate they will need about 4 years to get most of these reports built and debugged.
- Really not seen any effect in working remotely or overseas. Other than the large number of conference calls at all hours of the day:(
What, if any, are some of the lessons learned from this project with regards to how it is staffed and managed versus how you might do it different on the next one?
- The biggest negative is the developers think they are the customer and that the real customer (BU’s) must keep the IT team happy. Actually it is the other way around.
- The IT team is just a vendor that must satisfy the customer (BU’s).
From an Industry perspective, do you believe there are any specific knowledge areas required for the consultant who is building a Webi Dashboard for this industry or is it more a generic skillset type tool?
- Nah, it is all generic information. What is the requirement. Where do I get the data. What system, table field. Build the data flow. Make the universe. Make the Webi. Send it out.
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