Determine Production Support Plan

Use

The purpose of this task is to plan the setup of a production support environment that is required after going live. This plan must include staffing, procedures, and facilities.

In case of local rollout projects as part of a global program, the Customer Competence Center (CCC) plays an important role within the production support organization.

Procedure

  1. Finalize the technical configuration of the production system.
    Determine the hardware for the production system in the system environment. This can include application servers, presentation servers, networks, printers, and screens for users. The hardware vendor has experience in sizing SAP Systems, and can advise on processor power, disk space, and memory requirements.
  1. Procure the hardware and software required for going live.
    Procure hardware and software based on the agreed budget and requirements.
  1. Determine the production support team.
    Organize the support team for the first days of productive operation. This team will be comprised of the implementation project team members. This planning step starts the transition of the implementation team into a support role.
  1. Create the help desk.
    Address the following checklist:
  1. Staff the help desk team.
    Experts in SAP applications and information technology can staff the help desk. Factors that influence team make up include the SAP applications implemented, locations and number of users.
    The help desk is responsible for organizing and delivering training sessions for new users using end user documentation completed in the Realization Phase (and amended, if necessary).
    Consider the time zones of the sites of the implementation and ensure proper coverage.
  1. Define help desk procedures and facilities.
    The help desk must have procedures for processing the priorities of problems. A help desk guidebook can help the telephone staff resolve problems, or ask for the right information. The procedures must identify the type of resource to which the problem is assigned.

Establish the goals of the help desk:

When calls are recorded, the issue resolution procedure used during the SAP project can be used.
Provide end users with the names of people working on the help desk. Tell end users how the help desk operates. Ensure that end users know whom to contact when facing an issue or problem.

Define SAPNet users in your help desk to forward questions that can be solved only by SAP support. See the SAP online documentation for information on SAPNet - R/3 Frontend and its procedures.

  1. Create disaster recovery plan and define procedures.
    Define and document the procedures for disaster recovery of the production environment. Define and document the roles and responsibilities for the disaster recovery procedures to ensure escalation mechanisms are in place. The following procedures must be defined and described:
  1. Reorganize team for production support.
    Organize the implementation project team for a support role starting with the final cutover, and for the first weeks of production. The team must have a proactive approach to ensure that the business is operating smoothly, and issues are resolved rapidly. The team must be available to users, and be ready to resolve issues sent from the help desk. The optimal scenario is that the team has few issues to resolve.
  1. Inform SAP about your planned going live dates.
    As soon as you know when you will go live with the SAP System or with new SAP applications you should inform SAP. Thus, you can ensure that SAP can provide optimal support throughout your GoingLive phase. Enter the relevant data straight into SAPNet - R/3 Frontend.

Result

This procedure will result in the development of a production support plan.

For searching for notes use SAPNet - R/3 Frontend or SAPNet - Web Frontend.
For entering problem messages use SAPNet - R/3 Frontend. The process is documented in SAPNet - Web Frontend and in the SAPNet - R/3 Frontend User Guide.