This HR tip comes courtesy of Karel Fennema of Accenture, who spoke at our recent HR 2011 event, held March 8 – 10 in Las Vegas.
Benefits of the Global Template
- Enables the support of global HR processes
- Enables implementations to have simplified reporting
- Ensures a consistent implementation across all involved countries
- Helps facilitate local implementations being added to the HR system (post go-live)
- Reduces system maintenance costs
- Ease of accessibility to important HR data
When to Go Global vs. Local in Your Design
- When should we think more on the Global level?
HR processes and SAP Workflow
HR structures
Personnel Actions and infotypes in scope
Reporting
- When should we think more on the local level?
Legal compliance (EEO/AAP, Family Data, ROE, etc.)
Need to store country-specific employee identification numbers (SSN, SIN, Tax number, other legal requirements)
Social insurance
Payroll/taxation
What to Consider When Implementing the Global Template
- Naming conventions for configuration and custom objects
Should be simple, yet make logical sense
- Allowing reports to be beneficial to most countries in scope
Global reports will reduce maintenance
- Design global security standards within the implementation
- HR processes should be designed to work on a global level
Country-specific variations should be well documented and justified
- HR structures should be designed in a way to support the entire SAP ERP HCM solution
Enterprise Structure – Company Code, Personnel Area, Personnel Subarea
Personnel Structure – Employee Group, Employee Subgroup
Organizational Structure – Org Unit, Position, Job, etc.
Best Practices with Defining a Global Template
- Send out questionnaires: At the beginning of the project, create and send detailed HR questionnaires to capture business requirements for each region
The questionnaire should capture information such as type of employee population, employee data captured in the HR system, transactions processed, reporting requirements, etc.
Once you receive the feedback, update the global template with the approved changes and communicate the updates with the rest of your team
Set up routine calls with the regional leads to keep them updated on the progress of the global template. Consider their recommendations and ask them about how they think the global template will work for their country.
At the end of the bluepr
int phase, obtain sign-off from project leadership and the regional leads to ensure they understand and accept the template
The global template should always follow a strict governance process. Any changes to the global template should be approved by a sounding board (i.e., several people with different responsibilities on the project) to ensure that updates do not negatively affect the global solution