I just want to know how big is big. I think to say a software is not user friendly is quite subjective, pls define it if possible. Rgds

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Josh,

Just my impressions from what I have been reading from SAP and similar software. There are more failure stories then success stories from SAP when it comes to maintenance implementations. Or SAP is running at the corporate level (FINANCE) and another CMMS takes care of the maintenance activities. The decision to take SAP has according to my sources, very few input from the working class (Operations/Maintenance)

Primary because the core bussiness from SAP is not originating from a maintenance environment.
I have never heard of a SAP implementation of less then $1,000,000, excluding hardware (maybe I am wrong but that is my info).

SAP is not for small/medium bussiness (less then 100 employes)

Datastream is not cheap also, we run it on Oracle (the cadilac of RDBMS) and we have about 200 users doing transactions in it, but it is cheaper then SAP. What I have heard is that SAP is accountant software with a maintenance module.

My impressions are from working 11 years with the same CMMS.

FYI, SAP has 3 major divisions namely 1) Logistics 2) Accounting and 3) HR.

Each division contains many modules. Like Logistics contain:
1) Production planning
2) Plant Maintenance
3) Material management
4) Project management
5) Quality management
6) Sales and distribution

Now Plant Maintenance (PM) consists of several portions:
1) Technical objects such as functional location, equipment, bill of materials, hierarchy etc
2) Work centre such as by disciplines eg Rorating, Static, Electrical, Instrument, Civil
3) Maintenance task list by generic type, equipment and functional location
4) Maintenance planning & scheduling - strategies, scheduling parameters etc
5) Maintenance processing - notification & work orders
6) PM Information system for statistics, KPIs etc

Material management contains:
1) Technical objects such as material masters,
2) Inventory management
3) Warehouse management
4) Materials planning
5) MM information system for KPIS etc
etc

Now I would like to answer some of the views posted above:

1) More failure than success stories

If you are looking for a comprehensive business solutions, SAP could be one of the answers. Because it's already designed integrated, don't implement the package in pieces, make sure all the modules & divisions communicate with each other during configuration set up and in terms of IT infrastrature required. This has to be managed properly. And there are a lot of master data like for equipment, materials, tools, measurement points etc need to be set up. If you can pass this hurdle, success it should be.

2) The issue of very little input from operations & maintenance people, I think originates from the way of implementation. Maybe Finance people take the lead in implementation with substantial participation by O&M personnel. In one case, I led O&M to fully utiizem

3) In view of how big is SAP, the cost could be high but 1 ID can be shared by up to 6 people logging simultaneously.

The comparison:
Datastream has
1) Plant Maintenance
2) Material Management

Not that I have something against SAP, but it looks like the most expensive Solution to implement.

If you don't have
1) management commitment
2) long term vision
3) computer literated personel
4) experienced IT-staff (no partime free-lancer who comes by now and then )
5) Some bulldozer Guy to put everything/everybody to work
6) Lots of $$$$ to spend

but do have
1) a lot of small kingdoms
2) Cover A.. Politics is natural way of doing bussiness
.....
Full implementation will be a nightmare.


There are cheaper solutions that have costed the heads of many maintenance and IT managers.

By the way, don't implement the various modules in pieces in isolated & non-communicating manner (they must be integrated) but can be implemented in a staggered manner ie module by module, not necessarily simultaneously to avoid a mountain of workloads. Eg in year 1, implement Accounting, year 2 implement Logistics & year 3, HR.

With the above satggered way of implementation (versus a big bang approach), is it still a nightmare? If it is, why have others implemented it successfully?

After implementation, enjoy the fruits of hard labour & investment esp'ly using the information systems for KPIs which should be set up properly. I think IT personnel will not be able to set up proper KPIs in the information systems, only the subject matter experts like the O&M users can do so.

No matter what softwares, only the people can make the difference because doing it using computers will not do any good (not the silver bullet) unless the users know the subject matter like maintenance & materials management.

In fact, before implementation of any software, i think it's an absolutely necessary pre-requisite to review or evaluate the knowledge levels of the users because maybe the software has been designed up to certain higher levels of knowledge in the subject matter.

If the levels of knowledge of the users is lower than the that contained in the software, it's most likely the users will say that the software is not friendly because they simply don't know how to use it to their advantages.

If the knowledge levels are at various platforms (some low, some high), it's necessary to bring up the lagging ones to a minimum sufficient level.

P/s I also have nothing against any other softwares. Just want to share my experince & thought in using SAP. Rgds