Professional tender management for SAP S/4HANA transformations

A professional tender management is an absolute must with SAP S/4HANA transformations! Find out why.

Do you rely on a professional tender management for your SAP S/4HANA transformation?

If your answer is „no“ and you assume that you can realize the switch to the newest SAP version readily alongside day-to-day business, then you risk the success of your project.

Because actually a SAP S/4HANA transformation isn't simply just the introduction of a small IT solution, but a business change project. Through the changeover, fundamental changes within the structure and procedures of an organization frequently arise.

A sophisticated tender management is an important step in order to respond to precisely this complexity of such a far-reaching company development and to lift the potentials of a new SAP S/4HANA system in the best possible way.

In this article we reveal to you why that's the case and which advantages a professional tender management offers with a SAP S/4HANA transformation.

What is tender management?

Before we go into more detail on the significance of tender management for SAP S/4HANA transformations, let's briefly recall for orientation what tenders actually are and why a management is needed for them.

Tender management (or in English also tender management) comes into use in organizations with the procurement of resources as well as with the outsourcing of services.

With a tender, suitable providers, the vendors, are stimulated to submit offers for sought products or services. Mostly this happens in writing and within certain deadlines. From these the company subsequently chooses the suitable partner for a collaboration.

So that this complex procedure runs efficiently and purposefully, most organizations apply an individual form of tender management. This comprises all steps of the preparation, steering and implementation of tenders.

These include processes like the creation of corresponding tender documents, the examination of incoming offers by defined criteria, the conducting of contract negotiations and (rarely) the support of the vendors after project start.

Summarized, a functioning tender management thus supports companies in…

• …identifying their real need for external products or services,

• …communicating this to the market in the form of concrete requirements,

• …analyzing the services offered on the market and putting suitable vendors under contract quickly and in a value-creating way,

• …favoring a long-term collaboration with the providers,

• …and acting in a legally compliant way in the process.

Which role does tender management play with a SAP S/4HANA transformation?

That tender management makes sense with procurements in everyday business is in itself no news.

With transformation projects like, for example, the changeover of a company to the new cloud-based ERP system from SAP, by contrast, a specific steering of the tenders is rather rarely worked with. Mostly standard procedures from day-to-day business come into use for this, or no tender management takes place at all.

The cause of this is a wrong definition of the undertaking. Many organizations view the switch to SAP S/4HANA as a pure IT project. In the worst case even as one of many IT projects that can be carried out in parallel.

At this point a wrong thinking thus quickly creeps in. After all, a simple IT project doesn't necessarily need separate tender processes (unless this is legally or company-internally prescribed).

Actually, however, SAP S/4HANA transformations are business change projects with a long-term focus and a correspondingly great impact on the entire company.

Many companies that have good IT personnel often underestimate the requirements that such a project brings with it. They try to realize the switch to the newest ERP generation without external resources alongside day-to-day business, and not rarely their own business department is completely disregarded in the process.

The catch: with such a far-reaching transformation, entirely different professional abilities and resources are needed that only the fewest organizations can cover internally.

That's the point at which the choice of suitable vendors comes into play. With this, however, given the high relevance of business transformations, nothing should be left to chance.

Existing tender processes, insofar as they're applied at all, are often too generic for this or can't be transferred 1:1. The procedures in searching for suitable personnel or tools are simply not the same as with established purchasing processes. On top of that comes that S/4HANA transformations are long-running projects with a corresponding volume of necessary resources.

That's why a specific tender management is advisable for the changeover of a company to SAP S/4HANA.

Why does a professional tender management make sense with the switch to SAP S/4HANA?

In order to understand even better why an accompaniment of your SAP S/4HANA transformation project through a targeted tender management is profitable, a look at a typical starting situation, as many organizations are currently going through it, helps.

Imagine the mid-sized company „Exemplario“. The management of Exemplario is aware that a changeover of the ERP system to SAP S/4HANA is business-critical. On the occasion, a cross-location harmonization of the internal procedures and processes should also take place.

Quickly, however, Exemplario runs into some challenges:

• The needed know-how and suitable specialists for the implementation are missing.

• Employee teams and the company's own purchasing are already fully occupied with day-to-day business.

• The tender object (content of the transformation) can't be described in sufficient depth (in business/process terms), but only from the IT perspective

• Suitable workflows and networks are lacking in order to carry out the complex tenders and the selection of the transformation partners efficiently and sustainably.

• In addition, a scarcity of specialists like project managers or SAP consultants prevails on the market, since numerous organizations are in a S/4HANA transformation at the same time.

Do you possibly recognize some of these problems? Then you probably also know about the dangers they bring with them.

Progress within the individual transformation phases delays massively, since they're not realizable, or only barely, with the available resources. On top of that comes a clearly increased risk of making oneself dependent on unsuitable service providers, having to accept unnecessary expenditures or even failing completely. This risk can intensify if a company doesn't rely on a multi-vendor strategy and instead works with only one realization partner.

A targeted tender management for the SAP S/4HANA changeover can help to counteract these effects already from the planning phase on. Because a professional sourcing not only accompanies the entire undertaking, but additionally proactively supports the stakeholders in selecting the best-suited partners as well as over the course of the project realization.

And those are by no means all the plus points.

The advantages of targeted tender management within the framework of a SAP S/4HANA transformation

If, with the changeover of your ERP system, you deliberately rely on professional tender management, that provides you valuable advantages in several aspects at once:

• Efficiency – You can search more efficiently for specialists and IT resources that do justice to your qualitative and quantitative requirements. Lead times in decision-making are reduced.

• Controllability – Assessments and decisions on individual vendors become comprehensible. This way, tender processes for personnel, products or other necessary resources can be standardized and made comparable. That increases not only the quality, but also the speed of the results.

• Risk reduction – The higher quality in the tender additionally reduces risks in the contract fulfillment. By means of corresponding planning and implementation, you can thus avoid an excessive turnover with individual knowledge carriers or service providers.

• Cost awareness – Potentials for the saving of expenditures can be identified and used in a targeted way. Furthermore, the costs of the purchasing and negotiation processes are optimized.

• Culture & strategy conformity – With a professional tender management, you ensure that the selection process of partners happens transparently and on the basis of the strategic conditions. That helps you at the same time to find the best cultural fit.

If you look for external support through corresponding consultants for your tender management, you potentiate all these effects and enjoy additional added values. For example, business and team leaders are relieved in strategy and planning, procedures are optimized according to your individual needs and you get faster access to needed knowledge and networks.

Why you should rely on grandega for the tender management of your SAP S/4HANA transformation

One thing you should keep in mind: With complex change undertakings, expert knowledge always stands in direct relation to the factors time and money.

If you want to ensure that your SAP S/4HANA transformation project is implemented cost- and resource-efficiently as well as sustainably, then the accompaniment of your tender management through experienced consultants can decide success and failure.

Suitable consultants and consulting houses with corresponding experience and free capacities, however, aren't easy to find.

Lucky that you came across us!

Within the framework of our holistic grandega vendor management model, you can, in shaping your tender management for the SAP S/4HANA transformation, benefit from our know-how and practical experience.

grandega offers you a proven procedure model for steering and implementing your tenders. On top of that comes an extensive market know-how of the ERP provider landscape as well as a deep understanding of the company-relevant processes.

That enables us to offer you a consistent management of even the most complex software/ERP selection projects.

And our promise at the end: We accompany you independently in the tender management for your transformation! The placement of our own resources for system integration isn't our goal. We lay the basis for your transformation success.

grandega's influence on your professional tender management with SAP projects

• Within the framework of the tender preparation, we can capture professional requirements by means of a tool (see grandega transformation compass). This way you get an individual solution for your company based on proven standards and on leading practices.

• In practice that means: Tenders are carried out quickly, cost-effectively and with little impairment for day-to-day business.

• The evaluation of submitted offers happens fairly, transparently and comprehensibly.

• Your quantitative and qualitative needs are fulfilled by giving you access to an efficient resource procurement and to experienced specialists.

• Business departments within your company are relieved and can concentrate on the core business.

• You reduce risks like for example the dependence on one vendor or high bad investments.

• Related and equally relevant topics like for example risk management are comprehensively included.

• Through constant analysis, optimization and establishment of standards, all measures are designed for long-term orientation and sustainability.

And quite incidentally, we show you that digitalization with SAP can also be fun.

That sounds too good to be true? Then get to know us!

Let's together find out how, with the help of a professional tender management, we make your SAP S/4HANA transformation a success. A success that radiates more feelings of happiness than the cake you'll cut to celebrate.