Vanguard Magazine

PERSPECTIVE HOW YOU CAN ACCELERATE YOUR S/4HANA MIGRATION USING PROCESS MINING Simplify the complex: T he next five years will pose a major challenge for executives across the federal government as they work to migrate all de- partments to the latest version of SAP (S/4HANA) by 2027. This type of shift is no simple task—not even for de- partments already using SAP; it's a mission critical transformation that will require a deep understanding of business processes and inefficiencies if departments want to get the most value and return on invest- ment (ROI) from the migration. Approaches like process mining can help federal government departments—and other public sector organizations—better manage the complexity of their transfor- mation efforts. In this article, we'll look at what process mining is and highlight how it can be used to accelerate transformation initiatives. We'll also share insights from one public sector client that we recently worked with on a process mining proof- of-concept project that could benefit any organization looking to understand the potential value of process mining. What is process mining? Process mining is a data-driven approach that public sector organizations can use to understand, analyze, improve, monitor, and optimize key business processes by extract- ing knowledge from event logs available in system controls and business processes. The approach captures "digital footprints" from systems, pulls them together, and or- ganizes them to create real-time visuals of the end-to-end steps taken to complete a process. Organizations can use process min- ing to support numerous activities—from IT transformation and general process im- provement to data analytics. Using process mining to accelerate transformation initiatives For executives looking at the changes re- quired to transition to S/4HANA with trepidation, process mining offers a more efficient and accurate means of reviewing and evaluating organizational processes, particularly Procure-to-Pay (P2P), Order- to-Cash(O2C), and Record-to-Report (R2R). You can use process mining insights dur- ing every phase of your S/4HANA trans- formation to help accelerate your activities while reducing resource requirements and keeping costs manageable. For example: • Planning and discovery: During the planning and discovery phase, you can use process mining to obtain measurable proof of how your key processes actually flow to support the identification of gaps 34 AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2021 www.vanguardcanada.com Sponsored Content

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