Change and Configuration Management 

Purpose

You can use change and configuration management first of all to create a change notification, which may, for example, report or query a design fault. After careful checking, the employees responsible can convert this notification to a change request, and approve a change if appropriate. If a change is actually made, you can plan and control the change process for all affected change objects (for example, material, bill of material, and document).

This change is then applied in production, and the product configuration is adjusted accordingly. Change management covers the entire organization, meeting the different requirements that users have of the software system.

Process Flow

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The following business process runs in SAP ERP:

       1.      Create change notification

The change notification is the preliminary step for a change request. You can use this notification to report faults (for example, design faults) or to ask whether specific changes to products are possible.

This function can be used by persons who work in the SAP system itself only occasionally, if at all. This includes both employees from various departments (sales, service, purchasing, and so on) and business partners (customers, development partners, vendors, and so on) who have access to the company's intranet.

       2.      Process change notification

The change notification is automatically directed to a central location, where it is processed by a person who is responsible for this.

¡        This person checks whether the proposed changes are appropriate and feasible, and whether change requests with similar contents already exist.

¡        According to the facts described, the processor rejects the query, forwards the query, creates a change request, or assigns the change notification to an existing change request.

¡        The person who created a change notification as an internal service request can follow the status of the notification on the intranet.

       3.      Create engineering change request (or change master record)

Once the processor has approved the query, the processor performs one or more of the following activities:

¡        Create change notification (as a subsequent notification)

¡        Assign engineering change request

¡        Create engineering change request

Engineering change request

By using a change master record (engineering change request or engineering change order), you can control the procedure for changes in more detail. An engineering change request (ECR) is a change master record that you create with reference to a change type (for example, design fault).

You can collect a wide range of information in a change master record:

¡        Data that is descriptive in character (for example, reason for change)

¡        Data with control functions (for example, validity data and indicators for object types)

¡        Data that the system updates automatically (for example, the administrative data)

The essential data of a change master record is grouped as follows:

¡        Change header (description, validity data, and status information)

¡        Indicators for object types (for example, bills of material, task lists, documents)

¡        Object overviews for the different object types

¡        Detail screens for individual objects (object management records)

Object management record

An object management record controls the change to a specific change object. There is no limit to the number of objects that can be processed with a change number.

The object management record offers the following functions for the change object:

¡        Special documentation

¡        Object-specific valid-from date (alternative date)

¡        Object-specific status profile (user status)

¡        Revision level for materials and documents

       4.      Process and release engineering change

In the engineering change request, you must check all the change objects that are entered and decide whether the change is necessary and can be made. If at least one change object is to be changed, you must convert the engineering change request to an engineering change order. You support various system statuses and user statuses that can be set for the different phases of the processing and checking procedure for the engineering change request. For an engineering change request, you process all of the data that is in a simple change master record. You also maintain additional data.

The following fields are not in a simple change master record:

¡        Change type

¡        System status

¡        User status

¡        Valid-from date

You only have to enter this date if you want to convert the request to an engineering change order.

       5.      Process order changes

Order Change Management (OCM) controls engineering change management for production orders. It enables you to include in the change process any existing procurement elements (production orders, planned orders, and purchase orders) that are also affected by the change. In this process step, you can adapt production orders to the changed product structure, even if work has already started.

¡        The starting point of the change process is a change to a sales order or to master data that makes it necessary to change production orders.

¡        The system generates initiating object records on the basis of these changes, which refer directly to the sales orders changes or master data changes.

¡        The system determines the affected procurement elements, and generates a procurement element change record for each procurement element.

¡        Using the procurement element change records as a basis, the employees can change the production orders in a controlled manner.

¡        The change to the production order completes the change process.

       6.      Manage product configuration

Products and projects go though various life-cycle phases, such as engineering, sales, production, and maintenance. In each life-cycle phase, a product has different configurations.

¡        A configuration comprises a range of different objects that describe the object in the current life-cycle phase. These can include documents, materials, bills of material (BOMs), and other objects. The configuration of these objects changes over the course of time, and tends to be different from one life-cycle phase to another.

¡        With configuration management, you identify the objects that describe a product in a specific life-cycle phase, and collect them in a metaobject – a configuration folder.

¡        By using different configuration folders in different life-cycle phases, you manage the configurations of products and projects across different life-cycle phases.