Example: Process Flow Change

You originally chose the item type Product Concept as the best process flow for your project. Now you realize that the decision points available do not adequately fit your process. You would like to change to the item type New Product Development, as it has decision points that better suit your requirements. Within the current item type, the active decision point is Specify.

Prerequisites

You have made the following settings in Customizing for SAP Portfolio and Project Management in Start of the navigation path Portfolio Management Next navigation step Global Customizing Portfolio Independent Settings Define Portfolio Item Types End of the navigation path .

Item Type	Decision Points	Permitted Item Types for Switching To	Permitted Item Types for Switching To
Product Concept	Ideate (0001)	New Product Development	Product Improvement
	Specify (0002)	New Product Development
	Design (0003)	New Product Development
	Develop (0004)	New Product Development

New Product Development	Ideatione (A)	Product Concept	Product Improvement
	Specification (B)	Product Concept
	Design (C)	Product Concept
	Development (D)	Product Concept
	Testing (E)
	Ramp Up Phase (F)
	Maintenance (G)

Product Improvement	Ideate	Product Concept	New Product Development
	Design
	Correct
	Ship
	Maintain

The system evaluates which new items can be switched to from Product Concept, based on these settings you have made in Customizing, and also on the status of the decision points in the current item. Mapping is available between the status of the decision points of the two different item types, and also between the status of the two different item types themselves.

In the table above, all the decision points for Product Concept match the decision points of the New Product Development item type . Regardless of which decision point is active for Product Concept, a change to the New Product Development item type is possible.

Note Note

If you want to change to the Product Improvement item type instead, you can see in the table above, that only the first decision point matches. Therefore, a change to Product Improvement is only possible if the current decision point has not passed Ideate. If the current decision point has already passed Ideate, then the item decision points must be manually reverted back to Ideate to switch to the Product Improvement item type.

End of the note.

Process

On the Item Details screen, the Phases and Decision dashboard displays the existing decision points for the Product Concept item type, as shown here:

Decision Point Name

ID

Status

Status Grouping

Ideate

0001

Closed

Closed

Specify

0002

Design

0003

Released

Active

Develop

0004

In Preparation

Created/Not Started

You choose the Change Process pushbutton to open the Change Process screen. You choose the new item type New Product Development from the list.

Decision Point Name	ID	Status	Status Grouping
Ideate	0001	Closed	Closed
Specify	0002
Design	0003	Released	Active
Develop	0004	In Preparation	Created/Not Started

You choose whether the system renames the previous decision points, or deletes them (including all assigned information) and creates new ones.

You select Rename previous decision points, and the new decision points are as follows:

Decision Point	ID	Status	Status Grouping	Comment
Ideation	A	Finished	Closed	Update
Specification	B			Update
Design	C	Active	Active	Update
Development	D	Set Up	Created/Not Started	Update
Testing	E			Creation
Ramp Up	F			Creation
Maintenance	G			Creation

Note Note

If you had selected Delete previous decision points, the new decision points would be as follows:

Decision Point	ID	Status	Status Grouping	Comment
Ideation	A	Finished	Closed	Update
Specification	B			Update
Design	C	Active	Active	Update
Development	D			Creation (Deletion of old decision Point 0004)
Testing	E			Creation
Ramp Up	F			Creation
Maintenance	G			Creation

End of the note.

The new item type New Product Development has more decision points than Product Concept, so the additional decision points are added. From the configuration tables described in the Customizing activity Make Settings for the Status Mapping For Items, the system determines the status of the new decision points.