Agenda item

a)         SAP Post Implementation Review

The Audit Committee at its meeting on 30 June requested that a post implementation review of the SAP system should be undertaken and its findings reported to its Committee in December.  The Budget & Performance Task Group also expressed an interest in this review following consideration of the SAP ‘health check’ report in March of this year.

Following the disbandment of this Task Group, the KPMG paper and covering report will now be considered by the Organisation & Resources Select Committee.

Recommendation:

The Committee is asked to consider the reports and provide comment as appropriate.

b)         Business Management Programme (SAP)

The Committee is reminded that the update report on the Shared Services Team developments, including the HR and Procurement elements of SAP will be considered by the Committee at its next meeting in January 2011.

This item was included on the Committee’s agenda following the disbandment of the Budget & Performance Task Group who had requested sight of the post-implementation review of the SAP system which was to be considered by the Audit Committee at its next meeting in December.  The report provided an opportunity to receive an external opinion from KPMG on the workings of the SAP system. 

The Cabinet Member and the Corporate Director for Resources confirmed that they were happy with the report provided but acknowledged that there were still some issues to address.  However, significant progress had and continued to be made in these areas identified by KPMG.

Visits to other organisations using the SAP system had also taken place to learn from experience.  Contact had now been received from a number of organisations who were keen to see the success of the implementation of the system by Wiltshire Council.

Although it was understood that the SAP system potentially had a wider capacity than currently used by the Council, additional modules of the system would not be considered unless there was a business case demonstrating a positive return equating to at least 10% efficiency gain.

The Chairman spoke to a draft motion he had circulated.  The Cabinet member identified that he was happy with it’s content except that 2(ii) and 4(iv) were wrong.  Nevertheless the motion as originally drafted was put to the meeting and was approved. 

The Committee noted that there was no documented long term strategy for the SAP system although acknowledged that there was focus on fixing existing issues to ensure the system remained operational.   

Resolved:

(1)       To acknowledge;

(i)         the overall findings by KPMG that “Ultimately Wiltshire Council achieved a great deal in successfully implementing a major SAP system”;

(ii)        the decision to go live on 1 April 2009 was bold but appeared to have been the right one; and

(iii)       that project initiation and planning was well organised and co-ordinated, a good standard of project documentation existed and that the Council’s SAP trainers showed a great deal of dedication.

(2)       However, in acknowledging the above to particularly highlight the following points:

(i)         that conflicting and competing priorities within the council at the time resulted in limiting capacity and resources for the project;

(ii)        there were currently no plans to further invest in SAP so as to drive out further efficiencies in other areas of the business;

(iii)       planned head-count reductions would mean that it was likely future projects would have to consider the use of contractors where internal capacity and/or skills were limited; and

(iv)      some service areas felt uncomfortable with the pace of the project and struggled to provide sufficient resource to manage the necessary business change activities that were delegated to them.

(3)       To note the following points for further scrutiny at the appropriate time:

(i)         Procurement and Commissioning Programme which commenced in July would address procurement issues including several new buyers appointed by the end of the year;

(ii)        A plan was being drawn up with a timeline for migrating significantly more financial processes and the associated staff into the Shared Services Team.  This also included a development plan for procurement;

(iii)       The SAP strategy scheduled for March 2011 would form an integral part of the overall ICT strategy which was currently being developed to align with the Council Business Plan; and

(iv)      The Corporate Programme Office was being reviewed as part of the Council’s business planning process and a benefits realisation plan was being developed to underpin the successful delivery of the business plan.

(4)       In addition to note the following general but important points:

(i)         Management should aim to use SAP functionality to the fullest extent possible appropriate to the organisation in order to avoid end-user developed applications;

(ii)        Areas of the business should be identified that were not taking full advantage of SAP;

            (iii)       KPMG did not audit the financial savings reported;

(iv)      KPMG identified that a key practice for getting value from a project was that it was driven by the executive (top management culture).

(5)       To formally advise the responsible Cabinet Member and Audit Committee of the Select Committee’s consideration and highlighted views on the report, and to receive responses from them in respect of the actions recommended by KPMG and the lessons learnt by the Council (bearing in mind the management responses already in the report).