SAP Business Partner (Cape Town)

SUMMARY:
The SAP Business Partner will be responsible to manage the overall SAP solution ecosystem at the company. The role is primarily involved in the plan and build phases (with reference to the Plan | Build | Run model of IT application management).

POSITION INFO:

Business Engagement and Relationship Management

• Regularly communicate and meet with key business stakeholders, key users and business leads to identify requirements, weakness and opportunities relevant to the business solutions.
• Understand business operational challenges and strategic priorities.
• Partner with business stakeholders to understand needs, gaps, and priorities.
• Keep stakeholders informed of progress and challenges to manage expectations.
• Ensure business satisfaction and IT portfolio success by managing expectations, controlling perceptions and communicating accurate status across stakeholders’ support.
• Oversee the governance of the business-IT relationship, establishing policies and processes for interaction and handoffs.
• Act as a primary point of contact and escalation for business, mediating to resolve service challenges and improve communication.

Business Requirements and Change Management

• Collect, prioritise and structure BU demand / requirements management process for business applications from an IT organisational perspective.
• Work with Process Owners, Key Users and other key stakeholders to understand how the SAP system can further enable, add value and automate business processes.
• Evaluate benefits, risks of and effort proposed initiatives by conducting impact analysis and/or business cases to justify the proposed changes.
• Work with business and IT stakeholders to translate business requirements into SAP functional requests that align with the SAP ecosystem and architectural principles.
• Track and report value realization, successes and lessons learnt during and after project closure, leading Project Implementation Reviews.

SAP Portfolio & Demand Management

• Participate in the planning processes of business units and service providers to ensure long-term alignment of goals and initiatives.
• Provide input into annual update of IT and SAP roadmaps.
• In consultation with partner consultants and other subject matter experts define the evolution of the future solution architecture and roadmap for SAP. In this regard the promotion of standard SAP functionality before custom development is key
• Support prioritisation decisions with business leaders.
• Support S/4HANA best-practice alignment, standardisation and solution consistency across sites.
• Develop business cases for new SAP functionality or -process improvements.
• Measure and report on service provider performance and business unit satisfaction, using metrics to identify and pursue opportunities for continuous improvement.
• Monitor recurring incidents and identify trends and root causes with the view of proposing improvements and recurrence of incidents and ensure business sign-off on completed solutions.

Solution Delivery Lifecycle

• Assist with scope definition, requirements gathering, process mapping and specification of projects and initiatives.
• Maintain a structured SAP enhancement / project pipeline.
• Ensure SAP changes follow IT governance framework, change control, and audit requirements.
• Oversee and participate in the development, testing and production cut-over of projects / changes.
• Monitor milestones, timelines and progress of projects, enhancements and fixes.
• Coordinate user acceptance testing (UAT).
• Support go-live readiness and post-go-live stabilisation.
• Assist in the guiding of end users through process transitions.
• Support solution adoption, training and change awareness activities.
• Manage stakeholder expectations during change.
• Adheres and implements the organisation’s Policies and Procedures and ensures compliance with ISO Standards with respect to SHE/Quality/Environmental/Energy.

QUALIFICATIONS & EXPERIENCE

• NQF 6 in Information Systems or equivalent qualifications.
• NQF 7 degree in Information Systems or equivalent qualifications would be advantageous.
• At least 5 years SAP ecosystem experience including SAP S/4HANA implementations and functional enhancements.
• Experience in manufacturing or industrial environments.
• Understanding of SAP change control and audit requirements.
• Experience of managing professional relationships with internal business customers.
• Experience translating business needs into system requirements.
• Strong communication, presentation, leadership skills.
• Experience in working across multiple SAP modules / functional areas.
• ERP solution and functional knowledge relevant to an engineering and manufacturing environment, preferably in multiple functional modules e.g. FI, CO, MM, SD, PP, PM, HCM, Warehouse Management.
• Strong understanding of cross-functional business processes.
• Firm understanding of the SAP S/4HANA technology platform product capabilities and architecture.
• Ability to work under consistent pressure.
• Team Player and must be able to function individually with minimal supervision.
• Mature and highly professional.
• Strong commitment to meet deadlines.
• Good interpersonal skills and ability to think proactively.
• Willing to work overtime when required.