Part 1: The Impact of Change in SAP: The Heroic SAP Testing Team 

This series introduces a maturity model for SAP quality teams responsible for testing releases and ensuring the functionality of critical business processes.  The model outlines “typical” stages organizations fall into based on their testing approach and use of automation. It also highlights how investing in QA capabilities can deliver lasting benefits to the organization. 

The Heroic SAP Testing Team 

Many SAP organizations heavily rely on manual testing to ensure SAP release quality. This approach works well for firms with smaller SAP environments with limited change, and is typified by these attributes: 

Why It Breaks Down 

The challenges with this model are well known, yet the approach remains commonplace: 

Ultimately this creates a “hero dependency.”  The work falls on highly skilled individuals making great efforts to get the work done at the expense of other productive business tasks.  The testing often requires a specialized level of knowledge of the business, limiting who can effectively participate in testing activities. And the time available from these individuals for testing is limited given their larger organization responsibilities.

So, even with heroes leading the charge, testing in this model will suffer from a lack of scalability, opportunity cost to the business, incomplete change impact analysis, and risks from the lack of comprehensive testing coverage.

What Comes Next 

Model #2 – Adopting Quality Processes 

As organizations grow or face larger projects, the hero approach is no longer viable. Outages, missed defects, and the sheer cost of diverting business experts force a change. 

So, just as standardized business processes improve business operations, testing too can benefit from this process-centric approach. In Part 2, we will explore how adopting quality processes help QA teams move beyond heroics and achieve greater consistency, scalability, and resilience.  

Stay tuned… 

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