How To... configure and execute Business Process Flows in SAP BusinessObjects Planning and Consolidation 7.5 version for SAP NetWeaver

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1 SAP BusinessObjects EPM RIG How-To Guide How To... configure and execute Business Process Flows in SAP BusinessObjects Planning and Consolidation 7.5 version for SAP NetWeaver Applicable Releases: SAP BusinessObjects Planning and Consolidation 7.5 version for SAP NetWeaver

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3 Document History Document Version Description 1.10 << Enter your summary of changes in this version >> 1.00 First official release of this guide

4 Typographic Conventions Icons Type Style Description Icon Description Example Text Words or characters quoted from the screen. These include field names, screen titles, pushbuttons labels, menu names, menu paths, and menu options. Caution Note or Important Example Recommendation or Tip Cross-references to other documentation Example text Emphasized words or phrases in body text, graphic titles, and table titles Example text File and directory names and their paths, messages, names of variables and parameters, source text, and names of installation, upgrade and database tools. Example text User entry texts. These are words or characters that you enter in the system exactly as they appear in the documentation. <Example text> Variable user entry. Angle brackets indicate that you replace these words and characters with appropriate entries to make entries in the system. EXAMPLE TEXT Keys on the keyboard, for example, F2 orenter.

5 Table of Contents 1. Scenario Background Information Step-by-Step Procedure Configuring BPF template Configuring BPF instance Executing the BPF Setting up notifications Appendices... 30

6 1. Scenario In this guide we will explain how to configure Business Process Flows with SAP Business Objects Planning and Consolidation 7.5, version for SAP NetWeaver. Business Process Flows (BPFs) guide users through the sequence of tasks within a defined business process. Business process flows are comprised of steps ans sub steps that must be completed sequentially. We can use BPFs to guide users, depending upon their roles, through various steps. An example of a business process may be month end financial close or yearly budget approval or monthly forecast/projection cycle or financial consolidation etc. A BPC user may have to perform different roles in different business processes and thus can be assigned to various steps in the business processes that he/she is involved in. For example a user may be the reviewer of the monthly forecast step for a region but may be the main person doing month end financial close. BPF functionality elucidated here will guide that user through all the activities that he/she is associated with and can track the completion status of the activities and the business process as a whole. The business scenario considered here consists of three steps. The first step is to seed the plan data; the second step is to enter manual changes and the third step is to execute reports. The second step has three sub-steps. It requires review and can be reopened. The second step has matched step regions as the opening criteria and the third step is set up with all step regions as the opening criteria. While executing the BPF, we will complete the steps and sub steps; while reviewing, we will accept some steps as well as reject some steps. Also we will reopen the second step after it is completed. We will also set up notifications. Thus this simplistic scenario has the examples of many possible options that are available while configuring and executing BPF. 2. Background Information Business Process Flow (BPF) functionality has been introduced in SAP Business Objects Planning and Consolidation 7.5, version for. The BPF functionality was not available in SAP Business Objects Business Planning and Consolidation 7.0, version for SAP NetWeaver The BPF functionality in SAP Business Objects Planning and Consolidation 7.5, version for SAP NetWeaver has enhanced functionality when compared to what was available in the SAP Business Objects Business Planning and Consolidation 7.0, version for Microsoft. A list of BPF terminology used in this guide is provided in Appendix A with the definition of each term. This guide is created with SP00 and has some known issues that will be fixed in the later support packs. These issues are mentioned in Appendix B. Appendix D lists several BPF Considerations for implementing this functionality. In order to configure BPF, there is a task called ManageBPF. This task controls all BPF administration actions. This does not require a role assignment. Any user with Admin client installed can be assigned the ManageBPF task. For executing BPF, there is a task called BPFexecute. The user task profile is considered while executing any steps or sub-steps. January

7 ... How To... configure and execute Business Process Flows in SAP Business Objects Planning and 3. Step-by-Step Procedure Here we will describe the process to configure BPF template, create an instance from that template and then execute the BPF. The last section explains the set up required for realizing notifications. 3.1Configuring BPF template 1. Log on to the Planning and Consolidation Administration client and click on Business Process Flows. Click on Create BPF Template in the action pane. 2. Enter the name and description of the BPF. Enter the controlling application 3. Click on Instance identifier and select the dimensions to create BPF instances. Please note that only time type dimension is preselected by the system and is the only required dimension. However it is a best practice to select at least two dimensions to define an instance. January

8 4. Click on Set Access to select either the users or teams who should have access to this BPF. 5. Click Next to create the steps and sub steps. Click Add to add a step. Enter the details as shown below for the step to seed the 2009 plan data from 2008 plan data. January

9 6. Please note that in this step we have set Allow reopen to No and Opening criteria as All step region. Allow reopen will allow that step to be reopened after completion. If this is set to No that step can t be reopened during execution. Opening criteria All step regions will enable opening of the next step only after all step regions are complete whereas in case of Matched step region when we complete a step region, the next step opens for the same step region. The first step of the BPF always opens regardless of the opening criteria. Defining these options will be important for the second step onwards. Click on Define Step Region Criteria and enter the details as follows. January

10 7. Please note that we can select any property as the owner property. The property that we select must have fully qualified user name as shown below. The same rule applies for the reviewer property also that we will use in the next BPF step. 8. Please note that the Choose reviewer property is grayed out in the screen capture below because we did not check the box Enable Reviewers in the earlier screen. Click OK to go back to the step and OK again to go back to the wizard. 9. Select the dimension members as shown below. We can select up to 6 dimension members here. The available selection formulas are SELF, BAS and DEP. January

11 10. Similarly create another step as shown below. Please note that in this case, we are enabling review, allowing reopen and setting the opening criteria to Matched Step Region. Selecting Matched Step region will enable opening of the corresponding step region from the next step after completing a step region. Please note that here we have to use the same driver dimension for this step and the next to avoid a deadlock (referred to in Appendix B). January

12 11. Click on Define Step Region Criteria and enter the information as shown below. Please note that we can choose any property to be the reviewer property. However it is a good practice to name the properties accordingly for easy identification. 12. Include the dimension members similar to the previous step. 13. Click on Add new sub-step and add a sub-step to this step as shown below 14. Enter step 3 as follows. Please note that we have set Allow Reopen to No and Opening Criteria to All Step Regions. January

13 15. Click on Define Step Region Criteria and set it up as shown below. 16. Include dimension members similar to the previous step. 17. Click OK to go back to the step and OK to go back to the wizard. 18. Click Next to access the actions. Click on the first step to seed data and select data manager from the interface and DATA MANAGER from the task as shown below. Please note that the default action is created automatically and we can add more actions if needed. January

14 19. Click on the sub step Enter changes for US and for the default action, select Interface for Excel in the interface and Schedule library in the task as shown below. 20. Please note that we can select any previously saved input schedule by clicking the Browse button. In this case, we are selecting a dynamic template. For each dimension, note the current view type. Since we selected Category and Time in the instance identifier, we have an option to inherit those values from the instance. Please note that the P_CC (entity type dimension) is restricted to only one value US. 21. Please note that we are entering all these actions in the tab step actions. The review actions are not available with SP00. As a workaround, we can also use a step or sub step (similar to January

15 ones we are creating) for review actions. In this simplistic scenario, we will be skipping the review actions. 22. Enter a second action in the same sub-step to recheck and send the data. Please note the task selected (SEND ACTIVE WORKSHEET).This is an example of entering multiple actions for the same step/sub-step. 23. Click Back to go to earlier screen to define steps and sub-steps. Click on the sub-step Enter changes for US and click on Copy button. Enter the name as Enter changes for Canada and click OK. Similarly copy the sub-step to enter changes for Germany. 24. Click Next to go to actions. Click on the sub-step Enter rates for Canada and change the P_CC member from US to Canada as shown below. Similarly for the sub-step Enter changes for Germany change the P_CC member to Germany. January

16 25. Click Save to save the BPF template. You may receive messages as shown below. Select Yes to save the template. 26. Click on the BPF template that was saved and click on Validate BPF template. January

17 ... How To... configure and execute Business Process Flows in SAP Business Objects Planning and 27. Answer Yes to the following question. 28. You may receive validation errors if you have missed a step or mistyped it or if there is some other inconsistency. Otherwise, you will receive a message as follows. 3.2Configuring BPF instance 1. In the previous section, we created a template. In this section, we will use that template to create a BPF instance that we will execute in the next section. 2. Click on the BPF validated in the above step and then click on Create BPF Instance. 3. Please note that the dimensions that we set as the instance identifiers are displayed in the first step. Select the pertinent dimension members. January

18 4. In the next step, we select the instance owner. The instance owner can reopen a step regardless of involvement in the step. 5. Click on Create BPF instance. 6. We will be presented with a preview as shown below. We can update the owner or reviewer here. 7. Click Finish to end the process. 8. Click on Manage BPF instance. The default filter setting is to show active BPF instances and the one that we created in the above step may not show up here. 9. Change the filter setting to inactive and click refresh. The newly created BPF instance will now be displayed as shown below. January

19 ... How To... configure and execute Business Process Flows in SAP Business Objects Planning and 10. Click the checkbox next to the instance and click on the Activate button to activate it. Change the filter setting to Active and click Refresh again. The newly activated instance shows up in the list of active instances. 11. Now we are ready to execute this BPF instance. 3.3Executing the BPF 1. Click on Interface for the Web 2. Click on Business Process Flows 3. The business process flow opens up with the first step already opened. 4. Click on the step and that will take us to the next screen as shown below. January

20 5. Click on the step name Seed and that will launch Excel interface with the Data Manager actions as per the settings in the BPF action. 6.. Please note that the values that we hard coded in the action screen of the BPF template have been passed correctly (for example P_Activity = A005, P_CC = US etc). 7. However the values that we set as inherit from BPF instance have not been inherited properly - this is a known issue which will be corrected in future support packs. 8. We can change the current view suitably and then execute the step to copy data from 2008 to 2009 January

21 9. After completing the step, we can click Back to BPF to take us back to the BPF. 10. Clicking complete will complete this step now. 11. Click on back to my activities to go back and view the status of our activities. 12. Please note the status of the steps now. Only Maintenance price data region is open for entering changes. The Personnel price data region is not yet open for entering changes. This is because we created the enter changes step with matched step region criteria for opening the step. 13. Click on the open step for enter changes for maintenance price and we will get the screen as shown below. January

22 14. We get the three sub-steps as we had created. Please note that the description of the sub-step that we created was Enter changes for US but the sub-step displayed truncates the for US part. This is something that we should be aware of while entering descriptions of the sub steps. 15. Click on the first sub-step and that will open the interface for Excel with the template that we provided in the action setting as shown below. 16. Please note the available tasks are as per the action settings. In this step we can make the changes to the seeded plan data and send the data after verifying the values as the sub step suggests. January

23 17. Click on Back to BPF after sending the data. Please note that this step should be reported complete only after all the three sub steps are done. Click on the second sub step and that will open up the input schedule to make the changes for Canada. Make the necessary changes and send the data. January

24 18. Similarly complete the sub step 3 for Germany. 19. Since we are done with all the sub steps here, we can complete this step. 20. Click complete and then the status will change to submitted as shown below. 21. This step requires review and hence the reviewer will get the screen as shown above where he/she can accept or reject the changes entered by the planner in the above step. 22. If we want to see the status of the BPF at this stage, we can click on back to my activities. The status of the BPF in My activities will be as follows at this stage 23. Please note that the upper portion of the my activities screen will show the overall progress of the BPF as shown below. January

25 24. If the reviewer wants to reject the changes, he or she can click on the reject button. That will change the status of the step to Rejected as shown below. 25. The my activities screen will also show this status as shown below. 26. At this stage, the planner can review the changes he/she has made, and complete the step so that it is resubmitted for review. 27. If the reviewer now accepts the changes by clicking accept button, the status will change as follows January

26 28. The my activities screen will show the status as follows: 29. Please note that the step execute reports for maintenance price data region is still pending though the preceding steps for that data region are complete. This is because the execute reports step is created with all criteria. Hence it will open up only after the preceding step is complete for all data regions and not just the matching data regions. 30. We can now complete the seed and enter changes steps for personnel price data region is similar way. January

27 31. After the reviewer accepts the changes for personnel price data region, the execute reports step will open up as shown below. 32. Click on the execute reports step for Maintenance price and that will open up the step as shown below. Please notice the action re-open step at the right hand top corner. We are able to see this because the earlier step was created with allow re-open as yes. 33. We will now see the re-open feature of BPF. The business scenario is that we have completed a step and proceeded to the next step (as we have proceeded to Step 3) and then we want to go back to the completed step (step 2 in our case) and make changes. Please note that we can go back only one step at a time here. So, if we have say 6 steps in the BPF, out of which steps 2,3,4,5 are re-open enabled and we want to reopen step 2 after we have completed step5, then in that case, we have to go back sequentially. Hence in that situation, we will re-open step 5,4,3 and then 2 in that order. In our example here, we are opening only one step. 34. Click on re-open step. This will open the earlier step of enter changes and change the status of the current step of execute reports to delayed as shown below. 35. The status of the BPF in my activities will now be as shown below. January

28 36. Please note that the status of enter changes is reopened and not just open. 37. The planners can now enter changes and the reviewer can review those changes as we did in the earlier step. 38. After the step execute reports is open again, click on execute reports for maintenance price region January

29 39. Click on execute reports. That will open up the report as per the action settings for that step. 40. After verifying the reports, click complete button to complete that step. The status of the BPF is now as shown below. 41. Similarly execute reports for personnel price also and complete the step. January

30 42. The top portion of the BPF now shows that all the steps are complete. 43. After all the steps of the BPF are complete, the BPF owner has an option to Finalize the BPF. In order to do that, click on Monitor. 44. The BPF instance owner will have the option to Finalize the BPF by clicking the Finalize process button. 45. Once the BPF is finalized, it can be seen in the monitor and in My activities screen with status filter set to Finalized. 46. Once the BPF is finalized, it is no longer active. The finalized BPF can be archived from the Manage BPF instance action in the BPC Admin console. January

31 47. Please note that BPF can t be deleted. They can only be archived to remove them from the BPC Admin console. 48. The archived BPFs are available for reporting if needed. In order to report on archived BPF, click on Archived instances report 49. It will show the BPF instances by template. January

32 3.4 Setting up notifications 1. In order to maintain the notification template, go to transaction se38 in SAP GUI and enter program name UJB_MAINTAIN_ _TMPL 2. Click execute and enter the template id, the template type C and Is active as Y. 3. Maintain the template for the notification January

33 4. The available variables in the template include %INSTANCE_NAME%, %STEP_NAME%, %URL%, %STEP_REGION_NAME%. These variables will be replaced at run time with real values. 5. The server name to send the notifications is maintained in the server manager January

34 6. The notification is received as shown below. The URL in the can be used to access the BPF directly. It takes us to the my activities screen. 7. The conditions for notifications as well as recipients for each condition are listed in Appendix C. January

35 4. Appendices 4.1Appendix A BPF Terminology Term Definition Business Process Flow A specific business process customized for a customer within the context of SAP Business Planning and Consolidation (BPC). BPF Template BPF Instance The definition to achieve a specific business process including, steps, actions and data regions The iteration of a BPF template (i.e, budget 2008.TOTAL) BPF Step Region An instance of a BPF step which represents the smallest common region of data to perform a business process step BPF Identifiers The dimension which defines a unique BPF instance BPF Driver An named property to define the owner of a specific Step Region (best Dimension Owner practice would be to prefix the property name with BPFO_ ) Property BPF Driver Dimension Reviewer Property BPF Monitor An optionally named property to define the reviewer of a specific Step Region (best practice would be to prefix the property name with BPFR_ ) Only required if review for the step is required. A global view of all BPF instances and a detailed view of any selected BPF instance with all steps and step regions. BPF My Activities BPF steps/sub-steps for a BPF instance: The process flow is displayed within a Web interface with the sequential BPF steps BPF Step Regions can be selected In addition any applicable sub-steps are shown Each step has a visual indicator of its status Admin BPF assistant The preparation/definition dialog interface required to establish a BPF template Action Pane BPF Action Presentation of SAP BPC functional tasks (actions) that are state or BPF sensitive - for example when the user has a schedule open, the action pane will reflect the option to send data Pre-defined BPC tasks and its associated parameters BPF launch action = action taken at the time of step/sub-step selection BPF non-launch action = action available in action pane when step/sub-step is active January

36 4.2Appendix B Recipients of notifications No. Condition Who Shall be Notified Link THE BPF INSTANCE "%INST_NAME%" IS ACTIVATED. THE BPF INSTANCE "%INST_NAME%" IS INACTIVATED. THE BPF INSTANCE "%INST_NAME%" IS WAITING FINALIZATION. Instance owner Instance monitor Instance owner Instance monitor Instance owner Instance monitor 4 THE BPF INSTANCE "%INST_NAME%" IS RESET. Instance owner Instance monitor THE STEP REGION %STEP_REGION_NAME% IS OPENED. THE STEP REGION %STEP_REGION_NAME% IS COMPLETED THE STEP REGION %STEP_REGION_NAME% IS REOPENED. Step region owner Step region owner Step region owner My Activities (single view) My Activities (single view) My Activities (single view) 8 THE STEP REGION %STEP_REGION_NAME% NEEDS REVIEW. Step region reviewer My Activities (single view) 9 10 THE STEP REGION %STEP_REGION_NAME% IS CHANGED INTO PENDING STATUS. THE STEP REGION %STEP_REGION_NAME% IS REJECTED. Step region owner Step region owner My Activities (single view) My Activities (single view) 11 THE BPF INSTANCE "%INST_NAME%" IS FINALIZED. Instance owner Instance Monitor January

37 4.3Appendix C BPF Considerations We have the following BPF considerations for using Business Process Flows in SAP Business Objects Planning and Consolidation 7.5, version for SAP NetWeaver with SP00. These considerations can be categorized into three categories namely sizing, BPF template and BPF instance. Considerations regarding sizing restrictions Up to 1 million step regions per BPF instances can be defined. The step regions can be calculated as a product of the number of steps and number of regions. Up to 1 thousand steps per BPF template/instance can be defined. Up to 100 BPF templates per appset can be defined. Up to 24 BPF instances per BPF template can be allowed Considerations regarding BPF templates The controlling application governs both the time dimension for BPF instances and the available dimensions for step regions. We have to define the BPF instance identifier separately and it will not default to the current view Considerations regarding BPF instance The end-user can use reopen in the user interface to reset a BPF instance step. Only end-user tasks are available to define a BPF and not administrative tasks. The first step will always be opened, regardless of how the opening criterion for the step is defined in the BPF template. Reopen function is available only for the prior step than the current one. Hence the last step of a process can t be reopened once that step is completed. We can deactivate and archive a BPF instance to manage the display of active and inactive BPF instances. January