Executive summary

Eskom , South Africa 's national electricity utility, is using SAP Tutor to help self-train and support 7 500 geographically dispersed users on six SAP modules - materials-, asset- and financial management, management accounting, project accounting and plant maintenance. Chosen for its ease of integration, SAP Tutor supports classroom-based training designed by Eskom's Finesse Solution Centre - accredited as a SAP customer competency centre (CCC) in 2000.

Lead

South Africa 's national electricity utility, Eskom, is one of the top 11 utilities in the world in terms of generation capacity and one of the top 9 in terms of sales. In 1998 Eskom implemented SAP R/3 in one of the largest and fastest implementations known at the time. It earned several international awards, including that of the Smithsonian Institute, for exceptional project management skill in bringing the project in on time and under budget. Crucial to the success of the implementation was Eskom's involvement of both users and management in the 300-strong project team, thereby ensuring their buy-in. Consolidating user commitment and capability through training, remains a primary objective of the Finesse Solution Centre, which was born out of the implementation project.

Business dilemma

Eskom consists of three divisions - Eskom Holdings, which generates, transmits and distributes electricity to municipalities and major industry sectors within South and Southern Africa, Eskom Enterprises, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Eskom by which all non regulated activities of Eskom businesses in South Africa and beyond its borders are carried out, and Eskom Development Foundation which undertakes Corporate Social Investment initiatives.

The three divisions combined earn revenues in excess of R32 billion and employ nearly 32 000 people of which Eskom Holdings contributes R31 680 billion of the revenue and employs 28 938 of the staff.

In 1996, Eskom Holding's commercial and financial systems and its human performance were not aligned with the organisation's new vision - which is to become a major player in the international energy market and to provide energy leadership in Africa as part of the continent's renewal.

Apart from being old and dating very rapidly, Eskom's financial and commercial systems at the time were not Y2K compliant. Also, most of these systems were batch systems. To modernise these systems and also to achieve the synergies inherent in integration, Eskom initiated a two year project and rolled-out five SAP modules - materials-,asset- and financial management, management accounting and project accounting.

The pilot for the two-year project was completed in the transmission division in 1998 and the final roll-outs in the generation division a short five months later and in the distribution division three months thereafter.

In a total of 40 000 training days on 65 business courses, 7 500 geographically dispersed users were trained to use SAP before the system went live in the various divisions. The challenge of keeping such a large number of existing users up to date on upgrades and new functionality as well as inducting new users to the system remains a major challenge.

Annually, the Finesse Solution Centre conducts approximately 286 courses for more than 4 000 students at a cost of R3.1 million.

SAP Africa 's education consultant, public services, Johann Pretorius, points out that because it is the end users that drive the underlying business processes in any organisation, "SAP's user training strategy focuses on skills transfer in the long-term. Eskom understands and applies this principle and, therefore, recognised the value of SAP Tutor to its own training objectives."

SAP solution, SAP differentiators, and implementation strategy

During the initial SAP implementation in the late 1990s, training material was stored on a server-based system that was cumbersome, which could not be easily accessed and which did not support proper version control. With the opportunity presented by Eskom's upgrade to SAP R/3 version 4.6 in 2003, the Finesse Solution Centre moved to SAP knowledge warehouse and SAP iTutor (earlier version of SAPTutor). Early in 2004 it migrated to SAP Tutor.

Says Leonora Vincent, Eskom's SAP training manager: "We looked at alternative training products, but none of them offered the ease of integration and training support that SAP Tutor gives us."

The Centre uses SAP Tutor to support its classroom-based training. "Computer literacy is not consistent throughout the organisation, so we need time in the classroom to familiarise students with computers" says Vincent. "In addition, for many of our students English is a second language and so they need the personalised attention of our training facilitators in a classroom environment."

The Finesse Solution Centre training is designed around specific scenarios in which students are encouraged to try and 'break the system'. As a simulation tool, SAP Tutor is therefore used to demonstrate actual, correct transactions during courses and as a reference on user desktops after the course.

Results and business benefits

According to Tebogo Makhwelo, the Finesse Solution Centre's technical training systems specialist, the main benefit to Eskom of using SAP Tutor is that it provides an online reference tool for users - who can use it for self-training in their own time and at their own pace. "In other words, it helps us ensure that the competency we develop in the classroom is maintained at the desktop, no matter how geographically dispersed our students."

"Also, SAP Tutor is very easy to use. It only takes one or two demonstrations to get students up and running. So they are quite willing to use it once they leave the course. And that encourages a continual learning environment."

Future plans and wrap-up

Eskom Holdings has implemented the human resources module of SAP and the Finesse Solution Centre will add related content to its training courses. "Our plan is always to have 100% of our transactional training content available online, via SAP Tutor," says Makhwelo. "Users will never be able to say they couldn't find out how to do a particular transaction."

Eskom is also in the process of designing its e-learning infrastructure. The Finesse Solution Centre will align its technology and processes, including SAP Tutor with that infrastructure.

At-a-glance sidebar

• SAP Tutor, running on SAP R/3 version 4.6c
• Hardware platform - HP and SUN
• Operating system - Unix
• Database - Oracle
• 7 500 users
• Number of sites - +/- 120
• Consolidating user commitment and competency on SAP R/3 version 4.6c

For customers interested in learning more about SAP products:

Telephone: +27 11 235 6000
e-mail education.southafrica@sap.com
Toll Free: 0800-981 334