Business Process Monitoring: Absoft serviceis, a UK First

Leading SAP® consultancy, Absoft, has announced a step change in the way it monitors clients’ enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, with the launch of its next generation SAP Managed Service. Robert MacDonald, Absoft Innovation & Technology Manager, explains the impact this can have on a sector which continues to address unprecedented challenges.

“Right now, it’s safe to say that the cost-effective, smooth running of any business is higher up the agenda than ever before. As global business continues to adjust to the challenges created by the current pandemic, the nuts and bolts of many companies - the ERP solutions that keep them running on a dayto-day basis - have to perform at optimum levels, with minimum of technical issues.

“Whilst in the pipeline long before Covid-19 struck, the challenges around cost and resource that the pandemic has brought to the global oil and gas industry make our nextgeneration SAP Managed Service particularly timely. Since the early 90s, we have witnessed peaks and troughs within the oil and gas sector and are experienced in helping clients weather the storm from a business IT perspective.

“The first SAP specialist in the UK to offer this level of business process monitoring, Absoft has focused upon automated monitoring, incident self-healing and self-service features. Real-time visibility of all critical business processes, the ability to eradicate repeated incidents and the option for users to request automated process implementation - without the need for human interaction - are set to revolutionise the SAP user experience and the results it can achieve.

“This combined support model provides clients with access to both functional and technical support and its flexibility allows it to align with specific business requirements. Root-cause analysis of technical issues, fast resolution and less operational interruptions are at the heart of the new service.”

Automation: the buzzword

“Absoft has consistently been ahead of the curve in comprehensive technical monitoring. The decision to launch the next-level SAP Managed Service is reflective of that approach, providing proactive and highly engaged automated monitoring of business processes.

“As anyone familiar with enterprise resource solutions like SAP will tell you, things go wrong in that complex environment. But does the support analyst know the implications of each error, and are the errors that affect the business the most brought to their attention first?

“Imagine a support service where everybody knew exactly the implications of every SAP error. For example, a printer fails and the SAP support team immediately knows which processes will be subsequently affected and takes steps to mitigate that. That is the benefit of automated monitoring.”

Self-Healing Systems

“Combining automation with monitoring also brings self-healing benefits. Put simply, this means that no SAP incident will ever reoccur. The system will detect a problem, respond and resolve it permanently, without the need for human involvement. This has significant impact upon business processes: not only does it save time in terms of manual tracing and repeated resolution but critically, it immediately resolves the problem for reduced business impact. “This brings particular value to our clients now more than ever, as global business grapples with the current circumstances. Automated repair of technical problems allows Absoft to offer fixed client costs, without the caveat of additional costs, manpower and time required for repeated issue resolution.”

Customer Experience

“We’ve all experienced the sinking feeling of realising we must deal with a service desk or follow a process that sends our request into seeming oblivion. It’s far better if the person you get through to knows what is happening and can resolve your issue, due to proactive monitoring of your activity.

“Self-Service requests are the next stage. A recent poll reported that 70% of consumers now expect self-service applications available to them. It makes sense; think how much of our daily lives we organise and manage without any human interaction. “Absoft has introduced that approach to its Managed Service. Automated SAP processes can now be requested and approved at the touch of a button, and then completed without human interaction – whether this be a system refresh, a transport request or a custom INNOVATION ZONE automation. Less time, less hassle and far less SPONSORED BY administration required.”

The Future

“Things are changing fast and Absoft is making an unprecedented level of investment in our managed service. Our aim is to make SAP simpler, faster, more reliable and more cost effective than ever before; an ethos truly aligned with the offshore energy industry of 2020 and beyond.”