SAP Analytics
Thought Leadership

It is said that there is no accounting for taste. Meaning, there is no mathematical formula that can define and score what individuals prefer. This is because each person has their own “taste” or set of subjective preferences they find appealing, and attempting to distill this highly variable process of selecting what one finds attractive, tasteful, even beautiful to a digital formula for universal criteria is considered impossible.

For some reason, this same subjectivity has reigned in the world of Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) solutions for too long, as I will argue. With the advent of xP&A (Extended Planning & Analysis), which can be thought of as high-intensity EPM, deciding which solution to buy is more critical than ever.

EPM as a solution category has arguably been around for more than two decades. Before the turn of the century, a long line of solutions starting with Hyperion was developed to alleviate specific pain points caused by Excel-based financial planning and analysis (FP&A) processes. 

In the first significant redefinition of EPM technology requisites, Gartner has just coined xP&A for Extended Planning & Analysis. While Gartner did not necessarily define an advanced performance management process to go along with these new platform technology requirements…xP&A does make possible some highly valuable advancements that are, in our humble opinion, worth serious consideration. 

Two key themes underpin xP&A:

• Alignment of Operational and Financial planning and analysis
• Incorporation of AI features such as Predictive Analytics

Of course, astute users of EPM might observe that using EPM tools to cover operational planning and analysis is not new, nor is predictive analytics. What is new is aligning these capabilities as a unified platform and assigning it a label. 

Let's face it, Gartner is influential. Redefining this category has had a ripple effect almost immediately on the market. Vendors formerly identifying as EPM technology developers snapped in alignment to rebrand their product portfolio as supporting xP&A. Customers are sure to follow Gartner's classification and articulate requirements for new analytics solutions using the fresh xP&A framework. 

How do longstanding vendors support these newly defined requirements? Prospective customers seeking the benefits of xP&A are right to be skeptical. Let's discuss three key ways technology vendors offering cloud EPM solutions may be overplaying their capabilities when they claim their solutions support xP&A. 

Most organizations think about defining and improving the business case for expected ROI from EPM models only at the time of technology purchase - if these concepts are considered at all. But this is a mistake. Instead, the best practice is to measure the ROI of the system frequently in as many meaningful dimensions as can be evaluated. For example, solution and cycle performance times, analytic value, accessibility/reach are all crucial dimensions where metrics should be defined and consistently monitored for optimization opportunities. Doing so will help to bring about a significant shift in Performance Management capabilities.

The current trend is to start from scratch and re-implement performance management (EPM or xP&A) solutions to address challenges with the status quo solution effectiveness. Unfortunately, this extreme step is very costly and not likely to produce high-value results.

Over the last decade, Column5 has been very involved in supporting SAP BPC Solutions, and a common theme for our customers has been the performance and stability of their system. With this in mind, we set out to address this challenge by developing the Darwin program.

Darwin has evolved (pun intended) to become a comprehensive platform of advanced features and pre-defined processes helping organizations maximize the value of SAP Analytics investments.

This blog focuses on how customers leverage Darwin’s advanced calculation capabilities to address common performance challenges specifically.