The Challenge
ESA faced a combination of organisational, technical and cultural challenges that made progress toward an S/4HANA migration difficult, such as a complex organisational structure with multiple directorates, legacy SAP challenges, migration uncertainty and intergovernmental priorities where the key business objective is compliance and traceability rather than traditional ROI.
ESA’s procurement capabilities are mission-critical and projects can span decades; supplier markets are limited and often highly specialised and processes need to be tightly mapped with signatures and approval included.
The organisation’s ongoing growth and program complexity required a modern, scalable and compliant digital core. ESA therefore needed to define a clear migration journey and path to implementation that was compatible with its regulatory and compliance-driven environment.
The S/4HANA migration also presents the opportunity to streamline shadow IT systems and consolidate ESA’s landscape while keeping business disruption to a minimum and maintaining the current levels of service to its stakeholders.
Resulting Solution
Resulting ran a Phase Zero engagement to prepare ESA for a successful SI selection and S/4HANA implementation.
Resulting began with a focus discovery phase to capture how ESA operates today, using executive interviews and targeted workshops to document end-to-end business processes and establish a shared understanding of requirements and constraints.
In parallel, Resulting baselined ESA’s “as-is” SAP landscape, documenting applications, integrations, reporting, data, and security using FusionGraph.
Resulting then began to understand the business’s priorities through conducting executive interviews, strategy reviews and using a heatmap to identify their key processes. This view was then used to explore potential “to-be” future-state scenarios aligned to ESA’s goals.
The outputs of Phase Zero were consolidated into the Phase Zero Ignition report, which set out clear findings, defined the current state, and outlined the practical options for moving forward, including what the future state could look like and what would be required to get there.
The Phase Zero approach was designed to embed change management principles and business alignment into every activity, rather than treating change as a standalone activity.
From this, Resulting produced seven structured recommendation areas, which were:
- Migration approach
- Integration platform
- Change, learning and adoption
- Code remediation and clean core
- Target platform definition
- Deployment approach
- Implementation cost and timeline
- S/4HANA opportunity identification
These recommendations provided ESA with a clear, evidence-based foundation for decision-making and planning, enabling the program to move forward with confidence and realise tangible benefits from the outset.
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Benefits Delivered
Together, Resulting and ESA completed Phase Zero, delivering a comprehensive, business-focussed S/4HANA migration report covering financial management, procurement and purchasing, and reporting and analytics.
Resulting provided a range of Phase Zero deliverables , including a solution briefing document, heatmapped process framework, RACI, and change-impact analysis that highlighted complexity and customisation so that they had a clear understanding of their business and what they need to achieve from an S/4HANA implementation ahead of selecting an SI.
By conducting executive interviews early, Resulting helped establish a common language and shared understanding of current challenges, future ambitions and the scale of change required. This helped to sell the project to change resistant members of the team.
Resulting also delivered additional value through RFP and procurement advice, SAP licence support including BOM review, shelfware identification and audit readiness, ROM estimates and Level 1 planning, and access to Resulting’s wider expert network.
These deliverables have ensured that, once ESA chooses a delivery partner, they will have a clear definition of the company’s SAP system and what it needs to deliver.
Conclusion
ESA needed to move from ECC to SAP S/4HANA but faced complex governance, stakeholder alignment challenges and change resistance rooted in historic SAP experiences.
Resulting delivered a Phase Zero engagement that clarified options, defined scope, documented processes, outlined the technical landscape, and equipped ESA with a detailed solution briefing document and informed stakeholders.
As a result, ESA has a clear strategy and credible investment case to move confidently into partner selection and implementation.
In complex, multi-directorate organisations such as ESA, governance clarity and stakeholder education are as critical as the technical planning of an S/4HANA migration. Deploying a phased approach builds confidence, in both the migration process and our expertise, and overcomes resistance in long-embedded SAP environments.
