What is your "fit" with Navision?
The learning begins. The Pre Sales Analysis is the getting to know you phase where your NSC starts to know what you need to run your business on Navision, and you start to learn about what Navision can do for your business. Its also where some of the kinks start to appear, and where the NSC is able to show them selves to you as the right company to Go-Live with. By this stage you have gone through the NSC review, you have seen all the Navision demos, and of course you have been promised that Navision will do everything you need. You will also know by this stage that you will most probably need your NSC to make system enhancements to match your exact business needs. The most complex part of this process, is of course matching your business requirements to Navision functionality, and then creating a gap fit analysis.Pre Sales Analysis
This is a critical phase of the Navision implementation process, and must be handled correctly. Now that you have decided (or are close to deciding) on Navision, its now time to find out how close Navision matches your business, some might say; how well your business matches Navision. This matching process is often referred to as the Gap-Fit Analysis.Differences between your business model and Navision
One day there will be a piece of software, that fits every business model, and covers every possible requirement. That day is not here yet. We are still at a stage, where between your business and Navision there lies a gap. To fill the gap there are generally three options. Modify Navision, Modify your business process, or find a work around. You will need to work with the various departments and come out with ROIs to decide which of the three options you will choose. The complex part of the Pre-Sales Gap-Fit Analysis, is that the Client and its employees knows its business, but probably don't know Navision. Whereas the NSC knows Navision, but probably does not know the Clients business.The size of the Gap between your business model, and Navision functionality is going to be a major factor affecting the final project cost.
Day In The Life
The key to a successful Gap-Fit Analysis, is to have a complete and effective definition of the companies business processes. The starting point for this is to create a Day In The Life map. This can be done how every you want, though I generally prefer to use Visio. The management of this task really depends on how complex your business is, and how well management know the process. In general you should be able to create a basic flow chart form 1-3 days of on site meetings between the client and NSC. And generally 2-5 days to complete and clean up the Visios. But this can vary dramatically depending on the particular circumstances.Gap-Fit
We do not at this stage have a contract signed, so its important that costs are controlled tightly at this stage. We are not trying to find every single Gap in the software, we are trying to scope out the size of the project, to get a feel for where we are heading. Since the NSC does not have a contract, they may be at this point eating a lot of the costs as "Sales Costs", and also from the client point of view, there may be a reluctance from some departments to invest their time and resources with out some form of commitment. Thus everyone needs to keep in mind and understand clearly that the Gap-Fit we are making, is an estimate, its is a starting point, and undoubtedly the final product will be very different. Keep this simple. And have everyone understand that this whole process will be repeated in more detail at a later stage.To create a Gap-Fit, we take the Day In The Life Visio, and Base out of the box Navision. We look at each point on the Visio, and then show how that function would be performed in Navision. At this point the appropriate team lead for that department, will indicate weather this works for them or not. And at this point the Sales Process tends to "Head South".
Up till now, everything has been pretty and flashy, and we are all happy. But in my experience, once we have specific scenarios, the arguments and problems start. Although most of the issues will be directed at the NSC, or sometimes to Navision, in reality, the project manager for the client needs to take control of the team, and get their buy in to the project. There should not be any software modifications done at this point, and definitely no promises should be made about what can be done. And the Client Project Manager needs to control the team leads for heading down the path of "Our Old Software Did That Standard" etc.
The purpose of the Gap-Fit is simply to get a list of Business Requirements, and then mark them as Gap or Fit. Nothing else. No quick fixes with code, no promises, etc. Just concentrate on the task at hand, of creating the list.
Once the list is complete, go back to the Gaps, and get a first idea of the required solution, i.e. 1/ Navision Mod, 2/ Business Process Reengineering or 3/ A manual work around. Unfortunately human nature, is that in the first round, the client is likely to mark almost all of the Gaps as "Requires Mod".
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