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SAP Project System - A ready Reference ( Part 1 )

former_member190313
Active Participant

‎05-09-2008 2:28 AM

 72 Kudos

Being a beginner in SAP PS is a challenge. As a techie, When I started my ABAP

Program in PS Module, I found a lot of scattered information but there is no article or
blog with consolidated information even on basic terminologies of SAP PS. This blog
is my attempt to provide an insight of basic techno-functional aspects and
terminologies of SAP PS to a novice.

In my first blog you will find the important terms of the PS module. I have tried to
explain them with the help of an example. Following this is the next blog SAP Project
System - A ready Reference ( Part 2 ) where the technicalities of the same are
covered.

The Project System (PS) module of SAP is specifically designed to provide

comprehensive and fully integrated project management functionality for SAP
customers. A Project is a complex undertaking, bringing with it huge data of different
type.

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At the beginning of each project, whether it involves developing a new product, make-
to-order engineering or internal organization, you need to define and set up the
structures necessary to manage your project and incorporate them into your existing
organizations and processes. Before you can run a project in its entirety, you must first
describe the project goals precisely and create a structure for the project activities to
be carried out. A clear project structure provides a basis for successful project
planning, monitoring and control.

Organizational Structures in Project System:

"

You create and manage your project structure in SAP R/3 Project System, by means of
work breakdown structures and networks.The WBS describes individual phases and
functions of a project. Network contains the individual project tasks and the
dependencies between them in the form of activities and relationships

Some important terms:

Project Definition
Project Definition is general description of the project that you want to manage. It is a
framework laid down for all the objects created within a project. It contains
organizational data that is binding for the entire project.

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Work Breakdown Structure (WBS)

WBS is a hierarchical model of the tasks to be performed in the project. It provides
overview of the project and forms basis for the project organization and coordination.It
shows work, time and money spent on the project. You can use it to plan dates &
costs and allocate budget. The Work Breakdown Structure can be displayed according
to:
Phase
Function
Object

Individual tasks required to carry out the project is called WBS elements.

Network
The network describes project processing. Thus the Network contains instructions on
how to carry out activities in a specific way, in a specific order and in a specific time
period.Main elements of network are activities and relationships. It forms the basis for
planning, analyzing and monitoring time schedules, costs, & resources.

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Activities
Activities are used to plan project staffing, capacity, material, PRTs, and service
requirements. When activities are assigned to WBS elements, detailed view of costs,
dates, and capacities at WBS element could be obtained. It’s a task in a network
which has a defined start and finish. An activity can be broken down into activity
elements.Three categories of activities in the Project System:·

Internal Activities
External Activities
General Cost Activities

Activity element
Activity element is an activity which is subordinate to another activity. Activity
elements contain the same information as activities.Three categories of activity
elements in the Project System:
Work elements
External Elements
General Cost Elements

Activity Type
It’s a physical measure of activity output of a cost center .e.g. hours, number of units
produced, machine times, production times.

Milestones
Milestones are the events in the project to which particular importance is attached Or
which trigger predefined functions. In general they indicate transition between
different departments or phases. Milestones are assigned to activities and WBS
elements:In PS milestones are used to:
Trigger predefined functions in network activities.
Carry out earned value analysis.
Determine dates in billing plan for sales orders.
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Relationships
You use relationships to depict chronological and technical dependencies between
activities. The relationship determines the nature of the link between the individual
activities. :
FS Relationship : An activity does not start until the preceding activity is
completed.
SS Relationship : An activity can not start unless another activity has started.
FF Relationship : An activity can not be completed until another activity has
been completed.
SF Relationship : An activity can not be completed until another succeeding
activity has stared.

Confirmations
It is a part of network control. It documents the state of processing for the network
activities and activity elements. There are two types of confirmations Partial &
Final.Confirmations are used to record:
The work center where the activity was carried out.
The person who carried out this activity.
The yield and scrap produced in an activity.
The actual values for the duration and dates.

Settlement
As a rule, projects are used to collect and monitor costs, but are not usually the final
cost object. For this reason the costs in atypical project will be settled at the end of
the period.To this end, you store settlement rules in the activity / WBS element
requiring settlement. They contain information on settlement receivers, cost
apportionment and control data. Settlement receivers could be cost centers, G/L
accounts. Etc.

Budget
The budget is the approved cost structure for an action or project in a particular
period.Budgeting differs from cost plan in that it is binding. In the approval phase you
prescribe your project funds in the form of budget. It is possible to allocate overall and
annual budget in parallel.

Work Centers
Work center represents the resources responsible for executing an activity. In a work
center, you can enter the available capacity and an operating time. You can arrange
the work centers in a hierarchy for capacity evaluation purposes. Internal activities
are assigned to work centers (resources) to be completed.A work center is a physical
unit within a company where an activity is performed.

Profit Center

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It is subdivision of business organization which is set up for internal management

control purposes. Profit centers divide business up on a management basis. The basic
aim of profit center accounting is to present areas of the business as entities operating
independently in the market.

Lots of jargons ….let me site an instance of the construction project of a

building..

Let say there is a construction company that is going to construct a Multi-Storey

building.

The first thing that needs to be created in the system is Project Definition. The entire
activity plan for this project will come under this project definition. Overall budget
needs to be estimated, assigned and get approved for the project. Project timeline
needs to be decided. Project could be then subdivided into separate parts which are
actually WBS elements lets say in this e.g. we have 4 main WBS elements:

1. Land Acquisition
2. Procurement
3. Construction
4. General

To every above WBS, budget and time line need to estimated.

Now to take an example we will drill down two WBS elements namely Land
Acquisition and Construction.

- Land Acquisition could be sub divided into activities as in

Generation of request document for the land.
Soil testing
Approval for construction
Preparation of purchase order of the land

Above 4 activities should be done in sequence. As in second activity will start only
after request document for the land is completed and so on. Hence these activities
have FS Relationship between them.

- Now take WBS element Construction.

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It could be sub divided in to floor wise tasks. Let say, we have four story building and
each floor has 4 flats. So under WBS element ‘Construction’ we may create separate
sub WBS element for each floor. Each sub WBS element of floor may be divided
further into last level of WBS elements one for each flat on the floor. This way we
will have hierarchy of the WBS elements.Finally last level of WBS elements i.e.
WBS elements of the flats will have activities like

1. Plumbing
2. Electrical work
3. Flooring
4. Painting
5. Furniture

These activities form the Network.

Let say Plumbing and Electricity work are the external activities as they are given to
a outside contractor. While the other activities are done by company labor so they are
internal activities. Plumbing and Electrical work could be started
simultaneously.While flooring needs be done once the plumbing and Electrical work is
complete. Hence they have FS relationship and so on…. Now if we talk about
milestones:
1. First milestone could be purchasing the land
2. Second could construct the base of the building.
3. Third could be construct the floors
4. Fourth could be completion of plumbing and electrical work for all the flats. And
so on….

As I have said that Work center represents the resources responsible for executing
an activity For the above activities, work centers could be the company labor required
for the construction, labor provided by the external service center for plumbing and
Electricity work. while Profit Centers could be the finally constructed flats.

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Project Examples
Elements
Sr
NO
1 Project Def Constructing the Buiding

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2 WBS
Generation of request document for
the land
Soil testing
Approval for construction
Preparation of purchase order of the
land

3 Activities
(Under 3rd Plumbing( external Activities)
WBS) Electricity work( external Activities)
Flooring (internal activities)
Painting (internal activities)
Furniture

4 Relationship Flooring needs be done after the plumbing

and Electricity work. Hence they have FS
relationship
5 Milestones
First milestone could be purchasing
the land
Second could construct the base of
the building.T
hird could be construct the floors
Fourth could be completion of
plumbing and electricity work for all
the flats

6 Network Plumbing and Electricity installation are to

be one contractor each. Therefore, there
exist a network within on the activities of it
under different WBSs.

( Referencee : The book : Functions in Detail : R/3 System - Project Management in

Engineering & Construction )

Tags:

Retagging Required sheetal deshmukh

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29 Comments

former_member184495
Active Contributor

‎05-11-2008 8:33 PM

 0 Kudos

Hi Sheetal,
a good blog to understand the terminologies in PS.
Waiting for Part 2.

Great work.

Regards,
Aditya

Former Member


‎05-11-2008 9:08 PM

 0 Kudos

Sheetak the Blog is really nice n very useful.

Former Member


‎05-11-2008 9:11 PM

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 0 Kudos

Sheetal very good Blog.

and indeed it is very useful.

Former Member


‎05-11-2008 10:08 PM

 0 Kudos

Nice and concise information on PS. Gr8.

Regards
Arpil

Former Member


‎05-11-2008 11:05 PM

 0 Kudos

Very well written for the consolidated information on SAP PS.

Former Member


‎05-12-2008 4:52 AM

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 0 Kudos

A good one . Will really help beginners to understand the concepts of SAP PS.

Former Member


‎05-13-2008 6:57 PM

 0 Kudos

Hi

Good job.
Both the parts are very much descriptive and can be used as reference for techies.
Starting point for beginners.
Thanks.

Former Member


‎05-20-2008 12:58 AM

 0 Kudos

Hi Sheetal,
This is a very useful blog for all the techis...Very simple language and a lot of
useful content...
Keep it up.

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Thanks
Nayan


SG141
Active Participant

‎06-12-2008 8:55 AM

 0 Kudos

hi sheetal i am working on a report in PS and need to pull the last posting date with
amount spend on the project.... where can i those.... thank you.


Makal
Active Contributor

‎01-05-2009 9:15 PM

 0 Kudos

Sheetal,
Wonderful job. Any beginner can understand the concept, terminology, and whole
picture of PS.

Amaresh

Former Member


‎02-04-2009 4:55 AM

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 0 Kudos

Hi Sheetal,

Very helpful blog!

I am very new to PS, and as per our requirement, i need to send a mail to completion
of one step. So i need to link a workflow to the PS.

Can you help me on this?

Thanks,
Runal

Former Member


‎06-27-2010 11:24 PM

 0 Kudos

Its Very easy to understand the basic flow of the PS module

Good attempt

Regards
Kiran

Former Member


‎07-02-2010 6:50 PM

 0 Kudos

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Hello Sheetal

Very nicely presented the Project system

Muthu

Former Member


‎08-23-2010 4:17 AM

 0 Kudos

Hi shital,

its very gr8 documentation for PS freash consultant.Hope if you have more
documentation ,you will forwards to sdn forum.

Regards,

Mahesh Amale

Former Member


‎08-10-2011 10:11 PM

 0 Kudos

The documents created are excellent and very useful to any PS module user.

Can you throw some ligt on how to import network activites from excel sheet.
Similarily can i import Confirmation from a excel sheet.

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Regards
SCSharma
GM_Manufactuing systems (using SAP)

Former Member


‎06-15-2012 9:53 AM

 0 Kudos

Hi Sheetal,

You have a done a great job!!!

Regards,

Pranav

Former Member


‎06-25-2012 11:36 AM

 0 Kudos

Nice Material.......Thanks sheetal

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Former Member


‎06-26-2012 6:02 PM

 0 Kudos

Hi Sheetal'

Thank you for giving such a valuable information for easy understanding of
PS basics.

Regards'

srikanth.


former_member190313
Active Participant

‎06-29-2012 11:33 AM

 0 Kudos

Thanks all for appreciating my work !

Former Member

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
‎07-03-2012 7:29 AM

 0 Kudos

Its really a great thing.Such an effort to make the jargons and business flow
comprehensible is really commendable!!

Thanks and Regards

Former Member


‎07-31-2012 10:52 AM

 0 Kudos

Nice Stuff for a beginner.

Great job!

Thanks & Regards

Nandha

Former Member


‎12-27-2012 10:42 AM

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 0 Kudos

Hi Sheetal,

Nice blog , Its very good for a beginner irrespective of Techincal or fuctional.

Thanks a lot.

Continue the same great Work :smile:

Thanks and regards,

Shekhar

Former Member


‎07-31-2013 7:08 AM

 0 Kudos

Hello...

Thanks for this usefull blog..really i don't have any idea about PS but after i read this
got a basic idea, the explanation give with the relation of construction excellent and
easy to understand..

fq1
Explorer

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
‎02-23-2016 6:43 AM

 0 Kudos

Hi,

Extremely good blog. Specially for beginners in PS. Looking forward for more like this.


MRobalinho
Active Participant

‎05-20-2016 2:20 PM

 0 Kudos

Excelent.

Very good work.

Former Member


‎03-16-2017 10:55 PM

 0 Kudos

This is good information, it made my life easier when trying to explain other people
with no PS experience.

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Thank you!


rohankoul
Associate

‎03-26-2018 12:22 PM

 0 Kudos

Thanks for the explanation. It was really helpful for me.

The example used is clear and easy to understand.

Great work


Anjhi
Contributor

‎02-13-2019 8:05 PM

 0 Kudos

Great work

former_member710317
Discoverer

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
‎04-26-2022 4:42 AM

 0 Kudos

really great blog , please keep posting the other module which you have worked on .

thank you .

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