Meet Bouzid, SAP Consultant

Hello Bouzid, so in a few words, what do you do at QESTIT?
I've been an IT consultant at QESTIT for several years, 7 years I think, and for the last few years I've been working as data migration manager on an SAP project.

This isn't your first time working on SAP projects, is it?
No, it isn't! I started working on SAP projects very early on in my career. I've been involved at various levels and scales, including internationally, since one of them involved deployment in over 26 countries.

This expertise is in demand today, as companies using SAP face the 2027 deadline. That year, everyone will need to have migrated to SAP 4/HANA. The stakes are high, and choosing the right partners is crucial. What's the key to a successful migration project?
In one sentence, I'd say: a good identification of the people involved in the project and a realistic budget.

• When I talk about human strength, it's very important. You need to identify trustworthy partners (including good testers) and the project players on the customer's side. You need to choose them for their functional (SAP) and business skills (key users). Building a good team is the key to a successful project.
• As for the budget, I'm not saying that you should necessarily inflate the envelope, but that you should evaluate it with specialists, or list your priorities carefully. This last point often enables you to stay within the envelope if you need to.

You mentioned “trusted partners”. How do you choose them?
I think it's really important to surround yourself with specialists and work hand in hand with each of them. That means working with companies with experience in the field. This ensures a quality migration and a well-defined project. At QESTIT, we're fortunate to have over 25 years of software testing expertise, and SAP specialists, including myself.

"Key users” also seem to play an important role, can you tell us more about that?
It's important to remember that SAP projects are unique in that there are many players involved in or affected by the changes that are about to take place. So we need to establish a relationship of trust with management, and then define key roles, known as “key users”. These will act as references to ensure that their job is well understood, and will also be trained in the new version of SAP. They will also be trained in the new SAP version, so that they can act as intermediaries with end users.

How do you ensure that collaboration with the business referents is a success?
The key to any SAP project is to really understand the different businesses that will be impacted. The analysis of the existing system, the “as is”, is crucial and enables us to build a future version, “to be”, that really meets the needs. It's a question of teaching, of really building a relationship of trust with these teams. Nobody likes change in their working habits, so our role is to anticipate it as best we can to avoid frustration during the go-live. We call this “change management”.

With all the projects you've done and followed, what are the differences between an SAP project and others?
The main difference with SAP is that this software includes modules that are more or less adapted to customer needs. So you have to set up the right modules and customize some of them to suit your business needs. In a “classic” project, you start from scratch and create everything. The approach is therefore quite different.

You've worn many hats on these projects, what's the most crucial role you've played?
The key to the success of this type of project is the team. But if I had to single out one role in particular, I'd have to say the person in charge of data migration. Data is essential today, and very precious for some companies. You need to be able to clean up the data and adapt it efficiently to the new system, by defining the right new rules (Mapping, data management and integration rules, etc.). Once again, this is all done in conjunction with the business referents who define the migration and implementation guidelines. The tester then becomes indispensable for verifying all these flows and the correct application of the rules.

What are the biggest challenges you've faced? How did you overcome them?
Oh there aren't a thousand, the main one is obviously the go live. Our challenge is the success of the project, that's the main thing. To succeed, I think it depends on the people we surround ourselves with:

• You have to be a driving force, motivated and motivating. This helps the people around you to stay motivated. It's a virtuous circle.
• A good team atmosphere is very important. There has to be good energy between the customer and us, so that everyone has the right dynamic for the project.

To conclude this interview, let's talk a little more about you! How did we get into the world of testing - by passion, by chance?
You could say that! For me, it was more by chance, since I studied technical subjects and throughout my career, I've had many different roles (developer, solution architect, solution data architect, business analyst, test manager, migration manager...).

If you hadn't had this career, what job would you have done?
I'd have loved to have been a watchmaker or a violin maker, which tells you how much I love precision and meticulousness!