Deviating from the question and answers, I would like to highlight a
story from the Indian mythology. A teacher teaching his student
archers asked them all to shoot an arrow at a clay bird perched on the
top of a tree and hit the eye of the bird. All the archers shot at the
bird but only one of them managed to hit the eye of the bird. When the
teacher asked all the student archers what did they see when they shot
the clay bird,some said they saw the bird on a tree,some said they saw
the bird perched on the branch. The archer who shot the bird was
quiet. When he was asked by the teacher as to what he saw , prompt
came his reply “I saw the eye of the bird”.What I am trying to
highlight here is that it is very important for an SAP HR consultant
to understand what the customer requirements are and be focused on
those requirements only.
[edit]PROJECT SCOPING
All projects are time defined based upon agreed business requirements.
Delivering what has been agreed upon is what the consultants need to
focus upon. Do not try to deviate from what is defined unless agreed
upon by the customer and the project team. Save the frills, fancies
and anything extra for the enhancements.SAP projects cost a lot of
money and the estimation is based on work to be done. A project's
success depends on meeting the objectives, goals and requirements for
what the project endeavor was carried out within the defined time
lines. If the project deviates in cost, quality and time , it
indicates that what was defined as required by the customer is not
being met. Deviations to projects makes the project team loose
motivation and interest, disturbes human resource planning for other
projects when they are to be released from the existing projects and
begin work on the other projects. In short it creates a chaos besides
financial losses.Many of us are in consulting and we need to
understand the bottomline- time is money. If your projects make
profit, your company makes profit and you too profit. This should be
your motto.
So remember and drill this in your mind that requirements for an sap
hr project are to meet the company’s goals and objectives in
initiating the project and clearly not what the sap hr user or even
for that matter the sap configurator fancies or wants.The success of
the sap hr project is only when the project sponsor states that it is
a success.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[edit]QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[edit]INFOTYPES
I have decided to answer all the questions directly to begin with now
that you have some fundamentals explained and then go ahead with more
discussions
1.What are info types ?
Infotypes, known as information types are units of human resources
information formed by grouping related data fields together. These are
represented in the sap hr system by a unique 4 digit number eg.
Personal Data (0002), Address (0006) etc. All customer infotypes fall
in the number range from 9000 to 9999. The fields in the infotype
would vary based on the country grouping for eg. if any employee
belongs to country grouping 10 then he would have the SSN no field in
the Personal Data infotype which would not be seen in same infotype
for country grouping 99.
*Infotype no SAP HR sub module
0000-0999 Personal Administration (HR Master Data)
1000-1999 PD Infotypes ( OM etc)
2000-2999 Time Infotypes
4000-4999 Recruitment Infotypes
[edit]PERSONNEL ACTIONS& HIRING ACTION
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2.What are personnel actions? What is the transaction for executing
personnel actions? Personnel Actions are the events of an employee’s
employment history within the organization beginning from hiring an
employee to termination of the employee.Each of these events need
specific information to be captured. This is achieved in sap hr by
grouping together infotypes called as infogroup which appear one after
another in sequence to capture/change information in the infotypes
whenever the personnel action is executed. Personnel Actions are
executed by transaction pa40.
3.What are the important info types for a hiring action? The important
infotypes for executing a hiring action are.
0000- Actions
0001- Organizational Assignment
0002- Personal Data
0003- Payroll Status ( this is automatically maintained by the sap
system and not required to be maintained in the info group for
hiring)
0006-Address
0007-Planned Working Time ( This should always be maintained before
infotype 0008 Basic Pay)
0008- Basic Pay
0009- Bank Details
0016-Contract Elements
0041- Date Specifications
2006- ( For annual leave & sick leave)
Note that it is the hiring action that allows you to assign an
employee to the hr structures.
[edit]IMG & PROJECT IMG
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4.5 & 6 What is IMG? What is its importance? What are the functions
you can execute using IMG? What is customizing? What does customizing
support? How do you create a Project IMG? What are project views?
IMG means the implementation guide. The configurators would customize
the sap hr system as per the customer requirements in the img. In the
img you can create project img’s which limit the customizing nodes to
the requirement of the projects and for each project img you can
create multiple views like MM,SD,HR etc to get more specific. To go to
the implementation guide or img from the sap easy access menu ,you
have to enter transaction spro in the command line.
[edit]ENTERPRISE & PERSONNEL STRUCTURE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
5.What is an enterprise structure?
The enterprise structure is one of the HR structures. The HR
enterprise structure composition depends upon the hr administrative,
time and payroll functions for that company. It comprises the client,
company code, personal area, personnel subarea and the organization
key. The hiring action assign an employee via infotype 0001-
Organizational Assignment to the enterprise structure. The enterprise
structure is the enterprise perspective of an employee.
6.What is a personnel structure?
The organizational personnel structure describes how the employee is
positioned in the organization. This is an individual perspective of
an employee in an organization. It comprises of the employee group,
the employee sub group and the organization plan (org unit, position,
job) for that employee. The hiring action assigns an employee via
infotype 0001- Organizational Assignment to the personnel structure.
7.What is the highest level of the enterprise structure?
The client is the highest level of the enterprise structure.
8.What is company code? Is it defined in HR? If not where is it
defined?
The company code is an organization unit(this is different from the hr
organization unit. Different modules like SD, MM, etc have their own
organization structures with their own organization units) which has
its own balance sheet and profit and loss account and is defined in
the FI module.
9.What are personnel areas and its functions?
Personnel (( Please note the spelling -> its Personnel (group of
people)and not Personal(Individual)) Area is the sub division
(understand these two words) of the company code and can represent a
functional area or geographical location.These play a very important
role in the time and payroll configurations. Each personnel area is
unique to a company code (mark these words) and is represented by a 4
character code.
10.What are personnel sub areas and its functions?
The further divisions (understand this word) of a personnel area are
defined as personnel subareas. The functions are similar to the
personnel area. Each personnel subarea too is unique to a personal
area (mark these words) and is represented by a 4 character code.
Hi everyone, i would be continuing with the answers to the rest of the
questions as an when i get the time and try to keep this going till
completion.
11.How is an employee in the HR Master data linked to a company to
which he belongs?
EMPLOYEE--->PERSONNEL AREA--->COMPANY CODE--->COUNTRY GROUPING--
>CLIENT
12.Can a personnel area be assigned to many company codes?
No. A Personnel Area can be only assigned to one company code. Many
personnel areas can be assigned to the same company code but the vice
versa is not true.
13.What are the indicators defined by personnel sub areas?
The indicators are all personnel sub area groupings for hr, time,
payroll which are very critical to the sap hr implementation. They are
also used tolimit HR authorizations.
14.How do you categorize the employee groups?
Employee groups are categorized based on employee/staff regulations of
work and pay such as
Active
Retiree/Pensioner ….. and so on.
These are also used to limit HR authorizations.
15.What are employee subgroups and what are the indicators set up
using employee subgroups?
Further division of the employee groups are called the employee
subgroups such as under employee group 1-Active you could have
employee subgroups such as AA–Hourly wage earner, AH–Salaried Employee
…. And so on.The indicators are all employee sub area groupings for
hr, time, payroll which are very critical to the sap hr
implementation. They are also used to limit HR authorizations.
16.Employee groups are two character and employee subgroup are two
character representations in the IMG. Do you support this statement?
False. Employee groups are one character and employee subgroups are
two character representations.
17.In the HR Master data where are planned working times for an
employee seen?
IT 0007- Planned Working Time using transaction pa51 – Display time
data
18.Do I need to give country assignment to personnel sub areas in
customizing? If true support the statement and if not what’s true?
No. You do not need to give country assignment to personnel sub areas.
You need to give country assignments to the employee subgroups on
assigning to employee groups in the enterprise structure.
[edit]QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
------------------------------
[edit]INFOTYPES
I have decided to answer all the questions directly to begin with now
that you have some fundamentals explained and then go ahead with more
discussions
1.What are info types ?
Infotypes, known as information types are units of human resources
information formed by grouping related data fields together. These are
represented in the sap hr system by a unique 4 digit number eg.
Personal Data (0002), Address (0006) etc. All customer infotypes fall
in the number range from 9000 to 9999. The fields in the infotype
would vary based on the country grouping for eg. if any employee
belongs to country grouping 10 then he would have the SSN no field in
the Personal Data infotype which would not be seen in same infotype
for country grouping 99.
*Infotype no SAP HR sub module
0000-0999 Personal Administration (HR Master Data)
1000-1999 PD Infotypes ( OM etc)
2000-2999 Time Infotypes
4000-4999 Recruitment Infotypes
[edit]PERSONNEL ACTIONS& HIRING ACTION
------------------------------
2.What are personnel actions? What is the transaction for executing
personnel actions? Personnel Actions are the events of an employee’s
employment history within the organization beginning from hiring an
employee to termination of the employee.Each of these events need
specific information to be captured. This is achieved in sap hr by
grouping together infotypes called as infogroup which appear one after
another in sequence to capture/change information in the infotypes
whenever the personnel action is executed. Personnel Actions are
executed by transaction pa40.
3.What are the important info types for a hiring action? The important
infotypes for executing a hiring action are.
0000- Actions
0001- Organizational Assignment
0002- Personal Data
0003- Payroll Status ( this is automatically maintained by the sap
system and not required to be maintained in the info group for
hiring)
0006-Address
0007-Planned Working Time ( This should always be maintained before
infotype 0008 Basic Pay)
0008- Basic Pay
0009- Bank Details
0016-Contract Elements
0041- Date Specifications
2006- ( For annual leave & sick leave)
Note that it is the hiring action that allows you to assign an
employee to the hr structures.
[edit]IMG & PROJECT IMG
------------------------------
4.5 & 6 What is IMG? What is its importance? What are the functions
you can execute using IMG? What is customizing? What does customizing
support? How do you create a Project IMG? What are project views?
IMG means the implementation guide. The configurators would customize
the sap hr system as per the customer requirements in the img. In the
img you can create project img’s which limit the customizing nodes to
the requirement of the projects and for each project img you can
create multiple views like MM,SD,HR etc to get more specific. To go to
the implementation guide or img from the sap easy access menu ,you
have to enter transaction spro in the command line.
[edit]ENTERPRISE & PERSONNEL STRUCTURE
------------------------------
5.What is an enterprise structure?
The enterprise structure is one of the HR structures. The HR
enterprise structure composition depends upon the hr administrative,
time and payroll functions for that company. It comprises the client,
company code, personal area, personnel subarea and the organization
key. The hiring action assign an employee via infotype 0001-
Organizational Assignment to the enterprise structure. The enterprise
structure is the enterprise perspective of an employee.
6.What is a personnel structure?
The organizational personnel structure describes how the employee is
positioned in the organization. This is an individual perspective of
an employee in an organization. It comprises of the employee group,
the employee sub group and the organization plan (org unit, position,
job) for that employee. The hiring action assigns an employee via
infotype 0001- Organizational Assignment to the personnel structure.
7.What is the highest level of the enterprise structure?
The client is the highest level of the enterprise structure.
8.What is company code? Is it defined in HR? If not where is it
defined?
The company code is an organization unit(this is different from the hr
organization unit. Different modules like SD, MM, etc have their own
organization structures with their own organization units) which has
its own balance sheet and profit and loss account and is defined in
the FI module.
9.What are personnel areas and its functions?
Personnel (( Please note the spelling -> its Personnel (group of
people)and not Personal(Individual)) Area is the sub division
(understand these two words) of the company code and can represent a
functional area or geographical location.These play a very important
role in the time and payroll configurations. Each personnel area is
unique to a company code (mark these words) and is represented by a 4
character code.
10.What are personnel sub areas and its functions?
The further divisions (understand this word) of a personnel area are
defined as personnel subareas. The functions are similar to the
personnel area. Each personnel subarea too is unique to a personal
area (mark these words) and is represented by a 4 character code.
Hi everyone, i would be continuing with the answers to the rest of the
questions as an when i get the time and try to keep this going till
completion.
11.How is an employee in the HR Master data linked to a company to
which he belongs?
EMPLOYEE--->PERSONNEL AREA--->COMPANY CODE--->COUNTRY GROUPING--
>CLIENT
12.Can a personnel area be assigned to many company codes?
No. A Personnel Area can be only assigned to one company code. Many
personnel areas can be assigned to the same company code but the vice
versa is not true.
13.What are the indicators defined by personnel sub areas?
The indicators are all personnel sub area groupings for hr, time,
payroll which are very critical to the sap hr implementation. They are
also used tolimit HR authorizations.
14.How do you categorize the employee groups?
Employee groups are categorized based on employee/staff regulations of
work and pay such as
Active
Retiree/Pensioner ….. and so on.
These are also used to limit HR authorizations.
15.What are employee subgroups and what are the indicators set up
using employee subgroups?
Further division of the employee groups are called the employee
subgroups such as under employee group 1-Active you could have
employee subgroups such as AA–Hourly wage earner, AH–Salaried Employee
…. And so on.The indicators are all employee sub area groupings for
hr, time, payroll which are very critical to the sap hr
implementation. They are also used to limit HR authorizations.
16.Employee groups are two character and employee subgroup are two
character representations in the IMG. Do you support this statement?
False. Employee groups are one character and employee subgroups are
two character representations.
17.In the HR Master data where are planned working times for an
employee seen?
IT 0007- Planned Working Time using transaction pa51 – Display time
data
18.Do I need to give country assignment to personnel sub areas in
customizing? If true support the statement and if not what’s true?
No. You do not need to give country assignment to personnel sub areas.
You need to give country assignments to the employee subgroups on
assigning to employee groups in the enterprise structure.