Knowledge · Guide 1 of 8

Why SAP knowledge never quite reaches daily work

In most companies, the most important knowledge about suppliers, purchase orders and invoices sits in SAP. Yet a simple question often takes hours to answer, sometimes days. The system is rarely the problem. The route a question has to travel is.

One question, many stops

Picture a head of procurement who wants to know why an invoice from a key supplier still hasn't been paid. She has no SAP access for that view. So she messages a colleague who knows the right transaction.

The colleague finds the invoice, spots a payment block and has to work out where it came from. That means pulling up the goods receipt and the purchase order. He might export a list to Excel, or ask someone in accounts payable in turn.

The answer eventually comes back, often two days later and usually as a screenshot. The information itself could have been available in a minute.

What these detours really cost

The direct cost is people's time. A lookup that takes three people fifteen minutes each adds up quickly. Across many questions a week, it can amount to half a full-time role.

The indirect costs weigh more. Decisions get postponed because the facts are missing. Early-payment discounts lapse because a block surfaces too late. Suppliers wait for answers that were settled long ago.

There is also a quieter effect. People who have waited for answers a few times eventually stop asking. Decisions then rest on gut feeling, even though the facts are sitting in the system.

Why reports don't solve it

Many companies try to fix this with reports and dashboards. That works for recurring questions you can anticipate. Most everyday questions, though, are one-off, specific and tied to a particular document.

A report shows how many invoices are blocked. It does not tell you why this particular invoice is blocked and what needs to happen next. Questions like that need a direct route to the answer, right where people already work.

What matters

A solution has to do three things at once. It has to accept the question where work happens, which usually means Microsoft Teams. It has to fetch the answer live from SAP rather than from yesterday's copy. And it must never show anyone more than they would be allowed to see in SAP.

The next guide looks at the options for getting there and where each one runs out of road.

Frequently asked questions

Why do simple SAP questions take so long?

The information is in the system, but only a few people can retrieve it directly. Every question passes through several hands before it is answered.

Don't dashboards solve this?

Only for recurring questions you know in advance. Specific questions about a particular document remain unanswered.

What does this cost a company?

Beyond working time, mainly delayed decisions, lapsed discounts and questions that people simply stop asking.

Want to see what this looks like in your procurement? Request a demo