JD Edwards Upgrade Strategy & Planning

We always start here to make the unknowns known and pave the path to a successful upgrade.

Astrategy is a plan of action designed to achieve a particular goal. Strategy is distinct from tactics and must not be confused. If your goal is to upgrade your JD Edwards environment, shouldn’t you start with a strategy?

Your strategy should answer WHAT, WHY, HOW and WHEN to execute your upgrade.

JDE Upgrade Strategy

One of the primary reasons for your upgrade is to take advantage of new functionality and features. However, we caution our customers to be aware of the challenges this poses to your upgrade plan. Anytime you start opening your business processes, your risk level (timeline, budget) goes up.

Hence, a prudent way to upgrade is:

  • Perform Technical Upgrade first and keep your existing processes the same
  • Stabilize the system and users on this new release running business processes the old way

  • Perform Functional Upgrade taking few processes at a time (iterative)

This will help you manage your risks, achieve goals and ease the new system rather than slamming it in. In practice, it is not this simple since some of the customizations you may  have made clog up this strategy. Some customizations may not be necessary in the new release. Why should you blindly apply customizations if they are no longer necessary? Your Upgrade Strategy should address this important aspect.

A typical upgrade strategy and plan should address the essential elements that are needed to make your upgrade successful:

  1. Key drivers that were considered for the strategy
  2. Assessment of your current system and technology
  3. Education of your key personnel with capabilities of new release(s)
  4. ‘To Be’ release evaluation criteria and final results
  5. Inventory of all customizations performed on your current system (R5X, F5X, Modified Std Objects, Custom Grids, etc)
  6. Upgrade strategy and recommended approach
  7. Infrastructure plan
  8. Upgrade scope, costs, timeline, milestones
  9. Potential risks and risk management plan
  10. Change impact and change management plan
  11. Resource plan

Keep Reading: Learn more about our JDE Upgrade Services and Free Workshop

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