How one of the largest school districts in the Midwestern United States uses Neptune Software’s SAP-centric low-code app development platform to streamline HR processes with a self-service portal for over 10,000 end users.
Challenge: Bringing Modern SAP User Experience to Outdated HR Interfaces
Managing human resource (HR) processes for more than 10,000 employees is a monumental effort. This effort is made even more challenging for one of the largest public school districts located in the Midwestern United States due to tight budgets and aging SAP technology.
While the school district uses an on-premise SAP ERP system to manage its HR functions, the system’s dated interface presented challenges. At the same time, any wide-scale system updates required bringing in consultants – and added expenses along with it.
While the district’s strategic plan didn’t include moving to the latest version of SAP Fiori [S/4HANA], it was still important to bring new functionality with a modern look and feel to users without requiring significant back-end updates to its SAP ERP system.
The school district began looking for a solution that was more agile and offered them a cost-effective way to introduce no-code/low-code apps that enhanced the user experience and seamlessly integrated back into their SAP system.
The school district sought to refresh all of its SAP ERP functionality in a self-serve fashion.
“From benefits selection to time entry to payroll information, we wanted one core self-service tool,” said the district’s IT leader. “That’s when we turned to Neptune Software.”
Solution: Neptune Software Is the School District's Go-to for SAP Self-Service Portal Apps With Easy Deployment
Neptune Software’s SAP-centric, low-code enterprise app development platform digitizes and optimizes business processes and user interfaces – at scale and with ease. Neptune DXP provided the school district with the right tools to easily build the self-service apps it needed for its outdated SAP processes.
As the project began, the district’s small ERP technology team worked closely with consultants recommended by Neptune Software. Collaborating with subject matter experts across different functional areas, the project team worked to identify key pain points and create a wish list of capabilities and options that would better serve their users.
“We looked across benefits, payroll, and the rest of HR, as well as our master data collection and maintenance efforts. We looked at each module in our SAP system to see how we were going to enhance it, make it more user-friendly, and improve the experience, and came up with a list of items to prioritize,” said the district’s IT leader.
Most of the development was done by our consultant, who worked very quickly and were not very expensive in relation to other work we’ve done in the past.”
In just a few months, the team was able to deliver a fast, cost-effective, and future-proof way to launch custom self-service applications, with an approach designed to help them save time and money on development, integration, and operations.
Results: "It Just Works!" Now in Use for 5 Years, the Self-Service Portal Is a Win-Win
Now in use for nearly five years, the self-service portal and tools are a win-win for users and the IT team alike. With an intuitive user interface, and little training, employees are empowered to manage many of their HR-related activities on their own, and the HR staff benefits from the freedom of having to answer fewer questions and support calls than before.
Using Neptune DXP, the school district can design, build, integrate, deploy, and maintain SAP Fiori apps in a fraction of the time it takes on other platforms. Today, the team delivers improvements continuously since deploying apps into production is easy. With just a couple of clicks, new features are available to end users.
“It just works. With Neptune Software we have an adaptable tool that sits on top of our SAP ERP system and makes things simpler for the employees that use it. Not only is our new interface more intuitive, but it also works better on mobile. Plus, app updates are low effort and easy to perform,” says the district IT leader. “And while we have a good relationship with the Neptune Software support team, and they’re very familiar with our system, we have only rarely had to call on them.”
That ease of use was particularly important when the district had to quickly stand-up new applications during the pandemic, so that employees could record that they had tested for the virus, and attest to being vaccinated, to name just two.
“Next up, we plan to tackle mobile purchase approval capabilities,” said the district IT leader, “and as we move forward, we’re continuing to evaluate ways to enhance functionality for our users. We’re also intrigued to go beyond SAP with Neptune Software and its second module to connect to any other system, which looks very flexible and interesting to us and is something we are considering in the future."
