There will be plenty fighting for your attention during the SAPPHIRE NOW and ASUG Annual Conference in Orlando this spring. So, why not start your week off with a solid foundation by joining an ASUG Pre-Conference Seminar on Monday, May 6?
This year, ASUG is offering one half-day and 14 full-day seminars tailored around the topics that are most important to SAP users. “Our seminars focus on emerging technologies or forward-looking topics,” said Danny Pancratz, director of education at ASUG.
Pancratz and his team work with SAP and its product management teams to create a relevant and comprehensive pre-conference agenda that offers attendees an in-depth and focused education on hot topics for SAP customers today.
Making the Pre-Conference Cut
The ASUG education team spends months tracking trends, fielding questions, and gauging interest among the ASUG and SAP communities. The team analyzes this information and creates a list of potential seminar topics. After selecting these topics, ASUG opened the review process for feedback from ASUG Members.
The topics that make the cut are those that best serve the needs of the SAP community, as well as serve as a strong complement to the SAPPHIRE NOW and ASUG Annual Conference experience.
Time for Focus and Immersion
ASUG offers about 500 relevant education sessions throughout the conference designed to help you better understand SAP products and solutions, but the pre-conference seminars include more than that.
“A pre-conference seminar is a more immersive experience,” Pancratz said. “It’s the foundation of building your personal education. You’re making the time to spend eight hours to really do a deep dive into a subject, which is a much different experience than hopping between 40-minute sessions during the conference where you’ll have so much more competing for your attention.
What’s great about pre-conference seminars is that they take place the day before the main conference even begins. You’ll have an opportunity to learn from SAP’s product management team, network with other customers, and prepare for what you want to get out of SAPPHIRE NOW and ASUG Conference. By dedicating a full day to learning, you’ll set yourself up for a more-targeted conference week.
All the Ways to Learn
Pre-conference seminars generally give you a comprehensive overview of a product. “But what this format allows,” Pancratz said, “is for more breathing room for Q&A.” He added that the time devoted to Q&A may vary a little from seminar to seminar, but there are usually opportunities during the day for attendees to ask questions as they come up.
Some of the seminars offer a hands-on component. With a couple of exceptions, the hands-on seminars will be a combination of a deep-dive overview, demos on how various products or capabilities work, and then some exercises for attendees to practice what they’ve learned.
What’s New for 2019
New this year, ASUG University will lead a condensed version of what it usually offers as a three-day course. This hands-on seminar, “Transition from SAP ERP to SAP S/4HANA,” is designed for finance end users and business leaders looking to understand SAP S/4HANA, review key end-user concepts, and discuss strategies and best practices for how to involve end users in their company’s transition to SAP S/4HANA.
Another item on the agenda this year is a multitrack session on SAP Leonardo. “There are lots of technologies within SAP Leonardo, and this unique seminar format will allow attendees to first get a general introduction to the SAP solution, but then to pick breakout tracks on certain technologies they’re most interested in learning about,” Pancratz said. “If they just want to learn about the Internet of Things, or machine learning, or analytics, they can sit in one of those rooms all day. But if they want to learn a little about all of them, they can hop back and forth in each track.”
Making Your Pre-Conference Plans
The ASUG Pre-Conference Seminars are geared toward people who are considering an upgrade or a purchase of a specific product, but also for people who have already made the purchase or upgrade and are looking to learn more.
Attendees can choose from a variety of seminars covering every aspect of SAP S/4HANA including a practical discussion of options, implementation strategies, and an understanding of SAP Central Finance. Other topics will include SAP Leonardo, SAP C/4HANA, SAP HANA, SAP Cloud Platform services, what makes an intelligent enterprise, user experience, and much more.
“Attendees should come with a plan of what they hope to get out of their time here and have a list of questions they’d like to see answered,” Pancratz said. “Take advantage of the fact that you have all-day access to experts for each topic, as well as other ASUG members who have the same interests.”
Save your spot for a day of learning before SAPPHIRE NOW and ASUG Annual Conference. Register today for an ASUG Pre-Conference Seminar.