Converting a Legacy Goal Plan Template

Objective

After completing this lesson, you will be able to convert goal plan templates using the Manage Templates conversion tool.

Conversion of Templates for Compatibility with the Latest Goal Management

From Manage Templates, you might see some templates with an arrow indicating they need to be converted for use in Latest Goal Management. These templates were created before the upgrade and need to be converted (if you intend to keep using them).

This screenshot shows an example of what you will see in Manage Goal Plan Templates, an option to Convert them to the Latest Goal Management version.

Access one of the templates and locate the Convert option.

This screenshot highlights the Convert button in Manage Goal Plan Templates.

The conversion tool will consist of 3 steps:

Introduction: Includes an introduction to the conversion process before getting started.
Validate: The system will look into the existing General Settings, Fields, and Field Properties to ensure compatibility with the latest version. Some validations might include fields that are not supported or a requirement to set character limits for field types like Goal Name, Metric, or Comments.
Note
As of the 1H 2024 release, you can adjust the character limits to 4,000 for fields Description, Metric, and Comments, as well as custom fields of type textarea. However, the previously recommended limits of 1,000 for Metric and Comments, and 2,000 for Description, remain best practice.
Convert: The conversion will take place in this step. After conversion, the template name remains unchanged, but the original template is copied and renamed to [Goal Plan name] Backup. It will be visible but no longer editable (read-only).

Once the conversion is completed, the Goal Plan will be indicated with a checkmark in the Manage Templates list and become accessible in the new version of Goal Management.

This screenshot shows the 'Conversion Succeeded' indication that you will see after converting old goal plan templates to the latest goal management version.

Hint

Convert only those templates that you are currently using going forward. It is not necessary to convert every single template. New templates created will not require any conversion.

More information about this process and implications is explained in this section: Converting Existing Goal Plan Templates.

The templates converted will retain their ID. The original template is copied with a new ID and renamed as [Original Name] Backup, in read-only mode.

Navigate to Manage Templates, and select at least one template to convert. Alternatively, you can add a new template from SuccessStore, and it will be displayed in the Latest Goal Management version.

The existing templates in your instance are convertible. You can run the Conversion tool to ensure the template is ready. Any fields that are not supported will be set to optional (not required) if they were previously required. They will remain in the template but will not be displayed in the user interface (UI).

Convert a Legacy Goal Plan Template

Business Example

In this exercise, you will convert one of your legacy Goal Plan templates to be able to use it in the latest version of Goal Management.

ExerciseStart Exercise

Steps

Navigate to Manage Templates using Action Search, and select the Goal Plan tab.
Select the 2019 Goal Plan for KTE Associates Goal Plan template.
Select Convert. Read the introduction and, when ready, choose Get Started.
Verify 2a, 2b and 2d validations are successful, but 2c Validate Field Properties shows some warning. This note refers to the requirement of setting up character limitations for some of your fields. Previously, there were no limits set, unless defined by your SAP Consultant in the backend. You can select Edit, and change them as needed or leave them as-is.
Select Convert, and choose OK in the confirmation dialog. The conversion will start, and you can select the button Return to Manage Templates to see the progress from that screen. You can refresh the page if needed.
At some point, your template should display with a checkmark, and another template with Backup has been created. This is your original template that will now be available as read-only.

Considerations for Converted Goal Plan Templates

A goal plan cannot contain more than 200 goals, including personal goals and owned and/or assigned team goals.

End users need Goal Management Access permission granted in Role-Based Permissions (RBP), permissions to access the template, also granted in RBP, and the action permission configured at the template level to create goals.

Goal Plan Fields - Considerations

Name: Always required and the first field to display on the UI when users create a goal. Maximum length (number of characters) is up to 500 characters. When converting the template, the 500-character default limitation can be set to fewer, but not more, characters.

Metric, Description, and Comments fields: These fields are of type textarea (multiple lines of text) and comment (unique field type for threaded comments), and both types can have a maximum length of 4000 characters. The recommended maximum values, however, are 1000 for Metric and Comments and 2000 for Description.

Start and Due dates: These dates must fall within the start and due dates of the Goal Plan template. If you try to copy a goal from another goal plan that includes different dates, you will be prompted to change them before the goal can be copied over.

Status: We recommend setting the label of the last enum value (dropdown option) for the Status field (state) to Complete. This is because the last enum value triggers the complete state of a goal. Otherwise, you can use the Trigger Completion option to set a different status, not necessarily the last one, to trigger goal completion.

The background style is not supported for the Status field, and only text color is available (HEX, not RGB).

Weight: If your SAP consultant configured them in the back end, the minimum and maximum weights per objective must be met to create a goal.

Other enum (dropdown) fields: beyond the Status field, they will not display any background or text color as configured in Manage Templates. The maximum enum values possible is limited to 20.

Summary

From Manage Templates, you might see some templates including an arrow indicating they need to be converted to be used in Latest Goal Management. These templates were created before the upgrade and need to be converted (if you intend to keep using them).
To convert a goal plan template, choose Convert and follow the steps.

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