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At the heart of SAP materials management is the material master. From forecasting requirements to post-sales distribution, your settings in the material master will control most actions associated with each material you inventory.
The creation and maintenance of this data can be cumbersome. Suppose your organization is arranged into functional silos. It may be difficult to appropriate a person or group responsible for maintaining all material master data. To assign a person or group from one functional silo to manage the data for another may be ineffective.
How likely is it that your sales manager is an expert in requirements planning, or your buyer is an expert in organizing distribution channels? How are those responsible for material master creation and maintenance to know what settings are in line with organizational goals?
Many mistakes can be made, and opportunities are missed when material master responsibility is unclear. I recommend a documented process for material master creation and maintenance. This process should be developed in a cross-functional team format consisting of senior leadership and end-user representatives from each functional silo in your business. This will ensure that material master settings follow corporate objectives while keeping the needs of the end user in mind.
By defining who is responsible for the maintenance of each section of the material master, along with rules on each critical setting, you can avoid failures of an ambiguous process. This way, when new products are introduced to your system, each party involved will know when and how to create master data. Also, when changes to a material master are required, each team member will know who is responsible for making the change.
After developing your documented process, I recommend that you incorporate the process as a checklist in your sales and operations planning meetings. This will ensure accurate data is in place before requirements are introduced into MRP.
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Matt Johnson is a Program Manager at Martin-Baker America, Inc., a leading manufacturer of aircraft ejection seats and crashworthy helicopter seats. As one of the company’s resident SAP super-users, he leads a continuous improvement team that strives for excellence in production efficiency and ERP innovation. Matt was educated at St. Francis University in Organizational Leadership, and maintains certification in APICS Production and Inventory Management as well as Lean Manufacturing. He has spent the past 11 years working in inventory management, production planning, sales and operations planning, continuous improvement, and program management, all in the SAP environment. 
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