What are the Options available when it comes to providing Solutions ?

The responsibility of meeting the clients requirements lies with the Functional Consultants and the Subject Matter Experts in the field. Even though most of the requirements are well thoughtof by the client at the very beginning.... it is not the end of the list in the real time scenario.... !There are implementations where client changes or brings in new requirement just before theProduction... So Consultant has to be capable of handling the last minute requirements andchanges which may arise from the client.The suggested measure to put an end to the clients requirements is by providing them a Cutoff Date , beyond which no requirements will be taken care.But certain changes need to fit in to the implementation even if it arises after the cut off date,else it would not make sense to the whole project..Let us take an example to find out what i was speaking above...Assume that Anil Passi Ltd ( Client ) has approaced Richary Byrom ( Consultant ) forimplementing oracle financials for his company. His company and operations are located in alocation assume some where in middle east, where there is no taxation worries. So RichardByrom made through and detail understanding of business and given all the best solutions andimplemented a perfect system for working... just before they are about to hit the productiondate... Government has made that particular country in the middle east as Taxable withimmediate effect..... now what ever solutions which Richard Byrom provided were withouttaking in to account taxations.... he cannot deny this new requirement, since without taxationwhat ever figures that are getting recorded are of no use, since it is not the true state ofaffairs of the business. So Richard Byrom has to carefully include the new requirements in tothe solutions desgined by him previously with immediate effect.. !Now from the Consultant point of view, let us see what are the type of solutions that one shouldadopt?Solutions can be many types, for the sake of understanding, let us take the major categoriesof solutions:1) Best Business Practices - This is a standard solution given by oracle by default for manycommon requirements faced by different industriesExample: Client requirement is that they spend many hours in preparing month end accrualand closing entries and reversing the same in the next month beginning. How oracle can helpthem? - For which Consultant can suggest them to use Recurring Journals and Auto reverse functionality which will result in reduction of Substantial time.2) Work Arounds - Work arounds are nothing but making best use of all available oraclefunctionalities to bring out a solution for the requirements. For providing Work arounds, onemust possess strong business skills, and know the limitations of oracle applications from thefront end.Example - Client wants to make payments in Cash using oracle Payables module. Butwhereas making payments in cash is not a seeded functionality provided by oracle. - Forwhich Consultant can suggest, to create a bank named CASH A/C without Cheque Numbers,and use this bank when ever you want to make cash payments.3) Customization - If a particular requirement is not taken care by Oracle applications with theavailable functionalities, one can think of customizing the applications by altering or insertingnew coding in to it, so as to make it perform in the way in which clients want it. For performingan Customization, sound technical knowledge and the knowledge on how oracle applicationsis built needs to be known. Customizations are not mostly preferred since it involves the workof technical consultants resulting in additional cost. And when you customize OracleApplications or the Database, you will loose the Support from oracle (i.e Metalink) !Example - Client after looking at all the available standard forms which an end user will beusing for his day to day operations, wants that, there are too many unwanted fields that aregetting displayed at every form which will not be touched by the users. So he wants all otherfields which are non mandatory to disapper from the form.For which a technical consultant can customize the form and disable the fields or hide thefields with a default value.When a consultant himself is not sure on how to treat a particular requirement, he can get intouch with oracle support ( as a last option/hope ) to get thier feedbacks as well !