The Board of Directors is currently forming local and regional CWG Chapters globally.
Our mission is to provide information and education about the SAP Variant Configuration (VC), the Internet Pricing Configurator (IPC), and SAP CRM configurators and historically the primary venue for this information sharing and networking has been either this website or at the European Conference in the Spring and the North American CWG Conference in the Fall.
Each CWG Chapter has their own website page and please visit for more information by clicking on the Chapter Title below.
With 500+ member companies, 250+ partner companies and 2,500+ members, not everyone can or will attend a European or North American conference to get specific answers to questions or meet and network with other VC and IPC professionals. This website has been the only alternative to the two conferences per year.
So, the CWG Board is enabling companies and members to have their own "mini conferences" to discuss and share issues, network and find out how to solve some of those tough problems through the formation of local CWG Chapters with face-to-face meetings and webinars. Each Chapter will also have a specific Chapter LinkedIn Group for networking and receiving Chapter announcements There is also a LinkedIn Group for all CWG members.
Chapters are designed to share and discuss issues that you may have in your everyday implementation, integration or modeling problems. It is also a place to learn more about the VC and IPC. Education is one of the primary goals and now this can be accomplished on a local level.
The CWG Chapter has to be self-sufficient though. We encourage their formation and will assist in building the member base and helping to get out the message to local members, and sharing information presented at the chapters, and the Chapter in return has the freedom to meet and have presentations about their local issues.
If you have an interest in forming a CWG Chapter in your area contact us here
For more information on each Chapter click on the menu entry for the chapter or if you are interested in either forming or joining a Chapter in your area please send an email to CWG Secretary or the CWG Vice President.
Almost like Roy Rogers and Trigger, the West Michigan Chapter will come riding over the snowy hills into the early sunset of a Michgan winter day to meet one more time...OK, Roy and Trigger never saw snow, but the idea is sorta similiar.... :)
A precedent was made with the formation of a CWG Chapter in Western Michigan (Grand Rapids Area, USA) that began meeting in 2008 and is now meeting about every other month with at least 7 member companies including: Steelcase, Haworth, Siemens, and Whirlpool to name a few.
Thanks to Steve Schneider and Kevin Meyer, this is a thriving chapter. The chapter has round table discussions, presentations, challenges for modeling problems, and current updates from SAP and interesting topics from members. Their meeting is usually scheduled for an afternoon and then always have some networking time after hours. Meetings are usually hosted by a member company. A LinkedIn Group has been created for CWG members in the Western Michigan area and is open to CWG Members living and working in the area.
This Chapter is also being organized. The process began in November with eMail invitations to members within approximately 2 hours of the Twin Cities have been sent out asking for them to participate, join and help in the planning. Bill Dorow is leading the organization effort for this Chapter. Any CWG member or company employees using the SAP VC or IPC are welcome to join the Twin Cities Chapter. We only ask that you become a CWG member first.
Take advantage of this opportunity to network with other VC and IPC professionals in the area and add some of your own experiences so that others can learn too. A LinkedIn Group has also been established so that Twin Cities Chapter members can network with one another and also receive announcements and participate in specific discussions.
A French Speaking Chapter is being organized and the planned first meeting will be a webinar and is scheduled for 20 Janaury 2010 that covers a large area as well including France and part of Switzerland and is led by Bruno Roux. Bruno is based in Meylon, France near Grenoble. A networking site for this Chapter has been created and can be found on LinkedIn.
The
success of this first chapter was the inspiration for forming more chapters and there is now a new CWG Chapter chartered for Northeastern USA called the New England CWG Chapter and for now encompasses Metro New York City, and the States of Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine. This is a rather large area to cover and we expect that this chapter will likely split into a smaller area for the convenience of the members. This chapter will be meeting in different locations and is lead by Daniel Naus and James Cross.
A LinkedIn Group has also been created for CWG Members living or working in New England or the Greater NYC area.
There is a scheduled joint meeting between the CWG New England Chapter and New England Chapter of ASUG on July 22, 2010. More information and registration.
South Central CWG Chapter
The Configuration Workgroup (CWG) has authorized the formation of a new chapter in Oklahoma, NW Arkansas, SW Missouri and Kansas.
Objectives of meetings will be defined by the members of the Chapter, but can be patterned after other CWG Chapters. Other Chapters have presentations from SAP and CWG Partners, round table discussions, modeling challenges, presentations from members within the Chapter and presentations can be shared between Chapters.
The West Michigan Chapter began a year and a half ago with only a few members and at first only met after business hours. Today, they meet about every two months at a member company facility and schedule an afternoon for the meeting with networking and socializing in the evening for those that choose to partake. Their largest meeting had 35 people attend.
Today, there are about 30 CWG registered members in the South Central area and there has been much interest to organize a local CWG Chapter similar to the one formed in West Michigan. The South Central CWG Chapter will have to follow the by-laws of the larger CWG organization and will have to be self-sufficient.
There have been many express interest about forming a CWG Chapter in Wisconsin. So, eMail invitations have been sent to CWG members located in Wisconsin to join the Wisconsin CWG Chapter (early March) as well as invitations sent to CWG members in Wisconsin to join a LinkedIn Group for the Wisconsin Chapter. Duane Moore of SAP is helping to organize the Chapter. More information to follow...
The New England CWG Chapter held a joint meeting with the ASUG (Americas SAP User Group) New England Chapter on July 22nd. With nearly 100 attending the day long meeting. EMC, located in Franklin, MA hosted the meeting and had great facilities. There was a new sense of awareness in the Variant Configurator and the CWG.
There were three tracks in the afternoon with one specific track on the Variant Configurator and we had 37 people listen to Presentations by Lawrence Matusek of eLogic Group on "10 Things a VC Modeler should know" and "SAP VC 101" and "SAP PDR - a hidden gem" by Daniel Naus of eSpline .
"Who is the CWG?" was presented by the CWG President in the general session and raised the level of understanding of who and what is the CWG. After the general session A CWG New England Chapter was held after the all day session. As a result there were several companies in the Boston area that joined the CWG.
