Challenge ERP system

Four factors are responsible why the implementation of an ERP system project fails.

• Lack of support from management
• Too much customization
• Missing requirement analysis
• Poor data quality

Management support

An ERP system is primarily a management software. It has to satisfy many stakeholders. From the decision maker, who needs to get to the essential information by means of reports, to the accountant, who wants to automatically trigger the payment of salaries. An ERP system spawns across the entire organization. The requirements of the stakeholders can be contradictory and complex, making a targeted implementation all the more important. This is only possible with the support of management. During the course of implementation, there may be resistance and challenges in both technical and organizational terms. If the project is not guided by the management, a holistic implementation in the company is not possible.

Customization

Do you adapt the software to the processes or the processes to the software? Business processes are often the differentiating factor for many companies. The processes are strongly intertwined with the employees and corporate culture and therefore difficult to change. There are clear limitations if you want to change existing business processes. The same applies to the ERP system. There are technical limitations. ERP systems allow the software to be adapted to specific needs. However, above a certain limit, the costs for adaptations increase exponentially. It is important to know these limits and take them into account when defining customizations.

Requirements analysis

If you ask users of an ERP system about their needs and expectations, you will get a different version for each person. Stakeholder requirements must be systematically recorded and weighted. Requirements engineering exists for this purpose. With this methodology, the requirements of the software system are determined and structured in advance of the ERP project. A clean requirements analysis is a prerequisite for a successful ERP project.

Data quality

Very few companies start from scratch when introducing a new ERP system. ERP data is already available in different systems. From customer contacts to shipping addresses and product definitions, data must be merged and imported. Data quality plays a decisive role here. For example, if there are duplicates in the source data or missing attributes in data records, this has a direct effect on the functionality of the system. Poor data can lead to functional limitations. The improvement of data quality cannot be achieved by simple measures, it is an ongoing process which, like all processes, requires a lot of time for implementation.