ERP mistakes and their impact on business
ERP or Enterprise Resource Planning systems are large and elaborate systems which handle large volumes of data and serve a number of different purposes for an organization. It is an extremely important part of an organization, and is also expensive to set up properly. Mistakes while implementing ERP will not only set your back financially, but also disturb operational efficiencies, productivity, databases and workforce management systems.
For these reasons, companies cannot afford to make mistakes while implementing ERP without sustaining a lot of damage. To avoid such lapses, it is best to know about where companies usually falter in implementing a sturdy ERP system within their organizations.
Lack of planning – The first step towards fruitful ERP implementation is proper planning and a sound ERP implementation strategy. A number of companies have suffered a loss of performance after a poorly planned ERP implementation.
As an organization, you need to ascertain exactly what you need from an ERP system, perform research and tests, carry out extensive internal audits and plan the implementation based on these factors. Implementing ERP is a huge step and should not be taken lightly. Proper planning of each and every facet of the choice of ERP platform and its implementation is necessary to make a success out of it.
Lack of trained personnel – Both implementation and use of ERP systems take a lot of specific training. Companies need to employ specialists both to implement ERP systems, and to manage them post-implementation to get best results.
In-house training is fine; provided adequate in-depth training is given to personnel who will go on to manage the framework. In case in-house training does not prove adequate, the company must hire experts to ensure that the ERP system yields satisfactory results and is maintained properly. Failure to do so would be nothing more than a waste of valuable resource.
Too much or too little customization – ERP systems are largely customizable, and the sole purpose of this is to make sure that businesses can customize these systems to fit their exact needs. One rule of thumb here is that the more the customization, the more the implementation costs.
Companies must first decide exactly what changes need to be made, and make only those changes. Both too much and too little customization can cause severe adverse effects to the productive functioning of an ERP system.