ERP systems can be a bear to implement regardless of whether the organization is a private, domestic corporation with a few offices or a public, multi-national spread across dozens of countries. But, for obvious reasons, the latter of the two has some very real and quite complicated pain-points that often prevent executives from moving forward with the initiative. Following are the key considerations global corporations must weigh when determining whether or not to buy and implement company-wide ERP software:
- How important is it to have consistent financial processes and reporting?
- How much time, effort and money is being wasted by having to manually collect and consolidate each outpost’s reports?
- How much control is the company ceding by allowing each outpost to use a different system?
- How is the current system handling government regulations across the different countries? In a best-case scenario, how would a new ERP system handle regulations?
- How will the different outposts handle organizational change management efforts around the new system? What are the differences in management style, culture and labor skills at each outpost?
- How will the different outposts be asked to contribute to the overall design of the ERP system?
- How will the different outposts handle data entry and data integration?
- How will an ERP implementation affect power structures within the corporation on a whole? How will these changes affect profitability, efficiency, trust and morale?
- How will the system be customized to address individual subsidiary’s needs?
- How will the organization address communications across the different outposts before, during and after the ERP implementation?
There’s no question an ERP implementation or upgrade of this magnitude can be daunting. The key piece to remember is that IT innovations often drive corporate performance. The more time an organization lets pass without integrating its systems, the more its revenue, efficiency and overall operations will likely suffer. But even knowing this, it can still be difficult to start the process. Our ERP Readiness Assessment can provide further insight into whether or not your organization is prepared to move forward with this type of project.
