Create an equal forum for all business partners – Pt II

Test the system

When it actually comes to using the ERP software, you need to test it. Most companies will provide some type of trial access or ERPNext demo. It may be available during or after the vendor’s presentation, vendor guided or not. One on one with each key department head so that specific, relevant questions can be asked. Whenever it takes place, make sure the right people are there to test it. In other words, while IT department employees should definitely be present, they are not the ones who will be using the accounting software. Get it in the hands of employees who will actually use it and see how well they work with it.

Educate the team on how to apply the package scoring method.

Most methods to evaluate manufacturing software functionality include a scoring system that quantifies the extent the software addresses a particular business need. The team needs to understand how to apply the system to properly disposition what they see within the POS software and vendor responses to specific questions.

For example, when a vendor responds to one of your requirements with statements such as “minor software change”, “write a report”, “future release” or “I will get back with you” (and they don’t), score the item a zero (or close to it).

The problem is all too often evaluation teams give the ERP vendor more credit than deserved when the software does not address a business need right out of the box. In the examples above, there are work-arounds and the team must understand the extent of a work-around to properly apply any scoring system.

Also, make sure the team understands it is part of their responsibility to seek clarification from the vendor when responses are unclear.

Conduct a team follow-up meeting immediately after each demonstration.

Allow time at the end of each demonstration for the team to discuss what they learned, reconcile differences, score the package, and document follow-up questions. Of course, this segment of the meeting does not include the vendor.When this is not performed immediately following each demo, the team will be hard-pressed to remember what they saw. In addition, two people attending the same demo can walk away with very different perceptions. The best approach is to address these differences before everyone leaves the meeting.

Independently, each team member records the score for each requirement during the demo. Afterwards, individual scores are discussed and reconciled into a single team score for each requirement. When a consensus score is not possible, it becomes a follow-up item.

Cost considerations.

While the cost of an ERP system is significant for a company, other important decision criteria, such as functionality; future proofing; underlying infrastructure [network & database]; and e-commerce capability – among others, may be under-stressed.

Plan for the future.

Choose an ERP solution that can grow with your company. Consider not only the features you need now, but the features you may need six months or a year from now. ERP is a long-term investment. You need a solution that is flexible enough to accommodate evolving business processes and new initiatives in your organization and is scalable enough to include additional users. You should also be able to phase in new ERP functionality as you need it.
When speaking of growth, consider eCommerce, marketing and top-line revenue. Many companies focus so heavily on the bottom line, process improvement and cost savings – they overlook dedicated bandwidth to growth.

Don’t forget upgrades – be sure the ERP system saves customizations as metadata and automatically carries those forward when a new release is available. Upgrading to new versions with added functionally should be painless, don’t settle for less.

Selection bias – it is not unusual that an individual on the selection team will have used a particular package in the past. While that feedback (good or bad) is valuable, be sure to weigh the merits of other systems based on the needs of the company evaluating, and not on the convenience of that individual’s familiarity with the system.

Professional Services.

A serious consideration in the selection process is the vendor’s implementation team or “Professional Services Organization”. Find out about their track record, references and project methodology. A significant reason that some ERP implementations have been considered a failure is not for the system, but for poor implementation, lack of internal adoption, or improper selection methods. It is estimated that up to 90% of enterprise system implementations are late or over budget.

When Selecting ERP, Questions to ask: