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There's a third option - customize the ERP to conform to your existing processes. The last place I worked chose that option, they were a medical device company

by mark-r 7y ago

There's a third option - customize the ERP to conform to your existing processes. The last place I worked chose that option, they were a medical device company and didn't want to change their processes. Of course it made a huge amount of extra work, much of which was done by expensive contractors.

NikolaNovak 7y ago
That option is a long thick gray line. Every ERP will be "customized". It has to be - provide your own chartfields, business units, workflows, decision points, etc. It's the amount of the customization that makes the difference. I've been on ERP implementation projects that were 28 days long, and 5 years long. I am the "expensive contractor", and I have never ever in 20 years met another expensive contractor who did not fight, tooth and nail, to minimize customization. From the initial business requirements and scoping, to the constant CRs likely to be encountered during implementation. On average/as a generalization, contractors/consultants have seen many businesses and see the commonalities, seen dangers of customizations, and fight them; clients know only themselves, believe in their uniqueness, and don't have a good vision or image of themselves post-transformation - how they could possibly do things differently. Consultants want their Time & Material bills, sure; but even more want successful project and references - not to mention sanity, semblance of life, and feeling like they did good work and helped the client.
- wdb 7y ago
  Yes, after all the customizations they decide to upgrade to a new version of SAP. The whole shebang can start over again. At least these days it's all SAP S/4HANA. HANA is not bad actually.
  - john_minsk 7y ago
    And you need to pay up every time you data grows by 64 GB. I guess sap is happy
- jandrese 7y ago
  Every customization is technical debt you'll have to drag forward on every new release.
- S3raph 7y ago
  That's so true. We are running SAP, which is so heavenly customized (someone 10 years ago thought it was a great idea, thanks!) that applying patches is nearly impossible and requires months of pain and expensive contractors.

by mark-r 7y ago

NikolaNovak 7y ago

That option is a long thick gray line. Every ERP will be "customized". It has to be - provide your own chartfields, business units, workflows, decision points, etc. It's the amount of the customization that makes the difference. I've been on ERP implementation projects that were 28 days long, and 5 years long. I am the "expensive contractor", and I have never ever in 20 years met another expensive contractor who did not fight, tooth and nail, to minimize customization. From the initial business requirements and scoping, to the constant CRs likely to be encountered during implementation. On average/as a generalization, contractors/consultants have seen many businesses and see the commonalities, seen dangers of customizations, and fight them; clients know only themselves, believe in their uniqueness, and don't have a good vision or image of themselves post-transformation - how they could possibly do things differently. Consultants want their Time & Material bills, sure; but even more want successful project and references - not to mention sanity, semblance of life, and feeling like they did good work and helped the client.

wdb 7y ago
Yes, after all the customizations they decide to upgrade to a new version of SAP. The whole shebang can start over again. At least these days it's all SAP S/4HANA. HANA is not bad actually.
- john_minsk 7y ago
  And you need to pay up every time you data grows by 64 GB. I guess sap is happy
jandrese 7y ago
Every customization is technical debt you'll have to drag forward on every new release.
S3raph 7y ago
That's so true. We are running SAP, which is so heavenly customized (someone 10 years ago thought it was a great idea, thanks!) that applying patches is nearly impossible and requires months of pain and expensive contractors.