Reflections on Change Management and ERP – Part 1

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I have friends who were forced to move out of a house that they’d occupied for 15 years as a result of a business change. Economic conditions had closed the local mine, but some key managers, my friend included, had been offered a position at Head Office. He accepted the new job with relief. That evening over supper he told his family that he had some bad news…and some good news.

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10 Reasons Why Goals Alignment is Imperative for Your ERP System

Misalignment of goals is one of the common reasons why many companies fail to realize the full value of an ERP system. Goals alignment should be the starting point BEFORE any company starts the ERP selection process, and BEFORE it sets its performance and measurement targets (metrics) and objectives.  Goals should be consistent with policy, they should be clearly defined, articulated, and communicated through the company.  This is a top-down, not bottom-up approach.

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ERP Application Erosion and the Cost Curve

How many of you remember the cost curve?

All economics students are taught the cost curve at university – it’s a very useful tool for planning and optimizing production. To be honest, the cost curve’s message haunted me for weeks until I had my ‘Eureka!’ moment – a little too late for the final exam, but not too late to be of value in my job here at SYSPRO.

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How African Markets Leapfrog onto New Technology

The recent Gartner Symposium has highlighted the need to not compare apples with oranges when talking about the latest IT trends in developed versus developing markets. It appears that trends in Africa and South Africa include more of a different approach, often characterized by current ERP implementers leapfrogging over old legacy systems directly onto the latest technology.

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How Mobile ERP can Improve Productivity on the Factory Floor

How do I do it better? Faster? More efficiently?

Today’s competitive economic landscape has us all asking these questions on a daily basis. The quest to provide ‘leading edge’, ‘best of breed’, ‘customer-centric’ products and services often has us chasing our tails and banging our fists against boardroom tables. And, to complicate the process even further, once we’ve created the wonder product, we still have to convince our market to buy it.

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