Sustained Business Value from SAP Business Software

By |February 20th, 2012|

From time to time, I review academic literature about the application of technology and offer my SAP experience-based perspective. A while back, I was reviewing one of these studies, which was about enterprise software. In this study, the authors made a key clarification. They recognized two types of implementations: problem based (i.e. address your “pain points”) or innovation based. Their suggestion was that some elements of both would be present on any large-scale IT project, but each type o [...]

SAP Landscape Consolidation

By |February 13th, 2012|

For any number of reasons, many companies that run SAP end up with fragmented and piecemeal landscapes. This problem happens for many reasons: roll-outs, independent Business Units, mergers and acquisitions, immature software procurement processes, lack of a Software Asset Management program, etc. The results can leave your SAP application and business solution looking like someone set off an explosion with scattered pieces everywhere. More and more, I am seeing companies work to consolidate on [...]

SAP ERP Project Failures Lessons Learned and Mini Case Studies 3

By |December 27th, 2010|

  In this final installment on these lessons learned and mini case studies, we will look at a few older SAP project failures. Even in these older SAP project failures, many of the same problems continue to repeat themselves. I would like to point out once again that in the major SAP project failures the software application itself was not at the root of the failure. The project failures I focused on are the ones where there is plenty of published literature to evaluate. Obviously that do [...]

Customer Relationship Management or CRM

By |June 13th, 2010|

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is a core business practice that almost everyone reading this post is familiar with at some level. You have likely read about CRM, attended workshops and seminars on the subject, and perhaps even believe you have implemented a CRM initiative. While customer relationship management is certainly not a new business practice, it is also not a practice that most executives understand or leverage to its maximum capabilities. In today’s post, I will provide an ov [...]

ERP vs. ERP II vs. ERP III Future Enterprise Applications

By |May 31st, 2010|

ERP I, ERP II, & ERP III Abstract ERP applications integrate enterprise operations within and across enterprise legal entities, or company codes. ERP ii (or ERP 2) applications extend supply functionality to external enterprises (generally vendor-affiliated companies or enterprises) to reduce cost, improve supply chain efficiency, and perform collaborative innovation. ERP iii (or ERP 3) enterprises go to the next level as they integrate the ERP and ERP ii functionality to include customers [...]

IT Outsourcing, Off Shore Support, Cost Cutting and IT Department Changes

By |March 23rd, 2010|

Businesses everywhere are looking to shore up their bottom lines by cutting costs. As a result, cost centers such as IT departments are prime targets for outsourcing and offshore maintenance. The typical business script is that as the IT organization moves into maintenance mode, cost centers with high overhead become a prime target for reducing costs. However, despite how things might appear, cost is not the real driver of IT outsourcing. The real driver of IT outsourcing is function. IT departm [...]