Improving Your Bottom Line Boosting profits with the right ERP and CRM tools

No Decision – May You Forever R.I.P. (Part 1)

Have you ever worked on a project that started off with boundless exuberance and fan fare, yet failed to deliver the anticipated results?  Sometimes it’s a result of a head on crash with completely unforeseen events.  More often than not however, it is usually more a matter of the project losing inertia for one reason or another.  It might be due to the project running out of money or resources, but frequently it is due to the project not having the foundation of a well documented and well justified business case to fall back upon.  Common symptoms that can derail a project are things such as competing corporate goals and objectives, and poorly understood or shifting priorities. 

I see evidence of the aborted project all the time in my industry.   Predominantly, an organization decides one day to replace their existing business management system (referred to as ERP system) and thus rushes headlong down the path of reviewing various business management software packages and providers only to run out of steam a few months later and ultimately make no decision.  This results in much wasted time and money for the organization as well as the ERP system providers.  How and why does this happen so often? 

First of all, the initial decision to replace their system could be based on any number of factors, but it usually stems from deficiencies in their existing system as it relates to being able to perform certain functions.  After some period of awareness and discontent, the decision makers give the go-ahead to someone, usually in the accounting or perhaps IT department, to start looking for a replacement ERP system.  You might recognize this as the “let’s just do it” syndrome.  The lucky recipient of the edict from above, armed with not much more than a short list of functional capabilities that need to be improved, sets off in search of the perfect solution.  It doesn’t take long to discover an array of ERP systems (at last count, approximately 350) and multiple providers of these packages. 

If the person leading the ERP software review process is lucky, they will find several offerings that appear to address their functional requirements to a greater or lesser degree.  It quickly becomes apparent however that the review and selection of a new ERP system is a daunting task filled with lots of risk and uncertainty.  As the review process continues, more questions than answers frequently arise, until at some point the project just stalls out due to lack of clear organizational imperatives and mounting gray areas. 

As an organization dedicated to helping companies successfully select and implement ERP systems, when the project is aborted like this, we call it “Losing to No Decision”.   The ironic thing is that a conscious decision to abort the project rarely occurs, rather it just flat runs out of gas because there is not enough organizational clarity and determination to grapple with the difficult tasks and overcome the speed bumps.  As you can imagine, this is ultra frustrating for everyone involved as it wastes time and resources and results in no progress being made against the initial objective.

Fortunately, there is plenty that can be done to avoid this wasted effort.  Stay tuned for the next issue as we lay the ground work including step-by-step instructions for ensuring that your project does not become part of the carnage.