International. Martín Cayón, DIRECTOR OF TOTVS North Latin America (pictured), recently shared with the media some recommendations for the implementation of a Management Planning System (or ERP) and explained how these have evolved over time. According to the executive, ERP began with the intention of more efficiently managing the key areas of a company (accounting, billing, sales, purchases and costs) from modules. The disadvantage is that these modules were not integrated and therefore, the organizations only partially took advantage of the functions of the system.
Over the years, explains Cayón, the developers of ERPs decided to increase the functionality of the solution from the integration of its components and thus facilitate communication between business areas. While it is true that with this change came the growth of ERP functionality, it is also true that it became more robust, time-consuming, and expensive to implement.
This, at the same time, placed it exclusively in the sights of large corporations "with my experience of more than 20 years in the information technology industry I have observed that entrepreneurs perceive ERP as a complex and difficult solution to implement, but they are also aware that the proper functioning of their company depends on its implementation and possibly, their subsistence," said the TOTVS executive.
According to a study conducted by Harvard Business Review, companies that acquire an ERP have a loss and savings reduction of 10%; but those who chose it correctly have a reduction of up to 35% on average.
To achieve the above, Cayón shared five fundamental steps to choose the right ERP, which are:
1. Involve your collaborators. If the need to implement an ERP was agreed, the recommendation is to involve the people who will be directly impacted by the decision, such as: end users, systems personnel responsible for the administration of the system, managers and managers.
2. Define what you want to achieve through an ERP. Understand our business model and how it is expected that the implementation of erp could optimize and facilitate its operation. Under this premise, the implementation scheme, priorities, business impact and likely benefits must be defined, as well as considering which areas will be impacted by the decision.
3. Scalability. Choosing an ERP that can meet the current needs of the business and at the same time has the ability to evolve in the future at the same time as the business, is vital. Therefore, before making a decision it is of the utmost importance to consider the scalability of the solution in two planes. Horizontal, with modules or functionalities to be implemented when the management model evolves and vertical, which supports transactional growth if the business grows.
4. Choose a business partner, not a brand. Selecting a business management software provider is probably the most important step. The recommendation is to choose who markets a quality software with the necessary scalability and that has that degree of flexibility required by changes in the business model as it grows.
5 . Plan for deployment times. Finally, it is important to keep in mind that every project takes time. For an ERP to be implemented correctly and successfully, the use of internal resources, their availability, experience and knowledge must be considered in the planning, because the duration and success of the implementation project will depend on them. Also the adherence to the standard processes of the solution because the level of adaptations and developments that must be made depends on it. In addition, the quality of existing data and business processes and the company's culture regarding technology and its adoption.
