Enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementations are mainly business projects rather than IT projects, so a lion’s share of efforts and, consequently, costs of ERP adoptions belong to the business side—for example, business process changes and master data preparation. However, ERP systems can’t just be acquired and started to be used overnight, so a system’s deployment itself and its fine tuning to certain business processes and practices is still a significant part of a deal. These processes are often interchangeable so it’s difficult to draw a fine line between system-related or business-related tasks—in some areas we have to change the system setup while in others we optimize processes because the software requires it. Sometimes clients need to modify both in parallel. Read the rest of this entry »