How can you use ERP systems globally and diversely?

In my experience, most of the organizations I worked with have their business units located in diverse geographies and operate very differently from each other. Understanding the operational model of each of these business units, and finding the gaps and commonalities is the starting point to identify if these business processes can be mapped to the shortlisted ERP systems when the organizations are in the process of selecting a new ERP. Today there are purpose-built industry-specific ERP available for organizations to choose from. This helps avoid choosing monolithic ERPs where you may need heavy extensions or customizations and in many cases, organizations buy all the modules of the ERP, some of which may not be entirely used.

I consider that the major challenge is first to understand, prioritize and define what is the "business" local needs and the "organization" needs and the major gaps; and only then prepare the correct definitions and change management before the ERP system deployment.

Businesses typically operate different systems and processes across various regions. It is natural therefore, to have variations in business processes even within the same region, as these businesses may have developed organically in these areas. The main objective of implementing an ERP system is to bring together the best business practices from different regions while considering the legal and region-specific nuances of each geography. This also implies that when a firm implements an ERP system, there is a commitment to the overall vision and a recognition that existing processes will change. This step is crucial, as neglecting it can result in challenges with adoption and prevent the full benefits of implementing a unified ERP system.

As per my experience, I have come across many clients and I have learnt that organizations first need to make sure that they must have a clear vision about their transformational journey and right crowd of people to reach, achieve it, embrace it and adapt it. Its easy then !!! Organizations nowadays are very much under the pressure of new technological wave of artificial intelligence but prior to jumping to, organizations must go through existing processes studies followed within. Define, restructure or re-engineer existing process if required because tailor made processes will not take you any where, you need to follow best practices in order to join the race of globalization.

In my opinion, each of the deployment models has its own advantages. Cloud ERP provides faster and more economical ways to keep up-to-date with the evolving technologies thus eliminating many of the costs and resource-related obstacles with AI, ML, and other sophisticated innovations already integrated into the service. Auto upgrades, high scalability and availability, higher security, and reduced maintenance are among the other benefits. Also, cloud solutions can be configured and deployed significantly faster. On-premises deployments give more control over the application, infrastructure, and data. Hybrid deployments can take advantage of both the cloud and on-premise systems.

When we did a global roll out across multiple languages and time zones, we provided videos on specific topics, written material and interactive training sessions. It is never the job done after training has been conducted so we had open bridge where any user could come and ask any question. There were different days in the week on different topics and my team manned the bridge for weeks. It was good as it also brought together users from different subsidiaries together and question asked eg from AP person in one subsidiary was answered by AP person on call from another subsidiary who was on the call for his question. This was a great collaboration . In nutshell, follow up sessions after trainings are very important

ERP Implementation is one of the major business process changes that any organization will have. Not only the change management needs to be very well prepared but also and specially the training program and documentation needs to be very well prepared and detail for each location; not preparing it taking in consideration all local, cultural and linguistic will be the first step to failure.

Some challenges and approaches that are worth considering: - ERP implementation is ultimately a business process change and should be led by the business team, who will be the end users of the system - It is essential to have champions who understand the benefits that the implementation would bring. Business champions should have a deep understanding of the business processes to contribute effectively to the deployment. - Forming the right team, with dedicated resources from both IT&IS and the business, is critical to the project's success. Supporting integration and conducting effective user acceptance testing (UAT) are some of the main steps that require dedicated resources to be executed successfully.

Some points to keep in mind: - Performance, Stability, Reliability (PSR) testing is critical and an approach needs to be planned for in the design phase - SaaS deployments need to focus on Operability, which means addressing load on system, purge plan, upgrade plan etc.

Using ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) systems globally and diversely requires careful planning, customization, and consideration of various factors. ERP systems help organizations manage their core business processes, including finance, HR, supply chain, manufacturing, and more. Here's how you can effectively use ERP systems in diverse and global contexts: ? 1. Select a Scalable ERP System: Choose an ERP 2. Customization and Localization: Customize the ERP system to meet the specific requirements of different regions and business units.