General Motors of Canada: Common Systems Implementation

1. General Motors of Canada:Common Systems Implementation Nazanin Angoshtari George Azzam Joe Chen Pedro Lay Irina Rojkova

2. Introduction Objective: Apply the GM Canada’s common system implementation to illustrate issues to consider during transition phase Facts about GMC: Part of GM NAO 30,000 employees in 9 manufacturing plants Over $4.5 billion spent in IT annually One of the largest and oldest corporations in the world

3. Common Systems Motivation: Economies of scale; leverage GM’s size and expertise to spread knowledge quickly across the organization and drive results quickly to the bottom line Goal: Choose a best practice, commonize and centralize business processes and systems worldwide

4. Question Given the goal of common systems, could GMC have implemented the common system transition in ways that would not have encountered so much user resistance?

5. Benefits of GMTKS The benefits of implementing GMTKS: • One common system supporting a common process • Reduction in overall and Canadian local system timekeeping expenses • Improved hourly workforce availability and productivity at the plant level - Eliminating double entry of paperwork with data entry • Re-deploying headcount • Providing on-line access to data on employees Major impacts: • On-line facility for tracking employee time • Common statistical reporting structure • Fewer people required in control centers • System maintenance/support is centralized at NAO • System processing & system support cost will increase for the plants • Large training requirement for plant supervision

6. Systems Comparison

7. Class Exercise GMTKS & Transition: What did go well? What did not go well?

8. Model of Factors Leading to Successful Use of Information System Management support for questions, importance,& info dissemination • System characteristics • flexibility • user control • transparency • simplicity Users’ perception of problem urgency User’s personal stake in IS • Use • operational • experimental User’s computer experience Organizational support for use (perf mses, policies, help desk, supvy support) + + + + + + Modification of H. Lucas, Information Technology for Management, 1997, NY: McGraw-Hill

9. Model of Factors Leading to Successful Use of Information System Management support for questions, importance,& info dissemination • System characteristics • flexibility • user control • transparency • simplicity Users’ perception of problem urgency User’s personal stake in IS • Use • operational • experimental User’s computer experience Organizational support for use (perf mses, policies, help desk, supvy support) • Strong global management support • Weekly conference calls • Complaint memo • User group meetings to identify built-in options for various demands • Less flexible than TARS • Complicated – users must remember new codes • No delegation + + + + • Front-line supervisors make cars, not admin tasks • Many GM Canada employees reached 30 year service mark • Not “Made in Canada” • No user perception of urgency + + • Avg employee > 30 yrs (used to old processes) • New supervisor had no staff support • Award for implementation • Users accustomed to paper-based system Modification of H. Lucas, Information Technology for Management, 1997, NY: McGraw-Hill

10. What Happened • The system was implemented simultaneously into seven plants across GM of Canada on March 17, 1997. • Two other plants were sold in December, 1997. • The systems were run in parallel for four weeks of testing with no serious implementation problem. • The supervisor who threatened to retire, did. • His replacement was reassigned for another position. • The Dept/Group additional screen was built by EDS Canada and resided in a separate system. • The employee identifier chosen was the five-digit serial number.  • The local union agreements had come to be recognized by GM NAO as a competitive disadvantage.

11. Transition Phase Activities • Beta-test and fine-tune • Organizational and Process Changes • User support and Training • Design to minimize TCO • Deployment • Continued IS Assessment • Post-Implementation Evolution

12. Question Given the goal of common systems, could GMC have implemented the common system transition in ways that would not have encountered so much user resistance?