Organizational Learning and Impacts of ERP Implementations

1. Organizational Learning and Impacts of ERP Implementations MIS 262 – Velianitis Phil Devereux and James Pratt

2. Introduction • Most (70%+) ERP rollouts fail, why? • ERP Systems have become increasingly integrated an encompass more end users. • A need for well-managed integrations between different systems and cooperating businesses. • Increases the need for organizational learning. • There is no perfect handbook for organizational learning due to company differences.

3. Organizational Learning • Learning theory states that people learn new skills through structures called “schemas.” • Employees are required to learn a large amount of information in a short amount of time. • This is due to the change from an outdated legacy system to a modern ERP. • As the ERP system increases in complexity, the amount of end user training must increase.

4. IT Learning Strategy • A company must develop and IT learning strategy that supports the overall goals of the business. • Layered view of Training & Learning Strategies. SIGMIS conference on Computer Personnel Research, 2003

5. Training with an ERP Project • In 1999 the average US Company trained more of its employees than ever before, IT comprised 9% of the total organizational spending on training. (Symposium on Applied Computing, 2009) • Training is seen as the largest organizational learning aspect in relation to an ERP implementation. • There are three groups which must be trained for any ERP implementation to be successful: • Technical Support Organization (TSO) • Management • End User

6. Training with an ERP Project cont. • An organization must select a TSO as the starting team to any ERP implementation. • The TSO groups are the subject matter experts from various departments throughout the organization. • Management must also be trained in the business aspects of an ERP. • The final training team is the end-user, these are the people whom will be using the ERP on a daily basis.

7. Benefits of Successful ERP Implementations • One of the major downfalls of implementing an ERP system is the lack of evidence associated with whether the ERP system is cost effective for your business. • A business must properly identify the organizational impacts of implementing an ERP from a financial standpoint. • ERP systems are still in the growth stage of the maturity model and therefore still uncertain as to long term benefits.

8. ERP Implementation and End User Training • Another major organizational impact that stems from ERP implementation is customer side quality, i.e. customer end user. • Does the organization tailor to customers who are closely tied to your business process? • This must be taken into account, as no company would want to lose customers over quality issues related to an ERP implementation.

9. ERP Implementation and End User Training cont. • We have developed a three step process in training your end-user in order to account for quality and customer focus. • Step 1: Define and Emphasize Ownership • Step 2: Develop Training Material • Step 3: Test, Implement and Train

10. Conclusion • An ERP implementation is a grueling undertaking that is laden with risk and sometimes un-calculable rewards. • Despite this, more and more companies decide that this risk is worth it as outdated legacy systems continue to become a thing of the past. • These risks can be minimized by increasing organizational learning through the use of a proper end user training program.