Goals and Customization of ERP System for Hershey

Running head: ENTERPRISE SYSTEMS
ENTERPRISE SYSTEMS
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1ENTERPRISE SYSTEMS
What are the key goals Hershey wanted to achieve using an ERP system?
Hershey wanted to achieve some key goals by implementing the ERP system. First of
all, the company wanted to achieve enhanced customer service by redesigning their entire
business process to keep the customer in mind. The main goal was to attain competitive
advantage.
Moreover, for catering to a huge number of seasonal requirements, the company
needed to set up a reliable and efficient logistics system which was only possible with the
implementation of an Enterprise Resource planning or ERP system. With the help of the ERP
system, Hershey wanted to achieve efficient transportation management, scheduling,
forecasting and production. Manugistics provided the required software to attain these goals.
Later Siebel provided a software to track the marketing effectiveness of the company and
how Hershey was managing customer relations (Ptak and Schragenheim 2016).
Hershey already had a huge network of nineteen manufacturing plants. It had over twenty co
packers and 8 contract manufacturers. Initially the company used legacy systems.
With the introduction of Y2K bug, it was evident for the company that the legacy
system was outdated and needed to be updated. Using the ERP system, the company wanted
to move to a client- server environment (Chauhan 2014). One of the reasons for adopting an
ERP system was that Hershey did not want to repeat the same mistake they did with legacy
system and wanted to tackle the Y2K issue. Hershey wanted to replace the existing legacy
system with SAP R3. It needed the ERP system so that Hershey will be able to properly
forecast production and manage the transportation efficiently.
With the new system, Hershey wanted to improve the delivery process to their
suppliers. This will have improved their supplier relationship indirectly benefitting the
company in the long run. Moreover, the company wanted to standardize and upgrade the

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business processes. Hershey also wanted to make the customer service efficient which could
be able to handle changing customer needs (Kapp, Latham and Ford-Latham 2016). The new
ERP system would have allowed Hershey to improve their inventory accuracy and reduce the
order cycle times. This would have resulted in low inventory costs benefitting the company.
Finally, Hershey wanted to achieve proper execution of its business strategy to emphasize on
its market candy business.
Discuss the pros and cons to customising the system.
There are several advantages and disadvantages of customising the system.
Customizing the system will help Hershey to integrate all the business functions of separate
departments into a single unit. The company could have improve the organisational levels
present in the business and could have managed the business processes efficiently. Moreover,
the customizing could have given Hershey an advantage of managing and tracking all the
manufacturing activities from a single hub. The customized system would have given
Hershey the benefit of automating the business transactions making the entire process more
efficient (Hwang and Min 2013). It would have allowed the company to support all types of
business process flows, practices and processes. Moreover, customizing the system would
have allowed the company to better manage the accounting processes and predict forecasting,
planning and reporting. It would have also allowed the employees to enjoy a better user
interface unlike the previous systems which used legacy software. The customized system
would have allowed Hersheys to check different processes efficiently such as sales and
distribution, material management, HRM, CRM and accounting (Chung, Ahmad and Tang
2015). Customization of the system would have allowed the company to better tracker sales
order and forecast future profits and sales. The customized system would have also allowed