ERP Implementation Challenges and Success Factors

This assignment delves into the complexities of implementing Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems. It examines various challenges organizations face during ERP implementation, including resistance to change, integration issues, and inadequate planning. The assignment also highlights key success factors for successful ERP implementation, such as strong leadership support, clear communication, and comprehensive training. Drawing upon a range of academic sources and real-world case studies, the document provides insights into best practices and strategies for overcoming implementation hurdles.

Running head: STRATEGIC INFORMATION SYSTEM
Strategic Information System
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author’s Note

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Table of Contents
Introduction..........................................................................................................................2
1. Identification and discussion of the structure of the company........................................2
2. Operation and functionality.............................................................................................3
2.1. Current business Process..........................................................................................3
2.2. Gap Analysis.............................................................................................................3
2.3. Issues fixed by the new system.................................................................................4
2.4. Criteria for the meeting requirement........................................................................5
3. Information system strategy............................................................................................5
3.1. Needs of the strategy................................................................................................6
4. Risks................................................................................................................................6
5. Problem Analysis.............................................................................................................7
5.1. Problem arising during the development of the project............................................7
5.2. Examples...................................................................................................................9
5.3. Solutions...................................................................................................................9
Conclusion.........................................................................................................................10
References..........................................................................................................................11

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Introduction
The report is prepared for xyz organization for the implementation of automated
information system in the organization and reduce the manual jobs of the employees. The report
provides a brief description about the business organization and reviews the functionality of the
automated information system. The requirement of the business is analyzed and the information
system is deployed in the current business process for increasing the efficiency of the
organization. The gaps in the organization is analyzed and data are collected by preparing a list
of questionnaires and interviewing the staffs and the other stakeholders associated with the
business organization to identify the problems in the organization. The different risk associated
with the project is listed and a risk mitigation plan is created for increasing the efficiency of the
information system and reduce the number of errors occurred during the development of the
project.
1. Identification and discussion of the structure of the company
Xyz is an small book selling company in Sydney which is managed by a small family.
The company sells the books in the local area and have four different branches in the city. The
company also gives regular supplies to the schools, colleges, universities and different libraries.
The stocks and orders of books are maintained manually using registers and online email service
are also used for taking orders from different region of the country (Harmon, P., 2014). The
organization have the requirement to remove the manual process of maintaining the stock and the
sales record because they are difficult to maintain and chances of errors increases. The manual
process also needs more time and the employees of the organization have the thought they can
maintain all the records centrally using an information system and by saving their time they can

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focus more on the customer relationship management to increase the productivity and efficiency
of the business (Laudon and Laudon 2016). Moreover the company have a plan to make a virtual
web store to sell their books and they are ready to create an ecommerce website to reach to their
global customers and grow their business worldwide.
2. Operation and functionality
2.1. Current business Process
XYZ operates on different region of Sydney and it is difficult for the sales representatives
to update the stocks immediately due to lack of any automated information system they have to
do it manually and thus it becomes a problem and cause delay for the customer to get their
products (Pearlson, Saunders and Galletta 2016). With the implementation of the information
system the sales representatives can fetch the details of the stocks and update the customer
accordingly and decrease the waiting time of the customer. This would also help in increase the
loyalty of the customer and gain more profit in their business.
With the implementation of the information system the all the business process can be
managed from a central point and it also helps to maintain the data of the customer and the
employees for increasing the efficiency of the management process of the organization.
2.2. Gap Analysis
For the gap analysis of the current business process of the organization the mission and
the vision of the organization is analyzed and the aims and objectives of the organization are
analyzed. The data regarding the requirement of the organization are collected by following the
process of interviewing the stakeholders and brainstorming the needs of the organization (Wu et
al. 2016). The current state of the books selling company is compared with the future state the

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company can achieve with the implementation of the new information system in the current
business process. The current workplace of the business organization uses a manual entry system
to maintain the sales records and a different register is used for recording the stocks. There are a
group of employees that researches on the new books that can be sold and adds them to the list of
the stock book (Le 2016). There is a huge gap between the sales personnel and the stick
maintaining staff and it is required to be reduced in order to increase the efficiency of the current
business process and maintain a sustainable growth of the organization. A swot analysis can be
performed on the current state of the organization for identification of the gap.
The information system is built after a detailed analysis of the gap and a strategy is
selected for the application of the information system in the organization. The information
system is aligned with the current business process and separate modules are created for different
functionality and deployed for increasing the efficiency of the current business process of the
organization (Zafra et al. 2016). All the stakeholders are involved in the development process for
making the requirement clear and reduce the occurrence of errors in the early phases of
development. If any error is found during the development of the information system it is
required to be fixed for increasing the quality of the final project.
2.3. Issues fixed by the new system
There are different issues faced by the staffs working in the book store such as
maintaining the record of the sales and stocks and the information system is designed to resolve
the problem and reduce the effort of the employees. The new information system would record
the details of the product, service, customer and the employees such that the admin can get all
the details from the information system (De Chaumont et al. 2012). The new information system
is also designed to store the records of the transactions generating a monthly or quarterly report.

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The maintenance of the inventory is also an important factor for increasing the efficiency of the
business organization the records of the stocks are updated after every order is placed such that
the sales man accessing the information system can see the available stock and take orders
accordingly. The information system is also designed to handle complex tasks such as giving
discount to the loyal customers (Bernroider, Wong and Lai 2014). The stock records can be
analyzed for finding the demand of the products and increasing the availability of the product.
Different accounts are created and connected with the information for accessing the data and
strong encryption algorithm is used for securing the data residing in the information system.
2.4. Criteria for the meeting requirement
The criteria that is used for testing the information system meets all the requirement of
the organization is to full satisfy the needs of the end user. The response time of the information
system should be minimum and it should be able to produce the accurate result of the querry of
the users. To develop the requirement acceptance criteria would help to maintain the criteria of
the organization (Galy and Sauceda 2014). The data residing in the information system should be
validated and no errors data should be inputted in the information system. The final solution
should be able to meet the goals and objectives of the organization and should be flexible such
that it can be aligned with the current business needs for the validation of the requirement.
3. Information system strategy
For the development of the information system an extensive review on different articles
are done and interview is arranged with the different stakeholders of the organization. The
different issues faced by the development team are analyzed and the project management plan is
created for proceeding with the development process according to the project schedule (Harmon
2014). The change management is necessary for the exploitation of the vulnerability of the

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information system and different successful information system are also analyzed for the
development of the information system (Oseni et al. 2014). Continuous improvement in the
current business process should be applied for elimination of the current errors and the risk
associated with the information system.
3.1. Needs of the strategy
The information strategy is required to be applied for gaining competitive advantage in
the current business process. The strategy helps to reduce the effort of the management team and
establish the needs of the book store (Hanseth and Braa 2016). A change management is also
important and adaptation of the new service and products in the current business and it also
improves the customer relationship. The loyalty of the customer can be improved and increases
the flexibility of the organization to adopt the future needs (Kale 2014). For the selection of the
strategy a project approval plan should be created and all the stakeholders must be involved for
the approval of the strategy for the development of the project.
4. Risks
The implementation of the Information System strategies (ISS) has been affected by
various problems during planning, designing and implementation.
Management Problems
The strategies developed by the management of the Xyz Company might be contradictory
to various levels of management of the company (Pearlson, Saunders and Galletta 2016). The
mutual understanding among different levels of the company might not be same. Therefore, there
is a misunderstanding among different levels of the management of Xyz Company.
Human Challenges

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The inability of different employees in the company creates problems in implementation
of the ISS in organization. The lack in technical skills of the employees of the Xyz Company
have caused problems in implementing Information system strategy (Rouhani, Ghazanfari and
Jafari 2012). The member of the team are not able to understand the technical use of the strategy
Therefore, creating a serious problem in the implementation of information system strategy.
Various uncontrollable environmental occurs in the organization including the failure in
organizational culture, change in behavior and lack n communication. These factors creates
serious issues in the implementation of the information system strategy.
However, these challenges can be resolved by proper training if the employees of the
company, the training and motivation sessions are required to be initiated in the company for
development of the company. A training on enhancing the communication skills is required for
improving the communication skills of the employees.
5. Problem Analysis
Information Systems projects in an organization helps in maintaining proper agenda for
the development of the company in the market. However, there are various problems that can
cause failures in the IS projects.
5.1. Problem arising during the development of the project
These problems are discussed below:
Correspondence Failure
This failure occurs when the system design objectives are not properly met by the
organization. The design and goals of the company are net by the completion of the project in the
market. The failure of the fulfillment of the goals and requirements in the project is termed in the

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correspondence failure for the project (Seo 2013). The failure in submitting the project within the
deadline creates a serious issue in the organization. The use of improper information technology
in the organization is the main cause of the failure in the information system project.
Process failure
This failure takes part in the process during incompletion of the allocated budget of the
project thee financial lack in the project is the main cause for the process failure. There are two
outcomes of the process failure including lack in workable system and consuming more time and
money for the completion of the project (Teittinen, Pellinen and Jarvenpaa 2013). Therefore, this
process failure creates an unsatisfactory completion of the project in the organization. Therefore,
the use of proper time ad budget is necessary for the success of the information system project in
the organization.
Interaction failure
The end user of the project is the main part for the completion of the project. Therefore,
the end user usage is responsible for the success of the project. The performance management of
the project is totally depended on the satisfaction level of the end user. Therefore, the amount of
data transfer for the satisfying the end user is depended on the frequency of usage. However,
heavy usage is not directly proportional to the high performance of the project (Sousa and Oz
2014). The smart use of the project by the end user is the secret for the success pf the project.
Therefore, the interaction with the end user is necessary. The lack in the interaction with the end
user causes the interaction failure in the project. The legal persuasion of the end user has to be
properly maintained in order to satisfy their needs from the outcomes of the project.
Expectation Failure

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The expectation of the end user is necessary to be fulfilled by the information system
project. Therefore, the failure in meeting the expectation of the end user is a critical issue in the
organization. Expectation failure is described as the difference between the desired result and
obtained result of the project (Parvizi Oghbaei and Khayami 2013). There are many cases when
due to small errors; the desired result is not obtained from the outcomes of the project. This
situation is called as the expectation failure. However, this failure is different according to the
different stakeholders of the company and the project.
5.2. Examples
For example, failure in the healthcare information system in UK. He Stimulus Bill was
passed for improvement in the health care facilities provided to the patients in the health care
organization in the country. This provides for an investment of some $148 billion in healthcare
of which $19 billion is specifically earmarked for healthcare information technology (Hanseth
and Braa 2016). However, the project was failed due to the improper management of the project
in the health care organization. The bill was not properly implemented in the health care
organization that have caused failure in the project. Therefore, this case study simply focuses in
the implementation of the strategies for the success of the project in the organization.
5.3. Solutions
The problems in the Information system have caused major changes in the management
of the project. There are various strategies initiated for mitigating the challenges in IS projects.
The implementation of the Management Information System (MIS) in the projects have helped
in maintaining the failures in it. The MIS strategy have helped in improving the decision making
process of the project managers (Galy and Sauceda 2014). This have helped in enhancing the
employee engagement in the project and improving the technology in the systems. The use of the

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MIS in the projects have led to create a computer application named as Decision Support System
(DSS) that helps in analyzing the problems in the project and provide appropriate solution for it.
Conclusion
From the above report it can be concluded that with the development of the information
system for xyz book store the current business process of the organization would be benefitted.
The information system would reduce the effort of the employees and the errors generated as a
result of the human error for management of the records in the manual process. The risk
associated with the development of the information system should be evaluated and a risk
mitigation plan should be created for increasing the efficiency of the development process.
Different examples of successful information system should be analyzed for implementation.

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