Woolworth's SAP Implementation: A Case Study

Running Head: WOOLWORTH’S SAP IMPLEMENTATION
Woolworth’s SAP
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Abstract
The evolution of the information systems in the organization started with the use of basic
information systems in the mid- 1950s. The systems like Sales Information System (SIS),
Transaction Process System (TPS), Management Information System (MIS), Office Automation
System (OAS), Decision Support System (DSS) and others were in practice in the organizations.
These are usually called divisions or silos and are not integrated with each other. Thus if the
information is required in other functional area, then the information is collected by re-entering
to each and every particular system. This process was very time consuming and less efficient.
Over the past 50 years there has been significant progress in the Information System with new
specialties and research communities. The progress can be monitored by looking at the use of
cards, electronic calculators back then, coming to the age of e-business and mobile computing.
The ERP system has capacity to handle large data reducing the data repetition and mistakes in
the data. Depending on market and organizational need the information system that an
organization use get evolves in size per their current need from standard platform. Information
that is required for an organization keeps growing and growing and as their needs and market
positions change, eventually they will find that they need an information system that can better
aid their business practices. And this leads to a large number of information system which
becomes complex and time consuming. There are large number of organization with thousands
of information system and database because of their business needs and growth in market area.
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Running Head: WOOLWORTH’S SAP IMPLEMENTATION
With increasing demand in market area, at some point they have to decide to implement an ERP
system from a vendor such as SAP, Oracle so that the large number of information system will
have dynamic flow. It prevents and eliminates duplication of work improving the performance in
information flow. When a company implements ERP system, it eliminates the division occurred
in the organization.
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Running Head: WOOLWORTH’S SAP IMPLEMENTATION
1.0 Introduction
Woolworths is a chain of supermarkets operating in Australia. Its chain is among the extensive in
offering groceries. Presently, Coles has 776 supermarkets all over Australia and most of its
businesses range from alcohol and other materials. The company presently has over 100,000
workers in its supplies and superstores and accounts for closely half of the entire workers
operational in Wesfarmers. Form the past, Woolworth is the leading in providing groceries in the
Australian market value behind Woolworths, followed by Cole its leading rival. At the moment,
this company has grown vastly thus requires a huge capacity to accommodate its customers in its
ERP system. Therefore, the company has resolved to move to implement SAP.
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system can be defined as collection of management
software that integrates businesses in managing different functions like product planning,
purchasing, inventories, supplier, customer service, sales, marketing, accounting and order
tracking into a cohesive database. ERP systems in a company are concerned with the managing
and the integrating the important part of the business. ERP is a real-time monitoring of business
functions and permits timely analysis of quality, availability, customer satisfaction, performance,
profitability and so on.
ERP system is different from the traditional systems like MIS, TPS, and DSS as it brings all the
business process together in an enterprise. Thus maintaining the transactions occur one time at
the source. It unites all departments, open communication and all database into one accessible
database. The traditional systems like Transaction Processing System (TPS), Management
Information System (MIS), Decision Support System (DSS) and others, perform routine
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Running Head: WOOLWORTH’S SAP IMPLEMENTATION
operations on a regular basis and provides data to other systems but used to have limited support
for decision making. Whereas in ERP system decision making support is high. The ERP system
in an enterprise results in making information flow dynamic and immediate, resulting the
increment in its usefulness and value. TPS, MIS, and DSS these all are types of information
system used in an organization in different level. In these systems the information is isolated to
particular system and hence if any information is needed we need to enter particular system to
transfer data to the system. But in ERP system, company uses to connect its business activities
across departments so everyone is working with the same data and processes i.e. in ERP system
there is a common interface and terminology.
No ERP cannot support all levels of management, since it allows each level to utilize information
in customized manner. For example: upper-level management can only utilize reports suited to
their positions within an organization whereas operational management can only utilize detailed
reports for their specific functions. Each level management have their own specific working area.
The migration of existing data to a new SAP system from existing legacy system is very
important to the success of a new ERP implementation strategy. The data in the legacy systems
may be of poor quality and may not meet the criteria set in the new system. The amount of types
of data to move should be consolidated and modified to meet the requirements of the new SAP
system. This is known as data cleansing. Proper skill, planning, and seamless execution of pre-
data migration preparation, data migration, and post-data clean-up to new SAP software from
start to finish is crucial and should only be managed by the most skilled subject matter experts.
This approach will is imperative to RR’s ERP implementation success.
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