IGT ERP Implementation: Goals, Pros, Cons, and Change Management

This report examines the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) implementation at International Game Technology (IGT). It begins by outlining IGT's key objectives for adopting an ERP system, including the integration of disparate systems and streamlining business processes such as accounting, manufacturing, and sales. The report then delves into the advantages and disadvantages of customizing an ERP system, considering factors like security, efficiency, cost-effectiveness, and scalability. It highlights the benefits of ERP, such as improved efficiency and better collaboration, while also acknowledging potential drawbacks like high initial costs and the time-consuming nature of implementation. Finally, the report discusses how IGT should handle change management during the ERP implementation, emphasizing the importance of stakeholder involvement and the need for a structured approach to managing changes within the organization. The report concludes by emphasizing the role of stakeholders and the need for a structured approach to implementing changes.

Running head: IGT ERP IMPLEMENTATION
IGT ERP Implementation
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author’s Note:

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Question 1
What are the key goals IGT wanted to achieve using an ERP system?
Solution
International Game Technology or IGT is the best manufacturer of slot machines and
lottery machines. IGT had a habit to depend on several unique systems to control their unique
departments of accounting, manufacturing, sales and orders of customers. When an executive of
IGT needed to master the status of a particular order, he or she had to experience all the sorts of
system to search for a simple piece of information. To get rid of this particular problem, IGT
decided of adopting ERP package for their business of lottery machines (Schniederjans and
Yadav 2013).
Enterprise Resource Planning is the mixed management of several business activities or
business processes like finance, sales, marketing, product and production planning,
manufacturing, inventory and materials management (HassabElnaby, Hwang and Vonderembse
2012). ERP is referred to as the sub classification of business management software that is
necessary to manage, collect, reserve and translate data from the previously mentioned business
activities.
Enterprise Resource Planning or ERP has various remarkable advantages, which make it
extremely acceptable and famous amongst all small and big organizations (Hung et al. 2012).
The major advantages of ERP are as follows:
a) Efficiency: The main benefit of ERP is that ERP increments the efficiency and
productivity of any organization and which makes it famous for all (Candra 2012).

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b) Competition: The next advantage is that it helps the particular organization in
competing with all other organizations in the market. It makes the process simpler for them.
c) Cost Effective Maintenance: It can be simply maintained in lower prices and thus can
be termed as cost-effective. (Hung et al. 2012).
d) Security: The next advantage is that these packages are extremely safe and secured and
thus information never gets lost often.
e) Scalability: ERP systems should be structured and they are extremely scalable and
flexible for all organizations.
The goals, which IGT wanted to attain by implementing an ERP package are as follows:
i) The main objective of IGT was to integrate all of their systems flexibly. The
accounting department of IGT required one simple system that will perform all of the accounting
works of the organization. Simultaneously, the other departments of IGT need their individual
systems (HassabElnaby, Hwang and Vonderembse 2012). Thus, it is recommended to IGT to
implement a full ERP system for their organization.
ii) IGT needed a particular software that can be simply integrated or updated and also it
should be of low cost. Therefore, IGT selected ERP (Hailu and Rahman 2012).
iii) The version of ERP that was selected by IGT implemented was SAP R/3 version 4.6
ERP for their organization. The stakeholders of IGT needed to maintain their three major
functions of business that are manufacturing, development of product, and finance via their
platform of ERP.

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iv) Another major goal of IGT for using the ERP was to produce various changes and
monitor budgets in producing and launching brand new products, just like the EZ Pay cashless
aspect (Ahmad and Cuenca 2013).
v) The other objective of IGT was to help the employees to search for the plant locations
that are building for the machines.
The previously mentioned statements clearly represent the objectives and goals of the
International Game Theory that they wanted to attain by bringing ERP packages in their business
(Hasibuan and Dantes 2012).
Question 2
Discuss the pros and cons to customizing ERP system.
Solution
Enterprise Resource Planning is the action through which a business, most often a
manufacturer, manages and integrates the main departments of the organization (Galy and
Sauceda 2014). The management team of an ERP system mixes all the important sections, for
example the human resources, purchasing, inventory, finance, sales, planning, and marketing.
International Game Technology had thought of adopting ERP for their organization (Hung et al.
2012). ERP has various pros and cons. The pros of ERP are as follows:
i) Security: ERP packages are extremely safe and secured and thus information never
gets lost often.

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ii) Easier Activities: ERP makes all the business processes like sales forecasting, tracking
of inventory, various orders and revenues of the organization much simpler. (Schniederjans and
Yadav 2013).
iii) Best Collaboration: Another advantage of ERP is that it can be simply amalgamated
with all the other departments and they can give a better visibility of the organization
iv) Centralized Storage: It has a centralized storage, which keeps all the information and
data in a single storage. ERP software further helps in the back up of data.
v) Several Modules: It has unique modules implemented in it, such as the SCM,
marketing, CRM, manufacturing, human resource management, finance, and project
management (Galy and Sauceda 2014).
vi) E-commerce Integration: ERP software can be simply integrated with e-commerce
sites and the management of tracking and processing of e-commerce sites based order can ne
done easily.
vii) Cost Effective Maintenance: Maintenance of ERP can be easily done within lower
budget for longer duration and thus can be termed as the cost effective maintenance.
viii) Efficiency: The main benefit of ERP is that ERP increments the efficiency and
productivity of any organization and which makes it famous for all.
ix) Business Intelligence: ERP software gives several functions of Business Intelligence,
which gives an overall visionary on the activities of organization and recognizes areas for
improvements (Ram, Wu and Tagg 2014).

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x) Scalability: ERP ERP systems should be structured and they are extremely scalable
and flexible for all organizations.
xi) Visibility: ERP produces complete visibility to all the business activities and processes
for all the organizational departments.
xii) Modular Software: ERP is a modular system of software, which makes it possible to
implement either many modules or some of the modules as required by the organizations (Hailu
and Rahman 2012).
In spite of having so many advantages, ERP do have some disadvantages. The cons of
ERP are as follows:
i) Time Consuming: An important disadvantage of ERP is that it is extremely time
consuming and most of the time, it even takes one to three years to be completed and become
functional.
ii) Initial Cost: While starting of implementation, the initial investment of any ERP
package is extremely high and most of the smaller businesses and organizations could not afford
it (Ram, Wu and Tagg 2014). The initial software, testing, configuration and planning costs are
too high in ERP.
iii) Excessive Customization: With the help of little customization it is not possible to
integrate the business activities with ERP system (Galy and Sauceda 2014).
iv) Indirect Costs: Direct costs are not incurred in the ERP implementation.
v) Migration: It is important for any organization to move their existing data from one
place to another. Any sort of migration of existing data to the new ERP software is almost

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impossible and therefore changing to a new system becomes extremely risky for any
organization.
vi) Payback: There is very little scope for payback or cost savings in ERP, which makes
it less porpular for small businesses or organizations (Nour and Mouakket 2013).
vii) Participation: Users of ERP implemented organization should participate in the
projects.
viii) Training: ERP is a little complicated to understand. Therefore, training of the users
and the employees are required each and every time in the organization.
IGT should have kept in mind the previously mentioned pros and cons before
implementing ERP in their business.
Question 3
How should IGT handle change management during ERP implementation?
Solution
Any organization before the implementation of ERP should do it carefully. There is a
drastic alteration in the management after the ERP is implemented (Hailu and Rahman 2012).
The organizational stakeholders play distinct roles for the selection of ERP packages, the
implementation, planning, adoption and the ongoing support phases. The roles of the
organizational stakeholders are of several sorts. Stakeholders of an organization are individuals
or collection of people within a particular organization. They have a stake in the result of an ERP
implemented software project and the permission of these stakeholders is required to launch such
type of project, function it further to a successful accomplishment and to make sure that the

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product is completely utilized (Nour and Mouakket 2013). Stakeholders, being the investors have
the benefit to move a particular project towards the success. They lead the organization in
selecting the perfect ERP package that can help IGT to attain its goals (Hasibuan and Dantes
2012). Moreover, the stakeholders can even help IGT in the implementation process of ERP. The
stakeholders of the organization also handle the change management of IGT. At first, the scope
of the change is determined and then the scope of incorporating the change is determined. The
stakeholders then either approve or reject the change in IGT. Finally, the ERP is implemented in
IGT (Ahmad and Cuenca 2013). Therefore, IGT can control or manage the change management
of ERP with the help of the stakeholders.

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References
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Candra, S., 2012. ERP implementation success and knowledge capability. Procedia-Social and
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Hailu, A. and Rahman, S., 2012, June. Evaluation of key success factors influencing ERP
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Hasibuan, Z.A. and Dantes, G.R., 2012. Priority of key success factors (KSFS) on enterprise
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