How painful is ERP really?
Posted by ExpensiveDecision268@reddit | sysadmin | View on Reddit | 96 comments
I’m a sysadmin for a small logistics firm. We’re starting to outgrow our system. Too many tools, too much manual effort, and too many points for things to go wrong.
Of course, now my boss is talking about this whole ERP thing. I’ve heard too many tales about timelines going through the roof, budgets going crazy, and people wanting to pull their hair out halfway through. So yeah, I’m a bit skeptical.
Still early days and really don’t know which direction to go in for our type of business.
Hector20133@reddit
honestly ERP can be painful but in most cases it is not the system itself it is how it is implemented. alot of the horror stories come from trying to customize everything to match existing processes or running multi year projects with heavy consulting layers. that is where timelines and budgets explode. in smaller logistics setups like yours the real win is usually just consolidating tools and reducing manuaş touchpoints. systems like xentral that connect inventory, fullfillment and order flow out of the box tend to reduce a lot of that early complexity instead of forcing you to design everything from scratch. my experience when teams keep scope tight and avoid over customizing ERP is way more manageable than it is reputation suggests.
milomylove_@reddit
imo it’s not the ERP itself that’s painful, it’s all the messy processes you discover when you try to put everything into one system like on paper everything looks clean, but day to day you’ve got manual steps, exceptions, random approvals that no one documented, and that’s what slows everything down. seen teams struggle more with that than the actual system. something that helps is mapping how work actually happens before committing too hard, otherwise you’re just forcing a broken flow into a new tool. tools like gralio can help lay that out so you see where things will break early instead of finding out mid-implementation
ERP_Insider@reddit
the right one is not, not really. Know what you want first, then start filling in answers and pick a system that fits your process rather than think the system will fix it. Happy to answer any questions if needed.
Vast_Procedure_7304@reddit
ERP can definitely be painful if the project starts before processes are clear.
The biggest problems usually come from trying to move bad data, unclear workflows, and too many manual habits into a new system. That is when timelines slip and people get frustrated.
When companies take time to clean up processes first and roll things out in stages, ERP is usually much more manageable than people expect.
phoenix823@reddit
People. Process. Technology. The technology is almost never the issue on ERP projects. The problem is that you're a small firm that hacked together your current tools and processes. The reengineering you suggest requires that everyone take a step back and solve these problems end to end, not just optimizing their own piece of the process. That is not the core skill set of any of the people doing these jobs. So a vendor will send someone in to interview everyone, understand the processes as is, and come up with a to-be process to implement in the new tool. Because nobody knows the processes end to end, nobody can fully validate the proposed solution, so it inevitably needs to get reworked a few times until it's correct.
You are NOT doing an ERP project. ERP is just a piece of software. You are fundamentally reorganizing how your firm does its key finance functions. You just happen to put this reorganized team/processes into a new ERP Platform in the end.
wildfyre010@reddit
It’s usually very painful, but not the actual sysadmin work so much as the programming, business logic, finance, and procurement elements. Normally those would be handled by a dedicated ERP person/team.
Sucralan@reddit
Whats the jobrole for such a person called?
raj6126@reddit
Consultant. Hire the outside consultants to do the heavy lifting. They just admin the system.
matroosoft@reddit
Having done both ERP as well as sysadmin, that's the same as saying: let outside consultants do your network, policies, configs, devices, then just admin the system.
Sure it works, but it's typically not to tailored.
Tall-Geologist-1452@reddit
Different_Back_5470@reddit
its more akin to have an external consultancy come in and build your server, and having internal IT admin it from there.
raj6126@reddit
No it’s not. What a terrible analogy. It’s like letting outside consultants set up your email accounts. ERP isn’t Infrastructure. It’s not the Hardware. It’s a software that keeps your orders and financial information. I currently user Jaggaer, Peoplesoft and Asset works. All together in sync and they all verify data from each other. They are built on heavy integrations built by consultants. We manage it.
ExpensiveDecision268@reddit (OP)
For now that's the plan
wildfyre010@reddit
Depends on the organization. Bigger companies tend to have a lot more folks that work directly on the ERP, and might call them something as specific as 'ERP Analyst' or 'SAP Administrator'.
Smaller companies usually abstract this to a dedicated business support part of IT, calling it things like "Enterprise Systems Administrator" or "Systems Integrator". There's a lot of variety.
ExpensiveDecision268@reddit (OP)
We aren't that big
wildfyre010@reddit
In general, your business needs to separate the work of building and operating the system (servers, network, storage; the traditional infrastructure components) from the work of configuring and using the system - business reporting, finance, workflow, etc - sysadmins can't own that second set of tasks. It's not your job.
mineral_minion@reddit
ERP Analyst is one title, it sounds better than Masochist
ziroux@reddit
Erotic Role Play, right?
Waste_Monk@reddit
I put on my robe and wizard hat.
thisFishSmellsAboutD@reddit
I assume my IAM role and fire up my config wizard.
bot403@reddit
I ascend to the control tower and start to terraform
robsablah@reddit
Thanks. I can't unread that. This thread is ruined.
ziroux@reddit
Quite light compared to other ruined acronyms like ATM or BBC
BatemansChainsaw@reddit
Only if you like smashing your appendages with hammers.
Waste_Monk@reddit
You must be an Oracle customer
fitzdevi@reddit
At my job, it's Computer and Tech Support Specialist. Sys admin has the same title. So does Help Desk...and Net Admin...cybersec...(help me) 😂
pepper_man@reddit
Often called business application support, ERP engineer, often specific to the system eg d365 support engineer
CVMASheepdog@reddit
Consultant……
ExpensiveDecision268@reddit (OP)
Well, it's a small company, and they are expecting to order the whole thing from another, and of course, I'll be the one who helps when something goes wrong
dreamersword@reddit
Wait I am not suppose to be the ERP person and the system admin sigh.
Old-Overeducated@reddit
To add to some of the great advice I'm seeing here about ERP being first of all an enterprise engineering task for senior management -- don't treat "EDI" as an afterthought -- center everything about interacting with the system around it. There are standards for sending invoices, receiving payments, sending shipments, receiving inventory, sending catalogs to customers (i.e. price lists), pulling from inventory, placing into inventory, placing and receiving orders, on and on and on. By the way, you place orders with your own manufacturing department -- this isn't necessarily all external. You cannot possibly do all that business analysis yourself. Drink deeply of the standards before you go shopping for vendors. Take a task or transaction oriented approach. Look around at how you're doing those things now and what's causing you pain. Look at what your suppliers and customers would be thrilled to death if you could do. An aside: there are customers who (for example) don't do electronic invoicing. That's fine. All your outbound invoices are going to be EDI transaction sets. Difference for them is the EDI destination is the Invoice Printer Daemon and then the printer in your mail room. Other customers will want you to fill in their spreadsheet -- in this case the EDI destination is Customer PITA Excel Invoice Builder Daemon. It should all be automated with logging and tracability. That kind of thing. You're not going to have your ERP vendor customize the system to deal with the outside world beyond straightforward EDI remapping. You're going to do that by writing software outside the ERP that understands EDI transaction sets and translates them into something else. And that means you identify all these cases before you get started. "Use the interface, Luke."
I strongly advise against Big Bang implementations.
IrquiM@reddit
If you get good, experienced consultants, it does not have to be painful.
But make sure you get the right ones. Just hiring one of the big consulting companies and thinking it will all be good, is a big no-go. And definitely get another consultancy to keep the first ones in line.
I_NEED_YOUR_MONEY@reddit
ERP is not a technical problem. an ERP's system's primary function is to be a target for users to blame for everything that frustrates them about doing their job.
Do you want Debbie in accounting to get mad at Jim in marketing for not correctly entering in his orders, or would you rather she get mad at a faceless computer system that is capable of accepting infinite amounts of blame, and all your employees can continue happily getting along with each other?
so naturally, ERP systems get an "ERP systems are the worst" reputation. but that's what they're for.
19610taw3@reddit
Remember Debbie in accounting has used the same spreadsheet for doing AP invoices since the company opened in 2007. This far along, she's going to fight you if you make her do it in a web page.
AlfaHotelWhiskey@reddit
This is more accurate - chances are you will not be remapping structured data - instead you will be doing the equivalent of mapping a teenagers diary into structured data.
That said, we are writing AI tools after the fact to do the translating after numerous failed attempts for scripts to do it.
19610taw3@reddit
I do think that's something AI could be VERY useful for.
Trying to analyze 100 different spreadsheets which have mostly the same data, but in all sorts of different columns, different notations depending on who was the person working on the spreadsheet.
wrincewind@reddit
I cannot imagine how you'd go about proving that the AI did it right...
bot403@reddit
Make AI write the code which verifies it. The code can be inspected, tweaked, debugged and proven and does not run probabilistically.
AI systems solve a ton of problems this way now. It doesn't try to "reason" the answer with tokens. It writes an analysis or converter program to do what you want.
BatemansChainsaw@reddit
This is what it feels like when you have to rip away excel spreadsheets that have been in use since the literal 1990s... ffs
BasicallyFake@reddit
If its set up correctly and you adhere to the expectations of the ERP, its fine. Companies dont like to follow the rules and start customizing things to fit their needs. It then becomes difficult to manage and difficult to pivot.
They make sense when they make sense but do a LOT of leg work on making sure the ERP of choice aligns with the business operations and growth objectives.
UBIAI@reddit
The hidden pain in ERP implementations that nobody warns you about upfront: the data migration. Getting your existing operational data - shipment records, vendor docs, invoices, all of it - into a clean, structured format that the new system can actually ingest is where timelines quietly explode. Most firms underestimate this by a factor of 3-4x. I've been using a platform specifically built to automate that extraction and structuring from messy source documents, and it genuinely changes the math on implementation timelines. That piece alone is worth sorting before you even pick your ERP vendor.
gamebrigada@reddit
If you aren't part of management and don't know their processes that well, you should play a pretty back seat role in this whole thing. Provide guidance on decisions, don't let them go bananas, and provide infrastructure. You don't know the processes they need enough to be that helpful.
ERP's are mostly platforms. The vendors will sell you the world, and tell you all the things you can do in their system. At the end of the day, just about none of those features are out of the box, and even if the system technically can do those things out of the box the amount of configuration and customization is a big lift to dial in to how your company wants to use the system.
I would shop for an integrator almost more than the system itself. Find an integrator in your industry, meet with them and let them pitch their capabilities. Ask hard questions like "how do you guys differentiate yourselves in this industry".
The most dangerous question your company can ask and integrator is "We don't know how this should work, aren't you the experts?". No, the integrators are not. Their job is to cater the system to align as close as possible to YOUR business needs. If you don't know your business needs and work flows, you need to figure those out before your specify what you want.
If you work with a company that sells an ERP that is in the Fortune 500, add at least a zero to your first quote that claims to do it all. You won't think its possible, you'll know what I'm talking about by the time you're done. Don't forget to calculate internal costs of all of your company time, this often gets missed. I've been in an implementation where that was almost 50% of the overall cost, and the project went 5x over the most pessimistic pricing. It only went 5x because we were a pilot customer in the industry and got 3 years of licenses for free.
Pretty UI's cost money. Your ERP doesn't need to look pretty or be in a web browser, and you probably aren't willing to double/triple the cost for it to do that.
XanII@reddit
1) Very painful on average. Constant change is your enemy and weird issues that are hard to troubleshoot without it having an adverse effect on business is normal.
2) New trend is 'vibe code your own ERP'. If anyone makes any kind of hints towards this direction take it as a cue to get out NOW. This was the cornerstone of a lot of burn-out stories starting from late 90's and forward and we are now in a new high era for this thinking again. Result will be the same though sooner or later even if results look good right now. See above why.
rangerinthesky@reddit
I was lead infrastructure at a major ERP. It was horrible. Happy to answer questions without giving the company away
mcinte7a@reddit
We just went through replacing an ERP that was never fully integrated and utilized with a new ERP.
The hardest part was the users trying to figure out what they did for their own jobs and what they needed. We(IT) sent surveys and shadowed them. Just about every month for the last three years users are still coming to us about reports they need or other things they do that they want integrated into the new ERP.
My company is unique in its reporting and we've had to write new or rewrite 100% of the reports that came with the ERP.
Fluffy-Queequeg@reddit
Every company says they are unique in their reporting requirements 😂
jason9045@reddit
It sucks SO much. My org is five years into a two-year implementation/replacement and I'd say it's maybe 10% done. It's necessary but oh man is it just pain points everywhere.
The budget? We had one of those once. It's been sailed right past at least three times over with another three times (at least) to come.
Fluffy-Queequeg@reddit
Walking on water and building something to a specification is easy when both are frozen.
TheDevauto@reddit
The pain comes from people. People want to do things how they have always done them. An ERP system has best practice workflows to use the system built in. Can you customize for Karen from procurement who wants to be seen as influencing a big project and does so by objecting to any change to the way she does things? Sure, but it can maje upgrades more painful and have upstream and down stream effects on others. Not to mention tge extra cost and time for customization.
This is a big reason for ERP implementation issues.
Fluffy-Queequeg@reddit
No to mention when Karen leaves the company, then Sally comes in and asks “WTF is this process like this for?” 😂
Parking_Ocelot_6893@reddit
If its anything on-premise SAP or Oracle run.
KrisBoutilier@reddit
Start with a frank examination of, and attempt to document, some of your existing key business processes. Use whiteboards, Post-It's, paper. Ensure you have a broad mix of players in the room and make sure everyone is actually participating.
If you can come out of that with some sort of coherent documentation (and everyone is still on speaking terms) then it's probably worth starting to look into ERP systems and technology. Otherwise, you're heading for a world of pain and wasted money.
Alec Sharp (Clariteq Consulting) has produced some excellent and very accessible resources on Business Process topics. Eg. these webinars on Discovering Your Organization's Business Processes
sc302@reddit
Erp is a project that the whole company needs to embrace. They need to map out their current process flows, identify where erp fits into their process, and then design the erp flow to meet their process. This is not an IT software thing where you simply enable a product and give it to the end user. This requires a lot of planning and preparation prior to accepting this is the right course for your business.
Do you need it, probably. Are you ready for it, no.
How do I know you aren’t ready for it? you are in here asking this question.
lelio98@reddit
Good info here. I’d add/modify that you need to map your existing processes and then modify them to fit with the ERP tool. Most failures or delays happen from people trying to fit their square peg into the ERP systems round hole.
Cormacolinde@reddit
Take any quoted budget from an integrator, and mulitply it by ten.
Also, an ERP is not syadmin business. You may provide resources (rackspace, servers, networking, etc.) but you will need an ERP specialist to handle the actual software.
19610taw3@reddit
I've done both in my career. It's wild how having ERP admin / analyst experience helps when you're interviewing for sysadmin positions.
Creative-Package6213@reddit
Too many business owners/executives think that ERP is an IT responsibility, and I'll tell ya what...it fucking isn't, like at all. I can't tell ya how much ERP (EPICOR) nonsense I get dragged into on a daily basis.
ImScaredofCats@reddit
I remember my first real job in a huge Finance department, the ledger system was completely separate from IT aside from being hosted and firewalled to only operate within the WAN.
The system had its own support team who were qualified accountants who had learnt from SQL along the way.
Paul-Ski@reddit
That steaming pile of garbage is the source of so many headaches. Even when I can delegate most of the issues that we get tickets for to an ERP analyst.
packetssniffer@reddit
The company I work for uses Netsuite (and they don't pay for support).
Any issue pops up and me and my manager are scrambling trying to figure what the hell to do.
After 3 years we gotten pretty good.
I've been applying elsewhere just because I hate having to deal with it.
Creative-Package6213@reddit
I don't blame you. Unless you're making some serious money it isn't worth the headaches.
mrcranky@reddit
This budgeting method is 100% accurate. The people who thought ERP was a good idea when you started the project will be fired when the project is a year in and already two years behind.
Loki-L@reddit
If you buy a product from a big company like SAP, you may have to change your workflow to match the process as SAP envision it. If you try to have software customized for your business needs it will taken even longer and cost more and still require change. If you are a really big organisation and have unlimited money and can pay SAP or Oracle or similar to customise some ERP software for you it will be even worse, much much worse.
I have seen several large companies that had one Helpdesk for normal IT and a seperate department for supporting their ERP solution.
The very worst was some companies that had in-house ERP solutions that had organically grown with the company since the 90s and ran on top of Lotus/IBM/HCL Notes.
At some point it is less hassle to send randomly generated amounts of money, invoices, orders and goods to randomly chossen contacts in your address book and generate charts and numbers for managers with fair dice rolls.
flummox1234@reddit
Depends. How much do you like paying a consultant that you give your watch to in order to tell you what time it is?
fuzzylogic_y2k@reddit
To give you an idea, we are 2 years and $6m into an extensive customisation of Microsoft dynamics. I think we are projecting 6 month away from the first go live.
Sajem@reddit
mplementing an new ERP is a whole of business project
This is from the top down. All dept. managers need to be involved. They all need to have skin in the game.
If your company doesn't have a project manager, they need to hire one to manage the project Do not let IT be the project manager
The only requirement for IT is to - A) Provide input on what they require in an ERP & B) To advise on the technology required. e.g. this system won't work because of a. b. & c. or this is perfect for our stack because of a. b. & c. - also to advise on the tech security side.
There are companies out there that can help that specialize in ERP consultancy projects.
There are also ERP systems designed around specific industries, these should be your target rather than a generic ERP.
DueBreadfruit2638@reddit
ERP migrations are best described as corporate heart transplants--except they don't go well.
SpeculationMaster@reddit
Painful, expensive, delayed, over-promised
ipreferanothername@reddit
if your place needs an ERP then it needs a team to handle it - i worked at a manufacturer a little while back, we had 2 people to work in the ERP and 2 people doing other it work [desktops, servers, basic networking, etc].
the finance and logistics people need to evaluate erp products, not IT people.
matroosoft@reddit
This. ERP needs a dedicated team. The kind of work is completely different. A great sysadmin might suck at ERP and a great ERP admin might hate IT work.
Sysadmin is terminal, systems and networking. ERP admins are mostly clickops and they love understanding processes and data.
ghostnodesec@reddit
Any ERP implementation is painful, its not the infrastructure part, its sorting the business logic, processes, etc. However if you're outgrowing your tools that's a sign. The struggle is always process/training/change management, getting people to do things differently is no mean feat
matroosoft@reddit
I've seen new managers stating they outgrew the tool so many times. But also: years of neglect and tech debt, no time to config it and adapt it to the business.
ERP is a one size fits all solution that needs constant tailoring, else your walking in a suit that's ten sizes too big or to small.
ElectroSpore@reddit
Are you talking supporting one or replacing one?
If replacing one just imagine two things:
matroosoft@reddit
If you'd like to be fired, this is your one and only chance!
nowildstuff_192@reddit
I admin and develop my org's ERP. I didn't spin it up from scratch, I inherited it from the previous guy. The was no integration company, no expert, no consultant. The business was run by lunatics (still is, but they're not quite as impetuous today) and they just bought it from the vendor and started using it circa 2013. When I asked him about how the whole process went he got a thousand-yard stare and said "worst 6 months of my life". I replaced him going on 5 years now and I'm still running into problems stemming from the way things were set up and people just got used to it.
Some people here are saying "get a consultant". I'll see that and raise you "hire someone experienced who'll sit in your offices full time for at least 3 months". Perhaps it could be done remotely but IMO the kinds of companies that use ERP software are not the kinds who could utilize remote meetings that effectively.
Here's what practically will need to happen. Everybody will need to re-learn how to do their job. Detailed workflows for every conceivable scenario will need to be built and integrated. Business rules will need to be put in place to prevent mistakes. System permissions are a huge undertaking to get just right. Everybody who needs to use system reports will have to learn where they are and how to read them.
And don't even get me started on customizations. Developers charge handsome hourly rates to build new forms, write form triggers and custom reports.
I managed to be both "ERP guy" and "IT guy", but I had a few things working in my favor that wouldn't necessarily be the case in another company. And I had plenty of sleepless nights.
iamoldbutididit@reddit
Because an ERP system runs on a computer, people who don't know any better think an ERP project has to be owned by IT, when it never should be. An ERP system exists to solve a business problem. Find the owner of the problem and you will find the key stakeholder who should be responsible for the ERP implementation.
Usually an ERP is owned by accounting because they want all their number crunching at the end of the month to add up. Sometimes, its spearheaded by operations, because they want to hold sales accountable to be able to properly plan production.
Turning an ERP project into an IT problem means the business leaders would rather point their fingers than be held accountable.
TinderSubThrowAway@reddit
It's painful for the company as a whole, but only because it's a lot of work, but when done the outcome is a net positive.
One thing to remember from your point of view, it's not an IT project, it's an accounting and/or operations project. Your job is to make sure that the system is up and running and available and maybe give some input here and there on things or handle the security aspects of the system.
The biggest headache is making sure you get a system that will work correctly for your business, and don't believe the sales people who say that everything you want works and will work.
ERP_Insider@reddit
Painful? Depends on the quality of your data - that's the first thing I'd look at. Then who owns the flow. No owner = more pain.
bjc1960@reddit
Half of all CIOs have "rescued failed ERP implementation" on their list of accomplishments.
Many issues are because the various business groups want the ERP to change to support them, instead of them changing to support the ERP.
We acquired 8 companies. That means we had 8 of the best ways to approach accounting, ordering, payments, receivables, estimating, etc.
The best analogy is "go teach 8 grandmothers to change their spaghetti sauce recipes" when they have been "making the gravy" that way for 40 years.
natefrogg1@reddit
I hate dealing with our current erp system, the last company had an erp system that was a joy to work with. It can be such a huge variance
My biggest things are: Is there any real documentation? Can my people get customer service in a timely manner?
Our current system sucks in that regard, the last one was amazing and I didn’t know how good we had it at the time. The documentation was so good that you could learn how it all worked with that alone, you could call a real person that had in-depth knowledge of how every facet of the system functioned, man we were so spoiled and didn’t even know it
jaydizzleforshizzle@reddit
The problem with ERP is business function primarily. The goal of an ERP is to translate the manual systems you have, with automated checkpoints and gates. The problem is Debbie from finance doesn’t know what the fuck she’s doing so you ask her how her job works and she loses her mind, and then there goes months of just trying to get Debbie to technically describe what she does so it can be codified.
kerosene31@reddit
Cloud or on-prem? Regardless it will be a massive pain, but at least a cloud solution is someone else's problem. On prem? Buckle up and say goodbye to any friends and family. I've only been part of one (on prem), about to go through another. I really want to retire before doing it again but it isn't going to work out.
ERPs are a necessary evil, because not everyone can just write everything from scratch. However that doesn't mean it is easy, it is just a little less difficult than home building everything. The problem is, sales will sell you a magic one size fits all solution. You really need to do a ton of work and research on your own. Find user groups for the systems you are looking at, and even see if you can reach out to some companies.
As much as I hate consultants in general, consider it for this.
The other thing (that may not fall under you) is to convince people to be flexible reengineering business processes. The "we've always done it this way" will wreck the project. The organization has to be flexible and be ok with "the ERP way" even if it isn't quite the best way.
Don't let the end users think that this all falls on IT. They need to be heavily involved, more than IT. If they think this is an "IT only project". it isn't.
These are big projects across the whole company.
Buddy_Kryyst@reddit
Just make sure you pick an ERP that suits your business needs and the closer that fit is to out of box the better. The more customization you need the greater the cost and time to implement and you'll find down the road all those customizations will also often increase your maintenance costs and can potentially cause problems during upgrade cycles.
Usually the nightmare around ERP is often associated with SAP implementations that can get all blown to hell.
SquizzOC@reddit
Do not do this in house, bring in a firm that specializes in it if you don't have the team to do it properly. DO A TON OF RESEARCH.
I've been through 6 different ERP systems in my career, between two companies, all same industry.
They all have their positives, but they always have a long list of negatives.
clickx3@reddit
I second this. You can manage the connectivity to the application when needed, but let the experts do the rollout and management or you will be miserable.
SquizzOC@reddit
I've been a part of a few migrations, but was fully in charge of our last one at the end of 2025. The development house we used was great, but I don't think I've ever been that stressed in my life and I wasn't doing the coding. I was just in charge of the design, workflows, etc...
When the CEO asked "How long you think this one will last for us", I said "Longer then I'll be employed here hopefully, I'm never doing that again" :)
MavZA@reddit
Depends on a few things. 1. Having the proper understanding that an ERP is a system, and that this system is not just an application, it is the people and processes that guide the usage of the application and the outputs of the ERP. 2. Having a proper business requirements spec. 3. Finding a good, holistic partner that is agnostic to provider that’ll help you find an ERP that fits your workflows or that can help you best fit and adapt your processes lightly to the ERP. You shouldn’t need to upend everything to use SAP for instance if Sage fits better(for instance). 4. Drawing up a proper budget for the implementation. 5. Build up training for users. 6. Build up SOPs for usage and maintenance of the system.
These are just high level things I can think of. The main thing everyone should understand when dealing with wide reaching systems is that the definition of a system broadens with it too. Sometimes we minify the meaning of what system means because tooling up a user has become trivial in certain instances. However when dealing with things like ERP/MRP system in this case means a large set of tooling that touches many people in many departments that can easily bring your company operations to a halt in the event of failure, so you need to ensure that you implement it properly, document it well, have processes and procedures for users to follow to ensure they don’t stuff up entries, and that you and your dept. understand how to maintain it, patch it, back up the necessary bits and how to recover from failure and then how to escalate issues to a vendor or support partner. Then with all of this ensure you have executive buy-in so that your colleagues are aligned. Concerning budget ensure that you have firm numbers for things like licenses and a favourable rate for soft items like man-hours, there might be instances where you go over a little on those because of unknowns during the implementation, but if you get a decent rate going in at least you can minimise in the event you need to rely on outsourced assistance. Lastly, you’ll likely enter into a “double entry” period, where you’re testing out the system and getting used to it at your company by duplicating the recording of entries using the old process and entering in record on the new ERP, don’t let that drag on too long once your department heads are satisfied. There might be some holdovers within their departments that need to be nipped.
That’s my little ramble on ERP. It’s daunting to a certain degree, but if you plan well, align stakeholders and get a good partner you’ll be sorted.
vrtigo1@reddit
Generally a sysadmin wouldn't be the primary POC for an ERP system. You usually have business analysts and/or a dedicated ERP person driving those types of projects. If you're a very small company then potentially it's different for you, but if so you need to ensure you have a solid understanding of all the business rules / processes as those will be absolutely key to a successful ERP launch.
But generally, it's painful.
One thing that is usually a pain point is getting people to acknowledge that "we've always done it that way" isn't a valid business justification, and that adapting your business processes to the ERP is often much easier than trying to customize the ERP to fit your business.
moneyfink@reddit
15 catastrophic erp implementations/migrations
https://www.arnnet.com.au/article/1266510/15-famous-erp-disasters-dustups-and-disappointments.html
Terriblyboard@reddit
implementing one will not be as bad as replacing one that is entrenched into the company. really just would be to start migrating things over to it from what ever disparsed tools they currently used. this is more of a business funciton than IT though honestly. every department will be involved. most importantly will be defining who has responsibilities in each department and who is defining requirements for each. Also who are the key stake holders. Again this is not just an IT function. I would not go SAP and i recommend looking into Dynamics. Highly recommend bring on a consulting ageny to help.
ppyre@reddit
some are more painful than other but all will require dedicated team, everyone's participation, long hours. When the time for "go/no go" comes you will almost certainly launch before you are 100% ready.
If money is no object, go SaaS instead of onprem. I went through 3 of them in the last 6 years.
mdervin@reddit
For you it's easy, if you go SAAS, you open up a few ports, manage the licenses and read one or two articles. If you do on prem, it's spin up a SQL Server, an app server and give the developer admin/root access (trust me you want to do this).
For your co-worker it is a death march looking into the void that looks back into their soul.
They'll need to break everything they do down into atoms, they can't make a single assumption, there will be meetings where you put yourself on mute and surf reddit. I was involved in an ERP migration during covid and I was actually playing tennis during the meetings. I had to be on the meeting, but I never said a word.
jstar77@reddit
In the middle of an ERP transition. I have meetings scattered through my calendar by the project manager that started in January of this year and ending in 2028. Barring no unforeseen complications we have a target completion date sometime in Q2 of 2028.
SASardonic@reddit
Depends on the ERP but in general: quite. I've only dealt with supporting and developing around educational ERP software and a lot of it is kind of a fresh hell at times. Any given ERP product generally requires its own set of knowledge to support. That said, it is also powerful and can lead to better interoperability so I can entirely respect why it's needed.
Rucio@reddit
If your company doesn't make ERP software, then do an RFP and find one that works for you. ERP consolidates your resources and helps you to manage a growing business. Yes it's more work up front now, but as you grow, it's scalable.
Silent-Document-8335@reddit
Short answer is it’s very painful