Say "When"

Welcome to the third in a series of blog posts designed to help you understand the key steps to building a compelling business case for changing key systems or processes.

Today we are focusing on the “When”

The reality of business is that there is never a good time for changing complex systems or processes and quite often the change is forced due to factors beyond your control (loss of a key resource, broken or retiring systems, expiring licences – your  “Why”).

When looking at changing systems or processes it is vital that you understand the size of the challenge your “What” before fixing your “When” and settling on the date you must go live.

Having a time driven expected go live (e.g. this must not take longer than X months) or an event driven expected go live (e.g. our current licence expires on the 30^th of April) is an important aspirational target, but until you have defined your “What” (see previous blog) it is impossible to fully understand the scale of the undertaking and whether those timelines are truly achievable.

The size and complexity of the change are key factors in the potential duration of the project, but the biggest factor that affects how quickly you can deliver the change is the capacity of your internal resources.

All businesses now run as lean as possible, with little spare resource capacity within their team, so it is important that you do not underestimate the time required to implement a new system or process and consider how you can free up the key resources to take time away from their day jobs for the duration of the project.

Less resource capacity = longer implementation

A typical ERP project for a manufacturing business (in my experience) takes between 9-12 months to do properly from contract signature to go live.

A rough rule of thumb is that for every day you spend with your provider / partner, it will require up to 3 days of time for the internal team to complete the associated project tasks, including attending training, self learning, data take-on, testing, documentation or go live preparation and reconciliation.

The time taken in selection of a replacement solution and partner can be a similar duration, depending on the complexity of the requirement and the number of vendors invited to tender for the business.

So the reality is that when looking to change any significant system, you must be realistic in your expectations and start the process as early as possible to give you any chance of hitting your target date and remember that fixing a go live date and then having a drawn out selection process just reduces the timeframe for the project and the likelihood of hitting that date.

Having a clear definition of your “When”  aids the selection of a potential partner and solution as anyone not able to meet the timescales can be eliminated from the process.

Defining an unachievable “When” will lead to misaligned expectations, shortcuts, a rushed implementation, compromises, disagreements on priorities, disappointment and high levels of team stress.

However, not defining your “When” will lead to prolonged selection process, scope creep, lack of focus and momentum and ultimately missed deadlines.

It is important to have a go live date in mind to focus thinking and effort, but you should always have a plan B (contingency date and budget) in your back pocket should the deadline approach and you are not quite ready to go live.

If you are thinking about changing any of your systems or business processes, NMcG-Consulting can help you to clarify your “When” to aid in shortening and smoothing the selection and implementation process.

Contact us via email at [contact@nmcg-consulting.com] or via the contact us form on our website http://www.nmcg-consulting.com