New businesses
When starting a business, the core of its IT might be the email. Often supplemented with a cloud-based financial system, like Netvisor or Procountor. It is used for invoicing, whenever there is something to invoic. The accounting office then manages accounts payable, receivables, reports to authorities and book keeping within the same platform.
In the next stage—often right from the start—companies create a website. The website includes a contact form that forwards leads and other requests to the email, which is the tracking system. Other than that, the website may just be like an extended business card with some sales-oriented content. If agency was used to help implement it, there may be also a new section with some initial posts - written by the agency - plus maybe the post by the CEO written in the initial hubris. But the site hardly counts as very relevant part of the business.
The excel way
If the business becomes more complex, excels-sheets are leveredged as on fast and easy option. In practise, maybe Google Sheets or another cloud-based alternative, to support sharing and concurrent updates. But ever so often the files are still kept on peoples laptops.
Surprisingly, this setup carries quite far! During my career, I’ve encountered a production facility —so actually a factory — where work shifts, manufacturing orders, their schedules and tracking for dozens of employees were managed entirely in spreadsheets (though invoicing and finance had actual system). This is to say, until we implemented the ERP there.
Now then, if the excels can be extended as far as that, why would anybody need an ERP on top of that?
Why not just continue with excels and emails?
Instead of answering directly, I’ll pose a few counter-questions for consideration. Or alternatively, feel free to give us a call or book a free consultation to talk about those points.
- Could an important order or job request be stuck in someone’s email while they’re on vacation, sick, or otherwise unavailable—causing operations to halt until they return?
- Is it guaranteed that every completed task makes it to invoicing? For example, if something was handled over the phone or otherwise verbally
- Does the billing department always have access to the correct information? If the work was hourly based and a different person handles invoicing, are the details of hours and materials reliably passed between them?
- s there a risk that unauthorized people could access or edit the key spreadsheets? In other words, are there authorizations in place?
- Even if only the right people have access to sheets, is it possible to accidentally delete critical data? Or overwrite a formula with a manual number, so that after some further copying and editing the spreadsheet simply breaks down?
- If spreadsheet access is restricted, to address above points to maintain integrity, does this cause others to be unable to update their take on the data? So that changes are managed via emails, phone calls, or other slower, unreliable methods?
- Does anyone have a clear view of the workload across employees and projects? Could there be overbooking leading to delays and conflicts? Or underutilized employees going unnoticed? Do spreadsheets keep up with these changes?
ERP as an alternative
The questions above are hypothetical, but based on real-world issues I’ve encountered over 30 years of working with ERP systems. If any of them sound familiar, it might be worth considering an ERP. It would obviously address all above listed topics, among a lot of other things. But going for ERP is usually much more fundamental topic and there are other bits and pieces to consider to make it really work.
At Webbros, we help assess where an ERP system could benefit your business and find the most cost-effective way to implement it. There is quite some experience in our organization to plan and realise a successful ERP project.
Book a free meeting to discuss
Jos yrityksellä jo on ERP tai edes varastonhallintasovellus, saattavat. kysymykset olla vähän erilaisia. Lue tästä lisää.
