Saving the ERP on the brink of being scrapped for a Manufacturer

Customer had invested significant amount in a sophisticated global ERP application. However, the ERP was neither helping management in controlling the operations nor helping finance perform it’s function efficiently.
Customer was on the verge of scrapping the ERP and move to a basic accounting application.
Difficulty in performing day to day activities. Further, it wasn’t clear whether this situation was on account of any issue in the system or user understanding.
Manual & out of the system workarounds introduced in the process over the period thereby not having a standard process and spending more efforts than necessary.
Manual records for auditors’ data requirements like Sub-ledger to General Ledger reconciliation of AR, AP, Inventory, FA, Accruals etc.
Manual records for statutory compliances like TDS, Excise / GST, VAT etc.

Root-cause analysis revealed lack of user awareness, understanding of the system and training leading to incorrect & inefficient manual processes
Root-cause analysis also revealed inconsistencies in access rights vis-à-vis functional responsibilities & inadequacy of reports, accentuating the problem of user understanding.
Recommended & helped with the action plan in 3 categories; User training, data correction and system setup (including report development) changes
Recommended process changes to take benefit of ERP features and remove redundancy
Reconciled historical financial data & helped clean-up the data in ERP
Recommended IT for development of reports across finance requirements, including format design & business test cases for acceptance
Recommended role of Super-users from Subject Matter Experts for each process
Drove the entire engagement as a Program, encompassing Planning, Execution, co-ordination with all stakeholders (including third party technology vendor) and periodic review with Steering Committee to ensure timeliness and appropriate direction.

The investment in the ERP was salvaged with efficiently used ERP and well-trained users.
Project delivered successfully in a tight timeline with all issues addressed
Manual & redundant processes done away with improved efficiency
Impact on regular operations was very minimal due to significant saving in bandwidth of staff