Torn between being
budget responsible and competitive is a tight rope balancing act at best.
Before any investment is made, the underlying motivation
needs to boil down to better customer service.
Treat your customers like you would like to be treated. The golden rule applies here too.
So let us assume that you have either already invested in
a new Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solution or perhaps you cannot afford
to invest in a new solution at this point in time, but you are relatively current. What can you do next to empower your
workforce and deliver better customer service?
Most new ERP solutions have Business Intelligence (BI)
modules. This is a great tool to integrate
in your organization, especially if it produced by the same organization. Some solution providers have created their own,
fully integrated BI solution, while others have integrated a well matured
solution to their applications. What
should be a cautionary flag is if you are attempting to build your own
solution. Not that this cannot be done,
but it is time consuming and prone to errors and a lot of debugging. So often the upfront costs of an integrated
solution are absorbed in the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO). The do-it-yourself method usually ends up
either costing more or does not deliver a complete solution.
Why is this “integrated”
solution so important? After all any
in-house solution is going to be integrated, right? Will that in-house application be portable to
a mobile workforce? Will there be a web
or Internet access connections? What
devices will connect? Who will have
access? What security protocols are going
to be embedded in the solution? What access
will your customers or suppliers have? Which
of your employees will have access? Who
will develop and who will use the solution?
Most of these questions are already pre answered in a packaged solution. There are also many existing reports in a provided
solution. Even if these are not exactly
what you need, they have enough logic built in them to be a good template for a
custom report.
You might not have a choice to implement these
technologies, your competition may already be providing it to your customers,
but you do have a choice in how and with whom you implement them.
The only exception, and it really does apply here too, is
where an organization wants to become a leader in their market place, set the
bar high, and dominate their market.
This approach should be done with extreme caution. Too many organizations have fallen flat, because
they were promised the world and no solution was delivered. This happens from a number of different factors,
from training, budget, and a general lack of resources. Regardless, you do not want this to happen to
your company.
The number one question to ask in the very beginning and
at the end of the process is: “Does
this solution empower my organization to deliver superior customer service?
If the answer is not YES, then more
homework needs to be done. There might
only be a piece of the puzzle missing that will change a no to a yes answer.
Dolvin Consulting
works with companies like yours to develop and deliver solutions that drive efficiencies,
reduce costs and enable you to become more profitable. Contact us today to see
how we can help your company navigate the constant flux in technologies.
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