Before you spend money on IT, do this!

How many times have you heard people blame “the system” for not getting things done? (No, I’m not talking a Rage Against The Machine-style rant here..!) My guess is that one of the primary reasons that things take way longer than necessary in your organisation is that you’re constrained by things you wish your computing system could do, or you have a ton of workarounds to get stuff done.

On average, implementing a new ERP system takes 9-12 months and costs thousands of pounds in implementation and support. With such a daunting prospect, it makes sense that people just want to get on with it, and engage with IT companies as soon as possible.

My question though is, do you actually know what you’re looking for? Can you accurately articulate the non-negotiables that a system needs to have? Conversely, how many times have you insisted upon certain features or processes when in reality that task only happens once or twice per year..?

In my previous corporate life I must have sat through dozens of presentations with all kinds of IT suppliers. You sit there smiling and nodding as they show off all the flashy features of their solution, knowing that they have no idea if this is an appropriate investment for your company, nor are they checking what you actually need. If they did ask you though, do you even know?!

So how do we get around this?

Believe it or not, the best way around this is to know what you don’t want, the goal is to make your processes as boring as possible. Before you engage with IT suppliers you need to spend time with the team detailing every step in your processes. Once you’ve got a map you can look at which steps are truly needed, which ones only exist for legacy reasons, which ones burn the most time, and which ones are crying out for automation.

It's surprisingly easy (and fun!) to do, and a great way to break down an “it’s always been this way” attitude. In a recent project we removed over 50% of the steps in the process just by applying some common sense (take a look here https://www.wlreporthelp.co.uk/general-7-3 for more details) Imagine all the add-ons and extra development spend if we’d insisted on each step being catered for by the IT solution.

When looking at your next solution, spend time upfront to work out how you can do nothing later. It will save thousands in implementation cost, make it easier for users to learn the new system and your ears won’t be ringing with staff saying “computer says no…!”