Who Should You Involve in Your ERP Selection? - The ERP Advisor Podcast Episode 146

Speaker A: This is the erp advisor.

Speaker B: Today's episode, who should you involve in your erp selection? Hello everyone. Thank you so much for joining us. For today's webinar, who should you involve in your erp selection? Quentin DeWitt is our speaker again for today. Quentin has been in the information technology business for over 20 years. He has led teams as a director of IT, brought innovative products products to market as a product Manager, and led large teams as a Director of Technical Support. Today, he provides leadership and guidance to ERP Advisors Group's consulting team through a wide variety of technical knowledge, experience and skills. Q serves Quentin, or Q serves as EAD's principal consulting. In this role, he provides senior technical guidance to our entire delivery team and supports the consulting division with executive oversight. His expertise is essential in serving as a project lead on our most technical projects, delivering independent and objective guidance to ensure clients select the right enterprise solution to meet their needs. On, uh, today's call, Q and I are actually going to review each phase of a successful ERP selection in order to provide a guide for staffing the project to ensure the right people have the right amount of sway at the right time. Welcome Q. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Speaker A: Absolutely love being on.

Speaker B: Yes, excited for you to share some insights on this. I know this is a very specific topic, but I think it's very important because we did staffing, your ERP implementation and understanding who to include at each of those phases. So today we get to dive into selection. Um, and I think just to kick us off, like, why is it so important to have a staffing plan in place before ever kicking off your ERP selection?

Speaker A: Well, you know, it's very important to have the right resources. Doing a selection does take people who are knowledgeable, capable, but also available and doing that resourcing plan up front and knowing who to involve with it is very important to getting to the end of it and actually being able to move forward. Also important in getting to the next phase because you want those resources, uh, that staffing plan to transition into implementation. These are probably going to be the people that are your leads within your implementation or your sponsors and things like that. And so if you don't staff it properly on the selection, you're going to run into trouble down the road. Um, so, you know, it basically increases the failure if you don't do staffing planning on your selection up front. Um, you know, there's always another aspect to it as well, which is by doing the staffing plan, by surveying your team, by seeing who's going to be involved with it lets people know that the change is coming and you can kind of iron out some of those worries, some of those doubts, some of those concerns. You can also identify the right people who might be champions for the change, um, who are really going to take, um, a lead in it, um, be a positive influence, um, and maybe make the smoother transition into a new system work. Um, there's also, um, you find out a lot about your organization when you're doing a staffing plan. So, um, sometimes you need to hear their voice and by doing that staffing plan, working with your team, you kind of hear their voice a little bit more. Um, and I think you've um, had some of that be part of implementation as well. But change management is a big part of it. People are the biggest part of this. They're going to, they run your business today. They're involved with every aspect of it. And if they, if you choose the right people, you'll have a much smoother experience. Um, some, some of the things are like, yeah, maybe they've been through it before, maybe they're against it completely. So keep an eye out. I don't have any thoughts on that.

Speaker B: No. You and I were talking about this before too. When we were kind of prepping for the call was the idea of expectation management. Um, you're setting the foundation for that at this phase because people know kind of what to expect in terms of, here's how involved I'm going to be. They know it's coming, like you mentioned, but also this is a good point to set up the reason behind why. So they actually know that the organization like, hey, we're going to be taking your input. We want to see how we can improve processes. And it's not just, hey, the higher ups have decided we're changing erp, so we're going to throw a new one at you and see, see how it goes.

Speaker A: Yeah, obviously the executives at the end of the day, or the ownership is going to make the decision on it. But the more you can plan for that staff, it include people. It may be much smoot. Sometimes it's harder to make a decision. But you know, um, it's your business, it's your operation, you kind of know what's best there. But doing the planning is always the first step.

Speaker B: And I think that's a good segue because at each phase of an ERP selection, we usually say phases for implementations, but there's definitely phases within selection as well. Different people are supposed to be involved and different people are supposed to have a say. Um, whether that be your subject matter experts. You'll hear us say SMEs a lot and that's the definition of that for anyone listening or your end M users. So I would love to kind of go through each of those phases and talk about like who to involve there and then and why. Um, so let's just start with the, with the needs analysis. Q.

Speaker A: Well, the needs analysis kind of pre faces your selection process and in that you're really digging in across the organization. You're, it's a pretty widespread. You want people at the executive level, ownership board, pe, whatever you want, uh, mid level managers. You want people who are in the weeds kind of directing the teams across the organization, at least where you're making changes. Um, but possibly broader than that as well. Um, and you want your subject matter experts, your SMEs, um, and the people that are doing the day to day. And you want to um, get them involved again. It does let them know maybe change is coming. It also lets their voice be heard, it makes them feel included, but it also gathers your requirements. So um, and it gives you a kind of a tip off of who might need to be involved with the core team or the leads on your selection process because you'll hear things throughout that. So it's also kind of tips you off in that way because it's all people based. Who are you people and where are they going, will they be excited about this, are they completely worried and um, things of that sort. But that phase is pretty broad.

Speaker B: Yeah. And your end users at that phase might be driving which SMEs are involved. So you could realize that there's tons of gaps going on and you're obviously with an ERP project, usually your accounting department.

Speaker A: Yes.

Speaker B: And once you recognize that those are the gaps you're like, wow, we need to involve this subject matter expert who oversees this department because their end users are the ones that have the most complaints.

Speaker A: Yeah. That helps you form your core team which is, is then going to carry out through um, being the main people involved with other phases or initiatives.

Speaker B: Absolutely. So going from that we're going to go into the initial vendor contact. And this is not for anybody listening. This is not, hey, we're contacting them to set up the demos and do all of this. This is really the base level. Start looking around.

Speaker A: Yeah, it's starting to look. And this is one where you don't want to get too many people involved with it because there are a lot of good salespeople out there. You start contacting one software vendor or one partner, and they have a really good connection because they've been in that business forever. And they kind of can steer you consciously, unconsciously. That's their job. They sell software or they sell services. Um, but you don't want to get too broad. You kind of want those, maybe the leads that you've kind of identified to talk to them. That's if you're doing it yourself, if you're hiring a consultant or advisor, it's actually not really on your plate at all. They should really narrow that field, do that initial contact, kind of keep a little bit of a separation there. But if you are doing this yourself, it's definitely core or maybe even executive or sponsor level that is involved with. With that because, um, they see the bigger picture. They're looking at it for more than just their functional area. Um, m. It could be an IT lead. It's usually an accounting lead, might be supply chain, but it depends upon what areas you're changing. But you want kind of a more lofty decision maker to have those initial conversations, um, because it's more of a decision at the business level than at the functional subject matter, expert level.

Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. And like you were saying, they don't do it intentionally. But talking to some of the software salespeople, sometimes it can be like a. Absolutely, we can do that. Like, yes, we can do that. And it's easy if you've never gone through one of these, to be like, wow, this product can do everything I need it to do. There's.

Speaker A: There's also some of it where it's like, oh, I have a friend. They. They work at this software company or this partner, and they're. And that's great. I, you know, you know, maybe. Maybe they're wonderful and they would do a great job for you. But when you expand it a little bit more broadly, that can also make you not look at other options that you should have.

Speaker B: Right. And funny enough, this next phase that we're going to talk about, I think is one where people. Mini demos, where people think we all need to be involved, everybody needs to come, everyone needs to see the product, but that's not the case. So can you talk a little bit about that phase?

Speaker A: Yes, the mini demos phase is basically these are smaller demos that just kind of give you a preview of the software, of the vendor, of the partner, a little bit of a gut feel of what's going on. Does the product look good? Do I think I could see myself in this Platform performing my business functions. Um, and you're tempted to get everyone involved, but it's not worth the investment to get everyone involved. You're going to go through multiple layers of that. You might go through 4, 6, 8, 10, 20. There are thousands of different software platforms out there. And so do you want to invest your time, your executive's time, your subject matter experts time in doing that process and weeding through those, or do you want to have that core team do it? You want to have that core team like they're the people that need to see that and say, this one is a thumbs down, this one is a thumbs up. Let's invest more time, let's put this in front of our ownership because we really think this is a good option. You don't want to put those 20 unless you're. I mean, if you're a smaller team, like less than 20 people, sometimes it is ownership doing that. So they've already seen. But, um, when you're a bit larger of an organization, it's just this core team. And when I say core team, usually you don't want more than like four or five people involved with that. Yeah, you know, really functional leads across the organization. Maybe, maybe your cfo, maybe your controller, maybe it's your supply chain manager, maybe it's your warehouse manager or your production manager, something like that, who you've assigned to that core function role. Um, they're the only ones that should be on those mini demos.

Speaker B: Yeah. And I. You're an executive at our organization. We work with Sean. I'm very used to managing executive schedules. I don't think either of you would appreciate if I brought you onto a call where you were like, why am I here?

Speaker A: No, we tend to be fairly busy, uh, within the organization and, you know, carving out the amount of time necessary to go through all those. It's like, even if you limit it to an hour or two per product, that's potentially weeks of time just doing that.

Speaker B: Yeah, exactly.

Speaker C: Wouldn't it be great if there was somebody out there who was truly independent, truly objective, and who really cared about what you needed? That's ERP Advisors Group. That is exactly what we do. We have a proven methodology that will take you through the needs analysis, selection, implementation and even optimization, where you'll go from being confused and upset and scared and unsure all the way through to having successful software that does exactly what you need it to do. We'd like to offer you a free consultation. Click on the button down below and let's spend a few minutes even 10, 15 minutes and talk about your project. And I bet you'll be surprised. There'll be some things we can do for you even over that call that would help you much less talk about how we could work with you over the duration of your project. And just know you don't have to do this project alone. You don't have to face these confusions on your own. It's exactly what ERP Advisors Group is here for. And we look forward to helping you through your process.

Speaker B: Uh, next one is one that you Discovery, where you've mentioned that lots of people tend to forget this phase and don't really hammer into it. So let's talk about it.

Speaker A: It is a phase. It's that bridging the gap between that kind of brief mini demo and a full demo where you can really dig in, um, and have a lot more involvement. And so discovery is a phase where from a staffing perspective, this is where you are going to have your subject matter experts more involved. You still want your core team, probably not your executives, maybe they want to attend, but this is where the vendor or the partner gets a chance to really dig in on those more complex areas of the business. And again, it's not staffing like across everyone in the organization is going to be involved with it because discovery is going to target areas where maybe you're more complex, where the vendor has some questions, they need to go a little bit deeper or they're gathering use case information to present in the full final demo. And so it's usually subject matter expert leads, sometimes actually the end user or subject matter expert, if they're like one of your best people in that area and possibly the core team, most likely some of the core team. Okay, so that's, that's how we typically see that phase, uh, staffed.

Speaker B: Great. And not everyone's going to that meeting. You and I spoke about this briefly. What is the best practice for communicating to uh, other team members what was discussed during Discovery so that they know what to be on the lookout for in the next phases.

Speaker A: So usually, um, it is the subject matter expert lead or the core team that's going to make kind of an announcement like, hey, we're going to have some people in from the software vendor, um, and we'll give you an update afterwards. It's usually more of a general high level summary. Yeah, we're going to discuss the manufacturing process or the supply chain and you'll see us walking through. Um, you can do that. Um, if they're involved, it depends on how involved Your whole team is on this process and how big or small you are as well. But, um, discovery is where the rubber starts to meet the road a little bit. And, um, a lot of people want to start getting involved. It will at least pique their interest for the next phase, which they may very well be included in.

Speaker B: Right, yeah, that absolutely makes sense. Which, the next phase is final demos, which is the fun one.

Speaker A: It is. And this is where you really start to get to bring in your bigger team. It's usually, um, segmented into different functional areas. And you can kind of, you know, your team is busy, you want them producing, you want them delivering for your organization. You don't want to pull them out for days at a time if you can avoid it. So you can usually, in these final demos, still include your larger full team. Um, and that's not everyone. That might be your better people, those who are involved, your core team, for sure, Your subject matter expert leads, your executives and some of your subject matter experts. And maybe it is everyone. But, um, this is also segmented into different functional areas. So it's not like, hey, they need to sit through accounting if they're in sales, or they need to sit through manufacturing when they're in procurement. Um, so you can really segment it out and get those users involved. Still at a lower level of time investment, but still have them involved. They're going to give you feedback. You know, they're going to get to see it. They're. They'll feel like they had a part in making the decision, even if really, at the end of the day, the executives are going to make the final decision. So, um, that's where you get to kind of run wild a little bit. But it's usually only with like two, maybe three vendors that you're doing that with.

Speaker B: Yeah. And that's, that's interesting because, I mean, these final demos can go full days. Right. Like, they can be. They're deep. You go into a lot of detail, uh, on these products. And so it is interesting to say, like, hey, you can have a lot of people involved, but their capacity to be involved throughout the day is very different.

Speaker A: Yeah. And it depends upon how your organization is. A lot of organizations that are going through a selection are doing it because they're growing, they're expanding, they're super busy. And when you have an organization like that getting your entire team and saying, well, this week you're just not working because we're doing these demonstrations, um, that could cripple a business.

Speaker B: Right.

Speaker A: They just can't do It. So you have to really pick and choose and make it as viable for the organization doing the selection as the importance is still on, you know, making the right decision. But it's a balance.

Speaker B: Yeah, that's interesting. And I think, I think you hear 8 hour demo and you're like, wait, that sounds like way too much. So that's just a fun little like if for anybody who's never gone, gone through this before, that it's not the whole commitment the entire time. You might have a couple SMEs that have to be.

Speaker A: But you know, when I hear 8 hour demo, I'm like, oh, that's not nearly enough time to see everything that you need to see. But yes, for a lot of people it's like eight hours watching, looking at a software platform. It's like m. Yeah. Um, well, I think about overwhelming.

Speaker B: Yeah, I think about my day job and like, Adam and I have definitely evaluated new products for us, like when we change zoom and things like that. And so it's. I couldn't imagine having sat through a demo that long. It's being like, I have so many other things that I could be doing right now.

Speaker A: Right. Or they're on their phone, they're like trying to get their emails handled or their work done. So that's another factor of like, give it enough to where they have the involvement. You have the right people there, you can have your broader team there, but don't overwhelm them and let them get their production done as well. So you might lose some of their attention if you don't.

Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. Uh, and then what about due diligence?

Speaker A: Due diligence is another phase that's very individualized for that particular, um, organization. So at certain phases you're going to want your subject matter experts involved with it, your SMEs involved with it, but that's usually functional validation. So you're going through, said, we did these final Demos, we saw 95% of what we needed to see. But we still have this question and it's deep in manufacturing on our work centers or you know, how we're going to route these, these different production orders through these different work centers. And so then you're going to want to pull in your subject matter experts, maybe your, your production manager for that area, and have them on a call. But that's one call for a couple. An hour, a couple hours to sort out that one piece. That's not the entire team. Maybe a core sponsor is on there. Um, maybe not. But that's just one phase. Then you have like technology, um, within due diligence and maybe that's your IT team with maybe um, someone who's going to be covering hardware or uh, is very involved with the website or whatever E commerce platform. So um, you have the technology and then implementation. Now implementation is one where it's more back to the core team, it's to the executives. It's not really deeper in the subject matter Expert weeds. It's kind of that bigger picture like okay, how do we work as methodology and so forth. So each portion of due diligence is a little different. Reference checking. Hey, are you going to visit the references? Are you going to call them? Who should talk to them? Well, this is probably your key executive sponsor or maybe it's one of the core team members, but it's a more senior sort of relationship.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, wonderful. Yeah, that was a lot of information. I think it's, I think it's important that people are thinking about these things during that phase and like actually digging into who needs to be making these decisions. Um, and Q, last one within the phases is the exciting one which is contract negotiation. Because you've made your decision, people need to be in the room involved in that.

Speaker A: Just your executive sponsors, just the decision makers at the end of the day. And they'll need to get input from their core team who was involved with every like the feedback. But at the end of the day, the negotiations, the dollars to make sure the licensing is right, the statement of work is right, the terms are right. Um, there's some legal involved with that and they usually haven't been on the team the whole time, so maybe some legal review involved with that. But it's usually your executive sponsors, your sponsors and, and maybe one or two of the core team, uh, that are involved with that because um, there's a lot of back and forth and, and you need to get that portion right and that will suck a lot of time out of the broader team. So you don't want to get them involved.

Speaker B: Yeah, and it's a little, it's a little too technical to be like, hey everybody, what do you think about each aspect?

Speaker A: Right. And you get caught in analysis paralysis as it were, when you have multiple options and do we have everything? And so keep it small there so that you can get through it.

Speaker B: Wonderful. Um, and Q, we've kind of touched on this a little bit, but obviously you're not involving everyone in every phase of the project. There's a lot of people that um, are involved in a high stakes project like an ERP project. Why is that? And how, how do you keep people who maybe aren't involved or feel like they should be involved, uh, from feeling like their opinions weren't heard?

Speaker A: Yeah, well, the simple answer is good planning, communicating with them outside of it. But you know, a lot, almost everyone will want to be involved with it except for those people who are afraid or have some, some worries and things like that. But you, one of the best ways to handle them is like we, we absolutely want your input, talk to them about it. But like we really need you focused on the business and that's where we need you. And we'll kind of work through all this and then come back to you and have you included in some of that. So different businesses, different cultures, different people. But it is a very people based things and you don't want to alienate your people. You want them to feel heard and feel like they have, um, some involvement. But you know, if you have too many cooks in the kitchen, you're never going to get it done.

Speaker B: No.

Speaker A: Um, and everyone will have a different opinion. So it's a rough balance. Um, there are many ways to keep them involved. You can send out regular updates, you can send out great, we're going to have the final demos and you'll be involved with that. Or just an announcement, hey, this team is seeing, here's some feedback we got or whatever it is, um, that you're looking at. But you know, it's mostly around planning. You definitely want to have the vital people involved, but most people think they're vital and they may be, but that's why you select the core team and make it the right people there. So, um, yeah, I mean, opinions. There's also the survey route. Getting a survey, seeing what feedback you have can also help you spot where you might run into trouble. So there's a lot of ways to look at it.

Speaker B: Yeah, that makes sense. And you're obviously going to have, we've talked about this in calls too, that sometimes there are people who are super resistant to change or there are those people who, regardless of how much you do, cater to making sure their opinion is heard in the surveys. Like they're still going to be unhappy. And there, there is a level of risk associated with that.

Speaker A: In any of these projects, always, you know, enterprise resource planning or ERP transformations or any major software transformation for a business has the risk of people leaving it, has the risk of people not wanting to do it. Um, but if it's the right thing for the business, you still have to. But maybe you get a heads up, maybe you can help resolve that before it gets to that point.

Speaker B: So, yeah, uh, and Q, just to round out the call for us today, um, what tips do you have for project managers trying to uh, determine who to include in their ERP selection?

Speaker A: This is a good one. So as you're doing that kind of needs analysis phase, and this is kind of. I was talking about this a little bit earlier, but you know, you really want to look for those people who try to drive change, who are innovative thinkers, m. Ah, who you know, um, are interested in the discussion. Like, you know, they're not necessarily about the enterprise change, but maybe about their processes, maybe about the business. You know, they're going to be involved because you want people who aren't going to stop you from being able to move forward involved with it. And so that's one factor that I've often found is important to keep an eye out for is, yeah, maybe you don't want only the enthusiastic because they'll be like, yes, let's do all of this change. And they may make the scope creep and grow and get bigger and bigger, but you definitely want to have some of them because they're going to get you through the process and, and they're going to see how that is. You may also want to have someone who's a little bit more grounded, a little bit more settled, definitely experienced in the business or their areas, um, to kind of have that counterweight. Because you want a mixed team. You don't want just one or the other.

Speaker B: Right? Yeah. You need the realists.

Speaker A: Yeah, I mean it's really, there's a world of possibility out there in any enterprise software transformation project. And if, um, people are unwilling to even see what the new system can offer, they're going to block you from being able to move forward. It's not that they're naysayers. They may be happy with the software, see no need for change. Um, but if they, you know, if they aren't even willing to look, you probably don't want to involve them with the selection process. Maybe they're fine, like, yeah, get whatever, I don't care. I just need one to do my job. Yeah, that, that's fine. But that attitude isn't necessarily going to get them through a selection. So. So you do want to look at that. Um, there are some other things too. Um, one of the things that I've seen is maybe you can spot this in people. But, um, there'll be people within your business who can see kind of the art of the possible. And there'll be people who are very literal and have to have it shown exactly the way they do it or the way they understand it in order to say, um, if they agree with it or if it'll work or not. So you do want to include those people, hopefully at the mid, you know, as you're part of your core team at the mid level management or above level that can see the art of the possible. Because in a selection, if the demoer doesn't connect with you culturally, it's very hard to see if the software is any good. Um, if the way they talk doesn't work or if their experience in your particular industry is just not quite right. Maybe it was a sub vertical that they weren't as experienced in. It can completely deviate a selection and you can go, you passed over a great platform that was really the right one for you because someone couldn't see what was possible past the personalities involved.

Speaker B: Yeah, and we've seen that. I mean, I know we see that all the time, which is super unfortunate.

Speaker A: Yeah, uh, I've been in hundreds and hundreds of demos and that's often one of the greatest challenges is like you have a great team, they know their jobs, they're absolutely willing to make the change. But if they can't see the art of the possible and see past maybe a bad demoer, which you can't always control know up front if that's going to happen. Um, it can really stall or even get you to a no decision. And then you've invested all this time m and you can't make a decision, you can't move forward and you didn't get what you were looking for out of a selection.

Speaker B: Yeah, that's absolutely true. And it's not even just a bad demo. Like they could be having a bad day and that could derailed it. Like it's somebody, you know always shows

Speaker A: up and you know, I've been through so many of these. It's like, okay, the week before someone was out in an emergency, someone ended up in the hospital and the person you had planned for weeks to do this demonstration isn't available. That's no one's fault. But then you have the backup person and they don't know you, they've never met you and the relationship that the other person built with your team isn't there and it just goes south and that's no one's fault. But. But it's, uh, a heavy factor. So when you're choosing and staffing your team, it's important to see people who can see past that.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker A: Or maybe you're willing to give it another shot if something like that happened.

Speaker B: Yeah. No, and that definitely makes sense. Well, thank you Q so much for joining us for today's call. I think this was very valuable information and I hope everybody on the call got, got what they needed out of it. Um, and if you have any questions, please, please let us know. We're always available. Um, rebecca.mccabe, rp advisorsgroup.com I'm available to direct you to the right person or answer your questions. And be sure to join us for our next webinar, which is scheduled for Thursday, September 17. How AI is transforming traditional ERP strategies and how to Adapt, where we might be joined by Q again. We'll see. Uh, we will guide business leaders through the process of evaluating ERP in the modern age of technology. And we will help you find answers to the most important questions surrounding AI. Please go to our website, erpadvisorsgroup.com for more details and to register. EAG is one of the country's top independent software advisory firms. ERP Advisors Group advises mid to large sized businesses on selecting and implementing a wide variety of business applications from enterprise resource planning, customer relationship management, human capital management, business intelligence and other enterprise applications which equate to millions of dollars in software deals each year across many industries. This has been the ERP Advisor. Thank you again for joining us.

Speaker A: Thank you. Sam M.