Responding to your peers, discuss the benefits and the drawbacks of implementing such a system.
PEER POST # 1
If I were a small company that has grown to need an ERP system, I would need to gather information on how the company currently functions, how the company is lacking in developing further, and what current issues are affecting our development. Once this information is gathered, recommendations can be made to enhance further the company’s growth. This would include choosing an ERP system that most benefits our needs, allows for platform scalability, allows for mobility, and lowers long-term costs (Corporation, 2023). The company should also ensure that the ERP system chosen will fit well the company structure and provide a more efficient operation process. The Enterprise Resource Planning system (ERP) I would recommend for a small company like mine to develop further is Acumatica. Acumatica is a top ERP system for small businesses. Acumatica focuses on providing a CRM to manage customer information, reporting on expense categories, accounting software, and cloud ERP (Blaney, 2024). Furthermore, Acumatica has several features to help further develop a small company into a much larger one; however, just like many other ERP systems, it can be costly to implement.
PEER POST # 2
There are many considerations when looking into new ERP systems, but the first should be budget, usability, and scalability, followed by the usual, who is the system designed for, what is the goal, and timeline. The most important step before finalizing the decision should be verifying that the new system is able to support the needs of the organization and is something that will improve the user’s ability to complete their job, if the new software or system is unable to complete the necessary tasks or has a very steep learning curve, additional actions may be needed. As stated in a U.S. Chamber of Commerce article, “An ERP system affects every part of your operations. Involving managers from accounting, human resources (HR), inventory, and sales helps leaders understand pain points and mission-critical tasks” (Elliott, 2024), they should have comprehensive knowledge of their department’s duties upon being selected to prevent delays during later implementation.
We recently moved to using Microsoft Dynamics Business Central for finance purposes, and I agree with many others, Microsoft Dynamics 365 is a very useful ERP for small businesses and can be scaled fairly easily with a managed process. The actual cost to transition was low (only higher due to outsourcing the build and automation) so many businesses could afford it. It is fairly customizable, so reducing the amount of visual noise and unneeded content can make it highly accessible to less skilled users. Lastly, it appears to be highly scalable, though in large organizations, with higher budgets, it may be better to opt to a more structured or in-house set-up. Despite being very effective, it does seem to have some connectivity issues with busier times.