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Why BPM is the linchpin for ERP Success

In today’s complex and volatile business environment, agility and data-driven decision-making are emerging as must-have traits for gaining competitive advantage. Integrating all facets of an enterprise into one comprehensive information system, ERP is one such platform that empowers organisations to achieve these priority business traits.  

Given this, ERP adoption has been on the steady rise, with organisations of all sizes actively implementing the platform. As per a report by Allied Market Research, the global ERP software market is expected to touch $78.41 billion by 2026, growing at a CAGR of 10.2%.

Clearly, ERP is no longer an option but a business necessity. That said, the real catch lies in getting the ERP implementation right. Being a complex IT project that is cross-departmental, cross-functional, ERP implementation is not usually straightforward. A phased approach needs to be adopted along with analysing organization-wide impact.

Given the complexity, a large number of ERP projects get scrapped or fail to deliver. In fact, as per Gartner, ERP implementations failure rates can exceed 75%. Stakes are always high with the cost and effort involved.  

So how can organisations tap into the benefits of the ERP system while balancing the risks? This is where Business Process Management (BPM) comes into the picture and proves to be a game-changer. Many ERP success stories highlight that improving and streamlining business processes prior to selecting and implementing their ERP systems is at the core of a successful implementation. 

Summary

Given the complexity, a large number of ERP projects get scrapped or fail to deliver. As per Gartner, ERP implementations failure rates can exceed 75%. 

BPM as a Foundation for ERP initiative 

From selecting the right ERP tool to reducing the overall risk, BPM proves helpful in every aspect of ERP implementation. Here we look at 5 ways BPM paves the way for ERP success:

  • Identifying the right ERP tool:

    The most important step in your ERP journey is choosing a tool that is the right fit for your business. While some amount of customisation to ERP software is recommended to meet your unique business aspects and help you differentiate from the competitors, overdoing it comes with a caveat of increased costs and longer implementation time. The key is to select a tool that aligns with the overall business requirements and requires minimal customisation. BPM does the trick here.

    BPM helps you map and analyse your business processes to understand your specific issues and thus identify the desired features and functionalities of the ERP tool. Further, it helps you identify processes that are unique and make a key point of difference to your business to analyse customisation requirements. Focused customisation not only maximises results, but also reduces the technological and financial burden.  

  • Automating Effectively:

    Many organisations simply put their existing processes on the ERP platform. However, automating an inefficient process only makes it run faster but magnifies inefficiency. Identifying breakdowns and bottlenecks in the current-state business processes using BPM helps you fix process problems and eliminate waste. Now, when these improved and efficient processes are moved to the ERP platform, you get the best possible outcome with automation.

  • Faster roll-out with maximum benefits: BPM gives you the right roadmap for your ERP implementation. Analysing your as-is model and to-be state helps you choose the right configuration for ERP implementation. Understanding your desired future state and aligning your ERP implementation with business needs prior to roll out empowers you to be right the first time. This helps you save time, cost and hassle of rework and enables quick ROI.
  • Change Management: Many studies highlight that the primary reason for ERP implementation failure is poor change management. BPM, with its collaboration functionalities, facilitates effective change management by enhancing communication between departments, teams and individual employees. Complete visibility into ERP implementation benefits and knowledge about the project, including implementation process, timeline, expectations, etc., encourages employee participation. Further, since BPM uses a format that makes the implementation understandable to business users and not just IT professionals, it brings them along on the change journey. In addition, with as-is process maps you can identify employee roles that will be impacted with the ERP implementation to provide appropriate training.
  • Analysing the impact and mitigating risks:

    Analysing mapped processes helps you understand who or what will be impacted with the ERP implementation right from people, activities, systems, business documents, etc. With this prior knowledge before the actual implementation, identify and remove risks that may cause interruptions. Also, understand how various processes interlink to understand the organisation-wide impact of the implementation and avoid any cascading interruption. 

Summary

From selecting the right ERP tool to reducing the overall risk, BPM proves helpful in every aspect of ERP implementation. 

Maximising benefits with the right BPM tool 

All these benefits combined together definitely make a compelling case for implementing BPM for ERP success. The key is to choose the right BPM software. With its ability to help you quickly map, analyse, improve and automate your business processes, PRIME BPM is structured to lay a solid foundation for your ERP initiative.  

Cloud-based, plug-and-play software, PRIME BPM includes several powerful functionalities, including: 

  1. In-built best practices Process Library and Rapid Process Mapping for fast and accurate creation of current-state process maps.
  2. In-built analytics engine to identify non-value-adding activities in the process. 
  3. One-click Process Prioritisation feature to identify processes that require urgent attention for improvement.
  4. Impact Analysis feature to analyse the impact of any new system, such as an ERP platform, prior to implementation.
  5.  Process Simulation to create as many future state scenarios as required in a simulated process and make adjustments to get the desired results.
  6. Collaboration module to help employees connect and drive continuous improvement, and many more. 

Contact Us, to further understand how PRIME BPM can streamline and fast-track your ERP implementation.