Do You Love Your ERP?

When most people think of “business software,” they think of an application or a platform with a specific purpose – a CRM such as HubSpot, or an email sending platform such as MailChimp. We can understand why most businesses wouldn’t consider custom-built software solutions for such applications — why spend that money when there are already so many options on the market?

But the kinds of projects we typically engage in here at Skeleton Key aren’t single-purpose applications. We are often building software that runs entire businesses — or at least, that runs many of their core operations.

The question of whether your business can benefit from custom solutions isn’t answered by thinking in terms of typical apps, but rather by thinking in terms of another type of software: ERP (enterprise resource planning) systems and ERP modules.

So ask yourself: Do you love your current ERP?

How ERPs came to be dominant (in certain industries)

In our experience, very few people answer this question in the positive. Some like their ERP systems just OK; others find them annoying, but necessary. Some even loathe their current ERP. No one we’ve talked to seems to feel their ERP is just right.

ERP systems started showing up in the ’90s as a way to operationalize and digitize standard business procedures, such as accounting, order management, and inventory control. More and more businesses began to adopt ERPs over the next two decades because these systems could perform crucial aspects of the business more efficiently and consistently.

Take a typical manufacturer, for example. This company may require several business software solutions because it needs several things done in a consistent and efficient manner: job costing, assembly, materials ordering, and so on. An ERP system can take these complex processes and create some standardization around them, while also digitizing key steps (like ordering supplies or tracking jobs through a facility).

The growing variety of ERP modules

So how do modern ERP systems juggle these different needs? Most do it by having a number of separate modules that cover different aspects of the business. A modular design helps to rein in some of the complexity of modern ERPs. Common ERP modules include software for:

• Finance and accounting
• Procurement and supply chain management
• Inventory management
• Job costing and estimating
• Job tracking
• Order management
• Human capital management (labor management)

With so much functionality to choose from, why don’t more businesses love their ERPs?

Even with a modular design, there’s no way for a single ERP system to capture everything a business needs to do, in ways that are optimized for that specific business.

ERPs, by their nature, are a “one-size-fits-all” solution, and you might think that would make an ERP inherently more effective. But the opposite is true. In order for something to be widely usable, compromises have to be made.

Take our manufacturing example again. There are many ERPs the manufacturer could use that have robust capabilities for job costing and assembly. But what if the business also needs a very detailed quality-control module?

While it’s possible that the ERP they use for job costing might have an ERP module for quality control, it might not. And if it does have one, chances are pretty good that the module will not match the company’s needs 100%. The ERP, in effect, could impose its processes on the company, requiring the business to change what it does – and how it does it – to accommodate the ERP.

On the other hand, if the ERP does not have a module for quality control in the first place, then a key element is missing altogether. That suite of processes now needs to be performed manually, often using spreadsheets or paper forms. This creates a fragile and labor-intensive process, whose steps can easily fail to track or keep pace with the data in the ERP.

Regardless, many people will say that they like their ERP, as it adds some value to their organization. But in our experience, no one ever says that they love their ERP. Even as it standardizes some things, it also creates the need for workarounds, manual steps, and clunky sub-processes.

Custom software solutions can augment — even replace — your ERP

Many of our clients came to us because they “weren’t feeling the love” for their current ERP, and they knew they needed expert insight from skilled business consultants to help them determine how to improve.

This is where custom software solutions can come to the rescue. We can build a custom solution to augment or even replace an out-of-the-box ERP to fit a business with unique needs. Here are a couple of case studies that illustrate how we’ve done just that:

Helmkamp Construction: A construction company was using an ERP system with robust accounting capabilities, but their field superintendents still had to spend at least 30 minutes each day entering each employee’s hours into spreadsheets at the job site. Payroll was a bottleneck, too, as the payroll clerk spent roughly 15 hours a week entering that data into accounting software. The solution was to create a more integrated system, which included a custom app that could be run on iPads in the field (and off the grid). This allowed field personnel to enter data quickly, and with higher quality, which made it easier for the payroll clerk to review, and it facilitated direct insertion of that data into the accounting system after review, which further freed up the payroll clerk and reduced the opportunity for accidents or errors in data entry.

A precision machining shop: A machine shop had an ERP system with many of the modules it needed for job costing and orders, but the one crucial thing they were missing was the ability to track physical items as they physically traveled through the shop. This was tricky, as many of their jobs consisted of large metal parts that did not lend themselves to attaching tags or barcodes. They also needed to associate a growing list of digital assets with these physical parts — things like blueprints, digital photos, and production notes. As robust as their ERP was, they were still tracking most of these extraneous bits of information using paper forms…and inheriting all the problems that come with paper. This was solved by developing a robust mobile solution that integrated with records in the ERP, took into account what was occurring on the shop floor, and provided a bridge to all of those disparate pieces of additional data.

We can help you build what’s missing

Custom software is one way of building better workflows and optimizing the intricate and unique details of individual businesses. For companies like the two we just described, ERPs did the job “just OK,” but there were advantages to be gained by building something that was “just right.”

What processes are you trying to shoehorning into your current software? What do you still do – or now have to do – in a spreadsheet, or even on paper? What do you wish your software truly handled for you, or helped you do better?

Book a no-charge consultation and let’s explore what we could build for you. Along with custom software, we offer consulting services to help you identify gaps and issues in your workflows so that all of your solutions (off-the-shelf or custom) deliver better value.