Turn up trumps

Some things just don't change – at least not much – and sadly, upgrading your ERP system or migrating to an entirely new solution is one of those. Although virtually all of the ERP developers now offer excellent software tools to assist, for example, with everything from gap analysis to data cleansing, as well as scripts for smoothing and speeding the whole process of the changeover itself, a major upgrade remains something not to be undertaken lightly. That's the near unanimous verdict from manufacturers of all hues that have recently gone through the process, or are still embroiled in it. However, what has changed, they say, is people's and companies' general understanding of the processes required to achieve successful upgrade projects – and that's true of both the user and vendor communities. Certainly, all of the significant software developers have now constructed well-rehearsed, staged implementation methodologies that should make them and you appear competent and savvy. For example, Infor offers its One Point Implementation Methodology, with common best practices, as well as a FastStart programme, that effectively packages up business processes by role, not function. That, says business consulting director Phil Burgess, helps visualisation of the business processes required, which in turn speeds up projects. "It means that users get a pre-configured but still flexible ERP solution for, say, 80% of their requirement, meaning they can reduce their effort mostly to the 20% that is unique to them," he explains. Hence Infor's offer of a notional 65 days for upgrading any of its heritage ERP systems to today's iteration. As Burgess says: "Five years ago, we and everyone else, would have been quoting triple that, and it means faster time to value and less cost in terms of consultants' fees." Importantly, he adds that, although Infor wouldn't quote 65 days for a 'rip and replace' migration from a third party ERP system, the organisation would harness the same approach and methodology – and claims again that users' project experiences would still be far better than in the past. Incidentally, Burgess also says that, where manufacturers know they simply can't commit the time to an upgrade, most vendors will offer services – and that because of these new methods and tools, the price can be surprisingly attractive. And he adds that in the future, with the advent of software components and the spread of SOA (service orientated architectures), the notion of upgrades that involve shutdowns over a weekend will be consigned to the history books. "We're aiming at the point where there will be no business disruption at all," he says. Until that time, however, the bottom line is that, although your experience with a major upgrade on any ERP solution is likely to be better than it would have been, say, five years ago, it will still involve a lot of work for a lot of people, normally over many weeks, if not months. And for all too many manufacturers, that scale of effort, on top of the day-to-day pressure of getting products out of the door, dealing with engineering change issues and handling customers' and users' expectations, still means late nights, oversights, overruns, overspends and less than ideal mopping up, often even including training, after go-live. Time to hear it from a few battle-hardened manufacturers, such as Norfolk-based novelty chocolates manufacturer Kinnerton Confectionery, which recently reported a successful upgrade to the latest version of QAD Enterprise Applications 2008 from Mfg/Pro EB. That had been installed as a Y2k project. So we're talking about a jump of two major revisions. Perhaps surprisingly, that whole process took just four months – in part due to help from QAD Global Services, which, according to Matthew Davies, head of IT at Kinnerton, has been very professional and accommodating throughout. "The business case for our upgrade was to do with the acquisition of two firms – Horsley Hick and Flower, and Lir Chocolates, through our holding company Zetar. Those were both running with Sage financials and needed to change, because it was no longer supporting their businesses. So the goal was to use our central IT resource here in Fakenham to host a single system, saving money on the systems side, but also allowing us, for example, to provide shared financial services from a single central department." Makes sense, but its Mfg/Pro EB was at the release prior to QADOs introduction of domains – meaning it wasnOt capable of handling multiple companies in a single shared database. "So the first phase of our project was to upgrade to QAD 2008 at Kinnerton, across our two manufacturing sites, the London HQ, and three third party warehouses," says Davies. Success for him came down to Ovigorous preparation and thorough analysis', which he describes as merely good practice. "We did some joint planning with QAD to map out what the project would look like from their point of view as well as from ours," he explains. "That included, for example: revising some of our business processes; integration and interfaces with other systems, all of which had to move over; and custom reports that would become redundant because of QADOs new .Net user interface." Incidentally, Davies suggests that the latter is so good, it's worth considering as a business case in its own right – simply because the enhanced experience encourages users to be more creative with the system and add more value to their roles. Beyond that, Davies insists there are still no shortcuts to good old-fashioned project basics. "You just have to be serious about preparation, planning, testing and checking. We used the Prince II project methodology to get that right. Also, always think hard about what you're doing, and communicate, communicate, communicate... We didn't have any data cleansing to do because we were just upgrading, not converting from another database or having to consider multiple sources. But we used two phases of testing before going live: initial verification that the system did what it was supposed to do, followed by a pilot, where we ran all processes and checked systematically that it did what users expected. That was done over about a month and doubled as training for those involved, with final training on the .Net user interface the week before go-live." As for the tools to run the conversion itself, Davies makes the point that QAD, like most of the ERP vendors, has done it all before, so you can expect your provider to guide you through best practice procedures, evading the pitfalls and providing scripts to automate much of the cut-over work. "When we did our conversion over a weekend, QAD simply fired up their scripts and it all just happened. Compared to others I've done, that part was a breeze. I would have anticipated a lot more hands-on, manual processing." Sounds good? What about an entirely different business, and one that hasn't kept pace with modern ERP developments – such as £20 million Banbury-based Norbar Torque Tools, a make-to-order manufacturer of torque wrenches and multipliers? Managing director Neill Brodey explains that its existing system was installed 20 years ago and, although it had been upgraded and maintained, it was also heavily customised, had been off support for a decade and was running out of steam – but that the sheer pressure of growth had pushed migration to a new system onto the back burner. A nice problem to have, maybe, but it also caused considerable pain, starting with an expensive aborted implementation of EpicorOs Avante ERP system, back in 2001. "I stopped that project, because it became clear, during the implementation phase, that the amount of work required to get everything we were used to from a big, off-the-shelf system was just too much... we simply didn't have time for the scale of preparation," says Brodey. So this time around, now with a system from Access Supply Chain and a go-live date of January 1 2009, preparation has been the name of the game, along with standardisation – and Brodey says it's still a lot of work. Why? Because for him it's not just about extracting data from Norbar's old VAX VMS Command system, and doing some data cleaning and verification. Following his 2004 experience, Brodey made the decision to walk away from customisation – but that meant changing some processes to fit with Access Supply Chain's standards. What's more, Brodey wanted to use the opportunity also to revisit key processes, particularly in production, such as sorting out inventory tracking problems. "For example, most of our gearbox components are manufactured on-site and replenished to assembly on a two-bin system – but they've become too accessible and that's been leading to inventory data errors. So although I'm passionate about lean, we're also doing some physical reorganisation, taking lineside goods back into local stock, and re-implementing a works order environment." There's no doubting that an ERP upgrade or migration is an excellent (indeed, many argue essential) opportunity for this kind of transformation – and for Norbar it's a requirement for data accuracy at the very least. But the plain fact is, if this kind of work is on your implementation agenda, no matter how good the software tools, you're in for a long slog. That said, Brodey praises Access Supply Chain's help around the methodology, its general advice and data extraction tools. He also says that Norbar elected to take the safe route of exporting BoM and routing data (9,500 line items out of 20,000 on its old system) to Excel in small, manageable batches so that, if there are errors, they can be found. And he emphasises the importance not just of training, but educating users "so that everyone knows the importance of getting the data right to the balance sheet". It's also fair to point out that the company saved on a decade of maintenance, it had attempted to migrate four years ago and that it's a very successful business. But there is another, ultimately easier way – if you're prepared to devote time and resource to revamping not just your ERP system, but all systems, data and business processes as part of a continuous improvement programme. That's what Arthur Hough, which makes everything from pressings for suspended ceiling to key blanks for locks, has been doing very successfully for the last 15 years. Partner-director Brian Appleby explains that his firm has been using Exel Computer Systems' Efacs ERP system for 15 years, and runs a rolling programme of upgrades and replacements at least every three years that include hardware. "You normally find you need more server power anyway and we donOt like keeping hardware for too long, because it starts to lose reliability,". Keeping on top of upgrades in this way leads to a view diametrically opposed to Brodey's, with Appleby saying: "Upgrades are much easier now because suppliers are getting so much better at sorting out migration routes and tools. Last week, for example, we upgraded Microsoft Small Business Server in just three days, including transferring all the data and re-pointing the PCs to the new server – and we only experienced two or three minor interruptions.O And itOs the same with Efacs. OWe did our last Efacs upgrade about 12 months ago – again with a brand new server and loading Efacs v8.2. They installed it and transferred all the data, and all we lost was about two hours with very little work from us. Modern software migration tools just make the whole job so much easier. In fact, you can do a lot of the data movements on the fly," says Appleby. His secret? "For us, data accuracy and business process improvement are ongoing themes. It's part of our drive to continuously update all our processes, including manufacturing, to get cost reductions and efficiency improvements. To do manufacturing and IT properly, it's essential to make sure that everyone is at the top of their game." It's hard to argue with that.