Information Systems Infrastructure (IS3314) 3 rd year BIS 2006 / 2007 Fergal Carton Business Information Systems

Last week Dell: what’s behind the “bureaucracy” issue? Topps Case study –Read the case, make your own notes –It’s about needing visibility of inventory –Key issues for Topps managers in Cork are : Multiple inventory locations Short product lifecyle Rapid growth in business

Michael Dell 6/2/07 "We have great people... but we also have a new enemy: bureaucracy, which costs us money and slows us down. We created it, we subjected our people to it and we have to fix it!" "I am asking each of you to look across your organizations and eliminate redundancies."

Topps : systems “as-is” Spreadsheet based (eg. mini P&L accounts) Payroll / invoicing / inventory : obsolete systems No local IS support Issues with Spreadsheets? Risks?

Systems issues Lack of on-line stock control Paperwork delays on shipping Lack of control of debtors balances / invoices due Lack of detail on reporting profitability Too much information in people’s heads Too much time gathering information, not analysis Shipping Credit Control Treasury

Potential business failures Sales order processing Invoicing “Execution”

Test & implement Process review, gap analysis Functional Specification Configuration & localisation Development RICE* components Convert data Standard processes Visibility of business Real-time reporting Upgradability Low risk... Languages Currencies Legal entities Interfaces Local reports Enhancements Localisations... GLOBAL LOCAL * RICE : Reports, Interfaces, Customisations & Extensions ERP : the global vs. local battle

ERP : it’s about control RevenuesSales Orders CostsPurchase Orders ProfitabilityP&L

Who benefits? Finance gain greater visibility Manufacturing? –Demand may be too unstable for MRP –Production planning needs more “nuance” –ERP is too literal –Much planning still done on Spreadsheets Sales: need of integration

Benefits for Topps Results in 1 week Drill-down capability Live data on inventory & shipment

What is the common data model? Products –Marketing –Products for Sales orders –Inventory availability for commit dates –Up to date prices –Production planning –Logisitics and distribution Customers –Marketing –Sales orders –Logisitics and distribution Money –Invoicing –Revenue reporting –Cost forecasting and control

Advantages of integration?

Single instance One system clock One copy of the production data One version of master data One transaction engine One database administrator

Single instance: data issues … Getting and maintaining clean data –When creating a new customer, who has control? –42 occurrences of Siemens in your customer database, what do you do? –Customers exist in ERP core database, but also in several legacy systems. How do you make sure they are in synch? –…

Database issues … Guaranteeing “high availability” How often should Test be refreshed? How many environments should I have –Test –Production –Development –Training –Business Simulation –… If I implement a change to Production, do I need to implement the same change across all environments? 20 programmers developing / testing new code every day: how do I track releases to production? …

Single instance – risks?

HelpDesk issues … Calls arriving at HelpDesk are either : Forgotten password New user Changes to user profile Printing problems Connectivity problems Response time problems System crashes System error messages PC problems I need more training …

HelpDesk issues … …or : Functionality questions (how do I transact an invoice?) Process questions (when should I post to GL?) Reporting (I need a revenue report)

Project handover to HelpDesk Prior to go-live, implement procedures for : –Logging calls such that it will be routed to the right person and tracked, reported on and escalated –Training for HelpDesk to be able to ask the right questions concering an application issue –Troubleshooting application issues to be able to deal with simple “fixes” –Ongoing consultation with application team regarding new functionality being rolled out, common errors, planned outages, …

Post go-live example “There was an awful lot of resources thrown at go- live, most of those resources were gone after go- live. Trying to get something fixed, it wouldn’t happen.” “In order to actually utilize it in a way that actually improves our lot, took, is still taking, quite a long time, and if you can’t do it yourself, it’s even worse, because you can’t get IS available, at times to do the work.“