Compatibility is a key part of any relationship. It might be in your personal life, it might be in your employment relationship, or it might be in the partners you choose to work with, but no matter how your look at it, this is a key factor in making things work.
In fact, the concept of compatibility even bleeds into the VAR—or implementation partner relationship. With Valentine’s Day on the horizon, love is in the air and we would today like to explore how important compatibility is to the success of an ERP project—and their job in helping you get a solution that can deliver for years to come.
Following our last articles on the main reasons that ERP Projects fail, the warning signs you need to identify, and the importance of working with a partner who is flexible enough to handle your needs, we would today like to turn our attention to another area—company size and the ways you can maximize compatibility.
The Importance of Seeking a Compatible Partner in ERP
A decision as important as the vendor is the partner who can take you there. Often, bad chemistry, improper focus, or poor scale can completely derail a project, turning the right software into the wrong one, resulting in high costs, or worse, complete ERP Project Failure.
Finding the right partner for your business often requires you to find a partner with the right size and focus who’s able to put their A team on the job. For most implementations, you want, need, and deserve the best of the best your team has to offer. After all, these are the people who will be intimately working with your business data and team to put a solution into action.
Everything from the aforementioned size considerations to things like culture and mentality need to be aligned—you wouldn’t put your child in a preschool with opposing values—why should you trust your ERP project with a team who may have different views than your own? But what should you look for?
Size: Getting the Best of the Best on Your Project
Often, if you work with a firm that’s too big for you, you’ll end up getting the second-string team. Additionally, a team too small will valiantly fight to deliver—only to miss the mark. A right-sized partner will reduce risk and deliver realistic goals and execution.
Look for a potential implementation partner whose business is just right. Too small, and it may not have enough experience—or experience in your industry. Too big, and it may not prioritize your implementation in comparison with larger businesses.
The Publisher Danger: Not Just Too Big—Way too Big
This isn’t to berate large partners who do great work for giant clients—but implementation partners are no different than you. Just as you’d probably put a bit more effort into serving a customer who represents a significant portion of potential business than one who doesn’t, a mid-sized partner is going to mesh better with your needs than a giant one.
Now, say you’re looking at the largest reseller in existence. Now multiply their annual revenue by a few hundred. Though not much of the vendor’s business is focused on implementation, even if their implementation staff payroll is 5% of their budget, it still represents an expenditure larger than most resellers.
Publishers are great at publishing—but if you trust them to implement, you’re probably not even getting the B-Team.
References: Have they Delivered Before?
Never be afraid to ask for references. A key part of the discovery phase is not only to ask whether the software is built for you but if the people implementing it know how to make it work. Checking references is a crucial step. The partners you speak to should be happy to supply you with names and contact information for previous customers.
Honesty: Are They Rosy or Refreshingly Straightforward?
Pragmaticism is the name of the game for companies seeking out ERP. Whether that means doing a ton of due diligence or vetting partners to ensure things work, the effort you put into selection will pay off in the long run.
As you dig into your potential solutions, keep a wary eye out for unscrupulous “partners,” dishonest sales tactics, and lowball offers, among other things. Whether it’s overpromising functionality or mismanaging expectations, you need to find a partner who can shoot from the hip.
Get the Most out of an ERP Project with the Right Partner for the Job
We don’t like to beat around the bush in New York. In fact, it’s why MIBAR has become synonymous with the term New York ERP Partner. We’d love to say that the ERP implementation process is failsafe—but then we’d be lying. We know that the wrong partner can ruin a client’s experience with the right software, because we’ve fixed “failed” implementations.
When you turn to us, you know that we’ll help you find a solution that works for you—not for our revenue numbers. At MIBAR, we want you to find the right vendor and the right partner. This is why we want to provide you honest, straightforward advice about the selection and implementation process—because we’re confident in our work and confident that one of the ERP options we provide will provide minimal risk and maximum reward.
Get to know more about how we work and download the free guide on reducing ERP project risk with the help of a partner here.
