5 Must Haves in an ERP Solution for Manufacturing Companies
When there is a noted growth witnessed in adoption of digital technologies across various industries, manufacturers are also gearing up for much needed digital transformation. It is now a necessity to have a robust ERP system in place, to achieve operational and business efficiency. However, for entrepreneurs, while planning an efficient ERP solution, it is an extremely cumbersome exercise to figure out the necessary beneficial functionalities of the ERP software.
First things first, no ERP application can be implemented as it is — a ready to use software product. An ERP solution has to be a custom developed application depending on the unique requirements of the organization as well as the industry the organization belongs to. It should be able to effectively address the challenges faced by the organization.
Manufacturing companies today are in dire need of a single and all-encompassing business solution platform that would help the organization to manage all business functions seamlessly; integrating the supply chain with manufacturing, quality control and financials. In a nutshell, they needed a modern ERP solution that would help manage their core business functions – financial accounting, budgeting, production planning and shop-floor control, job costing and cost sheets, inventory, Accounts Receivables and Payables, EXIM (Export-Import Management and Compliance), Statutory Compliance for Taxation, etc.
1. Industry Challenges
Here are a few challenges that have been identified, which I hope you will be able to relate to as a manufacturer:
- Lack of visibility of raw materials stock across manufacturing and subcontractor locations leading to excess stock and blocked financial resources.
- Inefficient tracking of AR and AP leading to unrealized revenues and ad-hoc, unplanned payments. This leads to a disaster in Cash Flow Management.
- Manual calculation of job costs components leading to miscalculations and errors in determining exact costing for a job run.
- Manual preparation of export-import documentation leading to a complete disconnect between realisation of import exemptions against deemed export sales.
- The shop floor calendar planned and tracked manually across all work centres and this leading to frequent breakdown in job runs thereby affecting delivery schedules for manufactured products for different clients.
- The data residing in disparate database systems causing non-uniformity
- Inability to forecast a credible sales pipeline
- Inability to determine potential revenue and profits
- Inability in determining aging assets and their maintenance
- And many more…
So, when you plan for implementing an ERP software for your organization, you need to hunt for the features and functionalities that helps you address the above challenges. This undoubtedly becomes the first and foremost must have for an ERP implementation in your organization. A Microsoft Dynamics ERP Implementation helps overcome the above challenges as well as aids in becoming an automation driven organization.
2. User Experience
Did you know: Most of the ERP Implementations fail because of lower user adaptability!
The employees working at a manufacturing industry may not be the one with technical know-how. Therefore, when developing an ERP solution, the manufacturer must ask the ERP Consulting partner for the user-friendly system so that all the employees can easily adapt to the ERP solution.
3. Improved Operations
A manufacturing company needs an ERP solution to have intelligent processes automation in place. The ERP should reduce their manual efforts and automate most of the important processes. The ERP software solution should enhance the areas including procurement and purchase cycles, inventory management, production management, waste management, sales orders, financial accounting and many more functions across the organization.
4. Business Insights
Business insights drives productivity in ERP. The ERP solution must provide business owners an optimized visibility across their organization geared to boost productivity and efficiency by surfacing useful insights. The insights should be intuitive and self-explanatory, representing the information of an individual task or whole business process relevant to an organizational role.
5. Cost vs Value
Remember: Price is what you pay value is what you get.
Ultimately it all boils down to money. ERP requires a handsome amount of investment. In today’s environment, it is difficult for the manufacturers to select the most appropriate ERP software. So, the overall cost becomes an important decision making factor for the manufacturers.
Need help with evaluation of the right ERP solution for your organization? Click here to get your free consultation. Our Microsoft Dynamics ERP consultants at Dev Information Technology Ltd. have more than a decade of experience in providing Microsoft Dynamics ERP advisory, acquisition, design, implementation, integration, maintenance and up-gradation services. Click here to know more.
Apart from those mentioned above, what do you think are the features, functionalities and benefits that you are looking from an ERP implementation. Feel free to mention them in the comment section.
Zenul Jinwala
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I’m glad that you brought up how the cost for an ERP system is what often determines which services get selected. My uncle wants to get these services, as he’s noticed lately that the workers in his factory are not working as efficiently as other locations he has visited. I’ll do my part to assist him by relaying your information to him!