Does it make sense to include Business Process Improvements in your QAD EE Upgrade?

Posted on: June 29, 2016 | By: David Kwo | QAD Business Process

As Logan Consulting participates in more and more Enterprise Edition (“EE”) Upgrades, one of the most common questions we are asked is if process improvements should be included as part of the upgrade scope or should it be considered a Phase 2 Project?   There is not a right or wrong answer to this. One significant variable is the culture of your organization. Is it one that there is consistent focus on business process improvements or has there been an acceptance of inferior processes such that customizations and off-line spreadsheets have become institutionalized?  Our experience is that most companies fall somewhere in the middle of this spectrum.

While the upgrade path from Standard Edition (“SE”) continues to shorten and be made smoother with the continued development and maturation of upgrade tools, it is still a significant undertaking.  We’ve seen them be done in as few as five months (pure technical upgrade, no process improvements) and we’ve seen take well over a year (most of the time, these are upgrades from a VERY old version of QAD, eB2 or older and thus lots of process improvements).    Similar to a Phase 1, of an ERP implementation, our view is that an EE Upgrade, should only contain the process improvements that provide tangible and meaningful improvements in cash flow, or EBITDA. So if your company is carrying way too much inventory, or spending an enormous amount on expediting fees/charges, we believe those are worthy of including in the scope of an EE upgrade.   Our experience is that most organizations are shying away from big bang go-lives. We’ve seen the carnage of this mainly in large, SAP or Oracle upgrades or implementations, with scope creep consistently pushing back the go-live date with the ultimately empty promise of huge business benefits.

Our experience is that an EE upgrade with a tight scope that includes only critical business process improvements benefits. It reduces both the investment and the risk for the client and allows both the client and the consulting partner to look at the results together to determine how well they executed the plan.

Think a QAD EE upgrade may be for you? Contact Logan Consulting, your Chicago based QAD partners, to set up a consultation.

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