EXE C U T I V E B R I E F

Improve business productivity

and agility with modern ERP

You don’t know what you don’t know

How do you run your business? Are you doing weekly planning on a whiteboard? Do
Modern ERP requires
you keep track of inventory in spreadsheets? Can you measure performance against an organization-wide
key performance indicators (KPIs)? If you rely on a legacy enterprise resource planning cultural change
(ERP) system, can key stakeholders even utilize it, or do they need to roll up their
needs to a few select “super users?” Does your business have lots of data, but it exists The goal of a modern ERP system
in silos and requires time-consuming and error-prone manual processes before it can is to bring your people together
be shared across business units? with shared goals. This requires
a major cultural shift in thinking
Even if you answer “yes” to these questions you might think, “but what we have across the enterprise. It requires
works—it’s good enough.” In today’s fast-moving, quickly changing, increasingly a data-driven mindset across the
competitive business environment, good enough is no longer good enough. Today’s business. While much of that
organizations need complete enterprise-wide visibility and the ability to collaborate change is typically driven by
across the business. They need the agility and flexibility to quickly respond to a management, enlisting change
changing market while growing the business to take advantage of new agents from all levels of the
opportunities—ideally, before the competition. Today’s way of doing business is company can give employees
data-driven and you need the right tools to access, share, and leverage this data in a sense of ownership toward
order to make business decisions to not just survive, but thrive. Bandages and the changes they’re about
bubblegum will no longer suffice. to undertake.

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 The birth of the digital operations platform (DOP) Tailored to industry and business specific needs—The ability
to easily integrate the ERP system with complementary
The modern ERP system’s origin dates back more than 100 applications that address specific industry and business
years, when it began as economic order quantity (EOQ)—a operational needs.
decision tool for optimizing inventory costs. Over time,
additional functionality was added, like finance and CRM, and Connected data for analytics, machine learning, and AI—
the individual components were integrated into a single Connect data across application silos for enterprise-wide
overarching—albeit, difficult to use—system. analytics, on-demand recommendations, and pathway to AI.

A simplified definition of ERP is a system or solution that Security and risk management—Tools for standards-based
businesses use to manage day-to-day business activities, security, risk and fail-over management, attack prevention, and
such as procurement, project management, operations, and processes for continuous security advancement.
sales. ERP systems can also introduce automation that replaces
manual tasks. The goal of an ERP system is to improve business
productivity and agility. Benefits of a modern ERP system

As these business systems evolved, they met the needs Implementing or upgrading to a modern ERP can cause
of their times, but their functionality was directly limited significant disruption to the business, causing the organization
by the available technology. Today’s modern ERP systems to lose focus, or even “break” business processes that the
might be better called digital operations platforms (DOP) company looked upon as core to their success. As scary as this
to reflect their agile, artificial intelligence-based, and may seem, the productivity gains and business improvements
experience-driven nature, as well as the critical role they that your business will miss out on far outweigh the costs
play in cloud-based digital businesses. and risks.

Some key functionality that modern ERP (a.k.a. DOP) systems Modernization has a strategic impact on your business. Without
bring to organizations include: access to a modern ERP system, it can be difficult or even
impossible to support new business models and benefit from
Support for complete industry and business processes— the improvements in key performance indicators (KPIs) that
Business strategy and requirements are considered in context of come with a successful ERP implementation.
a larger set of capabilities and technology needed to address
complete business processes. Some of the major benefits of a modern ERP system include:

API-based integration for complex workflows— Ease of use—You can’t achieve return on investment (ROI) if
Native support for services-based APIs enables flexible your employees can’t use your ERP system. Updated systems
inter-application collaboration to support complex workflows are more user friendly, encouraging employees to seek out data
and in-context analytics. and integrate it into the decision-making process.

Complex application environments—Flexibility to handle More informed business decisions—Enterprise analytics

complex, hybrid technical environments while applications and enable businesses to connect data across business silos and
data move from legacy and on-premises software to cloud. drill down on overall results and KPIs to functional contributors.
With modern ERP systems, businesses can grow the “analytics
Collaboration with supplier and customer ecosystems— mindset” within the organization to increase data-driven
Ready to work beyond the enterprise and support the full decision-making and increase operational effectiveness. By
industry technology ecosystem by connecting with customer, aligning enterprise KPIs with department objectives, teams and
supplier, and partner applications. individuals have a clearer picture of how their priorities impact
overall business performance.
Future-proofed for extension and scalability—Extensibility,
scalability, and performance are part of the ERP’s core design ROI is always the key metric for business decision makers, and
principles to maximize business agility—including support for modern ERP systems help teams communicate more clearly
user interaction modalities beyond the traditional UX. with executive stakeholders through business analytics,
scenario planning, and financial impact analysis.

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By understanding the drivers of current financial outcomes and Improvement of key performance metrics—Organizations on
then using tools to model future outcomes, teams not only the latest ERP versions see more significant benefits in metrics
benefit from greater confidence in their decisions, but also get such as complete and on-time delivery, inventory turns, internal
increased support from executives that know they’re investing schedule compliance, and reductions in operational costs.
company resources intelligently. These performance improvements have a direct impact on the
bottom line, which may even pay for the ERP system.
Ability to attract and retain talent—A major challenge for
manufacturers and distributors today is the retirement of Utilize emerging technology—Analytics, mobility, cloud,
employees with years of “tribal” knowledge and expertise partner networks, and the internet of things (IoT) are becoming
combined with a new generation of workers that are less table stakes in the modern manufacturing and distribution
inclined to embark on manufacturing and distribution careers. environments. For example, using IoT and analytics together
Without these resources, your company can’t exist. The new (such as applying analytics to inexpensive sensors on
generation of digital natives demand technology that is machinery) can help to support predictive maintenance and
user-friendly and supports how they like to work. This means enable bigger profits in new service models. Outdated ERP
software that mirrors the look and feel of applications they use systems can’t support this innovation.
in their day-to-day lives and supports immediate access to data
and collaboration. For many manufacturers and distributors,
modern ERP systems have been a key differentiator when Data-driven mindset across the business
targeting this generation of workers.
Saying that ERP systems help organizations manage day-to-day
Breaking down business silos to increase collaboration— business activities is not only an oversimplification, but it
By extending ERP capabilities beyond operations with a modern doesn’t address the breadth and reach of modern ERP systems.
platform, businesses can increase collaboration across Not only do modern ERP systems touch and connect virtually
functional areas for improved workflows and increased every operational corner of a business, they also help foster a
productivity. As teams leverage improved communications and data-driven mindset across the business—empowering key
cross functional data, they can reduce cycle times and increase stakeholders to leverage this information for critical
accuracy. Native social tools within ERP systems allow teams to decision-making that can grow the business and increase the
share rich information across regions and time zones using bottom line.
devices that support work wherever and whenever needed.

ERP systems should support “outside-in” requirements for

exchanging information with suppliers and customers.
Networked support for processes such as supply chain
management, product lifecycle management, and order
management help to reduce cycle times, increase accuracy,
and improve overall business flexibility. Analytics for in-context
decisions can factor in third-party data, such as stock levels,
lead times, and demand forecasts for improved planning,
scheduling, and cost and risk management.

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Infor builds business software for specific industries in the cloud. With 17,000 employees and over 68,000 customers in
more than 170 countries, Infor software is designed for progress. To learn more, please visit www.infor.com.

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