ERP Systems: Critical Factors in Theory and Practice

This paper reports the findings of a research project investigating the utilization and continuous improvement of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems. Adopting the aspects of a resource management framework and Critical Success Factor research, an initial framework is developed. The framework is developed through a survey of ERP system expert consultants. A number of factors and causalities are identified, including the positive role of use by top management and the role of corporate culture. Two factors were found to have a negative impact on utilization. The first is the unreflective use of ERP system implementation methods, which can ‘kill’ the visions and ideas of implementing ERP systems, while the second is the vanilla implementation strategy.