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Chapter 7 Processes, Organizations, and Information Systems
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the organization is committing to maintaining those alterations as the application is changed over
time. Here, organizations fill gaps by choosing their lesser regret.
Transition Problems

Transitioning to a new enterprise system is also difficult. The organization must somehow change
from using isolated departmental systems to using the new enterprise system, while continuing to
run the business. It’s like having heart surgery while running a 100-yard dash.
Such transitions require careful planning and substantial training. Inevitably, problems will
develop. Knowing this will occur, senior management needs to communicate the need for the
change to the employees and then stand behind the new system as the kinks are worked out. It is
an incredibly stressful time for all involved. We will discuss development techniques and imple-
mentation strategies further in Chapter 10.

Employee Resistance

People resist change. Change requires effort and engenders fear. Considerable research and litera-
ture exist about the reasons for change resistance and how organizations can deal with it. Here we
will summarize the major principles.
First, senior-level management needs to communicate the need for the change to the organi-
zation and reiterate this, as necessary, throughout the transition process. Second, employees fear
change because it threatens self-efficacy, which is a person’s belief that he or she can be successful
at his or her job. To enhance confidence, employees need to be trained and coached on the success-
ful use of the new system. Word-of-mouth is a very powerful factor, and in some cases key users
are trained ahead of time to create positive buzz about the new system. Video demonstrations of
employees successfully using the new system are also effective.
Third, in many ways, the primary benefits of a new ERP system are felt by the accounting
and finance departments and the senior management. Many of the employees who are asked
to change their activities to implement ERP will not receive any direct benefit from it. Therefore,
employees may need to be given extra inducement to change to the new system. As one experi-
enced change consultant said, “Nothing succeeds like praise or cash, especially cash.” Straight-
out pay for change is bribery, but contests with cash prizes among employees or groups can be
very effective at inducing change.
Implementing new enterprise systems can solve many problems and bring great efficiency
and cost savings to an organization, but it is not for the faint of heart.

New Technology

Emerging, new technology affects all information systems, but it affects enterprise systems par-
ticularly because of their importance and their value. Consider, for example, the cloud. Because
of the cost savings of cloud-based computing, organizations would like to move their enterprise
systems to the cloud. But legal, risk, and business policy factors may make such a move infeasible.
The organization may be required to keep physical control over its data. When moving it to the
cloud, the cloud vendor controls the physical location of the data, and that location might not
even be in the same country as the organization. So, some sort of hybrid model may need to be
devised (see Q7-8).
Similar comments pertain to mobile technology. Employees want to use mobile devices to
access and even modify enterprise system data. But mobile devices are just that—mobile. The
enterprise system may be exposed to considerable risk while outside the control of the organiza-
tion. And ERP data is a juicy target for crime (see “One Stop Shopping” on pages 314–315). These
factors don’t mean organizations cannot use new technology with enterprise systems, but they do
add challenges.