Bringing a supply chain into the 21st century is no small feat. Unfortunately, many companies treat it as such, perhaps because, at a distance, a supply chain seems fairly straightforward, or maybe zealous salespersons oversold the simplicity of the process.

However it happens, the result is often to buy the new technology, turn it on and expect results. Take care deciding and capitalise on the opportunities technology offers or disappointment is inevitable, says Doug Hunter, Manager: Professional Services at SYSPRO Africa.

"With proper supply chain environments, you are not just talking financials, but also manufacturing, distribution and other stuff. That's quite complex and goes through functional boundaries. The processes are, by nature, cross-functional. But, many ERP implementations in the mid-market still end up with siloed functions. So you're actually trying to break into a different way of doing business and that's often not tackled properly."

The supply chain is a complex field of interactions that sit at the heart of efficiencies and outcomes. This is why there is often a sense of urgency to modernise it, because problems at that level can cause serious issues for the business, and when they occur, the business will demand action. But, any modernisation exercise will impact the business at fundamental levels and effectively change the business itself.

It comes down to that familiar trinity of change: people, processes and technology. Whenever one or more is neglected, the modernisation is likely to fail dismally. This is why customer-centricity is often held as the focus for businesses, because it reflects the combined efforts of those three areas. Yet, supply chains are tricky in this regard, since bad inner workings are not always exposed by the results. Thus, when an attempt at modernisation happens, a lot of ugly starts coming to the surface:

"You could think: as long as you have the final goods, you are running great processing. But, not if your back-end isn't properly sychronised, often, we find people upgrade from a system with limited manufacturing and inventory management, they realise they aren't getting the value to support their growth."

Holistic approach

Companies are in the habit of dealing with one element at a time, using focused spend to address specific problems in their environment. But, this is where supply chain modernisation falls apart. It's a process that needs to be applied holistically across the company.

Because of this, the right ERP is important, not just for its functions, but how it helps you engage your people and processes. An ERP that wants to meet people halfway. Starting with technology is a fine first step, but only because it acts as a catalyst for this change. Essentially, you want to enable employees, who use the technology tools to address and refine processes. To do this successfully, Hunter says it's crucial to grasp how ERPs have changed.

"ERPs are predominantly transaction-based systems of record. The bulk of the users are doing transactions to do purchase, sales, production and other types of orders. Those are all transactions. But then high level users want to see what's been happening. This makes the ERP a system of engagement. This is the big move for ERPs: engage more in the user experience and make it easier for them to get to grips with the solution."

The engagement requirement is what separates new ERP environments from their predecessors, and it is a massively important shift in how supply chains are managed. The improvements may sound trivial, but they are actually highly effective.

An example of this is predictive text: time and effort is saved if the search function in an ERP can preempt what a user might be looking for. This is already a norm among consumer search engines and, as such, an ingrained expectation with the user. Having such a feature in the ERP environment improves their engagement. Even on a transactional level, speed and style of engagement are crucial.

Another example is the use of artificial intelligence in reporting. Modern ERPs are increasingly central to data aggregation efforts in a company, delivering more frequent, detailed and tailored reports and insights. Modern AI hugely boosts the effectiveness and reliability of reporting, again giving incentives for people to engage more and adjust processes through intelligence.

"Today's ERP cannot be prescriptive, but rather meet people halfway, encouraging them to truly scrutinise and evolve to effective and appropriate processes," says Hunter. "Because supply chains have cross-functional processes, people need to be collaborative and talk to what's best for the business, not just my area. Then the technology has to enable all of that. So you quite often find it's the people, not the technology, that is the harder to deal with. If they aren't engaged, your modernisation will fail. You should choose the technology on that basis for modernisation to succeed."