Designing a Framework for an Efficient ERP Implementation in Technical Educational Institutions

Abstract

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) started in mid 1970s for integrating all information in business at a single place for better control and management. The benefits from ERP implementation are: changed organization culture with common vision, better resource management, improved financial management, better report generation, improved alignment of strategies, improved data quality, improved coordination and communication among users and many more. With the use of interactive communication technologies, Educational institutions also felt the need to use ERP systems in the 1990s. Since then the TEIs all over the world have been investing in ERP implementations. The literature suggests cases of failure of ERP in spite of heavy investment costs and quite high maintenance costs. The benefits are left unrealized. Many researchers have identified various critical success factors for the successful ERP implementation in TEIs. These include top management support, change management, business process reengineering, user motivation, training, infrastructure cost, customization efforts, deployment strategies and vendor selection. The present research aims to design a framework to help the TEIs in implementing ERP in an efficient way. Though operational efficiency is the main target for the research, it cannot be isolated from other important dimensions like user satisfaction, the costs and challenges for ERP implementation. The reasons for ERP failure or inefficient implementation could be due to the problems faced by the users in using the ERP solution. The present study aims to identify the problems faced by the users in TEIs, the challenges faced by management, various costs required for ERP implementation along with the factors that are important for user satisfaction. Also the perceived benefits from users of the TEIs are taken as targets for designing the framework for efficient ERP implementation in TEIs. The suggested framework, designed with inputs from 22 TEIs in India, will help improve the efficiency of ERP implementation and help the management to reduce the costs and realize the benefits.