ERP 와 조직 간의 Fit 과 Customization 이 ERP 구현 성공에 미치는 영향: 조직 메모리 이론을 바탕으로

배억호,하봉문,정승렬 한국경영정보학회 2010 한국경영정보학회 학술대회논문집 Vol.2010 No.1

본 연구는 ERP 시스템 구현에 있어서 필연적으로 발생하는 조직과 ERP 시스템 간의 불일치(Mismatch)와 Customization 이 ERP 구현 성공에 미치는 영향을 파악하고, 개별 불일치 유형 별로 어떠한 Customization 이 적절한지를 파악하고, 제시하고자 하는 것이다. 실제 ERP 구현 시, 기업은 Customization 을 적게 하는 경향을 띠며, ERP 컨설팅 관련 종사자들은 ERP의 Best Practice 도입과 Customization 을 최소화 방안을 권장한다. 그러나 조직과 ERP 시스템 간의 불일치는 ERP 구현의 주요 실패 요인이다. 본 연구모형은 ERP 컨설팅 관련 종사자들을 대상으로 40 개가 넘는 프로젝트에서 수집된 자료를 사용하여 실증적으로 분석하였다. 본 연구 분석 결과에서, 조직과 ERP 시스템 간의 불일치는 ERP 구현 성공에 부정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 나타났고, 조직과 ERP 시스템 간의 불일치와 Customization 상호작용 항의 영향성 검증을 통해, 불일치를 Customization 이 해결함으로써, ERP 구현 성공에 유의적인 영향을 가져오는 것으로 나타났다. 그리고 Customization 은 ERP 구현 성공과 유의한 관계가 없음을 실증적으로 제시함으로써, Customization 은 ERP 시스템 구현에 있어서, 주요한 고려사항이 아니라는 것을 밝혀냈다. 그리고 개별 불일치 유형에 대한 Customization 방법을 분석함으로써, ERP 구현 성공을 위해서 사용자 요구사항에 있어서의 적절한 Customization 은 어떠한 것인지를 실증적으로 파악할 수 있었다.

조직의 정보 니즈와 ERP 기능과의 불일치 및 그 대응책에 대한 이해: 조직 메모리 이론을 바탕으로

정승렬,배억호 한국경영정보학회 2012 Asia Pacific Journal of Information Systems Vol.22 No.2

Until recently, successful implementation of ERP systems has been a popular topic among ERP researchers, who have attempted to identify its various contributing factors. None of these efforts, however, explicitly recognize the need to identify disparities that can exist between organizational information requirements and ERP systems. Since ERP systems are in fact “packages”-that is, software programs developed by independent software vendors for sale to organizations that use them-they are designed to meet the general needs of numerous organizations, rather than the unique needs of a particular organization, as is the case with custom-developed software. By adopting standard packages, organizations can substantially reduce many of the potential implementation risks commonly associated with custom-developed software. However, it is also true that the nature of the package itself could be a risk factor as the features and functions of the ERP systems may not completely comply with a particular organization’s informational requirements. In this study, based on the organizational memory mismatch perspective that was derived from organizational memory theory and cognitive dissonance theory, we define the nature of disparities, which we call “mismatches,” and propose that the mismatch between organizational information requirements and ERP systems is one of the primary determinants in the successful implementation of ERP systems. Furthermore, we suggest that customization efforts as a coping strategy for mismatches can play a significant role in increasing the possibilities of success. In order to examine the contention we propose in this study, we employed a survey-based field study of ERP project team members, resulting in a total of 77 responses. The results of this study show that, as anticipated from the organizational memory mismatch perspective, the mismatch between organizational information requirements and ERP systems makes a significantly negative impact on the implementation success of ERP systems. This finding confirms our hypothesis that the more mismatch there is, the more difficult successful ERP implementation is, and thus requires more attention to be drawn to mismatch as a major failure source in ERP implementation. This study also found that as a coping strategy on mismatch, the effects of customization are significant. In other words, utilizing the appropriate customization method could lead to the implementation success of ERP systems. This is somewhat interesting because it runs counter to the argument of some literature and ERP vendors that minimized customization (or even the lack thereof) is required for successful ERP implementation. In many ERP projects, there is a tendency among ERP developers to adopt default ERP functions without any customization, adhering to the slogan of “the introduction of best practices.” However, this study asserts that we cannot expect successful implementation if we don’t attempt to customize ERP systems when mismatches exist. For a more detailed analysis, we identified three types of mismatches-Non-ERP, Non-Procedure, and Hybrid. Among these, only Non-ERP mismatches (a situation in which ERP systems cannot support the existing information needs that are currently fulfilled) were found to have a direct influence on the implementation of ERP systems. Neither Non-Procedure nor Hybrid mismatches were found to have significant impact in the ERP context. These findings provide meaningful insights since they could serve as the basis for discussing how the ERP implementation process should be defined and what activities should be included in the implementation process. They show that ERP developers may not want to include organizational (or business processes) changes in the implementation process, suggesting that doing so could lead to failed implementation. And in fact, this suggestion eventually turned out to be true when we found that the application of pr... Until recently, successful implementation of ERP systems has been a popular topic among ERP researchers, who have attempted to identify its various contributing factors. None of these efforts, however, explicitly recognize the need to identify disparities that can exist between organizational information requirements and ERP systems. Since ERP systems are in fact “packages”-that is, software programs developed by independent software vendors for sale to organizations that use them-they are designed to meet the general needs of numerous organizations, rather than the unique needs of a particular organization, as is the case with custom-developed software. By adopting standard packages, organizations can substantially reduce many of the potential implementation risks commonly associated with custom-developed software. However, it is also true that the nature of the package itself could be a risk factor as the features and functions of the ERP systems may not completely comply with a particular organization’s informational requirements. In this study, based on the organizational memory mismatch perspective that was derived from organizational memory theory and cognitive dissonance theory, we define the nature of disparities, which we call “mismatches,” and propose that the mismatch between organizational information requirements and ERP systems is one of the primary determinants in the successful implementation of ERP systems. Furthermore, we suggest that customization efforts as a coping strategy for mismatches can play a significant role in increasing the possibilities of success. In order to examine the contention we propose in this study, we employed a survey-based field study of ERP project team members, resulting in a total of 77 responses. The results of this study show that, as anticipated from the organizational memory mismatch perspective, the mismatch between organizational information requirements and ERP systems makes a significantly negative impact on the implementation success of ERP systems. This finding confirms our hypothesis that the more mismatch there is, the more difficult successful ERP implementation is, and thus requires more attention to be drawn to mismatch as a major failure source in ERP implementation. This study also found that as a coping strategy on mismatch, the effects of customization are significant. In other words, utilizing the appropriate customization method could lead to the implementation success of ERP systems. This is somewhat interesting because it runs counter to the argument of some literature and ERP vendors that minimized customization (or even the lack thereof) is required for successful ERP implementation. In many ERP projects, there is a tendency among ERP developers to adopt default ERP functions without any customization, adhering to the slogan of “the introduction of best practices.” However, this study asserts that we cannot expect successful implementation if we don’t attempt to customize ERP systems when mismatches exist. For a more detailed analysis, we identified three types of mismatches-Non-ERP, Non-Procedure, and Hybrid. Among these, only Non-ERP mismatches (a situation in which ERP systems cannot support the existing information needs that are currently fulfilled) were found to have a direct influence on the implementation of ERP systems. Neither Non-Procedure nor Hybrid mismatches were found to have significant impact in the ERP context. These findings provide meaningful insights since they could serve as the basis for discussing how the ERP implementation process should be defined and what activities should be included in the implementation process. They show that ERP developers may not want to include organizational (or business processes) changes in the implementation process, suggesting that doing so could lead to failed implementation. And in fact, this suggestion eventually turned out to be true when we found that the application of proces...