Mastering ERP Implementation: Dolium's Solution to Overcoming Complex Challenges

12 August 2024 | Business

In a companion article, Kitbag Consulting posted an article about the challenges experienced when navigating the challenges when implementing an ERP solution in government and large corporates.

Their insights were based upon 40 years Industrial Engineering experience and 15 years of recognised consulting excellence to the Australian national security and Defence environment, they have taken their lessons learnt and built their own Integrated Business Support System – DOLIUM.

So, what is DOLIUM?

DOLIUM is a platform for organisations to model and document their activities and then use those activities to deliver against their mission and objectives. Modelled and interconnected activities are used to; perform daily tasks, optimise business or regulatory activity, coordinate the various business functions that connect to meet organisational outcomes, link critical data and decision points to drive efficiency in a world of constant change.

DOLIUM has been designed using the insights gained from collaborating with clients on significant system changes, organisational restructuring and machinery of government transitions.

In our LinkedIn post series, we aim to highlight key shortcomings in the implementation and use of complex ERP solutions, focusing on elements that cause significant disruption.

What is an ERP?

Essentially an ERP is a system designed to manage transactional activity within an organisation. It captures and processes data from various business transactions such as sales orders, purchase orders, inventory movements and financial entries in real time.

What ERP is not ?

ERPs do not contain management activities concerned with the planning, oversight, decision-making and the maintenance of strategic direction of an organisation.

By documenting and following robust frameworks for planning, execution and evaluation, organisations can respond swiftly to market shifts and emerging opportunities. Ultimately, management activities are finely tuned to a company's strategic objectives, enabling effective and innovative operations, positioning it ahead of competitors who may lack such disciplined oversight.

Transactional and management activities serve distinct but complementary roles within an organisation. ERPs contain the transactional activity whereas DOLIUM contains the management level activities.

For government, DOLIUM serves as the guiderails to achieve policy objectives and for corporates, DOLIUM is a source of competitive advantage.

How is this so?

DOLIUM helps to manage and optimise management processes within your organisation. It provides a centralised but accessible platform for managing activities, documents, processes, and data with the aim of ensuring compliance with regulatory requirements and industry standards, as well as improving operational efficiency and product quality.

As an eQMS, DOLIUM helps you to establish and maintain effective management practices, ensure compliance with regulatory requirements, and drive continuous improvement in outcome quality and customer satisfaction.

DOLIUM democratises activity modelling by making it accessible to non-IT staff, thus providing a valuable tool to use in the conduct of daily business. No more gathering dust on the shelf, the Integrated Business Support System is a live up to date facility for staff to use, optimise and innnovate.

DOLIUM significantly improves and reduces risk to ERP implementation and management by leveraging existing documentation activity baselines, ensuring precise resource allocation and optimal utilisation of existing SAP, Oracle and other ERP systems:

• Enhanced precision in resource allocation, eliminating waste.
• Assurance in achieving strategic objectives through meticulous resource management.
• Transformation of ERP systems from operational tools to strategic assets.
• Significant improvement in strategic resource management and integration with daily operations.

Activity Integration

Activity-focused integration is an alternative to provide a more nuanced path to competitive advantage than system integration alone as it emphasises the optimisation of the way tasks and activities are performed within an organisation.

By concentrating on refining and standardising management activity, businesses can achieve speed to decision with greater transparency across organisational boundaries without necessarily overhauling existing systems. For instance, streamlining task flows, eliminating bottlenecks and implementing best practices can lead to significant gains in productivity and customer/community satisfaction.

While integration is crucial for ensuring different technological components work together seamlessly, system integration should only occur where the risks and costs are outweighed by considered benefits.

A deeper focus on activity improvement ensures that each step in the value chain is as effective and efficient as possible, ultimately leading to a more agile and competitive organisation.

Alternative to System Integration and Bespoke Solutions

Consultancies have on many occasions been engaged to write Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) for organisations with significant ERPs. Those SOPs communicate how managerial activities should be performed to complement the transactional nature of ERP’s.

Unfortunately those SOPs and supporting processes have been articulated in such a format (Word/ Excel and or Visio), they more often than not become expensive shelfware after their first use or forgotten with the inevitable staff churn.

With advances in available in technology, Kitbag Consulting has been designing Integrated Business Support Systems that transforms SOPs into a functionally based support system. DOLIUM is an revolutionary step in Integrated Business Support System development.

The Integrated Business Support System significantly improves the means, controls and efficiency of the organisation through embedded best practice and enables enterprise of an end to end view.

Using the functionalities of the approach, staff can follow their relevant activity according to their role/ function and link into the transactional system at the appropriate screen to perform that transaction. Essentially, all of the departmental processes are external to ERP thus requiring minimal modifications during ERP integration.

Minimal modification enables the software vendor (not the System Integrator) to routinely conduct technical upgrades with little operational disturbance and no additional cost.

It will in its very nature embed the agencies’ governance framework, reduce audit procedures and ensure alignment of legislation, policy and business rules into roles and everyday practice.

The approach also promotes self‐sufficiency in that agencies will own the processes and be able to amend them to cater for legislative, policy and business changes.