Why do companies struggle when implementing new information systems?- Project Management

Implementation of information systems can improve your business by making it more efficient, accurate for decision making, better customer service and can help you evaluate your company’s performance and more. So, you can understand why many companies try to incorporate information systems into their business but why do so many try and struggle?

Implementing a new information system into your business process should be viewed as a project, it is both costly and time consuming, so it is important we treat it like a project with steps and breakdowns i.e., it can’t happen overnight. This is a misunderstanding many have of implementation, for example the Hershey foods corporation tried to implement ERP systems but struggled. They struggled because it was rushed with insufficient time for implementation and thus resulted in large amounts of inventory problems for the business. Another reason why they struggled like many others, is because there was no ‘pilot’ or ‘test run’ done to see how the information systems would work and any potential problems that needed to be fixed before implementation.

In a case study in class, we talked about ‘Apple Computers’ trying to implement information systems but also struggled. This was because if a company is going to implement information systems, they must also alter their business process to cater for the information system but unfortunately many don’t, which can lead to a failure in implementation.

Another, you would think the obvious necessity when implementing new systems would be sufficient staff training but evidently many overlook this necessity. Staff in the business need to feel confident and comfortable when adapting to these new systems and business processes thus extensive training is needed and without it, the business will struggle.

These are just a couple of scenarios where many companies make the mistakes when implementing new information systems,

I hope this was another insightful blog for you this week,

Thanks for reading,

Jake.