Best of breed IT strategy: an alternative to enterprise resource planning systems

Abstract - Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software has become the dominant strategic platform for supporting enterprise-wide business processes. However, single vendor ERP software systems have been criticised for not meeting specific organisation and industry requirements. An alternative approach ‘Best of Breed (BoB)’, integrates components of software from multiple standard package vendors, and in some cases custom components. The objective is to develop enterprise systems that are more closely aligned with the requirements of an organisation. Although this approach may not be common at present it is likely to grow in importance due to business needs and technology advances such as the componentisation of ERP software. A case study analysis of a BoB implementation at a global entertainment's company is used as a platform for the discussion of the issues associated with this strategy and a comparison is made with the single vendor ERP alternative. The analysis centres on the complexity of implementation, the differences in the levels of functionality and business fit and the maintenance requirements.

Enterprise resource planning or enterprise resource plotting? Technological, organisational and inter-organisational aspects of enterprise resource planning package adoption and diffusion

Those in organisations tend to adopt new technologies as a way to improve their functions, reduce cost and attain best practices. Thus, technology promoters (or vendors) work along those lines in order to convince adopters to invest in those technologies and develop their own organisations profit in return. The possible resultant ‘conflicts of interest’ makes the study of reasons behind IT diffusion and adoption an interesting subject. In this paper we look at IT diffusion and adoption in terms of technology (system features), organisational aspects (firm level characteristics) and inter-organisational aspects (market dynamics) in order to see who might be the real beneficiaries of technology adoption. We use ERP packages as an example of an innovation that has been widely diffused and adopted for the last 10 years. We believe that our findings can be useful to those adopting ERP packages as it gives them a wider view of the situation.

Web mediated market interactions and enterprise software

With increased consolidation and a few large vendors dominating the market, how can software vendors distinguish themselves in order to maintain profitability and gain market share? Increasingly customers are becoming more proactive in selecting a vendor and a product, drawing upon various publications, market surveys, mailing lists, and, of course, other users. In particular, though, a company's Web site is the obvious place to begin information gathering. In sum, it may seem that the days of the uninformed customer prepared to be "sold to" are potentially all but gone.

Achieving enterprise integration through software customization : part I-evidence from the field

Achieving business and IT integration is strategic goal for many organisations – it has almost become the ‘Holy Grail’ of organisational success. In this environment Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) packages have become the defacto option for addressing this issue. Integration has come to mean adopting ERP, through configuration and without customization, but this all or nothing approach has proved difficult for many organisations. In part 1 of a 2 part update we provide evidence from the field that suggests that whilst costly, if managed appropriately, customization can have value in aiding organisational integration efforts. In part 2, we discuss in more detail the benefits and pitfalls involved in enacting a non-standard based integration strategy.

Achieving enterprise integration through software customization : part II-enacting the strategy

In part 1 of this update, we put forward the argument that integration in ERP based environments can be achieved in ways other than adopting a software configuration only approach. We drew on evidence from two large ERP implementations to show how, despite the cost implications, some customization, if carefully managed, could prove helpful. In this, the final part of the update, we discuss the benefits, and potential pitfalls, involved in enacting a non-standard based integration strategy. This requires attention to a) broadening the integration definition; b) bringing legacy practices forward and c) developing a customization based integration strategy.

Enterprise Business Technology Governance: Three Competencies to Build Board Digital Leadership Capability.

The competent leadership of digital transformation needs to involve the board of directors. The reported lack of such capability in boards is becoming a pressing issue. A part of leadership in such transformation is the board of director’s competence to lead Enterprise Business Technology Governance (EBTG). In this paper we take the position that EBTG competencies are essential in boards, because competent EBTG has been shown to contribute to increased revenue, profit, and returns. We update and expand on the results of a multi-method approach to the development of a set of three board of director competencies needed for effective EBTG.

Surviving (thriving) in academia : feminist support networks and women ECRs

In this paper, we reflect upon our experiences and those of our peers as doctoral students and early career researchers in an Australian political science department. We seek to explain and understand the diverse ways that participating in an unofficial Feminist Reading Group in our department affected our experiences. We contend that informal peer support networks like reading groups do more than is conventionally assumed, and may provide important avenues for sustaining feminist research in times of austerity, as well as supporting and enabling women and emerging feminist scholars in academia. Participating in the group created a community of belonging and resistance, providing women with personal validation, information and material support, as well as intellectual and political resources to understand and resist our position within the often hostile spaces of the University. While these experiences are specific to our context, time and location, they signal that peer networks may offer critical political resources for responding to the ways that women’s bodies and concerns are marginalised in increasingly competitive and corporatised university environments.

Complexity Development Theory and enterprise development at the bottom of the pyramid

In 2001 45% (2.7 billion) of the world’s population of approximately 6.1 billion lived in ‘moderate poverty’ on less than US $ 2 per person per day (World Population Summary, 2012). In the last 60 years there have been many theories attempting to explain development, why some countries have the fastest growth in history, while others stagnate and so far no way has been found to explain the differences. Traditional views imply that development is the aggregation of successes from multiple individual business enterprises, but this ignores the interactions between and among institutions, organisations and individuals in the economy, which can often have unpredictable effects. Complexity Development Theory proposes that by viewing development as an emergent property of society, we can help create better development programs at the organisational, institutional and national levels. This paper asks how the principals of CAS can be used to develop CDT principals used to develop and operate development programs at the bottom of the pyramid in developing economies. To investigate this research question we conduct a literature review to define and describe CDT and create propositions for testing. We illustrate these propositions using a case study of an Asset Based Community Development (ABCD) Program for existing and nascent entrepreneurs in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). We found evidence that all the principals of CDT were related to the characteristics of CAS. If this is the case, development programs will be able to select which CAS needed to test these propositions.

The influence of families on early adolescent school connectedness : evidence that this association varies with adolescent involvement in peer drinking networks

School connectedness is central to the long term well-being of adolescents, and high quality parent-child relationships facilitate school connectedness. This study examined the extent to which family relationship quality is associated with the school connectedness of pre- and early teenagers, and how this association varies with adolescent involvement in peer drinking networks. The sample consisted of 7,372 10-14 year olds recruited from 231 schools in 30 Australian communities. Participants completed the Communities that Care youth survey. A multi-level model of school connectedness was used, with a random term for school-level variation. Key independent variables included family relationship quality, peer drinking networks, and school grade. Control variables included child gender, sensation seeking, depression, child alcohol use, parent education, and language spoken at home. For grade 6 students, the association of family relationship quality and school connectedness was lower when peer drinking networks were present, and this effect was nonsignificant for older (grade 8) students. Post hoc analyses indicated that the effect for family relationship quality on school connectedness was nonsignificant when adolescents in grade 6 reported that the majority of friends consumed alcohol. The results point to the importance of familyschool partnerships in early intervention and prevention.