Another person who should be in the selection team is the Chief Information Officer (CIO) of the company. This is because the CIO is responsible for all the systems that are to be installed. While in the decision making team, the CIO is the key person who will give technical advice to the team. This is a crucial contact in the team because of the software. The CIO is the best person to advice on the various technical requirements of the software. Before an information system is procured, it is important to understand what the software will play. This is best covered by the technical people in the department of technology. In this case, the CIO is the decision making representative (Morris, 2011).
Another person that will be in the decision making team is the Chief Finance Officer. This is the person who will advise on the available finances to finance the purchase of the software. It is important to have a representation of the finance officer so that the type of software that will be purchased will meet the financial strength and objectives of the company. It will be important to know the funds that are available for the purchase of the system. The chief financial officer will help clarify the financial position of the company and what the company is able and willing to use when it comes to procurement of information systems (Murray et al., 2013).
Another person who should be part of the team is the branch manager of the different branches of the company. The company has expanded to be in Canada, France, Brazil, Puerto Rico, Japan, and Mexico. It is important to have representatives from these departments. This is because most of the ERP systems today have web-based capabilities. This will mean that the company will have one installation of the system and all the other subsidiary companies will be connected to the main installation. This will mean that there is a need to have the branch managers who will advise the business processes that should be included in the ERP systems. The branch managers will also represent the interests of their branches.
There will also be the need to have heads of all the sectors whose business processes will be included in the ERP. What this means is that there will be a need to have the human resource head, the accounting section head, the revenue collection head among others. An ERP system has modules. It will be installed in a modular approach. What this means is that one module, say accounting will be installed separately but will integrate with the other modules. This means that the head of accounting will be required while implementing the system. This will cover the interest and the technical aspects of accounting business process. The ERP vendor will have to understand the accounting procedures that are followed. Not accounting alone but all the other modules. The presence of the heads of these modules will help the vendor know how to configure the system so that their interests will be included. ERP systems are customized to suit the needs of the users. It is the needs of the users which need to be represented in the implementation process. This will be covered by the modular heads of the company. They are the technocrats of the system and will give their views regarding this (Sarker et al., 2012).
References
Morris, J. J. (2011). The impact of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems on the effectiveness of internal controls over financial reporting. Journal of Information Systems, 25(1), 129-157.
Murray, M. J., Chin, W. W., & Anderson-Fletcher, E. (2013). Satisfaction with ERP Systems in Supply Chain Operations. In New Perspectives in Partial Least Squares and Related Methods (pp. 295-313). Springer New York.
Sarker, S., Sarker, S., Sahaym, A., & Bjørn-Andersen, N. (2012). Exploring value cocreation in relationships between an ERP vendor and its partners: a revelatory case study. MIS Quarterly, 36(1), 317-338.
