ERP

IT Budget Hacking (w$$t)

By Jim MacLennan ⋅ January 2, 2010 ⋅ Post a comment

Some block-and-tackle IT management stuff for today – taking a long, hard look at the IT budget, a task that is less-than-pleasant for many. Most of my peers have already cut any and all low hanging fruit – it’s time to start thinking aggressively. Software Maintenance for the Small Stuff Most have concentrated on their [...]

Bootstrap Market Research: Master Data Management (Results)

By Jim MacLennan ⋅ December 17, 2009 ⋅ Post a comment

As previously noted, I’ve been doing a lot of discussion and data crunching around “Master Data Management” lately – so I’ve “bootstrapped” a little market research project. It’s still a work in process – responses are trickling in – but I thought I might take some time to summarize what I am hearing to date. [...]

Bootstrap Market Research: Master Data Management (What, Who, How)

By Jim MacLennan ⋅ November 30, 2009 ⋅ One comment

I’ve been asked a lot of questions about “Master Data Management” over the past few weeks – what does it mean, who does it, and what are some tools and metrics that organizations are using to reign in this important aspect of ERP and analytics systems. I started reaching out to the folks in my [...]

Collaboration “in the Wild”: Some Observations

By Jim MacLennan ⋅ November 15, 2009 ⋅ Post a comment

An Enterprise 2.0 dream scenario: implementing a complex project across multiple sites, in two different time zones, with a large team (well over 100). The team was reasonably savvy with collaboration tools; core team members were quite comfortable with Instant Messaging, and we have been relying on SharePoint for many months. A centralized, coordinated document [...]

Who owns Master Data in your company?

By Jim MacLennan ⋅ May 30, 2009 ⋅ One comment

I’ve had to respond to this question, inside and outside of the company, in a number of different conversations over the past few days. It’s interesting, because this is one of those conversations where semantics mean a lot – what people say is just as important as what people don’t say. I only mean that [...]

Notes from SAPPHIRE 09

By Jim MacLennan ⋅ May 16, 2009 ⋅ Post a comment

Yesterday at work was “catch-up day” from a week at SAPPHIRE 2009, the annual user conference for SAP. As with the JDA/Manugistics conference earlier this year, there were concerns that attendance was going to be low, because so many companies are limiting travel expense. At the conference, I did hear that attendance was only was [...]

Another Take on Enterprise Open Source

By Jim MacLennan ⋅ February 18, 2009 ⋅ Post a comment

Today’s best conversation was with Christopher Young, of B2BSX, a startup software exchange where corporate IT departments can buy and sell their development efforts, and make a little cash to offset stressed budgets. It’s an interesting idea, and spawned some ideas in a couple of different directions. Andy Hardy, IT Director Every company I’ve worked [...]

I Think I’m Learning SAPanese …

By Jim MacLennan ⋅ November 23, 2008 ⋅ One comment

Spent time at an industry conference last week (ain’t Boston great!), and heard the term SAPanese – that special language SAP users learn when immersed in worlds of Walldorf and their ubiquitous software. It’s not unique to SAP – lots of software companies develop their own vocabulary. Heck, IT “geeks” are famous for it – [...]

Politically Correct Euphemisms in IT – Translated!

By Jim MacLennan ⋅ May 26, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment

I recently attended a professional seminar, and noticed a propensity for politically correct euphemisms to describe life in corporate IT. This was a typical group of IT professionals, representing a variety of companies – small and large, public and private. As with most group meetings, we started with a trip around the table; quick introductions, [...]

Optimizing the Wrong Part of Knowledge Management

By Jim MacLennan ⋅ March 16, 2008 ⋅ Post a comment

I sat in on the report-out session from a kaizen event this week, and something occurred to me as I reviewed a ton of interesting findings in a very short time … Best Practice Self-contained deliverables are the most powerful tools for knowledge knowledge transfer you can have in your organization. I’m talking about a [...]

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