The alignment of the information technology’s Enterprise Resource Planning rollout strategy with the business strategy in a semi-governmental organisation

Abstract

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems are highly intricate Information Systems (IS). The im-plementation of this type of integrated system is difficult and high in cost. It places immense strain on time and resources. Many ERP implementations have been classified as failures because they did not accomplish anticipated goals. This contribution first outlines one ERP in South Africa, its characteristics and architecture, and thereafter discusses the business rationale for ERP, ERP software selection steps and SAP as software. The research highlights the migration obstacles to preclude for a successful implementation and places special emphasis on the need for Governmental strategic alignment to increase the success probability of an ERP implementation. The National Service (NBS) of South Africa, a semi-governmental organisation, was selected as the research subject. The organisation’s alignment of its IT ERP rollout strategy and the business strategy in addition to specific aspects of its policies that could cause implementation failure were reviewed. The research instrument, a questionnaire, was distributed to all employees that took part in, or were affected by the organisation’s ERP implementation. Based on an analysis of the results it was concluded that the implementation project was only successful from a technical perspective. Project failure occurred in human aspects of ERP implementation such as change management and adequate management support. The concurrent restructuring process at the organisation also negatively affected the project. Ultimately, the research results indicate that overall the IT and business strategies of the NBS could be characterised as being aligned, but it is suggested that the research needs to be repeated over a longer period to determine the full degree of alignment as the present research was only conducted over a short period.