Why Erp? a Primer on SAP Implementation

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I am a Professor in the Management Information Systems area and I use this book as a quick and relatively painless introduction for students who know absolutely nothing about the software that supports Integrated Business Systems. It is an excellent read for that purpose. It focuses on why Enterprise Systems are valuable for some companies, the dangers of blind adoption, the value and power of systems integration, and some of the costs associated with implementing these systems. Just as important, it does this in an interesting way. At least more interesting to my students, who are either dual majors in business administration and information systems or straight majors in some area of business administration. While the other reviewers are correct in their blistering reviews of the book from a technologist's perspective, the book is not written for technologists. As the title suggests, it is a primer and primers are written at the most elementary level. I have not come across a better book for someone with no knowledge of Integrated Business Systems to learn quickly in 119 pages what Enterprise Systems are about.

This actually is a good read. It kept my interest for a full 2 hours, which is what is took to read it. The case study is real and on the mark. It illustrates that even if SAP is being widely adopted in your industry (in this case furniture), it may not be the right solution for you. In this instance, SAP (or the SAP implementation approach) was wrong because the company, whose business model was "make to order", tried to cut time and costs by directly implementing a configuration which worked well for a company that has a very limited (few part numbers with minimal change) product line.The author also did a realistic job in presenting the politics of the situation. The company president wanted an easy integration under a tight deadline. The IT geek wasn't interested in the business model and wanted a showcase quick installation. The marketing guy wasn't interested in the details and wanted to showcase the installation. The book's hero is a healthy skeptic, who is trying to understand ERP, its benefits, and how it fit his company's business.Based the book's title, I thought I was picking up another SAP marketing book. But it is not that at all. It's objective and deals with business issues. No ABAP, idocs, and organization elements here.

What steps an organization needs to consider and take before moving into an ERP environment is given so simply in this book. Jacobs and Whybark present the facts in such a way that anyone in an organization understands that ERP is not a magical cure for their ills. Yes, this book is written very much like "The Goal," yet one knows this from the start. Where is it written that such a book must be full of theories, processes and analogies that makes it boring and undigestable. I applaud Jacobs and Whybark for giving the business world an easy to understand and follow guideline for ERP.

This book is presented as the ERP version of "The Goal", and it is true that it takes the form of a novel. However, it is not clear that the weakly developed fictional elements add or detract from the message. The case study, however, is useful, and overall this is a palatable way to get an introduction to the implementation of Enterprise Resource Planning. Like most writing on ERP, it focuses on one software product, in this case, SAP R/3. However, it is not a disguised advertisement and should be useful for managers contemplating adopting any such system in their companies.