Enterprises who need to stay ahead in a technology-driven market require organizing, automating, and optimizing their core business processes. As these businesses continue to evolve through the aid of technology, the role of finance is evolving too. This is primarily due to the increased spending in IT that reached 3.7 trillion in 2018 and is expected to grow even further into the foreseeable future.
If we look at trends, it is evident that businesses need to adopt the right technology solutions. Solutions that make it easy to standardize operations, provide visibility, and deliver valuable insights to monitor the business pulse and proactively react to the changes. This necessarily involves making the most out of the enormous data that is generated in finance and operations functions. An ERP system is meant to do that and is in place for most of the global organizations. However, are they efficient? Do these systems promise a profitable business future?
Issues with Old ERP
ERP systems have been around for decades. They are essential for the smooth functioning of business, integrating critical business processes such as finance, supply chain, operations, reporting, manufacturing, and human resource activities. While most companies have some form of operational ERP system in place, most of these systems are disjointed, working separately to manage each business function. This prevents seamless data flow between departments.
Besides, with an on-premise, legacy ERP system, employees may rely on manual record-keeping and duplicative processes. It is likely then that the same information will be stored in different formats across multiple departments. This extends the inefficiencies further and increases the chances of costly mistakes.
This silo-ed approach worked well for companies in the past, but with evolving business needs and shifts in consumer demands, most legacy ERP systems fail to integrate critical business functions and promise future business growth. In a data-driven world, these systems restrict companies from drawing intelligent insights into their finance and operations functions.
What you need to do
With changing market dynamics, the need of the hour for businesses to stay competitive is to bring intelligence into their existing business processes. The traditional, disjointed ERP systems are likely to remain ineffective in keeping organizations at the forefront of innovation and remain profitable.
Moving to a cloud-hosted ERP solution such as Dynamics 365 has additional benefits. Unlike on-premise systems, cloud-based ERP systems reduce the burden on IT and bring down the total cost of ownership. Besides, accessing the ERP system is easy, as employees can connect to the system from anywhere, on any device. All they need is an internet connection. The ability to access information from anywhere fits perfectly in today’s modern workplaces where work usually happens on-the-go and through remote employees.
Cloud solutions also have built-in security features to safeguard sensitive business information.
However, what sets apart a cloud-hosted ERP from the legacy systems is the access to modern tools such as AI, machine learning, and Business Intelligence that help organizations in capturing, interpreting, and acting on the available data from various business processes.
With limited functionalities and broken data flow, remaining efficient in achieving the business bottom line seems impossible with legacy ERP systems. To succeed, organizations must adopt the right tools and migrate to a modern ERP system that promises future growth. A system that is capable to bring intelligence in existing business processes and provide actionable insights to drive better results.
