Apple Bust...

So I'm sure that many of you saw that Apple was going to announce a world changing something on Tuesday. Apple has released so many innovative products over the last few years, and with every technology company chasing Apple, I had high hopes. So I was very disappointed to see that there big world changing announcement was that The Beatles CD's were now available in iTunes. Seriously? Apple changed the home page of their website to announce The Beatles. I could care less that they are now available in iTunes. Besides, anyone that listens to The Beatles has already purchased the CD's and imported them into iTunes. This was a huge bust and whoever hyped that event should be fired! There was nothing groundbreaking or world changing, as the website said it would be, about this announcement.

Planning vs Luck

I think the two cases today showed us two very different views on how to implement ERP. On the one hand Harley Davidson planned extensively and failed, while Cisco didn't plan at all and was very successful. I think it's not just about luck and planning, the important thing is the ability to adjust quickly on your feet. Cisco did not plan well, but through quick thinking and teamwork they were able to work through their ERP issues and get a successful system up and running. Nothing ever goes "as planned", so problem solving and quick thinking are probably the most necessary attributes to ERP.

Outsourcing Panel: Expectations

Today in the panel a key point of discussion was expectations. One speaker discussed how vendors and suppliers expect different things. The software developers from this company were located in Chile and they were trying to prove themselves. This caused a problem because since the software development was outsourced so the managers were not able to clearly define the work environment and their governance plan to the vendors. This poses an interesting problem because you need to have a defined plan in place so that you can get what you expect from outsourcing.