We believe it's never too early to start considering your ideal business processes. The value of mapping future state or to-be processes before selecting a new system is worth the effort. Here's why:
1. It presents a real opportunity to identify simpler, more streamlined ways of running, irrespective of systems and technology. Businesses often identify easy opportunities to eliminate hand-offs, reduce unnecessary variation across sites or divisions, and save wasted time.
2. It provides a logical starting point to derive business requirements for your new ERP system. By mapping your to-be processes you will identify equipped needs, complexities and constraints that the system simply must support. Your process maps and business requirements will then become the foundations for subsequent solution design, development, and testing.
3. It kicks off the change conversation and builds critical buy-in as early as possible, by focusing your people on their vision for the future and the impacts of change. This early engagement helps to develop knowledge, understanding, and readiness for the project ahead.
ERP software vendors frequently offer out-of-the-box support for best-practice processes to accelerate project delivery for their customers. By carrying out to-be process mapping before bringing them on board, you'll be better placed to judge where their standard processes will work to your plus, and where additional relationship or workflow may be required to support your business differentiators.