Abstract
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system, by providing firmwide integration, has become very popular solutions for coordinating activities and decisions that span multiple functions. The implementation and management of ERP systems has become a key management issue. Some of the major benefits claimed for ERP are more uniform organizational structure, unified technology platform, and efficient operations and customer-driven business processes. Companies might use an ERP system to integrate the corporation across geographic or business unit boundaries or to create a more identical organizational culture in which everyone uses similar processes and information. A unified and information system platform and environment is facilitated by creating a single, integrated repository that gathers data on all the key business processes. By integrating separate business processes such as sales, production, finance, and logistics, the entire organization can efficiently respond to customer demands. While these benefits do appear very attractive to adopting organizations, there has not been much empirical research to validate these claims. It has also been reported that many organizations have problems implementing ERP systems, or fail to achieve a higher level of process integration. Although previous studies have looked into the issues like CSF (Critical Success Factors) of ERP implementation, a systemwide framework to access ERP implementation and benefits are still missing. Based on balanced score card methodology, this study proposed such a model for ERP evaluation. Four organizations were chosen as the targeted cases for model validation. Each case has adopted the ERP systems and regarded it as the major IS system of the company. The results of the study reveal the following issues need to be explored further. 1. The lower customerization in ERP adoption results in higher success rate. 2. The adoption of reputable ERP system results in lower risk. 3. The stage strategy in ERP adoption results in higher success rate. 4. A formal (or functional) organization team is a more proper organization structure for ERP implementation than an ad hoc team.