How to select an ERP project using the star method?

How can the personnel manager communicate with the interviewer in a short time to determine whether the interviewer is suitable for the company? This has always been a headache for the personnel manager. To this end, the personnel management experts proposed to use the star method for interviews. This method can reflect the interviewer's personal abilities and psychological qualities to the greatest extent. In terms of Human Resource Management, the use effect is very good, so it is widely used during the interview. In fact, this is not only applicable to human resource management, but also very useful for the selection of information projects.

"Star" is the abbreviation of four English words. "S" refers to situation, which means a scenario or scenario in Chinese. That is to say, when interviewing information management software or information partners, we need to simulate a real enterprise environment to see if the other party can adapt to this environment. "T" indicates the target, which means the target in Chinese. That is to say, it is not enough for an enterprise to simulate an environment. It also needs to set some goals that the enterprise wants to achieve based on the environment. "A" refers to Acton, which means action in Chinese. That is to say, the information management software or partners should adopt the methods and actions to achieve the user's desired goals. "R" indicates result, which means result in Chinese. That is to say, when their solutions are adopted, what results can be achieved and whether the goal can be achieved. If the goal is not achieved, how many gaps are there.

In a word, an enterprise simulates a real management environment, puts forward the goals it wants to achieve, then asks the other party to propose corresponding solutions, and then the enterprise performs an assessment, check whether this method can achieve the expected results.

Not long ago, I used this method to interview several ERP software and partners. The results were very good and I was able to reflect the advantages and disadvantages of ERP software and the strength of my partners.

I. Enterprises first perform self-check, discover problems, and simulate scenarios

Before selecting an ERP project, I did some research on various departments of the company. During the survey, I asked users to do the following.

1. Summarize the problems that occur in management and specify the ins and outs. Financial management personnel often find that the unit price provided by the procurement is inaccurate when they account for the supplier. It is not enough for financial personnel to give the question, but also to give the ins and outs of the problem. After confirming with the buyer, the financial personnel found that the original price changes frequently. First, the new purchase price could not be communicated with the finance personnel in a timely manner, and second, it was possible that before the purchase order was placed, the price may still be negotiated between price leaders and cannot be determined. As a result, the price on the purchase order is inconsistent with the price given by the supplier. You need to confirm the purchase and increase the reconciliation workload.

2. After finding out the problem and cause, the next step is to simulate a scenario that is more in line with the actual situation, just like playing a love drama. I found this specific product first. Then, based on the user's description, simulate the current environment as follows. The purchaser needs to clear 1000 m² of glass of a certain specification after receiving the demand from the material clearing department of the Material Planning Department. However, due to recent fluctuations in raw material prices, we still need to confirm with the supplier when placing the purchase order today. However, it takes a long time for the supplier to confirm the price with the company's Purchasing Manager or even the top management, and it has been working with the supplier for a long time, confirm the purchase price. Each time a purchase order is completed, the buyer will send the original procurement documents to the financial archive. Each month, the finance team accounts with the supplier based on the purchase order, supplier delivery order, and company warehouse receiving order. After verifying the correctness, the supplier will issue the invoice for subsequent work.

During scenario simulation, due to time and energy constraints, we may not be able to simulate them one by one. Therefore, when performing self-check, you must select important issues related to the livelihood of enterprises, rather than focusing on them.

Ii. Set the target

After finding out the problem, I asked the responsible person to propose what target they wanted to achieve. To address the above reconciliation problem, financial management personnel have a simple requirement to minimize errors during reconciliation. When the financial personnel reconciliation, it is generally required that the three tickets (enterprise purchase order, supplier delivery order, and warehouse receiving order) have the same content. If they are inconsistent, the relevant department should open a change order and indicate the relevant reasons. Under normal circumstances, if the three tickets are inconsistent and the responsible person does not take corresponding measures, the finance department has the right to refuse the payment.

When setting goals, you must be aware that the goals must be clear and unambiguous. This is because only clear goals can be referenced in future assessments. If it is an empty target, it is no different from no target.

3. Ask the informatization project partners to provide specific solutions

After the above two steps are completed, the next step is to interview the partner. When interviewing partners, I talked to other people about their software advantages and the strength of their company, instead of asking them to talk about it; and didn't let them demonstrate the ERP system as they wanted. I simply asked them about their company and products and asked them if they had any successful experience in the industry.

I put the problem assignments and the goals the employees wanted to achieve on the desktop and asked them if they could help their employees solve these problems. If they could solve these problems, could they provide a solution, and the actual demonstration in the ERP system.

Through this step, we can get at least the following information.

1. Ability of the implementation consultant. By recreating the operating environment at that time, the problem encountered during normal operations is proposed, and then the implementation consultant is asked to provide a solution on site, and the feasibility of the solution is demonstrated in the system. Through this process, we can have a comprehensive understanding of the level, adaptability, and management experience of this implementation consultant. Experienced and competent consultants will face these problems without changing colors, because he may have encountered these problems in his previous work. However, some consultants who have no practical experience will reveal their original problems. It is because after simple training implementation consultants, it may be okay to let them go through the process step by step from start to end. However, if they leave a link to let them handle it, they may be powerless. This is like carrying back the text. If they are asked to carry back the text from start to end, there may not be much problem; however, if a paragraph is drawn in the middle, the people who are not familiar with the back will, it will be stuck there. The same applies to implementation consultants.

2. Smoothness of the ERP system. The smooth flow of the ERP system is very important for enterprise users. Whether the process runs smoothly is directly related to the user's enthusiasm for operating the ERP system. To test whether ERP operations are smooth is to control some practical management problems. Through the reproduction of the actual scenario, we can roughly assess whether the ERP software meets the needs of the enterprise.

Iv. Assessment Results

The last step is to assess whether the solution provided by the supplier can solve the actual problems of the enterprise. Enterprises always want to use ERP projects to improve enterprise management and solve practical problems used by employees. Therefore, when we listen to the supplier's solutions, we should not listen to the problem; instead, we should pay attention to whether the solution provided by the partner can solve your urgent needs.

In fact, the assessment is relatively difficult and may be more difficult than the above steps. Because there are no assessment indicators or comparison objects. It is too simple and not reasonable to evaluate the Evaluation Based on solving users' problems. Because a problem is often not only a solution, but different solutions have different effects.

Therefore, the key thing is that we need to know more about some solutions. Only in this way can we make a correct assessment. It is also difficult to learn more about some solutions from time to time. As long as we interview several suppliers and read more ERP software, we can learn more about how to solve the problem. In this way, we can make a horizontal comparison between our solutions, it can find management methods that are more suitable for enterprises, which are more efficient in management, more valuable for enterprises, and more acceptable to employees.

Finally, we should also note that, when using the star method for project selection, both partners and software products can finally be reviewed with the parties. For example, if the finance team raises a reconciliation question, but the Purchase Department is also involved, it is recommended that the purchase department and finance department managers should join the CIO in the interview for three review sessions. This is because only the parties are most qualified to evaluate whether the solution provided by the partner is feasible and can achieve the expected results. Both CIOs and project partners cannot make judgments on behalf of the parties.

Using the star method to evaluate partners and software products is a simple and practical method without profound theoretical requirements. CIOs with less management experience, it is easier to get started. When I used this method for the first time, it was still quite stiff and a little hard-working. Now, after three or four applications, I am very skillful, I am a management expert. This method is also a time-tested practice when I recruit people, so that I have found many excellent helpers.