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Enterprise Systems are comprehensive and complex applications that form the core business operating system for many companies worldwide and throughout most industries. The selection, implementation, use and continuous change of Enterprise Systems (ES) (e.g. mySAP.com) require a great amount of knowledge and experience. Due to the lack of in‐house ES knowledge and the high costs of engaging experienced implementation consultants, organizations realize the need to better leverage their knowledge resources. Managing this knowledge is increasingly important with the second wave of ES projects focusing E‐Business applications like Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Supply Chain Management (SCM). These new applications embrace an open‐integration strategy that will incorporate and support other vendors’ applications as part of its Internet‐based enterprise computing platform. This paper proposes a framework for managing knowledge in Enterprise Systems. The framework draws its strength from meta‐case studies and comprehensive literature analyses, which is consolidated into a three‐dimensional framework. The preliminary results show that the importance of value‐adding activities and innovation are elemental to knowledge management in the aspect of ES.

Enterprise systems are commonly implemented by firms through outsourcing arrangements with software vendors. However, deriving benefits from these implementations has proved to be a challenge, and a great deal of variation has been observed in the extent of value generated for client and vendor firms. This research examines the role of co-specialization as a strategy to make the most out of outsourced enterprise systems. The authors develop hypotheses relating resource co-specialization with two indicators of success for implementation of enterprise software: (1) exchange success and (2) firm growth.

The hypotheses are tested using a unique panel data set of 175 firms adopting Advanced Planning and Scheduling (APS) software, a type of enterprise system used for managing manufacturing and logistics. The authors identify organizational factors that support co-specialization and then examine how co-specialization is associated with enterprise software implementation success, controlling for the endogenous choice to co-specialize.

The empirical results suggest that resource co-specialization is positively associated with implementation success and that the two resource co-specialization pathways that are examined complement each other in providing performance benefits.

This paper contributes to the research literature on outsourcing. The study also provides a new empirical test using a unique data set of 175 firms adopting APS Software.

The purpose of this paper is to understand the nature of the difficulties experienced during enterprise system (ES) adoption. More specifically, this paper aims to investigate interrelations between these difficulties and therefore identify the source difficulties that cause other problems.

The research methodology is based on grounded theory approach and draws from the experience of a few dozen ES adopters. Interviews with ES practitioners are conducted and open coding procedure is applied during the process of data gathering. Next, axial coding is used to verify problem categories and subcategories. Finally, causal mapping analysis is performed in order to reveal interrelations among difficulties and elicit source problems.

The results suggest causal relationship among various problem categories and reveal seven source difficulties in ES implementation: knowledge of employees holding various positions in the adopter organisations' hierarchy, changes in the enterprise occurring during ES adoption, finance, enterprise structure, information technology (IT) infrastructure, data import and legacy systems, and training schedule.

The need for further research in order to incorporate multiple stakeholder view, project phase, and success measure.

The results may help practitioners in reaching the problems' source and thus facilitate overcoming the actual problems rather than ineffectively struggling with their symptoms. As a result, practitioners may better anticipate possible problems and assess potential threats to their projects.

This study gives insight into the actual problems experienced by ES adopters. It also identifies the real problems encountered during ES implementation as well as the other problems that occur as a result of these source difficulties.

As the dynamics of the external environment of the enterprise continue to increase, the support of information systems for organizational agility becomes increasingly important. Collaborative Management System (CMS) is a new type of information system that can cope with the dynamic changes of the organization. Effective knowledge transfer is the core of the system implementation. The purpose of this study is to explore the knowledge transfer barriers faced by CMS in its implementation process.

Through field interviews with a representative CMS provider, this paper summarizes the barriers of knowledge transfer during CMS implementation into three aspects.

Based on the innovative measures taken by the company and relevant literature, the corresponding mitigating strategies are proposed.

The findings enrich the implementation methodology of agile information systems by exploring the knowledge transfer problem from a novel context. The study also provides a reference for practical implementation to overcome the dilemma of knowledge transfer.

This paper sets out to examine the conditions of enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementations on the basis of research conducted among practitioners dealing with ERP projects.

This paper builds on the research conducted among a few dozen practitioners dealing with ERP projects. The queried respondents include both ERP adopters and experts representing system suppliers. The study discusses how the researched projects were linked with enterprise strategy, how their efficiency was measured and to what extent they defined implementation goals. The analysis takes into consideration various types of projects and success levels achieved.

The results show that adopters experience different conditions depending on the project type. The findings suggest that practitioners should be more focused on the business benefits. The outcome shows that implementers from very complicated projects are more aware of the overwhelming challenge at large, while, on the other hand, the relatively simpler projects seem to be underestimated.

This study suggests that ERP researchers should take into account the particular type of project being studied. Further research can develop a methodology by which implementation projects can be evaluated. This methodology could cover a broader range of conditions.

Illustrating the conditions of real ERP projects, this study gives insight into the actual problems experienced by the ERP adopters. Drawing on these results, the practitioners may better anticipate possible problems and assess potential threats in their projects.

This paper investigates the conditions that surround the different projects and how they relate to successful performance. These findings will then in turn shed light on the mechanisms that determine the results of ERP.

The purpose of this paper is to consider the question of what is an appropriate enterprise resource planning (ERP) reference model for specifying areas of change in the context of IT-driven ERP implementation and through the model matching. There are other implicit goals to increasing the awareness of the reference models, as this highlights the principles embedded in ERP systems and explains the classification of reference models, which is useful in terms of the reuse of knowledge.

In this paper, a comparison between ERP reference models is conducted using a suitable decision-making technique and the final results are discussed. The comparison depends on nine criteria related to conceptual ERP reference models: scope, abstraction, granularity, views, purpose, simplicity, availability, ease of use for model matching, and target audience.

This study concludes that the business process reference model is best for specifying areas of change in the context of IT-driven ERP implementations. The final ranking of the alternatives based on all criteria places the system organizational model second, followed by the function and data/object reference models, in that order.

This paper is one of very few studies on the selection of appropriate ERP reference models according to the ERP implementation approach and model matching factors. This research also provides an in-depth analysis of various ERP reference model types.

The main purpose of this paper is to discuss whether an enterprise system (ES) is a part of an organization's administrative paradox. The paper aims to question which role the ES has in organizing, focusing aspects of flexibility and stability.

The paper is a qualitative, longitudinal, case study of how an ES maintains, and even reinforces, existing administrative organizational structures. The theoretical lens used is mainly structuration theory.

An ES can take the part of an organization's administrative paradox. An administrative paradox is two sides of the same coin when coordinating organizations – the concurrent striving for flexibility and stability. The studied ES even centralizes control, creates norms, and enhances power for actors in positions of authority (top management). Because of its structure and configuration the ES is a powerful tool to coordinate. The ES is considered to be organizationally ungainly, but at the same time indispensable.

The paper provides valuable insights on how the studied organizations try to deal with standardization/stability and flexibility that can be valuable for other system users or implementers to learn from, as well as the analysis as a whole.

The paper combines structuration theory and theories covering the administrative paradox and aspects of coordination in order to analyze and discuss the implementation and use of an ES.

Enterprise resource planning (ERP), a technological approach for enterprise information systems, has many recorded case examples of lengthy and expensive implementations reported in literature. This research has uncovered an alternative process‐driven and document‐based approach that may offer a simpler and more flexible solution compared with technology‐driven ERP. This paper investigates the differences and similarities of the two approaches, and also answers a related question: Is the enterprise system implementation an information systems effort performed to support the business processes, or is it a process re‐engineering effort required to implement the pre‐packaged software system?

To investigate the advantages and disadvantages of the two approaches to an enterprise information system, this research developed a unified modeling language (UML) process model of a manufactured housing company and used it as a basis for a conceptual level UML model for both an ERP‐ and a document‐based system.

In a designed experiment with UML‐fluent analysts, the process‐driven document solution to an enterprise information system was shown to be smaller, less complex and more flexible than an ERP solution at the conceptual design level.

Software specifications for the resulting document‐based system included only standard COTS software packages easily usable in companies of any size. Further, the potential for prototype as‐you‐go development offers opportunities for continuous refinement of the system in contrast with the episodic implementation of packaged ERP systems.

This alternative system highlights the desirability, for both academicians and practitioners, of concentrating on processes and then implementing the most suitable technology, rather than allowing the technology to impose constraints on processes.

Despite more than two decades of experience regarding the adoption and implementation of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems in organizations, ERPs success is questionable. Though ERPs success stories are published in past research studies, the failure rate of ERP systems is relatively high. The purpose of this study was to find issues and challenges and assess the degree of criticality of these issues/challenges faced by organizations during ERP implementation.

For doing systematic review/research synthesis systematic literature review (SLR) was carried out considering research studies published within the time period, i.e. 1999-2018. Three major steps such as planning, conducting and reporting were followed to proceed further in this study. This study attempted to accomplish a critical review of 53 studies out of 103 studies identified, which were published in reputable journals to synthesize the existing literature in the ERP domain. The studies selected have almost addressed different challenges/issues faced by small and large organizations during ERP implementation.

Research synthesis/SLR led to the identification of 31 issues/challenges, which may be termed as most critical based on their occurrence/frequency in past studies included. The topmost ten issues/challenges amongst 31 identified include top management approach, change management, training and development, effective communication, system integration, business process reengineering, consultants/vendors selection, project management, project team formation, team empowerment/skilled people and data conversing/migration. However, other issues/challenges identified such as security risks/data security, cloud awareness, functionality limitations, service level agreements and subscription expenses are more related to cloud ERPs.

The current study is unique in its kind, focusing on the issues and challenges faced by organization during implementing ERP projects. Moreover, this study contributes to understanding and further analyzing management capabilities for developing remedial measures while planning the implementation of an enterprise system in their organizations prior to the occurrence of different issues and challenges ahead. The study also led to understanding and explaining socio-technical issues and their severity.

This study aims to examine organizational factors (i.e. top management support, training and education, enterprise‐wide communication) that may influence the enterprise resource planning system implementation success in Iran.

Empirical data were collected via a survey questionnaire. The questionnaires were distributed to selected managers of companies adopting ERP systems in Iran.

The results indicate that the companies' top management must provide full support and commitment to the project if the system is to be successful. In addition, management must also ensure the plans are communicated and understood by the entire company. Finally it is also illustrated that adequate training and education pertaining to the systems must be given to all users to ensure that they are able to use the system effectively and efficiently thus contributing to their satisfaction which will subsequently influence the implementation success.

The ERP implementation success dimensions were measured using subjective and perceptual measures. This was due to the difficulty in securing the related factual data from the participating organizations.

The findings may help companies planning to implement an ERP system to strategise their efforts and process to ensure successful implementation.

This study examines how organizational factors, namely top management support, training and education as well as enterprise wide communication among ERP users, affect ERP implementation success in Iran.