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Case: Cisco Systems, Inc. Implementing Erp, 9-699-022

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Personal Assignment 3

Case Study
Cisco Systems, Inc: Implementing ERP
Case: Cisco Systems, Inc. Implementing ERP, 9-699-022
Reading: Thomas H. Davenport, “Putting the Enterprise into the Enterprise System,” Harvard Business Review (July-August 1998): Reprint 98401
Putting the Enterprise into the Enterprise System by Thomas H. Davenport
Enterprise systems appear to be a dream come true. These commercial software packages promise the seamless integration of all the information flowing through a company—financial and accounting information, human resource information, supply chain information, customer information. For managers who have struggled, at great expense and with great frustration, with incompatible information systems …show more content…

To put it bluntly: if a company’s systems are fragmented, its business is fragmented.
Thomas H. Davenport is a professor at the Boston University School of Management in Boston, Massachusetts. His most recent book, Working Knowledge: How Organizations Manage What They Know, was published in 1997 by the Harvard Business School Press.
Assignment Questions
1. At the end of the case, Pete Solvik has a number of questions. Please think about these questions, and be prepared to give your answer:
What factors had made the difference between success and failure of the Cisco ERP project?
Answer:
1. The company was a startup company and it was easy to perform changes to its current business process
2. The company had huge growth rates as far as the revenues were concerned, so that company was no short of the funds required for the ERP Project.
3. The employees were very enthusiastic to work for the new project as they found it interesting from the otherwise monotonous tasks. So the company could embark upon its intelligent employees for the success of the project.
4. The company enjoyed full support from the top management which was one of the major reasons for the success of the ERP project. The management was 100 % in favor of the project

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