User Review
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As organizations remodel processes to meet the needs of users in every location, role and function, Unit4 CEO Mike Ettling asks, is your enterprise tech right for your people?
New ERP- As the CEO of an enterprise software company, this year has taught me that we have a much greater responsibility and obligation than simply selling products to customers. I would go as far as agreeing with Josh Greenbaum’s long-held view that a ‘culture of mediocrity’ has crept into the enterprise software market in terms of how products and platforms are designed, delivered and supported.
That is why we have invested so heavily in modernizing our architecture and I believe it puts us in a good place to meet the challenge laid down by long-standing industry experts such as diginomica’s Dennis Howlett, to prove the value that enterprise software offers customers. We must enable businesses to succeed and become more resilient to these ‘Black Swan’ events like the COVID-19 pandemic or recessions like the one in 2008.
I am an eternal optimist. We live in a new reality where the assumptions we made about the world, prior to March 2020, have been challenged. What is clear though, is that we have an opportunity to rethink and deliver better outcomes for our organizations, our people, and the communities we serve.
In speaking to our customers, they are sharing that they need to focus on building agile, empowered teams, and enabling fast decision making. This is also something that has stood out in our recently published study, Digital Enterprise Strategies for People-Led Transformation. When asked about the drivers for current enterprise apps strategies, the ability to innovate faster was the top priority for global decision makers and 84% said the pandemic had accelerated their enterprise applications strategies. Organizational redesign is on the table with managers gaining a better understanding of how people want to work and designing processes and technology with a new mindset.
The big shift
At our recent customer conference, Experience4U, we heard from a number of experts and customers on how proactive organizations are taking this time to remodel their organizations around people.
Unit4 customer, Forest Research, is harnessing the benefits of this approach. Finance Director, Meiron Nelson, talked about how COVID-19 has been a catalyst for moving from a largely manual process-based organization to one that is fully digitized and accessible to all team members. With much improved financial control, Meiron talks passionately about the impact of going digital on the employee experience and culture. He describes the move to a single integrated cloud platform as a “significant step forward” with people accessing data and completing tasks at a rapid pace regardless of location, including from forests.
The global pandemic has forever changed the culture of human interaction. Fosway Group’s Director of Research David Perring believes the future has arrived early. People want to work for organizations with a shared purpose, that build a culture of trust. This has to be supported by frictionless experiences, digital HR innovation and an agile and adaptive workforce. Digital innovation and mobility are key; the talent agenda has changed forever.
