Case study - Selecting multiple systems

Client Situation

Medium sized organization seeking to replace all back office and front office systems. CFO given responsibility for the project, the financial manager was the project leader. Neither had experience
in system selection or implementation projects before.

 Background

The back office systems had a wide variety of requirements, from collecting and reporting on complex trading information to accounting for a variety of assets. The company also had other more traditional type businesses to support.

 Key challenges included:

• managing foreign exchange
• consolidating numerous entities
• bank reconciliation of numerous accounts
• high staff turnover due to the manual systems and processes, which were in place
• The front office systems were outdated and could no longer manage the increasing complexity of the business. Key issues were the limited reporting capability and the need for accurate reconciliations daily. This was taking up a lot of manual time and effort.

 Challenges facing the client:

The client had to work through the following challenges:

• Either purchasing a single system, separate front and back office systems of a back office system with best of breed front end solutions
• Minimizing additional resources required to manage the new system
• Integration, as well as the type of integration between the new systems
• How to assess core functional requirements, prioritize these and trade them off against return on investment (ROI)
• Manage ongoing costs.

Key outcomes:

• Uitlized the system selection online selection methodology
• Revisited the business case to confirm benefits and ROI
• Revisited business requirements and developed these in more detail
• Simplified the request for proposal process
• Focussed on negotiation strategy for the final solution

Result

• Single system selected and implemented in the timeframe agreed;
• Final solution cost saving of 43%;
• Avoided potential resource issues, which would have delayed the project.