Thomas H. Davenport
Jeanne G. Harris
Susan Cantrell
October 14, 2002
In the mid to late 1990s, most large corporations undertook one of the most ambitious information systems projects in their histories: the implementation of packaged enterprise solutions. Big business benefits were promised to follow, including more accurate business planning and the ability to serve customers better, cheaper and faster.
Despite the millions of dollars and copious amount of organizational attention devoted to enterprise solutions, a clear majority of organizations Accenture recently surveyed have achieved half or less of the benefits they had targeted. Like a film director returning to rework a movie so that it reflects his original creative vision—often called a "director's cut"—these organizations are once again turning their attention to enterprise solutions to ensure that they achieve the vision—and the value—of what these systems were meant to be.
Drawing on statistical analysis applied to data collected from 163 organizations with enterprise solutions, this report reveals just which actions lead to value realization from enterprise solutions. For organizations seeking to capture the original promise of enterprise solutions, they must:
- Integrate: unify and harmonize enterprise solutions, data and processes with an organization's unique existing environment, and use the systems to better connect organizational units and processes, as well as customers and suppliers.
- Optimize: standardize most processes using best practices embodied in enterprise solutions software, mold and shape processes to fit the unique or strategic needs of the business, and ensure that processes flow and fit with the systems themselves.
- Informate: to employ a term coined by Shoshana Zuboff in her path breaking book In the Age of the Smart Machine, organizations "informate" when they use information to transform work.
In the context of enterprise solutions, organizations informate by transforming enterprise solutions data into context-rich information and knowlege that supports the unique business analysis and decision-making needs of multiple work forces.
The report concludes with pragmatic recommendations for those organizations seeking to leverage one of their most underutilized assets.
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