Facing "big Brother":

This paper discusses the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) rage. ERP represents immense investments for companies around the globe and has been promoted as a management panacea. Not surprisingly, many implementations fail to match such expectations. In this study, we: (i) propose a broader perspective to comprehend the substantive, institutional, and political factors involved in the ERP phenomenon, as an alternative to the techno-reductionism that has characterized the prevailing approach on the subject; (ii) present an exploratory survey of 28 implementation experiences, concentrating on the process of adoption, chosen implementation approaches and outcome assessment; and (iii) pose two major dilemmas consultants should address when assisting their clients through an ERP implementation.