Agile Software Engineering Practices and ERP: Is a Sprint too Fast for ERP Implementation

The Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) implementation is a complex and active process, one that involves a mixture of technological and organizational interactions. Often it is the largest IT project that an organization has ever launched and requires a mutual fit of system and organization. Concept of an ERP implementation supporting business processes across different departments in organization is not a generic, rigid and uniform process it is a vivid one and depends on number of different factors. As a result, the issues addressing the ERP implementation process have been one of the major concerns in industry. Therefore, ERP implementation process receives profound attention from practitioners and scholars in its academic or industry papers. However, research on ERP systems so far has been mainly focused on diffusion, use and impact issues. Less attention has been given to the methods/methodologies used during the configuration and the implementation of ERP systems; even though they are commonly used in practice, they still remain largely unexplored and undocumented in Information Systems research domain. Furthermore, research on Agile Software Engineering Practices in ERP Implementations context is almost nonexistent. Many IT specialists find agile management frameworks positive, but ask themselves whether these can also cope with the complex adjustments of ERP systems. The answer is quite simple: agile management frameworks, in particular Scrum, were developed for the exact purpose of enabling successful execution of large and complex projects. Depending on the size of the company, an ERP project including preparation can take over a year – or it can become a long-runner that eats up resources. One reason for this: if projects are handled in line with traditional procedural models, lengthy integration and acceptance tests are not carried out until the end. So, at the end of the development the detected errors and change requests pile up and delivery is delayed. This study is a response to the frequent calls for industrial case studies on agile software development (Dingsøyr et al. 2012; Dybå and Dingsøyr 2008). This paper is useful to researchers who are interested in ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks. Paper also aims at the professional ERP community involved in the process of ERP implementation by promoting a better understanding of ERP implementation methodologies and frameworks, its variety and future development.