CISCO Systems: Implementing ERP

Group 10
Section C
Abhinav | Aditi | Akshay | Ameya
Faizal | Mohit | Prakhar | Sushant

Q.1- What was the model for IT Management in Cisco prior to January, 1994? What
were the weaknesses of that model
Previously: UNIX based SW package for transaction processing, supported by financial,
manufacturing and

Order entry systems

Shortcomings:

Did not provide required degree of reliability, redundancy and maintenance

Too much of customization

Final straw with previous ES Workaround in system caused corruption of Ciscos

central database company shutdown for two days

Did not support the intensive growth that the company planned to realize over a period
of next few years

Major con of choosing ERP they usually became huge projects eating into company
time and resource

Reasons to choose ERP over individual FITs/MRPs:

Ciscos tradition of standardization

Implementing individual packages would lead to mismatch in time of completion of

adaptation in different

departments

Individual department would request for different budgets which may not agree to
overall plan of company

People want the system to mirror their operation instead of retraining

Q.2- Why did Pete Solvik initially want to avoid an ERP solution?
Solvik had strong opinion about keeping each function independent
Solvik wanted that each function should take its decision regarding the implementation of
the application and timings of its move
Instead of IT organizations reporting to him directly, he emphasized on the point that
budgetary decisions on IT expenditures should be made by the functional areas
He also that apprehensions towards the implementations of megaprojects like ERP
What was done to address the concerns of Solvik and Redfield regarding ERP
projects?

The implementation was done all at once

That is instead of going with phased implementation, it would now be done on parallel
basis
Following this, core ERP team members were placed into five tracks
Each had - a Cisco information system leader,
- a Cisco business leader From KPMG or Oracle
- Business consultant
- IT consultant
- Additional personnel from the business

Q.3- Why do many general / functional managers resist Information Systems such
as ERP? Why wasn't anyone willing to volunteer to lead the ERP project?

It would require a lot of customization

Huge finances and not sure of benefits

They were mega projects. Large scale and involved a lot of risk

The best of the business people were required

Warranted an intensive training programme

Since failure could lead to a lot of losses and could also result in loss of careers for
many

Q.4- What are the advantages and disadvantages of 'big-bang' ERP implementation
approach?
Pros:
Shorter implementation time frame
Redundancy can be avoided Simultaneous use of old and new systems are avoided
Lower cost of implementation
Facilitates better collaboration and integration across all functional areas
Helps to achieve sustainable growth
Immediate redressing of issues
Cons:
Higher element of risk
Higher probability of technical/functional issues
Complexity involved in the deployment and testing
Stress on employees to learn quickly and the timeframe for training is very small
Large task force required for implementation
Higher project expenditure

Q.5- Was Cisco smart or lucky with the ERP implementation project? Why was
there a performance dip after cutting over to the ERP system?

It was a good mix of luck and smart work

They were able put on board a good mix of veteran business people from Cisco and
implementation team from KPMG.
Old system crashed just the day before they went to the board for proposal
Additionally they purchased a promised capability from a hardware vendor rather than
a specific configuration which helped them to reduce their cost and shift the
responsibility of adding additional capacity to the vendor.

Performance dip:
It was highly unstable system and crashed almost once per day
They had tested the system with a partially loaded database. Also, the system was
tested as and when each phase was rolled out instead of testing the whole system in
one go
Also the hardware was found to be incapable of handling the volume of transactions
that Cisco handles on a day-to-day basis