Managing knowledge in enterprise systems
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/13287260180000765 |
| Published date | 01 December 2001 |
| Date | 01 December 2001 |
| Pages | 37-54 |
| Author | Roy Chan,Michael Rosemann |
| Subject Matter | Information & knowledge management |
Journal of Systems & Information Technology 5(2)
37
MANAGING KNOWLEDGE IN ENTERPRISE SYSTEMS
Roy Chan
Michael Rosemann
Information Systems Management Research Center
Queensland University of Technology
Brisbane, Australia//-2+-
{ rw.chan|m.rosemann }@qut.edu.au
ABSTRACT
Enterprise Systems are com prehensive and complex applications
that form the core business opera ting system for many companies worldwide
and throughout most industries. The selection, implementatio n, use and
continuous change of Enterprise Systems (ES) (e.g. my SAP.com) require a
great amount of knowledge and experience. Due to the lack of in-house ES
knowledge and the high costs of engaging expe rienced implementation
consultants, organizations realize the need to better leverage their
knowledge resources. Managing this knowledge is increasingly imp ortant
with the second wave of ES projects focusing E-Business applications like
Customer Relationship Manag ement (CRM) and Supply Chain Management
(SCM). These new applications embrace an op en-integration strategy that
will incorporate and support other vend ors' applications as part of its
Internet-based enterprise computing platform. This paper pro poses a
framework for managing kno wledge in Enterprise Systems. The framework
draws its strength from meta-ca se studies and comprehensive literature
analyses, which is con solidated into a three-dimensional framework. The
preliminary results show that the imp ortance of value-adding activities and
innovation are elemental to knowledge management in the aspect of ES.
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF ENTERPRISE SYSTEMS
Enterprise Systems (ES) ( synonyms are Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP),
Enterprise-wide Systems and Enterprise Application Systems) can be defined as
customizable, standard application software which includes integrated business
solutions for the core pro cesses (e.g. production planning and control, warehouse
management) and the main administrative functions (e. g. accounting, human resource
management) of an enterprise (Rosemann 1999). In order to configure and use ES
efficiently, components like implementation tools (procedural models, reference
information models, customizing guidelines, project management software), workflow
functionality, tools for the development of add -on modules and system administration,
and office suites are usually embedded.
Journal of Systems & Information Technology 5(2)
38
The new economy is now heavily focused on the use of Internet to conduct
businesses. To date, ES vendors, as well as consulting services, have extended their
services to applications such a s Supp ly Chain Management (SCM), Customer
Relationship Management (CRM), and other e-Business solutions.
Currently, the main ES vendors are SAP, J. D. Edwards, Oracle and PeopleSoft.
The Gartner Group (Gartner Group 1999) forecasts that the ES market will be greater
than $ 20 billion by 2002 (with a probability of 80 %). More than 50 % of this will be
ES service revenue, while the total ES license revenue will cover approx. $ 9 billion.
They estimate that more than 90 percent of Fortune 500 enterprises have purchased a
module or a set of modules from an ES vendor. 50 percent have made a co mmitment to
one vendor, while only less than 20 percent went actually live. They also estimate that
the SME market is the main customer group as more than 50 % of these enterprises still
haven't selected a next-generation ES. For 2000 (2001, 2002) the Gartner Group
anticipates a market growth of 22 % (25 %, 28 %). All these figures show that ES-
initiatives are among the biggest investments enterprises are currently conducting.
THE NEED TO MANAGE KNOWLEDGE RESOURCES
Implementing comprehensive IT app lications like Enterprise Systems is a
knowledge-intensive task. As such, it requires a great amount of experience from a wide
range of peop le such as representatives from business departments, technical specialists
from the IT department and project managers within the organization to external
business and implementation consultants. Organizations implementing Enterprise
Systems rec ognize this and find that Knowledge Management is strategically
advantageous as it seeks to deal with the p roblem of leveraging knowledge resources in
an organization. There is strong motivation for better leveraging ES implementation
knowledge and making this knowledge available to those involved in the ongoing
management of the system. "Having made costly errors by disregarding the importance
of knowledge, many firms are now struggling to gain a better understanding of what
they know, what they need to know, and what to do about it" (Davenport 1998).
While most existing ES liter ature have focused on the types of knowledge,
methodologies and critical success factors required for the implementation of ES
software (Bancroft 1996, Clemons 1999 , Kirchmer 1999, Mahrer 1999, Scott 1999,
Slooten, Yap 1999, Sumner 1999), it is noticed that they have not taken aspects of
knowledge management into account. Knowledge resources can be better managed by
having the transparency about what knowledge is required a t which point in time during
the implementation phase and where the knowledge resides. With this knowledge at
hand, managers and implementation consultants can more effectively select, implement,
use and upgrade the system. Furthermore, the ES vendors co uld provide a better
guidance throughout the implementation pro cess. This paper demonstrates how this flux
of different kinds of knowledge can be structured to gain a p ositive influence over the
entire success of the project.
TYPES OF KNOWLEDGE REQUIRED FOR THE MANAGEMENT OF
ENTERPRISE SYSTEMS
Managing an Enterprise System requires a wide range of knowledge. In order to
develop with a list o f the required areas of knowledge for the ES management, an
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