Himanshu Shekhar (G15024)

Navneet Kumar Shukla (G15033)

Niladri Shekhar Dandapat(G15034)
Pallab Paul (G15036)
Umesh Chaudhury (G15057)

Table of Contents
1 Leadership plays a pivotal role in the success of ERP project. Which
leadership best practices did the Keda managers engage in?..............3
2 What are the main challenges faced by Keda in each stage of its ERP
project? What factors contributed to the project success in the face of
these challenges?................................................................................. 4
3 Culture plays an important role in any project implementation. How
were Kedas cultural characteristics leveraged in bring about a project
success................................................................................................ 6

1 Leadership plays a pivotal role in the success of ERP

project. Which leadership best practices did the
Keda managers engage in?

The leadership ensured that needed information for every decision maker
at every step for decision making was provided.
While working out the plan, Keda focused on how much investment was
needed and in what kind of systems, objectives, hindrances that the
company faced, why computerization was needed and what problems
were being targeted to solve.
A decision was made not to build the customized ERP system in-house but
to purchase the technology from a third-party provider as it was not
Kedas core activity and thus would have been expensive and timeconsuming.
Vendor assessment was done comprehensively by visiting existing client
of vendors which in turn made middle and top management more aware
about computerization and ERP and helped in avoiding the mistakes made
by others.
Key roles like key users, consultants and IT officers were identified in the
beginning of implementation itself.
Vital representatives such as departmental managers and essential
operational staff were involved who possessed a comprehensive
understanding of the operations and need of the departments. Thus
everyone was involved which made sure all had clarity on their roles and
responsibilities and nobody would protest the implementation of the new
system later on.
It was made sure that the project team worked as an integrated team.
Support and involvement from senior management during
implementation phase was provided which offered a reward system for
longer working hours.
All challenges and difficulties faced during implementation were reported
promptly.
Key users transferred their knowledge and skills to other users.
Operating manuals were prepared.
System testing and training were conducted in parallel.
Timing was carefully chosen (mostly during lean season) to avoid risk and
manage business disruptions.
During deployment, big-bang implementation was preferred over phased
implementation.

1 What are the main challenges faced by Keda in each

stage of its ERP project? What factors contributed to
the project success in the face of these challenges?
Following are the challenges that surfaced in each stage of the ERP
implementation project and the corresponding success factors to mitigate the
challenges:
1. Selection of ERP as the future solution: After Beijing Riamb ceased
maintenance support for the MRP II solution in 2004, and Keda outgrew the
capabilities of the MRP II system in its expansion. Keda needed a
replacement fast, especially with the rapidly growing production demand.
Although there were multiple IT projects in the planning phase but Keda
decided that the ERP system implementation would be the primary
importance for them to integrate the various departments and improve the
productivity. Once the ERP system is implemented then on top of it other IT
system such as CRM, Supply Chain Management System, and Business
Intelligence etc. could be easily built in future.
2. In-house development / Outsource: Next challenge for Keda was to
decide if they would go for in house development of the system or outsource
the implementation to other software vendor. Keda correctly decided to
outsource the implementation to vendor since the software development
was not the core competency of Keda and it would be too costly for them to
build a IT team for in hose development
3. Vendor Selection: Vendor selection was a major challenge for Keda since
majority of the ERP implementation failed in China. The global vendor might
be more experienced but a local vendor might be more suitable in local
cultural context. Keda evaluated 20 vendors including domestic and global
players. They also visited the existing clients of the vendors for whom they
already did the ERP implementation. Keda understood the practical
implementation challenges from the companies in which ERP was
implemented and then took a informed decision during initial short listing of
the vendors. They also prepared a questionnaire for the vendors and asked
for RFP from the shortlisted vendors. Keda also involved the senior
managers during the vendor selection process to make them accountable
for such a large project. They collaboratively selected SAP as the ERP
solution who had the most flexible and matured product with most
experience in the ERP implementation globally.
4. Team Setup: During the formation of the team Zhu properly mixed the IT
and Key business people from each department. The Key business people
were the pivot point of the projects success considering the complex

workflow Keda had. It would have been impossible for IT only to implement
the workflow. Zhu faced strong opposition from division head to pull key
people out from the department and put into the ERP project but with the
support from the senior management Zhu could able to achieve this. Zhu
also assigned an owner for each module of the ERP system from the
corresponding department of Keda and blocked their time till 5 PM for ERP
project. Although he faced opposition from the department managers but
with the help of senior management Zhu could able to overcome this by
introducing performance bonus and penalties.
5. Modification of Existing Workflows: There were lot of workflows which
could not be implemented as is in the SAP system. Either out of the box
customization needed to be done in the SAP system or the workflows
needed to be tweaked to fit into the SAP standardized framework. Keda took
the right decision to tweak the existing workflow with the help of key
business people rather than modify the SAP standard framework.
6. Data characteristics: Keda kept a large quantity of raw materials and
parts but each had a small stock. This presented a unique challenge in
selecting the right ERP software for Keda. The sheer amount of data was a
big issue in implementation, together with the poor quality of existing data
translated to extra workload in retaking stock and renumbering stock code
so as to ensure data accuracy in the new system.
7. Training cum testing approach: Keda conducted the training program for
its users on the new system and by doing this they achieved the business
user testing in parallel to the training exercise. This reduced the time for
separate testing phase.
8. Deployment Phased or Big Bang: Phased implantation was lesser risky
but time consuming. Big bang approach was risky but time effective. Keda
went for Big bang approach since they had very short time span and they
could not afford duplicate data processing effort in case of phased
implementation.
9. Users resistance: This is perhaps one of the most cited challenges in any
system implementation project. With the drastic changes in many facets of
the business undergoing ERP adoption, it is to be expected that at least
some users will resist this change. This resistance presented itself in Kedas
case at various points of the implementation process. For instance, the
collocation scheme during the implementation was vehemently opposed to.
After rollout, some felt that work became more tedious, and a redistribution
of power brought by ERP made some middle management unhappy, too. But
Keda could overcome the user resistance by removing the people who were
extreme against the new system and brought new people to can mobilize
the workforce to align to the organization strategy.

10.
Production delay: Production delays were also reported immediately
after rollout. Disruptions to business were to be expected since ERP systems
are enterprise-wide effort that involved fundamental changes in the
business operation. To circumvent this problem, rollout time was carefully
chosen to occur in a low season for the company so as to minimize
disruptions to business.

2 Culture plays an important role in any project

implementation. How were Kedas cultural
characteristics leveraged in bring about a project
success
Kedas success in its ERP implementation project was a remarkable one,
especially in China. This case serves to elucidate the ERP concept and the
management of ERP projects. The factors that make the difference between
success and failure in ERP implementations are demonstrated in much of what
Keda did, though some of those factors are more cultural specific than others.
For example, by adopting consultants recommendations in all cases of
disagreements, much time was saved from fruitless arguments. The choice of a
well-established packaged solution, the collocation work scheme, and
leveraging key users knowledge in devising system specifications and system
testing probably helped, too. The governmental influence for implementing
innovation to achieve excellence was one of the primary driver for ERP
implementation.
Strategies sometimes only work in particular cultural settings. For example,
embarrassment was deemed an important punishment, so important that it
could be career ending, which gave rise to the canteen work as a punishment;
this was probably more unique to enterprise management in China. But this
helped Keda in freeing up the department managers to focus more on the ERP
project rather than their own departmental routine work. Also, the forceful
response of replacing everyone who did not comply in the ERP deployment
shows the cultural practice of China that employees need to be aligned with
the organization strategy. In failing to comply with what senior management
decides the employees were at risk in losing their jobs. This reduced the
opposition of the ERP implementation and adoption a big way to achieve the
success.