Create a ‘Shopping List’ When Buying Business Software

Many times it seems that small- and mid-sized businesses struggle with their business software. The common complaint of, “This doesn’t do what we need it to,” is often heard in my initial visit.

Choosing and implementing business software is a challenging endeavor. Most software problems I see businesses struggle with, unfortunately, are mostly self-inflicted wounds. The selection process is usually at fault.

Purchases are often made based on descriptions from sales materials or representations made by sales people. Businesses are encouraged to buy software today to fit the vision of what the business is to become in the future. Over-spending on software seems to be the norm.

How should a business choose software?

An effective process begins with having a clear view of the business. What is this business all about? Distribution? E-commerce? Manufacturing? Services? How does the business make money? How does the business think technology can help with this?

A key point that often is not understood: Technology enables business processes. It is a fundamental truth that people and businesses will not do things with technology that are not already being done in some fashion.

It is important to identify the core processes of a business. Sales through cash collections, purchasing through cash payment and paying people are three primary process threads in most businesses.

Packaged software is designed to “enable” these core processes. The software will have a certain way it expects the processes to work into it.

Without knowing the type of business and the type of processes that are needed to support the business it is premature to have a conversation about business software.

Once these things can be discussed, the next step is to perform an assessment of the current business software. There are two main pieces to this assessment. “What’s wrong with what you have?” and “Does what you have fit what you?”

Businesses struggle with technology either because the technology is flawed or it doesn’t fit the business. The problem is usually that the software doesn’t fit.

Software struggles experienced by a business typically come from a gap in the software’s capability to support the underlying processes of the business.

Once armed with an understanding of the business and its processes an approach and budget can be developed for any needed software change.

If the needed software change involves buying new software, then a “shopping list” should be developed. The software “shopping list” should focus on what is really needed to enable the processes of the business.

Once the list is developed potential vendors can be identified. Software makers tend to have strengths in certain types of businesses or business processes. One size does not fit all.

Once these vendors are identified they will want to give a demonstration of their software. Since all software tends looks great in the hands of a skilled demonstrator, avoid this. A better process is to prepare a script of business process items for the software demonstrator to show. This script should be designed to accurately reflect the shopping list and processes important to the business. This process tends to reveal to users how the software would work in their specific business.

Employing these process steps helps put a business in the position to be successful with a software implementation. Failure to use this type of process may lead to software struggles for the business.