Enterprise Resource Systems
and Kroger
Anne-Marie Hughes
Caroline Sawyer
Ed Przezdecki
Adam Jesse
Introduction
In business, it is important for companies to be able to communicate effectively. Each department of a company relies on the other departments as they add to the value chain. One way for a company to integrate its different departments is enterprise resource planning. ERPs are software programs that allow companies to join together data across operations on a company wide basis (Jessup and Valacich 248). ERPs store company information in a common database and allow all departments to access it from one central location (Koch). Companies without ERPS may contain many legacy systems, each operating with different equipment. Without an ERP and a common system used by each department, when information changes, it has to be changed in each legacy system. ERPs connect different departments so that company actions can be streamlined and data can be sent from one department to another easily. This makes it easier for information to be up to date. When data is changed in one department, it is updated company wide, avoiding conflicting data.
There are many reasons why it is advantageous for a company to use enterprise resource planning systems. ERPs improve information access, and increase the accuracy and consistency of data. ERPs also improve employee productivity and cut down on the amount of paper companies use (Jessup and Valacich 250). The systems allow business partners and suppliers to communicate quickly, thus cutting down on the time it takes to process orders and get products to customers.
Companies can either choose packaged or custom enterprise resource planning applications. Packaged applications come from major companies and ...