Integrating Processes in Manufacturing

Winning the Bet

The problems IGT faced before implementation of the ERP system was coordinating information. For example, when department managers wanted to obtain data on an order, they had to scrap together the pieces of data from a variety of different units because it was not all compiled into one integrated system. There were sets of data pertaining to sales to customers that needed to be accessed, information about what machines were being produced and the status of payments also needed to be accessed by the accounting department—so there were quite a few different areas that needed to be compiled for easier dissemination (Winning the Bet, 2014, p. 104). The fact that all of this information was kept in different locations was particularly troublesome for the accounting department which took 2 weeks just to close the books because it had to track down all the information from various departments. Something needed to be done to make the process more efficient.

The new system helps to control processes by making all units integrated into one system where information is collected and available via the ERP system. By integrating product development with manufacturing and finance, the new system allowed for better estimates and pricing, allowed for managers to be able to print out the manufacturing processes at their own computers, and prevented workers from cutting corners as they could do before. It company sites were now all connected and managers could monitor changes to the design as they occurred and oversee the process in real time. As Qi and Tao (2018) point out, integration is a crucial element of manufacturing in today’s Digital Age and must be utilized.

The benefits of the ERP system are that it provides a more integrated approach to the various aspects of the company, from keeping finances to overseeing manufacturing to providing sales. The ERP system keeps information together in one place as opposed to having it dispersed in different units. It also puts all the sites together so that more information is linked and greater access to data is available to all department managers to help them make more informed decisions.

Hartmann and Germain (2015) point out that there are many benefits of pursuing and implementing integration capabilities in manufacturing—from enhancing performance, which IGT showed was possible through integration, to enhancing product design, which IGT also showed was definitely possible through the development of the ERP system.

The old system continued to be operated because it had been internally developed to help managers know which parts were being manufactured at which plant location. This was helpful for internal operations, and the old system’s integration into the new system allowed for a complete and total change management process to be completed with the old still being used when needed but also being subsumed and now subsisting in the new system. Any change management process that is able to overcome as many resistance points as this operation could have potentially faced would have to be viewed as a success, as change management is so sensitive to the old ways of doing things (Hornstein, 2015), and this was not a problem for IGT.