Epicor’s best practice implementation methodology – the Signature methodology –provides a comprehensive, highly structured and consistent framework for delivering successful software implementations. Proven in thousands of projects, Epicor’s Signature methodology provides an efficient, client-focused and reliable process plan for business software implementation projects anywhere in the world.
The Signature methodology is compliant with the PMBOK and PRINCE standards. It includes six stages that ensure faster delivery of better business solutions, successful management of implementation risks and ultimately – the smooth transfer of the new system and knowledge to the customer:
1. Prepare
Requirements research – ROI and KPI definition – Solution concept discovery – Initial scope, resource and timeline determination
A successful implementation focuses on resolving business challenges or pain points, achieving specific business goals, streamlining business processes and ensuring good ROI. Therefore, the preparation stage of the Signature methodology is mainly concerned with the identification of the customer’s business challenges and collaborative work with the customer in defining the customer’s business goals, identifying the sources of ROI and the KPI that contribute to profit with focus on the critical business processes that are relevant to the ROI & KPI initiatives. Requirements research also includes defining a solution concept validated by a scripted demonstration and preliminary implementation criteria. At the end of the first stage a statement of work (SOW) is prepared, which defines the scope, timeline and cost of the project.
2. Plan
Organise project – Best practice review – Project planning finalisation – Project launch
The planning stage is concerned with organising and structuring a detailed step-by-step roadmap to successfully guide the project team through the project implementation. Using the information and solution design from the preparation stage the team concentrates on reinforcing the solution, validating and reviewing the major processes defined during the preparation stage and confirming which processes will be included in the implementation. During this stage, in-depth interviews with department leads are held, preliminary gaps are identified, thereby enabling the team to define, prioritise and identify re-engineering points, SMART objectives (Specific, Measurable, Agreed, Realistic and Time defined) are set and final decisions are made regarding the project scope, plan and resource requirements. The three main outputs of this segment are the project initiation document, the final project plan, and a preliminary data migration scope definition. At the end of the planning stage the software modules defined in the documentation are installed on the customer’s network and preliminary orientation training is carried out for the project team to familiarise them with the way the software works.
3. Analyse
Foundation education – Business modelling – Gap analysis – Input, output and workflow definition
The objective of the analysis stage is to further perfect the business mapping, end-user feature requirements and process definitions, as well as to create test cases for the proof of concept to be developed during the design stage. The analysis stage begins with foundation education delivered to the project team to lay groundwork for business modelling and provide additional understanding of the key processes. Business procedures, functional area interactions and departmental functions are then reviewed to ensure the most logical and smooth workflow; gaps, including data gaps between the legacy IS and the new system, are identified, defined, prioritised and agreed upon, which enables the project team to analyse and design inputs, outputs, workflows, reports, any necessary interfaces to third-party systems, as well as critical data, data mapping and cleansing requirements, access security requirements, and compliance requirements. All internal and external documents to be generated by the system are also defined during this stage.
4. Design
Solution design – Proof of concept – Configuration – Workflow development
The design stage starts with solution design. As functional business processes have been defined during the previous stages it is now time to define the transactional processes, identify and document changes to current processes and test specific business cycles, such as acquisition and payment, sales and collection, inventory and warehousing etc., and transactional processes, such as managing payables, processing receipts, creating sales orders etc. Once the business cycles have been tested and documented, the entire business process flow is developed, data migration templates are built and the first pass data migration is performed so that the proof of concept developed during this stage can use genuine customer’s data, real business scenarios and transactions. The proof of concept is a critical element of the design stage, as it enables the team to identify the unique needs of the organisation and the points where system customisation is required. After the completion of the proof of concept, final system configuration is determined and the configuration document with data input standards is created. Finally, all identified workflows, integrations and reports are designed and developed during the design stage.
5. Construct
Production system setup – Conference room piloting – Project team validation – Deployment planning
During the construction stage a production-ready system is set up and configured based on the decisions made and documented during the previous stages, also, the second pass data migration is performed at this point. A production-ready system includes a fully configured application, installation, data, customer-specific reports, customised interfaces, reports, and forms. Conference room pilot testing and project team validation are then carried out in order to validate the solution against the business processes and key scenarios of the customer by allowing the end-users to use the software for typical business processes under actual operating conditions, thereby verifying that the new system meets the business requirements and design specifications and that it is successfully performing the operations necessary to drive the customer’s business goals. At the conclusion of the acceptance testing, the second pass data migration is analysed, refined and a final data deployment plan is created. Also, end-user requirements are finalised and preparations are made for the final go-live.
6. Deploy
End-user training – Cutover confirmation – Production system deployment – ROI and KPI review
This is the final and the most exciting stage of the software implementation process. With testing having been completed, end-user training can now be performed on a fully functional system. Following end-user training the final production system is populated, and the final data migration and security setup are performed. The new ERP system, which has by now been thoroughly tested and integrated into the company’s infrastructure, finally goes live and from this moment onwards the end-users start performing and managing the company’s daily transactions, activities and processes independently. The ROI & KPIs defined during the preparation stage are reviewed as part of the deployment stage. The members of the project team stay on the project for a specified period of time to assist the end-users in the transition from the legacy IS to the new system. Technical support and consultation remain available after the completion of the implementation process to help our customers continue to take full advantage of the benefits of their new system.
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