Of course you are not thinking of sabotaging your Dynamics GP implementation. Who would do that? But by ignoring some obvious minefields, you may just find that you have blown up the project. Forewarned is forearmed; watch out for these danger signs:
1) Demanding a fixed fee implementation
Of course the ideal would be to know up front exactly what the project will cost. But if you insist on a fixed fee for the implementation, you are necessarily tying the hands of your implementation partner and placing limitations on the work. You can’t expect a partner to agree to an unlimited amount of work for any set fee. If you do insist on stringent time and monetary limitations, you may sacrifice important functionality. Working with a reliable and recommended partner, you can get a degree of cost certainty and you will still have the flexibility to add or subtract from the installation particulars as necessary for your business processes.
2) Choosing a partner based on the lowest price
Just because a bid is lower than the others, doesn’t mean the work will be inferior; in fact it doesn’t mean anything at all. At least find out why it costs less. Perhaps the partner has such a volume of business that they have their processes streamlined better than the rest, or perhaps your processes closely resemble others they’ve worked with. The lowest price could turn out to be the best; but don’t choose solely on that criterion.
3) Starting late and expecting to finish early
You need to have a realistic idea of how long a good Dynamics GP implementation takes. Allow at least three months, ideally longer. If everyone is under pressure to get things down quickly, important functionality will be sacrificed.
4) Failing to consider the road ahead
What other systems need to integrate with your new Dynamics GP? Don’t wait until the installation is complete before mentioning that you’d also like it to work with your CRM or other critical business management systems. Of course you can always go back later and integrate everything – at an increased cost in both time and resources. You don’t need to be able to see the complete future of your Microsoft Dynamics GP relationship, but you should have a general idea of what systems you are running now and whether you want to continue making use of them.
To learn more about Microsoft Dynamics GP (whether on premise or in the cloud) and how it can help you achieve your business goals, .
By , a Dynamics GP partner serving clients in Delaware and Pennsylvania
