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Planning an ERP Implementation? Here’s How to Prepare Before the Project Starts
Enterprise resource planning (ERP) software can help your business scale with more streamlined processes and informed decision-making, but it’s also one of the trickiest implementations to get right. Gartner research shows that over 70% of new ERPs fail to realize the business’s original transformation goals, describing almost a quarter of those failures as “catastrophic.”
Finance, operations, and IT leaders who know the business is ready for their first ERP—or perhaps migrating from a legacy solution—therefore usually want to know what groundwork can ensure success.
If you think about it, every action in your business will result in some kind of transaction. When done well, an ERP becomes the thread that connects all of those actions into a complete story. That’s why migrations must be treated as an operational redesign rather than simply slotting existing processes into more sophisticated software. This level of change requires significant time and resources to prepare for, even if you’re working with an ERP consultant.
In this article, I’ll cover:
- Guidelines for ERP implementation to help teams prepare before engaging a consultant or starting a rollout
- Some important considerations that I often see businesses miss in the lead-up to an ERP migration
- A practical checklist you can reference to see if you’re ready for the next step
How to Prepare for an ERP Implementation
My biggest piece of advice for any company looking to do an ERP project is that they shouldn’t think about it as a technology project at all. It’s really a business transformation project.
There are five areas I recommend looking at before embarking on this journey. While preparing your data is one of them, a successful project is largely about knowing how the technology will change your operations, and being realistic about the internal effort needed to plan that change.
Get Clear on What You Need the ERP to Solve
Companies usually bring in an ERP when they’ve outgrown spreadsheets or entry-level accounting software. The business has probably become more complex, and teams need a better way to centralize systems, reduce manual work, and make growth decisions.
At this stage, it’s important to define specific, measurable ERP goals that are tied to business value. It can be surprisingly easy to go into a transformation based on the idea that it’s time for an upgrade, or with vague intentions like “better reporting.” In 2025, Deloitte interviewed several project teams who had recently launched an ERP system. One of the biggest takeaways was that going live became the main ERP goal, rather than working toward the business improvements the system was supposed to deliver.
Goals should do a few things: Identify the key operational problem, establish where you’re at before the ERP, set a target for improvement, and provide a timeframe. Clear objectives will keep the implementation focused on improvements that actually matter to everyday work and the business’s overarching priorities.
Consider How Processes Should Translate to an ERP
One potential mistake companies can make with an ERP migration is to recreate their current operations in the new system. The problem here is that those processes often don’t need to exist at all. Some weren’t necessarily designed deliberately, but are workarounds that evolved from technology limitations.
When a modern ERP removes those limitations, recreating the workaround would defeat part of the purpose of implementing new software. Well-executed projects instead examine gaps in existing procedures, considering how they should be redesigned in the ERP to create more value. For example, if purchase approvals rely on emails and spreadsheets, the implementation is an opportunity to look at why those manual handoffs happen and how the ERP could automate or simplify the workflow.
Know Your Sources of Truth
Many of our clients at Convverge have a specialized side of the business, like manufacturing or engineering. These departments often use niche software that doesn’t directly belong in an ERP—think design tools or even time-entry programs.
However, information that comes out of those systems often has financial or operational implications that do eventually flow into an ERP. For example, engineers might use specialized software to create and approve a product design. Information like a bill of materials can then come into the ERP, where it’s relevant for procurement, financial reporting, and other business decisions.
As consultants, we handle the technical work of integrating the ERP into this ecosystem of applications and workflows. But—and this is something many companies don’t realize—having clarity around business processes and their sources of truth must come from the client. This internal knowledge is ultimately what determines how the ERP is set up and how users will interact with it.
Before integration can happen, I highly recommend getting clear on:
- Which processes generate information that needs to end up in the ERP
- Which system is the authority on that information. In other words, which source should the ERP consume?
Prepare Your Data for an ERP Migration
Data cleanup is a familiar best practice for any kind of transformation, but it’s worth pointing out here because an ERP truly lives and dies by its data.
An ERP migration is a great opportunity for “spring cleaning” and deciding what should move over to the new system. Look at both your master and transactional data, ensuring that records are accurate, current, and deduplicated. The goal is to migrate what represents the business you’re operating today. If there are 15 years’ worth of vendor records, including companies you haven’t worked with in a decade, automatically bringing them into the ERP will mean starting a clean system with old clutter.
That doesn’t mean you must completely delete older records—just that they don’t necessarily have to be inherited by the new software. Starting with reliable information helps prevent irrelevant data from carrying forward into the reports and metrics the business will eventually rely on to make decisions.
Be Realistic About the Internal Effort Required
In my experience, the primary thing businesses underestimate when preparing for a new ERP is the amount of effort that’s required on their end.
While you can outsource the technical execution of an ERP, you can’t really outsource the business decisions that will determine how the software functions. The types of questions we’ve covered in laying the groundwork for transformation—Should this old process still exist? How do we want workflows to function in the new system? Where are our sources of truth?—need input from internal teams who understand your operations best and work closely with those systems every day.
An implementation partner can recommend how the ERP should support those needs and translate your decisions into a solution that works well. But you have to make some foundational calls based on your business needs and operating realities.
This takes real capacity that organizations must plan for. Decide who will need to participate in what is essentially a process redesign, and how they will fit that into their schedule. Because ERPs touch so many areas of the business, a best practice is to involve a cross-functional group of stakeholders who can represent their teams’ requirements and goals. If you’re evaluating implementation partners, ask them what they’ll need from you throughout the project so you can plan accordingly.
Sanity Check: Is Your Business Ready to Start an ERP Implementation?
You don’t need to have every detail figured out before you start talking to an ERP implementation partner. A lot of the question marks you’ll come up against are exactly what we’re here to help you out with.
That said, having clarity around your processes, data, and internal capacity will enable productive conversations about what comes next. Here’s a quick checklist you can refer back to if you’re seriously considering an ERP and unsure what needs to happen internally first:
- The business can clearly describe which problems it expects the ERP to solve and could translate those problems into measurable goals.
- Existing business processes are mapped out, and it’s clear where the ERP could replace them versus where specialized systems will stay in place.
- Teams can point to which systems should serve as sources of truth for information that needs to flow into the ERP.
- Process owners recognize where established workflows have gaps or bottlenecks, and are prepared to redesign them as part of the implementation.
- IT knows where relevant data lives and has a plan to clean and organize it before it moves to the new system.
- Project leaders know who needs to be involved and are making room for the time and effort they’ll need to contribute.
Give Your ERP Implementation Plan a Clear Direction
An ERP is a significant investment in how an organization will operate and make decisions for years to come. Taking the time to understand your business processes and priorities—and decide what those should look like in the future—is the non-technical yet essential work that must happen before any software gets built.
From there, an experienced partner can help you determine how technology supports that vision and develop a practical path to get there. Learn how Convverge supports businesses with ERP implementation.
