We are testing the ERP system. Part 3
We continue to test the ERP system. The first part is here , the second part is here .
Today we will try to deal with production and projects. And in the next part we will talk about reporting and all sorts of tools for decision-making.
Let's start with the projects. With them more understandable.
First, we define the concept. I can be wrong, if something correct me.
A project is a set of measures and actions aimed at achieving a certain result. I think so.
If we talk in relation to ERP, then the project management functionality is needed to service complex transactions. A simple example: you have entered into a contract with a client for the design, the delivery of a certain amount of equipment, and also for the installation work on this equipment. It is clear that the procedure of concluding a contract occurs first. Then you write the project for 3 months, and you do it by the efforts of several employees of your company, each of whom is responsible for their own section. In the process of developing a project, there is correspondence with the client, the first copies of the project are born, etc. Then start the delivery, prepayment, shipment. All this is also stretched in time. Then your employees go on business trips, incur any expenses on them. Somewhere you hire from a contractor for installation. Shipping costs, again.
And now "attention, question." How much did you earn on this deal?
Another nuance. A year has passed. Some project participants quit. I want to see how this or that process went when developing a project, who wrote what and who.
Well, and many other questions.
')
I have clients who use projects and in much simpler situations. If the transaction is not monosyllabic, when the customer is billed, he paid for it, and you just shipped the goods to him, then projects are needed. So it seems to me. Otherwise, then deal in the transaction will not be easy.
That's what is needed in ERP-systems project management. We are testing.
To get started, just ask to show you a list of projects.
It is possible to understand from the list, in what state is the project? Is it finished, in process, or how?
How to see from the project, what were the deliveries on it? That's exactly where they can be seen? Where can we see what was delivered, how and when it was paid for, etc.? Where is the correspondence of the project participants with customers or third parties?
Where can I see all the costs of the project? Who, how much, when paid for and for what services? Are these services rendered or not? Rendered? And where is it visible?
Where to see who, when and where went on business trips on the project?
Being in the list of any documents, for example, invoices, orders, it should be clear to which project this or that document belongs. Is it possible to rebind the document to another project? When can and when not? How, for example, does the system block the possibility of rebinding a document to another project if the transaction has already been completed? After all, if you “pick up” a document from one project and “give it away” to another, then it is likely that you will change the financial indicators of the first project. Therefore, the system must understand when it can be done and when it cannot.
Ask to show the financial statements for the project, where it would be clear how much you earned on the project and when, how much you spent, where and how much. One of these reports I showed in this topic. It is clear that the set of indicators will be less than in the shown report, but the essence is the same.
There is another functional design direction. In my opinion, quite useful. This is a task management system. At least, we use it in our company, and many of my clients have also come to this. Here you have a project. You want to know who exactly and for what exactly is responsible in this project? How is this or that task accomplished (to meet with such a person, to prepare such a document, to coordinate such a document, etc.) and what exactly was done there, and if not, why not? When you wanted the problem to be solved and when it was actually solved. It is very convenient if this thing is integrated into projects, otherwise you will have to look at all the information in one place, and the tasks in another, and guess what it is.
So ask them to show where in the project you can see the tasks in it. Where in the task is it visible, in what condition is it? Done or not? Overdue or not? How it was performed, what problems arose, etc.
In other words, looking at the project you should be clear from it. How much they spent, how much they earned, where and when they went, who wrote to whom and what, who did what and when.
Perhaps the most difficult and incomprehensible part of all this testing. I thought for a long time how to come up with universal tests for production, but it turned out to be not so simple. Therefore, I will write only those tests that will work exactly. At a minimum.
So you produce something. First, I propose to deal with issues that torment those who produce.
Well, perhaps all. The remaining questions are either related to sales, or to finance, or to supplies.
Where can I see what the company must produce to satisfy customer orders? In short, the production schedule in the studio!
If space planning is shown to you, then ask a simple question. What to do if I have not fulfilled the planned volume today? I once wrote about this . In general, in the West, they have long understood that this planning method does not solve anything and does not improve the situation in production.
Where in the production schedule can I see what and in what order I should do? You can't do everything at the same time, right?
Further. Ask a simple question: “What methods of production management does your system use? What are these techniques? What production indicators can these methods improve and at the expense of what? ”By using exactly which methods, is production achieved on time?
Here you look at your manufactured product in the directory. What is his current cost price? In which warehouses and how much of this product is there?
How, being on the product in the directory, to understand from what you usually produce it? What are the replacements and analogues for each component? How to quickly understand if there is no component, which component can be replaced now?
When a production task is created, the composition of the components is created automatically? Can I make changes to it? How exactly does the replacement of the component on the analog?
There you have, for warming up, a fragment from testing one very well-known ERP system (XXX).
XXX traditionally has a system that determines the need for production and procurement. Works traditionally stupidly. The system simply dumps into a certain list of commodity items that are not in stock and they are simply billed. That is, you simply issue an invoice to the client, and the system immediately adds everything that you have written out to this list. The list is single, it’s all together - and what needs to be purchased and what needs to be produced. At the same time, the components of the manufactured product are not included in this list, if they are not in warehouses and it is unclear how to buy them. Of course, half of the bills are traditionally not paid, but XXX is not interested. This means that you will produce something that no one needs, because the bill will remain unpaid.
Finally, they told me that XXX fully complies with the MRPII standard. And I finally understood what MRP and MRPII are in the performance of some ERP system developers. This is when not a damn thing works.
So carefully examine how exactly the need is formed, according to which particular algorithm
In order to do something, you need to have the necessary equipment, qualified people and necessary components. With qualified staff and equipment, I think, and without ERP can be sorted out. But in order not to find oneself in a situation when there is not one component out of a hundred in the warehouse, it is necessary that the system helps to avoid this situation. I wrote about this in this article and repeat just laziness.
I deliberately did not write here about the planning of production facilities and human resources. Firstly, this is not so often necessary, and secondly, such a case: I had a client who wanted to plan everything cool. And power and loading and technological operations etc. I tried to explain to him that it is better not so much to plan as to just produce what you need and when you need it. No, he is adamant. Ok, we try. In the shops of the Tajiks. On the literacy of the question. And components and finished products are simply dumped in a heap, and at night. Making it all this qualitatively failed to take into account. Savings on the storekeeper. To take into account technological operations, it is necessary that someone entered them into the system. The question is who? At night, only Tajiks, who did not even see a computer in their sleep, were in production. There’s probably no reason to tell further.
Why am I doing this? And besides, in the company everything should be organic. If you want to take into account everything cool and automate, then the culture in the company should be appropriate and employees. Some harmony must be respected. Do not try to automate horse-drawn transport. We must first change it.
Today we will try to deal with production and projects. And in the next part we will talk about reporting and all sorts of tools for decision-making.
Let's start with the projects. With them more understandable.
First, we define the concept. I can be wrong, if something correct me.
What is it and why is it in ERP
A project is a set of measures and actions aimed at achieving a certain result. I think so.
If we talk in relation to ERP, then the project management functionality is needed to service complex transactions. A simple example: you have entered into a contract with a client for the design, the delivery of a certain amount of equipment, and also for the installation work on this equipment. It is clear that the procedure of concluding a contract occurs first. Then you write the project for 3 months, and you do it by the efforts of several employees of your company, each of whom is responsible for their own section. In the process of developing a project, there is correspondence with the client, the first copies of the project are born, etc. Then start the delivery, prepayment, shipment. All this is also stretched in time. Then your employees go on business trips, incur any expenses on them. Somewhere you hire from a contractor for installation. Shipping costs, again.
And now "attention, question." How much did you earn on this deal?
Another nuance. A year has passed. Some project participants quit. I want to see how this or that process went when developing a project, who wrote what and who.
Well, and many other questions.
')
I have clients who use projects and in much simpler situations. If the transaction is not monosyllabic, when the customer is billed, he paid for it, and you just shipped the goods to him, then projects are needed. So it seems to me. Otherwise, then deal in the transaction will not be easy.
That's what is needed in ERP-systems project management. We are testing.
To get started, just ask to show you a list of projects.
It is possible to understand from the list, in what state is the project? Is it finished, in process, or how?
How to see from the project, what were the deliveries on it? That's exactly where they can be seen? Where can we see what was delivered, how and when it was paid for, etc.? Where is the correspondence of the project participants with customers or third parties?
Where can I see all the costs of the project? Who, how much, when paid for and for what services? Are these services rendered or not? Rendered? And where is it visible?
Where to see who, when and where went on business trips on the project?
Being in the list of any documents, for example, invoices, orders, it should be clear to which project this or that document belongs. Is it possible to rebind the document to another project? When can and when not? How, for example, does the system block the possibility of rebinding a document to another project if the transaction has already been completed? After all, if you “pick up” a document from one project and “give it away” to another, then it is likely that you will change the financial indicators of the first project. Therefore, the system must understand when it can be done and when it cannot.
Ask to show the financial statements for the project, where it would be clear how much you earned on the project and when, how much you spent, where and how much. One of these reports I showed in this topic. It is clear that the set of indicators will be less than in the shown report, but the essence is the same.
There is another functional design direction. In my opinion, quite useful. This is a task management system. At least, we use it in our company, and many of my clients have also come to this. Here you have a project. You want to know who exactly and for what exactly is responsible in this project? How is this or that task accomplished (to meet with such a person, to prepare such a document, to coordinate such a document, etc.) and what exactly was done there, and if not, why not? When you wanted the problem to be solved and when it was actually solved. It is very convenient if this thing is integrated into projects, otherwise you will have to look at all the information in one place, and the tasks in another, and guess what it is.
So ask them to show where in the project you can see the tasks in it. Where in the task is it visible, in what condition is it? Done or not? Overdue or not? How it was performed, what problems arose, etc.
In other words, looking at the project you should be clear from it. How much they spent, how much they earned, where and when they went, who wrote to whom and what, who did what and when.
Production
Perhaps the most difficult and incomprehensible part of all this testing. I thought for a long time how to come up with universal tests for production, but it turned out to be not so simple. Therefore, I will write only those tests that will work exactly. At a minimum.
So you produce something. First, I propose to deal with issues that torment those who produce.
- What should I do?
- What do I need for this?
- Can I start doing this?
- When should I start?
- What should I do?
- How to make on time?
- What is my cost price?
Well, perhaps all. The remaining questions are either related to sales, or to finance, or to supplies.
Where can I see what the company must produce to satisfy customer orders? In short, the production schedule in the studio!
If space planning is shown to you, then ask a simple question. What to do if I have not fulfilled the planned volume today? I once wrote about this . In general, in the West, they have long understood that this planning method does not solve anything and does not improve the situation in production.
Where in the production schedule can I see what and in what order I should do? You can't do everything at the same time, right?
Further. Ask a simple question: “What methods of production management does your system use? What are these techniques? What production indicators can these methods improve and at the expense of what? ”By using exactly which methods, is production achieved on time?
Here you look at your manufactured product in the directory. What is his current cost price? In which warehouses and how much of this product is there?
How, being on the product in the directory, to understand from what you usually produce it? What are the replacements and analogues for each component? How to quickly understand if there is no component, which component can be replaced now?
When a production task is created, the composition of the components is created automatically? Can I make changes to it? How exactly does the replacement of the component on the analog?
There you have, for warming up, a fragment from testing one very well-known ERP system (XXX).
XXX traditionally has a system that determines the need for production and procurement. Works traditionally stupidly. The system simply dumps into a certain list of commodity items that are not in stock and they are simply billed. That is, you simply issue an invoice to the client, and the system immediately adds everything that you have written out to this list. The list is single, it’s all together - and what needs to be purchased and what needs to be produced. At the same time, the components of the manufactured product are not included in this list, if they are not in warehouses and it is unclear how to buy them. Of course, half of the bills are traditionally not paid, but XXX is not interested. This means that you will produce something that no one needs, because the bill will remain unpaid.
Finally, they told me that XXX fully complies with the MRPII standard. And I finally understood what MRP and MRPII are in the performance of some ERP system developers. This is when not a damn thing works.
So carefully examine how exactly the need is formed, according to which particular algorithm
In order to do something, you need to have the necessary equipment, qualified people and necessary components. With qualified staff and equipment, I think, and without ERP can be sorted out. But in order not to find oneself in a situation when there is not one component out of a hundred in the warehouse, it is necessary that the system helps to avoid this situation. I wrote about this in this article and repeat just laziness.
I deliberately did not write here about the planning of production facilities and human resources. Firstly, this is not so often necessary, and secondly, such a case: I had a client who wanted to plan everything cool. And power and loading and technological operations etc. I tried to explain to him that it is better not so much to plan as to just produce what you need and when you need it. No, he is adamant. Ok, we try. In the shops of the Tajiks. On the literacy of the question. And components and finished products are simply dumped in a heap, and at night. Making it all this qualitatively failed to take into account. Savings on the storekeeper. To take into account technological operations, it is necessary that someone entered them into the system. The question is who? At night, only Tajiks, who did not even see a computer in their sleep, were in production. There’s probably no reason to tell further.
Why am I doing this? And besides, in the company everything should be organic. If you want to take into account everything cool and automate, then the culture in the company should be appropriate and employees. Some harmony must be respected. Do not try to automate horse-drawn transport. We must first change it.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/93448/
All Articles