Are you heading up a new system implementation project? Learn how properly managing integrations, data migrations, and change management can help you succeed.
The process of implementing a new system includes:
- Defining business needs
- Building a technical solution around those needs
- Testing the new solution
- Training
- Rolling out the new system
Companies commonly implement new systems when they outgrow their current solutions, acquire other companies, or expand their current offerings.
Properly scoping integrations, data migration, and change management will help keep those system implementation projects on time and within budget.
1. Integrations
As the company launches new applications, developers must integrate them with existing systems and data warehouses.
Methods of integration, protecting data integrity, and ensuring compatibility are all complex factors in designing integrations for your new system. Are all of your existing integrations documented? Accurate estimates for building integrations depend on knowing your data and where it’s going.
A complete system landscape diagram illustrates all applications, databases, servers, and the data that flows in between them. Planners should document integrations with descriptions including integration methods. It doesn’t have to be anything complicated – a simple spreadsheet tracking the following items is useful:
- Specific data elements
- Tables
- Field names
- Source system
- Destination system
2. Data Migration
Before any data migration efforts can begin, the data must be defined and cleansed.
Data owners and stewards are great roles to have in place before beginning migration. Is your data well-defined? Accurate estimates for data migration or synchronization projects require knowing your data, where it’s stored, its structure, and its meaning.
Clean data requires first having organized and defined data. Data migration projects are a great excuse to clean house! Get rid of duplicates, simplify databases by merging data, find and correct incomplete data, and get rid of inaccurate or outdated data.
3. Change Management
Even if the new software implementation goes perfectly, companies often struggle with user adoption.
Leverage the benefits of change management to get your users engaged and support the new system throughout the life of the implementation project.
Organization Change Management (OCM) is a certifiable role, much like a project manager. Change Managers identify and overcome resistance, engage employees, implement change in phases, and communicate the change. OCM is an invaluable piece to setting your project up for success.
So Little To Do, So Much Time
Strike that, reverse it.
These are just three components of extensive system integrations, which often take teams of people working over long periods to accomplish the hundreds of tasks that need to get done.
However, by giving integrations, data migration, and change management additional time up-front for planning and scoping, your project has a better chance of success.