Beyond ERP: planning for field mobility solutions

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In the past, organizations have dedicated a significant amount of time and resources in getting a new ERP solution to work just right for their businesses. Unfortunately, it often takes more than today’s ERP system to gain the efficiencies needed to become and remain a market leader. With new technology coming out constantly, it is important to ensure the ERP system is flexible enough to handle change. New requirements often center around bringing technology into the hands of the field worker. Changing ERP systems these days often brings only incremental improvement while implementing a new field mobility solution can yield a payback often measured in months, not years.

Organizations looking at ERP systems need to consider what happens after the new system is installed. What is the future roadmap of the product? What else is it capable of doing? Is it scalable for the future? What technology stack is it using? What is the future of the software vendor? Can it easily be integrated to other solutions such as field mobility?

The next step for many organizations is to implement a field mobility solution to allow more and more users to interact with the system, including those whose jobs take them out of the office. Field mobility solutions shorten billing cycles, improve cash flow, eliminate duplicate data entry, significantly reduce errors, enforce standard business processes, provide real-time information, and improve customer satisfaction. Field workers can record information and have it automatically transmitted back into an ERP system so invoices can be sent out the same day.

Enterprise field mobility systems such as TaskMaster from TBS Enterprise Mobility allow organizations to be more innovative with their current business practices and become industry leaders. Pairing TaskMaster with Microsoft Dynamics NAV allows customers to leverage the strength and flexibility of the most popular mid-market ERP system in the world. The fact that it is owned and supported by Microsoft provides assurance that the Dynamics NAV will be around in the future. Users will never be locked into a system that can’t take advantage of new innovations or technology.

In closing, when looking for an ERP system, organizations should choose one that can scale with their business and also has the capability and flexibility to integrate with new technology innovations such as field mobility solutions. Over the next ten years or so, enterprise mobility solutions will be the next wave of automation to hit organizations. We all need to be prepared.

Malcolm Roach, President of Open Door Technology Inc.

For videos of Malcolm Roach and Steve Reynolds of TBS Mobility discussing mobility solutions, please view our channel on YouTube.

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