IDPM Working papers
This Working Paper is part of the Development Informatics series
Success and Failure of ERP Technology Transfer: A Framework for Analysing Congruence of Host and System Cultures
Alemayehu Molla and Ioannis Loukis
Abstract
Enterprise resource planning (ERP) applications are spreading worldwide, including into developing countries. Problems related to cultural mismatches are one of the challenges that affect this global diffusion. Two main sets of culture can be identified in any ERP situation of development, implementation and use. On the one hand, there is a culture embedded in the ERP software reflecting the views of the ERP developers, vendors and consultants. On the other hand, there is a culture reflecting the views of the implementing organisation's project team, managers and users. We refer to the first as the ERP system culture and to the second as the ERP host culture . This paper presents a framework that allows analysis of these two cultures and their impact on ERP success and failure. The paper demonstrates the utility of this framework by applying it to a case study. Overall, we argue that good congruence between ERP system and host cultures can contribute to ERP success both in process and outcome terms. However, lack of congruence can contribute to ERP process and outcome failure.
Educator's guide to student questions for this paper
View/Download options
You will need a PDF reader such as Adobe Acrobat (downloadable from Adobe) to view PDF file(s). PDF files open in a new window.