“Why can’t this system give me what I want?” – A simple question with a complicated answer.  When we think about Systems, we are usually focusing on what we are trying to do at our keyboard.  There is so much more that is going on behind the scenes.  The systems we use to run our business involve our daily business processes, connecting with employees, customers and vendors and ensuring that have accurate visibility to what is occurring.   As you might imagine, there are a multitude of things that need to be done properly for you to see what you hope to see on the screen when you left-click your mouse. At D&H-United, this is more complex due to the several distinct companies that form our combined business.  In our drive to be the leader in our industry and operate as one company we will move from the many to a single group of integrated common systems and processes.

You will hear the letters ERP in reference to systems.  This stands for Enterprise Research Planning.  This does not sound like catchy new software – it is so much more. This is far reaching and refers to a platform of integrated systems that encompass business processes across all parts of the enterprise.  This includes dispatching, field services, invoicing, project tracking, inventory, accounting…and so on. Having the right ERP platform allows for synchronization of teams and data regardless of branch, service offering or function; bottom line – improves effectiveness in achieving goals as one organization.

As a key part of our strategic plan, we are extremely excited to be launching our own ERP project.  Given the breadth of this type of project, we will be selecting representative team members across the various parts of our business who together with professional support will collect requirements necessary to incorporate in a new state-of-the-art ERP system. Once we understand what we need to better achieve our goals, we can then research the various ERP vendors and select the best one for our business.  What follows is the migration of our entire business to the new platform.  This is a huge undertaking and will require almost two years to complete – we are in this for the long haul.

You will be hearing more about our progress and details in the near future.