In early 2008, Waste Management (WM) a waste management, comprehensive waste and environmental services company in North America, the largest with 50,000 employees, a fleet of 21,000 vehicles and $12B in annual revenue, filed a lawsuit against SAP for a $100 Million implementation that was headlined as a “complete failure”.
The premise of their lawsuit was that SAP fraudulently induced WM to license a US-applicable waste management solution that required “no customizations”, was a mature and “integrated end-to-end” product and was an “out-of-the-box” solution with the functionality and scalability necessary to meet WMs specific business requirements; all while SAP had known that this “all-in-one solution” was undeveloped, untested and defective.
This very public event was not your typical headline news flash, but in the ERP world it was more than just a blip on the radar due to the magnitude and size of both companies, and WMs ability to make this public and followed by some of the leading IT news makers such as ZDNet, CIO Magazine, ComputerWorld and even CNN and Reuters. Fast forward early/mid-2010, SAP made a one-time cash payment of an undisclosed amount; case resolved and dismissed. WM is back at square one, and SAP unfortunately walked away with a much publicized “sting”.
To be fair, and to the defense of SAP, as documented in this 2004 article, WM is a giant company built on countless acquisitions with a large landscape of silo/outdated legacy systems lacking integration and fractured end-to-end business processes. Any experienced ERP consultant, with their common sense and sanity still intact, knows that such a business/technological environment and landscape is a recipe for disaster unless you have a cocktail of bullet-proof architecture, business process experts, execution, leadership, planning, knowledge and vision internally within the company that delivers on promises through painstaking hands-on work. Surprised? You shouldn’t be… Text-book ERP implementation and project/program management best-practices will tell you the same thing about any “overly fragmented” environment such as WM; it takes an internal upheaval and re-alignment of enormous magnitude to engage a successful SAP implementation, and in this case, as proven time and time again in many failed ERP projects, this was very likely the root cause.
So where does that leave us in the context of this article? How does any of this relate to “Expecting Management and Managing Expectations”? What are the lessons learned and how may they be avoided? What would it have required to make this, and many of the like, projects succeed?
First, some insight on the title of this blog post. “Expecting Management” relates to that “down the rabbit hole” scenario where everyone is expecting, yet rarely experience, a project to be managed effectively with alignment, expectations, information, knowledge etc. set with accuracy and structure, and “Managing Expectations” relating to that necessary and fundamental duty to set the right expectations before taking the leap into projects of significant magnitude.
Second, let’s be clear about the motivation behind this article. Albeit the introduction does portray a negative event in history that can leave some discomfort and doubts about ERP implementations, even in the best of us, the purpose is three-fold:
> Bring awareness and understanding to the audience on the reality of ERP implementations
> Have an honest and open “lessons learned” and “Expecting
> Management and Managing Expectations” discussion
Appreciate the fact that any, yes ANY, ERP implementation can be successful if you employ the right ingredients of success including effective “reality-checks” by arduously managing the project and managing the expectations that go hand-in-hand.
With that said, let’s cover some key areas that relate to the WM story, and many others that the likes of us PM’s and IT professionals have encountered.
Expecting Management
Was WM fully expecting SAP to manage the successful implementation single handily without failure, particularly since they committed $100M to the project? Very likely. Did SAP assume that WM was internally prepared and ready to “clean up” the “internal cobwebs” of fractured processes, infrastructure and technologies so as to design a solution that SAP can adhere to effectively? Very likely. Can you picture the ensuing disaster here? Unrealistic assumptions on either side…
Lesson learned here is as with most projects engaging an external vendor praising quality and success, neither party can simply assume that either of them will meet each other half way and get “down to business” and produce concrete results through hard work and dedication. Ok, so most of us naturally expect that if we pay a significant amount of money for a service or product, we should receive unparalleled quality and satisfaction… Well, not always the case with IT implementations! Why you may ask?! Let’s face it; technology is complicated. Sure on paper it can look and sound like a “plug and play” solution, but at the end of the day everyone on all sides need to pitch in with hard work, late hours, creative thinking, teamwork etc., to get the job done!
In short, “expecting management” on an ERP implementation, whether on the client or vendor side, is purely naive and high risk; you must take things very seriously and prepare your team (top to bottom) to roll up their sleeves and get the job done.
Managing Expectations
Remember how it feels to be on a project and not know what is going on, or what you should be doing for weeks and months; your manager doesn’t take the time to give you some comforting feedback, the clock keeps ticking, and one day “BAM!” some big announcement to everyone that changes your role and deliverables 180 degrees?! Well, that’s a typical case lacking “managing expectations” by senior management.
Specific to the case of WM and SAP, there was a lack in setting the right and realistic expectations on the feasibility and time line of the implementation; particularly when the ability of both sides to overcome such a challenging project might have been lacking.
Lesson learned here is to always keep your team aware and informed; setting realistic expectations that maintains comfort, focus and motivation. Leaving people in the dark, particularly when they are your most valuable asset on a large implementation, is a recipe for failure; it creates gossip, mischief, low morale and motivation, and the formation of their own expectations which are unrealistic and highly biased.
Alignment
If you have ever worked for the government, or any body that is driven by committee-like decision making and planning, alignment is something very close to the heart; particularly in cases where you need to get everyone to agree with what you and/or they are doing before it gets done… Exhausting, isn’t it? Yes and no; alignment can help in other ways besides getting people to side with you; such as validating your ideas, getting input for a variety of sources and getting different perspectives, ensuring your plan is air-tight and resilient etc.
Lesson learned here is to keep everyone aligned; this is essentially part of managing expectations… When you manage expectations you are aligning everyone with the eventualities that may/will/have arisen.
Core Values
Next time you are in the office take a look at your corporate/core values; read them well, for they are the foundation of maintaining a healthy and positive environment that thrives to succeed. How is this relevant to the topic? Core values can be leveraged and integrated in any project/program; particularly in the case where you have diverse cultures, opinions and internal/external influences. For example, the concept/value of having “one global team that work together to realize the mission and goals of the organization” is a core value that is key to breaking any barriers between people working together positively.
Lesson learned here is to integrate core values in your project team; nurture and grow a positive environment that encourages people to speak up, challenge their peers and superiors, motivate and succeed. Don’t just talk about core values, you need to preach and evangelize them; the first step is making everyone believe, the second is having them trust that you (as a leader) will uphold these values at the cost of your reputation and even your job.
Perception of Reality
If you ever get caught in a situation where key tracking tools like status reports and KPIs are not reflecting the reality of a project, then you know you are in for some serious trouble. The tipping scale between reality and perception can very easily be swayed, and often when information is lacking or uncertain and opinions/assumptions of varying nature are made then it creates a wave of political deceit, collusion and “padding” that form the dangerous perception that others accept as reality.
Lesson learned here is to maximize and maintain transparency, honesty and traceability so as to secure and resonate the reality of a situation. Often times most people will cower from altering the perception of others to reflect the reality, as it could mean compromising their credibility and even their job. A solution to that problem is to gain the support of upper/senior management by escalating your concern, followed by a well-planned strategy in communicating the reality of a project in an effective and non-threatening way therefore breaking the flawed and overpowering perception that could lead to failure.
Zero Tolerance
Perhaps too strong for the politically balanced and calm/cool/collected types, but using a dash of force and a sprinkle of fear can often help in situations as sensitive and complex as the WM and SAP project. For example, if you sponsor and engage an employee incentives model within your project, it will help secure the commitment of your team with that extra edge you need to overcome challenging phases. Incentives, used in moral and reasonable ways, can be the “magic potion” that encourages, motivates and drives your team to push hard and deliver results without compromise.
In conclusion, we can learn a great deal from history, and one thing that has consistently resonated in most projects is that it actually takes a significant effort, sometimes even painstaking, to implement a successful ERP solution… So be honest with yourselves, set the right expectations, and don’t just expect effective management; fight for it!