Implementing ERP As Business Process System In Skycity NZ: A Replacement Strategy

Overview of Skycity NZ

Skycity NZ is one of the major convention centres known for the development of casinos as well as event centres. It is specifically prominent in its establishment in Auckland, New Zealand with its base located in the Auckland Sky Tower. Being one of the most prominent casino business centres in the country, it is the second casino in the entire of New Zealand and the only casino situated in the area of Auckland (“SKYCITY Auckland – Hotels | Restaurants | Bars | Casino | Entertainment | Conventions”, 2018). The organization would thus need a system to organize the data generated everyday in the business. The data generated everyday in the business can be huge. The organization has already thought about strategizing to shift the business process into the cloud using Microsoft Dynamics 365 (Nwankpa, 2015). However, it can be seen that the strategy is faulty enough and thus this report consists of a replacement strategy by implementing ERP into the business. The report would cover the reasons why ERP implementation is better than Cloud and would put forward the situational analysis, strategy of implementation, security, and IT requirement for implementing ERP as the business process system to the organization of Skycity.

Being one of the most prominent casino business centres in the country, it is the second casino in the entire of New Zealand and the only casino situated in the area of Auckland. The business is spread over a huge area including a theatre consisting of 700 seats, convention centres numerous bars and restaurants and two hotels as well. The casino itself consists of over 16,000 gaming machines and game tables over 100 in number.

Skycity NZ has the vision to provide their customers with world-class entertainment. It has a mission to thrill the customers with stupendous excitement, and also to generate the feeling inside everyone as if they have emerged as a winner. That just not includes the customers but also applies to the staff and workforce of the organization as well.

Ever since the announcement has been made by Microsoft about its Dynamic 365 product, Skycity Entertainment has used the Dynamics 365 that is expected to roll out the support to handle over 60,000 staff all across New Zealand (van der Aalst, Li & Montali, 2017). The business edition of Dynamic 365 mostly targeted the SMBs which consisted of the following:

• Microsoft Power Apps that are used for the development of customised applications
• Dynamics repackaging for taking tabs on the employee management system

However it can be noticed that the number of total employees in the business process have encountered a huge turnover and the number of employees were difficult to keep a tab on every time. The contract with Skycity NZ and Cloud implementation by Dynamicx 365 ensured the focus to the finances and the supply chain management (Liao, Huang & Lin, 2018). It had confirmed the solution was able to provide the numbers in real time and the analytics for Skycity that would deliver the insights in accordance to the data that has been delivered till date. This would enable the clients to set standards for the financial practises that have been around the organization with the utilization of the best service practice guidelines that had been included in the Dynamics 365 for further operations.

Current Business Process and Challenges

Asset register and evaluation depends on the complexity of networks, connecting devices that have the ability to connect to the internet. The following table contains the asset register and valuations for the organization in New Zealand for the years 2017 and 2018.

Table 1: Asset register and valuation

(Source: Created by author)

Some software applications used by Skycity NZ include Microsoft Dynamics 365. It is used mostly for reporting and the software is used for the employee evaluation. These applications are used for various purposes. It also uses the software systems in order to manage the functioning of the back-end telecommunication functions.

Skycity NZ is an organization that aims to provide an experience of fun and frolic to the customers all throughout the time spend over there. In addition to that, it aims in handling every employee problem with ease and does not intend to leave any stone unturned in making the customers have a full blown experience.

Cloud implementation with the help of Microsoft Dynamics 365 has been recently revamped in the business process of Skycity NZ (Chang, 2016). This process has been successful in handling the business process for the organization implementing its utilization to the employee management system and data handling. However, as per reports, cloud implementation particularly for this business purpose would be problematic for the disadvantages it already possesses. These can be figured out as below:

• Potentially long term commitments to the service providers:The implementation of the cloud services for the business would require paying for the services and that has to be done in a routine manner. This routine payment would not fall under any time constraints and sometimes even require payment of the services over and indefinite future (Sarkis & Sundarraj, 2015). This would generate further complications regarding the payment methods if any kind of managerial changes be implemented in the business process. Further it would create complications for the payment methods and any kind of non-payment would make the service providers to abstain from further providing of services.
• Limited Customization or flexibility:Customization is a dire necessity for any kind of business, and especially for those business processes that incur a huge amount of data every day. The business process of Skycity involves the spead of the business over a span of a huge area including a theatre consisting of 700 seats, convention centres numerous bars and restaurants and two hotels as well. The casino itself consists of over 16,000 gaming machines and game tables over 100 in number (Kumar, 2018). The organization would thus need a system to organize the data generated everyday in the business (Kegg et al., 2017). In addition, it is not justifiable to say that every day the generated data would be just the same and there would be no need of agility or flexibility to the business process due to the generated data. Therefore, the business process would suffer a huge problem due to the rigidity of the system.
• Security issues:Cloud implementation is one of the most agile features of running a business process. However, it has numerous added security risks associated with its structure. Cloud interface do not possess any physical existence. The entire storage capacity of cloud is much more than one can imagine (Saravanan & Sundar, 2015). Therefore, it falls short on being a secured structure as there can be numerous incidents of data mismanagement due to the huge storage area for the business as well as the data handling. Due to the risks associated with the system, it would be extremely problematic for the business to put the data and information of the organization at jeopardy.

Table 2: 5 year IT Strategic Plan

(Source: Created by Author)

The Operational Plan and objective for the organization Skycity NZ needs to follow the plan according to the strategies taken and stick to it in order to make sure that the ERP implementation is not facing any further risks that would most likely increase the budget of the plan. According to reports, this deal between Microsoft and Skycity had won a competitive tender that had based it selection on the commitment of Intergen positioning on the working relationship (Harwood, 2017). The deputy CFO of Skycity, Mr. Richard Smith was however sceptical about the setup that had been implemented in the organization for keeping tabs on the employee management as well as the data generated per day given the business structure. There had been various reasons that would implement advantages on the structure of the business due to the latest business process; however, there are also added disadvantages that have made the business process fall prey to the various types of risks (Nagpal, Khatri & Kumar, 2015). The following report would look for the risks that can be found in the business structure due to the latest implementation in the business process.

Why Implement ERP instead of Cloud?

Capital Expenditure Budget Plans

Table 2: Capital expenditure budget plan

(Source: Created by author)

Operational Budget Plan

Table 3: Operational Budget Plan

(Source: Created by Author)

Data security system that ERP provides is a new system that improves the consistency, accuracy, and security of data given its built-in firewalls and resources. Restrictions to data can also be enhanced with the help of the solution management team. This ensures total security to the data generated each day in the business process.

There are numerous advantages that Enterprise resource Planning or ERP possesses if implemented as a business process propagation system. This includes how the risk associated with the Microsoft Dynamics 365 would be mitigated with the latest implementation (Bazazo et al., 2017). Amongst the various benefits, the following would describe why implementing ERP would be a better choice than implementing Microsoft Dynamics 365:

• Efficiency: Any ERP implementation solution would most likely eliminate the repetitive nature of the otherwise existing business process in the system. The system helps in streamlining the business process and would make it efficient for the companies to collect employee data irrespective of the department any individual employee works in.
• Forecasting: ERP software has the ability to provide the users with the tools that are needed to make sure of the accurate forecasts (Luszczak, 2016). It generally helps the management officials to forecast about the business in the possible long run. Since it provides the users with almost accurate assumptions, it becomes easy for the officials to make realistic estimates and effective forecasts about the business further.
• Collaboration: It is important that the business processes are able to collaborate with each other rather than having a rigid and agile software system. With the data entered into ERP systems being centralized and consistent, there’s no reason why departments can’t work together (Zerbino et al., 2017). The software also touches on almost every aspect of a business, thus naturally encouraging collaborative, interdepartmental efforts. This forms an advantage over the existing information handling system for Skycity NZ.
• Cost saving: Since the ERP system has accurate and real-time information handling as well was almost exact forecasting capabilities, it allows manufacturers to proactively manage operations, prevents disruptions and delays, breaks up information logjams and helps users make decisions more quickly.

Therefore, it can be found that ERP implementation is much more feasible in comparison with Microsoft Dynamics 365 for the business process of Skycity NZ.

The requirements for implementing ERP system in a business process data handling for Skycity NZ can be listed as follows:

• Identification of the provision in the organization: The primary requirement in the implementation of ERP system in the organization of Skycity NZ is the provision to check whether the current business environment would be ready for the latest implementation (Kulkarni et al., 2015). If anything in the business process needs alteration or elimination or exchanging, that should be noted in order to make it a perfect environment to implement.
• Training and resources: A well-orchestrated vendor training program is flexible and comprehensive for the implementation of successful ERP implementation. It offers both live and online training, and both introductory and continuing education (Ptak & Schragenheim, 2016). Some vendors even provide training resources that are targeted for specific roles and jobs in the organization. This is needed so that the ERP system could be handled flawlessly.
• Support and maintenance: The purchasing of ERP system is just not the only requirement but a team should also be made at the ready for any need of support and maintenance required in the ERP system.
• Software usability: The role of software usability in ERP adoption should not be overlooked. The easier the software is to use and to understand, the more your users will welcome it.

The staff hired by the company must go through a proper session of training that would help them in their work. The staff-training plan of the company has been decided for a period of 12 months. The training provided would cover the basic training regarding the rules and regulations to be followed by the employees of the company. It would then include the training of employees regarding the key technologies that is being used by the organization such as ERP handling, Data analysis, Data Entry and others.

Along with all these, the offline service providers will be trained in better management of customer relationship. They would also be trained on the usage of information system.

Conclusion

Therefore, it can be concluded from the above report that it would be better for the organization of Skycity NZ to implement ERP in the business system rather than the technology management system it has been using, which is the Microsoft Dynamics 365 in cloud. This is because Skycity NZ is one of the major convention centers known for the development of casinos as well as event centers. The organization would thus need a system to organize the data generated everyday in the business. The data generated everyday in the business can be huge. The organization has already thought about strategizing to shift the business process into the cloud using Microsoft Dynamix. However, it can be seen that the strategy is faulty enough and thus this report consists of a replacement strategy by implementing ERP into the business. The report thus covers the reasons why ERP implementation is better than Cloud and would put forward the requirements for successfully implementing ERP as the business process system to the organization of Skycity. The various disadvantages that the traditional system holds had been described thoroughly in the report along with the advantages the new ERP implementation would have that would help in mitigating the risks imposed by the existing system.

Reference

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Chang, J. F. (2016). Business process management systems: strategy and implementation. CRC Press.

Harwood, S. (2017). ERP: The implementation cycle. Routledge.

Kegg, D., Guilmette, A., Mandich, L., & Fisher, E. (2017). Microsoft Office 365 Administration Inside Out (Includes Current Book Service). Microsoft Press.

Kulkarni, A., Hegde, N., Sharma, M., Kulkarni, A. A., Hegde, N., & Sharma, M. (2015). Educational ERP systems in the market–a comparative study. International Journal of Innovative Research Science in Technology, 1.

Kumar, C. R. (2018). ENTERPRISE RESOURCE PLANNING SYSTEMS IN TOURISM INDUSTRY. Editorial Board, 7(2), 241.

Liao, L. M., Huang, C. J., & Lin, X. Y. (2018). Applying Project Management Perspective for ERP Implementation: A Case Study. Proceedings of Engineering and Technology Innovation, 8, 40-45.

Luszczak, A. (2016). Using Microsoft Dynamics AX: The New Dynamics ‘AX 7 ‘. Springer.

Nagpal, S., Khatri, S. K., & Kumar, A. (2015, May). Comparative study of ERP implementation strategies. In Systems, Applications and Technology Conference (LISAT), 2015 IEEE Long Island (pp. 1-9). IEEE.

Nwankpa, J. K. (2015). ERP system usage and benefit: A model of antecedents and outcomes. Computers in Human Behavior, 45, 335-344.

Ptak, C. A., & Schragenheim, E. (2016). ERP: tools, techniques, and applications for integrating the supply chain. Crc Press.

Saravanan, R., & Sundar, C. (2015). DERIVATION AND VALIDATION OF A CONCEPTUAL MODEL FOR ERP IMPLEMENTATION SUCCESS FACTORS-AN INDIAN CONTEXT. Journal of Theoretical and Applied Information Technology, 78(1), 132.

Sarkis, J., & Sundarraj, R. P. (2015). ERP-enabled business process reengineering: implications from Texas Instruments. In Business process transformation (pp. 157-170). Routledge.

SKYCITY Auckland – Hotels | Restaurants | Bars | Casino | Entertainment | Conventions. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.skycityauckland.co.nz/

van der Aalst, W. M., Li, G., & Montali, M. (2017). Object-centric behavioral constraints. arXiv preprint arXiv:1703.05740.

Zerbino, P., Aloini, D., Dulmin, R., & Mininno, V. (2017). Framing ERP Success from an Information Systems Failure Perspective: A Measurement Endeavor. Journal of Electronic Commerce in Organizations (JECO), 15(2), 31-47.

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