ERP Post-Implementation Performance Audit

The City Auditor released a new audit today. Fortunately for all of you, I haven't had time to read anything except the executive overview. That's the part where they dumb it down for the decision makers. I'm pretty sure I'm not allowed to take the whole 56 pages to bed with me. That kind of thing usually gets overruled in our house. Here's the short story. ERP stands for Enterprise Resource Planning system. The City chose PeopleSoft to integrate Human Resources and Finance functions. The auditor's findings? Not good. Age old story in the enterprise software business. Company sales team comes in with highly trained individuals who know the software inside and out (I used to be one of these guys). They put on a dog and pony show. Everything looks awesome. People ooh and ahh. Look how easy he makes it seem! The purchase is made. A few people get some topical training, they throw a few user manuals at IT and suddenly things don't seem to work as slick as they did in the demo. I'll find some time to read the audit over the weekend. I'm very curious to see Mark Funkhouser's recommendations. In the mean time, just be thankful my wife has more common sense than I do and knows that performance audits don't make good nighttime reading for me. You all get a reprieve from my Paper Chase outline version. For now...