Building Effective Partnerships: A Roadmap for Postsecondary ERP Implementations

Technology expenditures at colleges and universities grew by more than nine percent between 2000 and 2001 to reach $4.7 billion, with spending on vendors' ERP solutions growing 14 percent to $764 million. Moreover, most institutions plan to move ahead with scheduled upgrades and replacements of ERP systems, according to findings from the 2002 Campus Computing Survey, despite a challenging fiscal climate for many colleges and universities.

The survey reveals that upgrading and/or replacing ERP systems - including student information systems, financial aid, accounting/financial management, and admissions/recruitment solutions - remain top priorities for many colleges and universities. Eduventures believes that as institutions seek to update and unify disparate, often homegrown administrative systems, spending on ERP systems will continue to grow over the next few years.

Building Effective Partnerships: A Roadmap for Postsecondary ERP Implementations highlights the importance and value of establishing strong vendor-institution relations in support of enterprise software adoptions and implementations, through the lens of PeopleSoft and some of its key institutional partners. The study examines factors driving vendor-institution partnerships and explores the changing nature of relationships between vendors and institutions. Additionally, and perhaps most importantly, through studying leading partnership practices, Building Effective Partnerships offers a series of recommendations for developing strong vendor-institution relationships and examines the potential benefits to be gained by effective management of these relationships.