Business and technology transformationBy Alex Roan

  • What if an organisation loses it's Enterprise Resource Planning system (ERP)?

    by Alex Roan on Jul 2, 2024

    This happened to Huawei in May 2019. President Trump used an executive order to block Huawei from transacting for information or communications technology with US organisations. An obvious impact for Huawei's mobile handset business was the loss of access to Google's android platform and services. Less obvious was the loss of access to Oracle's ERP software. The impact of this may have been bigger.

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  • Business framework

    by Alex Roan on Jun 18, 2024

    One of the challenges of improving operations is identifying and prioritising where to focus. A good way to provide some structure to the approach and to improve communications is by working with a framework or map which helps to visualise the areas of the business and the nature of possible improvements.

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  • Information gathering

    by Alex Roan on Jun 13, 2024

    My 4-step process to gather information for transformation projects. Uncovering operational details is often a challenge for programs such as restructuring, process design, IT implementations and acquisitions and divestitures.

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  • Improving stakeholder interactions

    by Alex Roan on Jun 22, 2015

    One easy way to improve the likelihood of a project or initiative being successful is to interact with stakeholders in a skilled way. Some of the benefits of good stakeholder interaction

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  • Can sites like 'freelance.com' shake up traditional professional services?

    by Alex Roan on Jun 22, 2015

    Can tools like freelance.com replace traditional professional services? I have been thinking about this in reference to management consultants, lawyers, tax advisors etc. Yesterday I listened to an [episode](http://www.jamesaltucher.com/2015/06/how-to-get-paid-for-what-youre-good-at-with-matt-barrie/) of the James Altucher podcast which discussed this.

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  • YouTube Let's Play and How Businesses Can Benefit

    by Alex Roan on Jun 6, 2015

    I remember on one project a Russian business expert was offended by an Indian consultant shaking his head in disagreement. The Russian person didn't know that in India a certain shaking of the head indicates 'I am listening'. In another project in Morocco a user requirement was almost missed because a local expert was ashamed to tell a foreigner that a donkey was a transportation type that needed to be programmed into the process and system.

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  • Advice On Selecting Project & Outsourcing Service Providers

    by Alex Roan on Jun 6, 2015

    I remember on one project a Russian business expert was offended by an Indian consultant shaking his head in disagreement. The Russian person didn't know that in India a certain shaking of the head indicates 'I am listening'. In another project in Morocco a user requirement was almost missed because a local expert was ashamed to tell a foreigner that a donkey was a transportation type that needed to be programmed into the process and system.

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  • Tools & techniques to manage business processes

    by Alex Roan on Jun 4, 2015

    Working on improving business processes is popular, but sometimes organisations do the wrong things at the wrong time; spending money on process related projects which underdeliver on benefits. Often times the actual value of process work is hidden behind various technical sounding methods, tools, techniques and software. The first step to choosing the right process improvement approach is to understand some of the terminology out there. Here is a run down of various process terms, methods, tools and software followed up with some thoughts on choosing the right approach.

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