Conceptualizing Enterprise Systems from an Integrationist Perspective

A purported feature of Enterprise Systems (ES) is that they are “integrated”; meaning that they in some sense bring parts into a unified whole. However, it is far from clear what is integrated into what, or how integration is achieved in practice. Moreover, the very concepts of integration and other related, fundamental concepts such as ‘organization’, ‘coordination’ and ‘knowledge’ are abstruse. To this end, the purpose of this contribution is to make an inquiry into integration by departing from the perspective of integrationism; a new development in the theory of communication. This view is further elaborated using Vygotsky’s distinction between lower and higher mental functions, and the notion of activity modalities suggested by Taxén. Integration thus conceived provides a foundation from which inquiries into ESs, both from a theoretical and practical point of view can be carried out. The ideas in the foundation are illustrated by some examples from the Ericsson telecommunication company. A sketch of an ES implementation method is outlined. The main conclusion is that a thorough ground for advancing the knowledge about Enterprise Systems can be established only if our unique human predispositions for coordinating and integrating actions are considered; something which may have far-reaching consequences for advancing our knowledge about Enterprise Systems. INTRODUCTION Enterprise Systems (ES) have made a major break-through in organizations in the last decades, mainly in the form of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems such as SAP, Baan, Oracle, and People-Soft. A definition of such systems, which appear to have been adopted by the community, is given by Davenport: “...the seamless integration of all the information flowing through a company financial and accounting information, human resource information, supply chain information, and customer information.” (Davenport, 1998, p 121) In addition to ERP systems, Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) systems are becoming increasingly important in organizations. PLM systems are designed to managing revisions and configurations; mainly during the development of products and services, while ERP systems are transactional oriented without revision control. As such, both systems are enterprise-wide, integrative systems, however different in nature 1 . For the purpose of this paper I will include also PLM systems in ESs. As is well-known, the implementation 2 of ESs in organizations is hazardous, often resulting in spectacular failures. An extensive amount of research has been devoted to analyze the success or failure of ERP projects (for an overview, see Cumbie et al., 2005). Usually, such research efforts try to identify various “factors” that can explain the outcomes (e.g. Gargeya & Brady, 2005). However, the results are fragmented in the sense that it is hard to find some underlying framework or theory that is capable of explaining how all these factors are interrelated. One reason for this is that there is no consensus about fundamental concepts such as ‘organi1 An interesting observation is that PLM-systems, in contrast to ERP systems, have by and large been ignored by the research community. This is indeed surprising since the information in PLM systems is a prerequisite for that which is subsequently managed in ERP systems. 2 By implementation I mean all activities necessary to make an ES a resource in an organization, such as adaptation of a vendor platform to specific organizational needs, user training and acceptance, operation, maintenance, and the like. Lars Taxén, Associate Professor Linköping University [email protected]