ERP Books

Being a Procure to Pay consultant(Certified in SRM / MM / FI) i was looking for books on FI to improve my skillset on FI. I initially purchased the book "Optimize your ERP Financials Implementation - Shivesh Sharma" but returned back the book with exchange to other book as the book did not contain any topics on optimization as was advertised and also the purpose for configuration is not explained properly.

Then i purchased this book "Discover SAP ERP Financials" by Manish Patel ($40.00 from SAP-PRESS). The book has surpassed the expectations. I thought this would be very basic but the author did an excellent job in explaining the topics with the latest optimization techniques. The case studies and the new optimization techniques are described in a great detail. Though this book does NOT talk about configuration in SAP , but it gives enough knowledge as to WHY you need to configure. In contrast the book by Shivesh Sharma does not have any optimization techniques /case studies and no configuration logic.

If you are an MM consultant and would like to venture into AP, then you would be thrilled to read the chapters 3 (Payables) , 4 (Taxation) and 5 (Bank Transactions). Manish Patel mentions about the new optimization techniques including e-payments through ORBIAN and OFX (Open Financial Exchange).

SD consultants would love the topic on processing incoming payments through LockBox processing and the EBS (Electronic Bank Statement) processing with the details on Interpretation Algorithm and Search Strings. An excellent case study on how a civic government achieved a better control on working capital management by processing the property tax payments through Lockbox. There is a separate chapter on Collections, Dispute and Credit Management.

HR consultants would appreciate the integration of major reservation systems AMADEUS , SABRE , GALILEO with SAP Travel management. It is interesting to read how the miles earned through flights is used for future reservations. Payroll accounting and detailed case study on a corporate plans to implement travel management sums it up.

A must have book for SAP consultants of all modules. Also useful to new FI/CO consultants.

It is now time for SAP-PRESS to come up with separate books on each of the sub-modules in FI ( AP/AR , Asset Accounting , FI Planning/Consolildation/New G/L ...etc). Manish Patel should team up with experts in each domain and come up with these books with Practical Approach.

The book outlines, not only, the technology of the internet and E-commerce, but much of the politics and theory as well. I found it educating, as well as, entertaining. A must read for anyone new to the internet world of business.

This book is very intersting and very helpfull for now day IT. Even if I did not need it for school I would have bought it to expand my professional knowledge.

The situation in the manufacturing industry in the United States in 2008 is as follows: All surviving US manufacturing companies are implementing or planning on implementing lean manufacturing principles and practices. All successful US manufacturing companies are doing or have done extensive lean manufacturing implementations. At the same time ERP systems remain as the backbone of the business enterprise integrating all the business functions within the organization. Manufacturing, accounting, sales, human resources, in fact all business function share this same powerful database.

Brian Carroll's 2nd edition of "Lean Performance ERP Project Management - Implementing the Virtual Lean Enterprise" provides management and operations practitioners with an excellent guide and reference as to how these two powerful systems and tools can be combined to achieve the productivity gains that companies are seeking. The book includes a history and evolution of lean manufacturing and an overview of lean principles and tools. Included also is a step-by-step guide for the project manager to apply these lean principles and practices while at the same time getting the full benefit of the power of an ERP system.

I can tell you from personal experience that these tools work. Having used Brian's methodology within my own organization we were able to achieve significant improvements in business processes and achieve our performance improvement goals of reduced cost, reduced cycle time, improved delivery performance, and the elimination of defects. I know that this book can also be a great resource for you company's improvement projects.

Carl Ollerer
Director of Manufacturing
Peerless Industries

This book is a must for any FI or MM consultants who want to take up a new assignment as an AP consultant. I have done one AP implementation before and this book has cleared some of the doubts that i had.

This book is much better and covered more information than the "Invoice Verification for SAP R/3" by Stephen Birchall.

However there is no information regarding posting incoming invoices through EDI. I was expecting some information on EDI invoices especially with the difficulty in settling planned delivery costs through EDI.

Overall, i liked this book.

This is a great book for any developer or even functinal guy who doesn't know much about Dynamics AX and wants to get a good briefing about the most important points regarding quality when developing, implementing and deploying a ERP project based on Dynamics AX. I really recommend it, it is not too long so it is "easy reading", but it has good "recipes" coming from real experience in the field, as you can tell when reading this book.

This book focus on kind of things which are critical for any AX project but you might not be aware when you just learn technical or functional aspects about AX (regular courses), that's why I beleive it is very interesting.

César de la Torre
Microsoft MBS-ISV Developer Evangelist
Microsoft - DPE

This is much more than a book - it's a book/service combination that is one of the most unique concepts for marrying traditional paper-based products with the web.

What you get: 132-page guidebook that provides (1) a structured process for evaluating the alignment of your ERP system to business processes, (2) a comprehensive list of questions to which you need to provide answers, and (3) a web URL for entering your responses, which generates a report. The report shows where you are and what areas need attention.

The book: Contains an 8-stage process flow for the evaluation. (1) identify need, (2) review scorecard system, (3) choose sections to be answered, (4) go online, (5) enter responses into system provided by the publisher, (6) receive scorecard and comparison report by e-mail, (7) review results, and (8) implement process improvement strategies as indicated by the report.

The questions in the book are divided into key process areas as follow: (1) General questions, (2) Environmental characteristics, (3) Initial decision criteria, (4) Project Management, (5) TQM, JIT and continuous improvement, (6) Strategic planning, (7) People systems, (8) Training and education, (9) Performance measurements, (10) Ccommunication infrastructure, (11) Product design and development, and (12) Operational set-up, planning and control. The questions elicit scaled responses; i.e., you are given a range from 1-10 as a possible response to most questions.

The service: Go to the URL provided, select Scorecard, select the key process areas for which you want an assessment and commence inputting your responses. You will receive an e-mail within a few days with the results and a baseline with which to compare where you are with where you should be based on survey averages. The format of the report is: question number in rows and statistics in columns as follow: Question, Result (your response), survey average for all surveys received, the difference between you and the average, industry average (based on the SIC code you entered), the difference between your average and your industry's average, software average computed per your specific ERP package and the average of all respondents using that package, and the difference between your score and the software average. This information is the basis of a gap analysis that is your responsibility to perform. It highlights where you stand in comparison to other respondents to the survey as an aggregate average, by industry and by specific software package.

Some points about the service: The more responses to the survey the bigger the difference between your ranking and the averages, which means that you should consider re-taking the survey at intervals (6 months is a safe interval). The web page claims that it is best viewed with Internet Explorer - I had no problems navigating around using Netscape version 4.77. Also, there are no hidden costs - the survey report is truly at no additional charge. Finally, the suggested strategy is to perform the evaluation in stages. This will allow you to focus on key process areas and take action to remedy gaps instead of being overwhelmed by an overly ambitious initiative.

The package as a whole: The book itself is a valuable resource to consultants because the question bank provided is usually closely guarded intellectual property. I personally intend to use it as the basis for a risk assessment spreadsheet, which will be a valuable tool. The service, including the report generated, will literally save a company tens of thousands of dollars in consulting fees.

I am more than pleased with this book - I am amazed. The quality of the questions, the approach itself, and the reports are valuable beyond what I imagined when I purchased this book. It gets 5 stars and my strongest recommendation to anyone, business or technical, who wants to take a snapshot of how well their ERP system is aligned to their business processes.

I decided to revisit this timeless classic since I hadn't read it since high school and hardly remembered it, which made me feel like I was missing out on something. The whole novel was entirely fresh to me and I was swept away once I got into it (and got past some of the southern language, accented speech and Ebonics). Mostly, I was enamored with Atticus Finch. His demeanor and sensibilities were remarkable under the circumstances and I admired the way he handled his relationships with his children. I also enjoyed watching Scout and Jem mature over the course of the years. It is no wonder the themes and characters have remained a staple in American literature for the last 50 years. The courtroom scene is riveting, the racial commentary poignant, the perspective priceless. Everyone should read this at least once in their lives if only to savor the richness and depth of Harper Lee's brilliance.

Her voices for the various characters and her southern accent are enchanting. She was a pleasure to listen to. The story is told by Scout, the daughter of Atticus, an attorney defending a black man accused of rape. The story illustrates the ugliness of racial inequalities in the South which hurts. But it also shows human goodness with a decent ending.

DATA:
Story length: 12.3 hours. Language: offensive racial slurs. Setting: Maycomb, Alabama, prior to 1960. Copyright: 1960. Genre: human relationships fiction and race relations.

This book captivates the mind with its wonderful adventures and adorable characters. Seeing the world through the eyes of an eight year old may sound dumb, and not a great way to spend you time. On the contrary, the memories that you had as a chold growing up emerge from a long sleep and you start to remember your adventure. Remember the haunted mansion down the street? the old man who murdered his wife? Well, this story talks about those stories, and more. It talks about matters that even most adults don't approach in the modern world. The setting is in the depths of the Great Depression, and it takes place in little Maycomb County, Alabama. The story weaves in and out of race, caste systems, and everyday life alongside fun in an "in-depth" story. This book has much more depth than when first read. Many chapters that seem random aren't that strange for they all have a meaning. I personally loved this book. I read it at school and it brought so much fun while reading it. It also brought the thrill of watching a trial through the eyes of a child. We as the readers are made to think in this book, but not so much that it's hard. Because our lives have progressed so much we see that her world is very different from ours right now. But similarities are still there. A couple of chapters in this book represent how even though something looks like it has been uprooted from our world (ex: racism), to get it to go away, you have to dig it up from it's roots. One major theme in this story is Roots and History. It even has a little tale of puppy love! (Remember those first crushes?). I realize that I make it sound bad, but that is because in class we do tend to overthink everything. That's why if you're an intellectual reader or just someone who likes books or to pass time, no matter what genre you like, this book will appeal to you. Buy this book or borrow it from a library or a friend and read it, because it will touch your heart as a great book and warm your heart as a human being. The movie though... Well, that's another story.

If you haven't read this book yet, stop whatever it is that you're doing, go immediately to a book store, and pick this up. To Kill a Mockingbird is among the best books I've ever read.

For those that haven't read this, or haven't seen the film version with Gregory Peck, which is also outstanding, To Kill a Mockingbird is about the Finch family. Atticus Finch is a lawyer and widower in a small Alabama town during the Great Depression. He has two children: Jem, an 11-year old boy, and Scout, an 8-year old girl. Their lives are turned upside down when Atticus is appointed to represent Tom Robinson, a black man accused of raping a white woman. The story is told from Scout's perspective.

While the story is framed around social and racial issues in the South, it's really about much more than that: primarily, it's a story about growing up. The Robinson case makes the transitions that Jem and Scout go through much more dramatic, but they experience the same kind of wonder and confusion that all of us experience as we move from childhood to young adulthood.

Atticus is exactly the kind of person we aspire to be: honest, caring, understanding, moral, and unflappable. You sort of get the impression of Atticus as the last righteous man. Atticus lives his philosophy: "The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience" (p. 120). In short, Atticus is the emodiment of human dignity--not just for himself, but for others too. If you aren't moved by his closing argument in the Robinson trial, you may be in a coma.

I thought it was odd, and somewhat revealing hearing the kids, especially Scout, describe their father: "Atticus was feeble: he was nearly fifty. When Jem and I asked him why he was so old, he said he got started late, which we felt reflected upon his abilities and manliness....Our father didn't do anything. He worked in an office, not in a drugstore. Atticus didn't drive a dump truck for the county, he was not the sheriff, he did not farm, work in a garage, or do anything that could possibly arouse the admiration of anyone." Ouch. But this is Scout with a child's perspective; her growing maturity changes the way both she and Jem see their father.

Harper Lee never wrote another novel; she grew up with and remained a close friend of Truman Capote's until his death. Harper Lee and Gregory Peck also remained close friends until his demise; Peck's grandson was named Harper in her honor.

To Kill a Mockingbird won the Pulitzer Prize for a reason: it's a masterpiece. Its warmth, compassion, comedy, and tragedy are rendered with such humanity that it honestly blew me away. I can't recommend it enough. Read it today.

The only reason this book deserves one star is that something interesting actually happened,albeit AT THE END OF THE FRIGGIN' BOOK!
I swear watching Teletubbies or mold grow in your shower is more interesting than this book.I could not get through half of it.
Nothing even goes on until the very end.By then though,you have given up as did I.
I agree that the book has a good plot but, how the plot is written is an entirely different story.One reviewer on here said that it sounded like it was written by a fifth grader.I wholeheartedly agree.I will never pick up this book again.

I found both of Ellen's books to be very valuable, not only as study guides and 'memory joggers' but also in my everyday work place. They are both valuable tools no BA can afford to be without!

I'm a consultant for requirements and training and also teach a university extension program on the subject and this is a great book that describes the process from a-z. It uses a variety of sources and has selected what is a good best practices list. It also has some good examples and diagrams.

The organization takes a little getting used to, mostly because there is a lot of information in a small package. I wish there also was a better linkage between the material and the references so I could go directly to the source for more info. Other than that, this is one of the better books to have on your shelf as an overall requirements reference.

I have read several books on requirements; And I must say this one is exceptional in content and delivery.Thanks Ellen keep doing your stuff.

This is good reference material. I am a Sr. BA with BCBSA. I have been referencing this guide for helpful tips and methods to elicit requirements. It is a good compliment and addition to the library but do not rely on it to get you through if you do not have experience as a BA.

I bought this because I have and like Gottesdiner's "Requirements by Collaboration." The idea of the "Memory Jogger" was very appealing. That is, my requirement was to have quick access to the essential requirements of the requirements process that I could use as a content and quality sanity check throughout the development project life cycle.

What "Memory Jogger" delivered was a good basic text on the requirements process presented in a virtually unusable format.

The rationale behind the "pocket-sized" format is beyond me. This will not fit into my pocket. I'm already carrying a laptop, a project binder (or two) and probably a flip chart; one more reasonably-sized book isn't going to make much difference in what I'm lugging around. Indeed, its size, shape, and weight guarantee that the "Memory Jogger" will either constantly slip from the stack I'm carrying around or get buried under the stacks on my desk.

The more serious problem with the format is that the type is too small. In attempting to fold a reasonably complete text on requirements into the inappropriate format, the publisher has reduced point size as well as cramped character spacing. In some sections the spacing between words has been reduced to the extent that the text is virtually unreadable.

An additional issue with the small page format is that most sentences are wrapped around multiple lines - one example that I'm looking at right now runs to five lines, making it hard to read and comprehend. Multi-column tables are obviously even worse. Let me emphasize that this is not because the content is verbose or poorly written; it's because of the constraints of the format.

The reviewer who was looking for flip charts or fold-outs is on the right track. I would also suggest that a more extensive use of color would have been useful, say by tipping the pages of each section in a different color. This would be a nice, fast visual indicator - one could flip quickly to the green section or the purple section as one needed.

This book will prove especially useful to the ones not in the know of ERP (and not only ERP) implementation project management. It has a really comprehensive chapter sequence and it is easy to read even by people that have just a year's experience on SAP (or other ERP software). The key concepts -pointed out by the author - that make an ERP implementation succesfull are useful to both consultants & managers.
For the ones already experienced in project management though, it is just a different opinion on the matter.

I've been collecting implementation/admin books over the last few months in prep for a large CRM and BW install at a client site. This one is fine from a generic perspective, but needs to be updated if the author expects people to still buy it. I'll stick with Jose Hernandez's admin book, George Anderson's implementation book, and Naeem Hashmi's BW book - the best out there.

i think more case study should be place in the books to allows reader understand the real environment.

This book takes the reader through an actual European R/3 implementation. It describes in detail the steps and most importantly gives practical "lessons learned" in each phase of the project. It is as unbiased a book as I have seen. You should read this BEFORE you select a project integrator, if for no other reason than to keep the consultant honest.

This concise, well-written book brings numerous practical examples and forms to light. It offers helpful summaries of key points. I was especially pleased that one can read this book within two hours and still have a useful reference text, even if you are a veteran of SAP or other software implementation projects.