How Using ERP for IT Services Helps Protect Your Business

Leveraging Your ERP for IT Services and Solutions

Before leveraging an ERP solution, you must first invest in one. And before investing in one, you need to know what it is. Simply put, a cloud ERP solution facilitates the seamless flow of information throughout an organization by integrating departments, processes, and people on a centralized platform. As a comprehensive business management system, it provides accounting, finance, inventory, CRM, sales (and more) functionalities and the ability to connect with third-party solutions. All companies in any industry can use ERP solutions, and all their teams, including IT, will benefit. ERP for IT services helps IT teams protect businesses and alleviate pain points.

Fitting ERP to Your IT Needs

IT team members are often unsung heroes. They implement, facilitate, and maintain companies’ IT systems and networks, making sure that everything runs smoothly. Even so, problems arise. IT pain points can include (but are not limited to) facing system failures, communication breakdowns, and cybersecurity issues, (re)defining remote working capabilities, and managing multiple tools, platforms, and subscriptions from many different vendors.

Whether it is a team of one or of many, the IT department must be able to resolve these pain points, and an IT ERP solution is a trustworthy remedy.

How ERP Helps

A cloud-based ERP solution, such as Acumatica Cloud ERP, provides IT departments with a business system that requires no hardware and is cohesive and connected. Instead of using multiple systems and platforms, the ERP software brings everything together under a single pane of glass. This gives IT experts a bird’s-eye view of their businesses’ entire operations from one dashboard.

When the inevitable pain points do occur, IT teams need only turn to one source for help. For example, when the pandemic forced businesses to become virtual workplaces, the transition was almost seamless for companies already relying on Acumatica’s cloud ERP software. PennAir—a distributor of pneumatics, hydraulics, and automation for the manufacturing industry—acclimated to the unprecedented challenges easily. Says CEO Seth Bray, “While our competition struggles to adapt, our team has been able to work anywhere and maintain business continuity under any scenario because we’re running PennAir on Acumatica in the cloud.”

The PennAir IT department—along with those of every business already using modern, cloud ERP technology—was not overwhelmed by the need to get employees up and running from home. A system that allows mobile access to updated, synchronized information was already in place.

In addition to their built-in mobility, most cloud-based ERP systems are easy to configure and customize. This means the IT department, when tasked with large requests or last-minute demands, can meet the challenge without taking time away from other, more strategic endeavors.

Bringing the Power of the Cloud to ERP

Cloud-based ERP solutions also offer other, powerful benefits. Acumatica’s 2021 Customer of the Year, Industrial Specialty Services (ISS), is an excellent example of a company that has experienced these benefits firsthand.

ISS, which provides integrated mechanical services and solutions to the refining, petrochemical, gas, power, pulp & paper, offshore and subsea markets, chose Acumatica as its cloud ERP solution and implemented the system within six months while facing a number of challenges, including the pandemic and three hurricanes. The ERP implementation was successful, and ISS CEO James Craig says, “The primary idea was to create a solution that was designed around the cloud. It was a critical element because we wanted to get away from maintaining servers or being responsible for them. We wanted to limit as much network infrastructure as possible, so we can stay focused on what we do best, which is servicing businesses in their plants and not running an overdone IT show. We needed a solution we could trust and that we knew would work with the services we provide.”

Indeed, ISS now has:

• The ability to see and control business performance through a centralized ERP solution.
• A flexible, scalable, and collaborative platform.
• Operational efficiencies through user adoption.
• Access to data in real time.
• An intuitive and easy-to-use interface.

ISS overcame great odds and is on its way to great success.

How Acumatica Can Help

As ISS’s story indicates, Acumatica Cloud ERP is well equipped to help your IT department leverage its ERP platform to navigate and manage challenges and pain points. An ERP for IT services, or an IT ERP, is a critical tool for succeeding in today’s digital economy.

It’s also critical that, before choosing and implementing your cloud ERP solution, you get IT buy-in. IT experts have knowledge and insights about what your business needs and can offer advice as to which cloud ERP solution is best.

If you would like to learn more, please contact us.

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