BilkentMBA2010, Lessons Learned, Week 4, Gun Gokmen

Leadership Behaviors and Perception in Self-Managing Virtual Teams

• Leadership are two distinct concepts. We discussed the differences of each other.
• Our project teams sre examples of "Self-Managing Virtual Teams" (SMV) Leadership is more challenging here, since there is no defined leader and one should grab it himself.
• The important point is that, what people observe is behaviors. Two concepts here: task-oriented (getting work done) and relationship oriented (knowing who knows what, directs you to the right person; for example our department secretary).
• IBM Sametime is a similar program to Teamviewer
• Emergent leadership: becoming a leader later, emerging yourself.

Guest Speaker: ERP Implementation in FNSS Defense Industries

• Cigdem came to talk, she's an HR specialist in the company.
• FNSS had MRP systems before, making one think that change would be easier. But turned out to be not, end user resistance was high.
• The selected ERP system was IFS from Sweden for its flexibility and defense industry experience. (FNSS's designs changed frequently, was doing engineer-to-order) They went live on May 2009
• The most important thing is a dedicated team for implementation.
• It was expected 8 months, but turned out to be 13 months.
• the biggest problem with HR process was the organization chart. The relations were very hard to link, it took3 months.
• Choosing consultants is very important. "You have to love them, you spend too much time with them. They shoould be flexible, should know empathy."
• The benefits of the system won't be well understood until 18 months after implementation.
• According to Cigdem, it is not good to change everything at once, go one by one.
• 2 important points: Customization is expensive, master data cannot be changed.

The Lecture:

• Cost ingredients for Cisco: software, hardware, integration, headcount. The biggest cost was integration at Cisco.
• We should be prepared to pay twice the budget we estimated.
• Three trade-offs in ERP implementation:
• big-bang vs. phased (roll out) implementation
• outsourcing vs. in-housing staff and resources (cannot do full in-house, must outsource to some extent)
• high vs. low customization level (must be closer to implementing as is. )
• Also there is customization vs. business process reengineering. (changing the company for the program)
• We also talked about Accelerated SAP methodology and support pack upgrade.
• Realization: unit test - you only test ones that are critical.
• Final system cutover: switch from old to new system. Old system is shut off. It can also go in parallel for some time, but is more costly and time consuming.