Sage 100 ERP software has helped thousands of small-to-mid-sized businesses (SMBs) run their operations successfully since its inception in 1985. However, the software possesses inherent functional gaps that can become acutely more painful as businesses evolve over time. During the webinar, “From Pain to Gain: How to Best Approach Your Sage 100 ERP,” over 50% of polled SMB executives acknowledged that labor-intensive reporting is especially burdensome to their organization, while 25% of attendees indicated business impacts associated with limited industry-specific functionality and 18% admitted that multi-entity management and consolidation and segmented GL accounts are a struggle.

Plugging the Functional Gaps

Substantial effort, time and sometimes dedicated personnel and procedures are required to manually alleviate issues stemming from these and other gaps. In one instance, an accounting executive running a legacy Sage ERP disclosed that storage fees were incurred to stockpile files used as part of their paper processes, in which documents were physically handed to the appropriate personnel for approval authorization and stored in cabinets. For organizations experiencing these and similar issues, the key is determining when the added time and cost of plugging these gaps outweighs the value of the Sage 100 ERP instance.

The webinar recounted a methodology recommended by Forrester Research during a previous event as one such exercise companies could enlist to help make this determination. Another option available to Sage 100 users is the Net at Work Business Health Assessment (BHA), a complimentary, online tool that enables organizational leaders to input their strategic initiatives to assist with prioritizing recommendations for aligning technology in support of that overall direction.

Exploring Sage 100 ERP Options

When Sage 100 functional gaps do not pose a true hardship to organizations yet, there’s options to fill the void now. Lisa Margolies, co-presenter and Net at Work Sage 100 Practice Director, reported on those options during the webinar. In some cases, third-party add-ons and custom services can bridge gaps. But “most [users] are aware that Sage only supports the current version and two versions back…so upgrading is always your best option, and you should always be on a supported version,” reminded Margolies.

But if those gaps are too wide and the combination of options presented by Margolies increase the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of Sage 100, Next Generation ERP solutions may be an appropriate shorter-term strategy. Next Generation ERP, such as Sage Intacct, standardizes much of the manual or third-party functionality typically found bolted onto instances of Sage 100. Workflow approvals, dimensional accounting and real-time dashboards and reporting, for example, are native to this type of cloud-based ERP software.

The Deciding Factor

The deciding factor, ultimately, is your technology roadmap. A product of undergoing the BHA, your roadmap helps you identify the right combination of technology at the right time to support your strategic endeavors. Drawing parallels from the technology shift in which businesses switched from DOS-based to Windows-based products in the 1990s, co-presenter and Net at Work Sage Intacct Practice Director Tom Thornton believes this will also be the case with Next Generation ERP.

“Everyone is on a different timeline with different circumstances and requirements. It’s important to acknowledge that you move at the right time based off of your assessment… There’s not a one-size-fits-all solution for every organization in every industry,” Thornton stated.

To uncover the full insights shared during this webinar, watch the recording of “From Pain to Gain: How to Best Approach Your Sage 100 ERP” today.