Changing your financial software? We can save you the headache of deployment

You have identified that your current financial software is not suitable for your business objectives and have gone through the long process of researching and selecting a better solution. Now comes the hardest part: implementing and migrating the new system into your business. Here, we outline the top four considerations to ensure a seamless deployment when changing your financial software.

Four things to consider when changing your financial software

1. Key stakeholders

Having already got buy-in from your key stakeholders from the start, it is important that the consultation doesn’t stop there. Continuing the conversation during the deployment period and review stage will mean issues are picked up and can be addressed quickly. Your end users will be high on the list of those to glean intel from. However, it is also important to hear from senior management, department heads, shop floor workers and the finance team.

2. Change management

Change always brings a degree of disruption but this can be minimised by putting a change management plan in place at the start of the project. The plan should include a deployment schedule, communication plan to all employees and stakeholders, continual feedback and review of concerns as well as an ongoing training programme.

3. Testing

The testing stage is crucial for a successful software deployment and can often take months to complete. Parallel testing by running the old and new systems simultaneously for a period will ensure the new system works as intended and identify any discrepancies. A robust data migration strategy will be needed to guarantee data integrity and accuracy during the migration process.

4. Dedicated deployment team

Having a dedicated deployment team is essential to make the process run smoothly. The team should include a project manager to keep the process on track, a data migration specialist responsible for cleansing the data, key stakeholders to ensure the implementation is efficient across all departments and a software consultant to customise the application and train the team.

Help from the experts

Moore Kingston Smith has a team of software advisory experts with decades of experience in helping clients of all sizes and sectors to design and deploy their ideal software solution. We can support at all stages of the process:

• identifying objectives
• selecting the most suitable software
• creating a data migration strategy
• customisation and configuration
• integration with existing systems
• testing
• ongoing training and support.

For further information on changing your financial software or an initial no-obligation chat, contact Simon Woodhams, Software Advisory Manager, or Nicki Savill, Partner and Head of Business Outsourcing.