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Impact of customization over software quality in ERP projects: an empirical study

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Abstract

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems are recognized as management information systems that streamline business processes of an enterprise. Delivering ERP software to meet functional needs of an organization with acceptable level of quality is a challenge due to the very nature of development and deployment of this packaged software. Drawing on ISO/IEC 9126’s characterization of software quality and Luo and Strong’s ERP customization framework, this paper analyzes the impact of the ERP system customization on software quality of ERP. A software quality framework for ERP customization has been developed, and three sets of hypotheses have been formulated. A detailed survey was conducted for data collection. The statistical data analysis reveals that module customization does not impact ERP quality, while database and source code customizations have significant influence over ERP quality. Our findings have implications for the implementation of customized ERP in organizations.

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Notes

  1. The ISO/IEC 9126 standard for software product quality has recently been superseded by the ISO/IEC 25000 series: the Software Product Quality Requirements and Evaluation (SQuaRE) set of standards. This also considers the same quality attributes and sub-attributes as ISO/IEC 9126 does. The significance of the ISO/IEC 25010 standard is that it helps the quality assurance group in analyzing usability, safety, and flexibility from user’s viewpoint for a software product.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Applications, Thiagarajar College of Engineering, Madurai, India

    Sudhaman Parthasarathy

  2. Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Kashipur, Kashipur, Uttarakhand, India

    Srinarayan Sharma

Authors
  1. Sudhaman Parthasarathy
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  2. Srinarayan Sharma
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Sudhaman Parthasarathy.

Appendix: Summary of questionnaire constructs

Appendix: Summary of questionnaire constructs

Functionality*

F1: The ERP software meets the business requirements of the enterprise

F2: The ERP software fulfills the requirements of the end users

F3: The ERP software provides the desired outputs accurately

F4: The ERP software covers all the functions mentioned in the specification

F5: The interoperability features of the ERP to interface with other systems are satisfactory

Reliability*

R1: The ERP software is stable and unlikely to fail easily

R2: The ERP software is capable of managing defects and faults

R3: The ERP software is capable of managing data loss, data recovery, and restoring the system

R4a: The ERP software delivers reliable and consistent results under different constraints

R5a: The ERP software has the ability to perform the stated functions for given inputs

Usability*

U1b: The user interface is well designed and easy to understand in the ERP software

U2: The end users are able to perform the different functions of the ERP software easily

U3: The users need not depend on the user manual or online help to use the ERP software

U4a: The interface between different ERP modules is well designed and understood

Maintainability*

M1a: Configuration management is easier for ERP software to accommodate future releases

M2a: Documentation of the developed ERP software is complete and supports future maintenance

M3: The ERP software has the ability to adapt to new operating environments and possesses good compatibility

M4: The ERP software can be configured to include new system changes with little effort

Module customization (Brehm et al. 2001; Luo and Strong 2004; Light 2005; Adisa et al. 2010)

MC1: The ERP modules were customized and re-organized to meet the business requirements

MC2: The sub-modules of the ERP module were customized as per the requirements of the customer

MC3a: The ERP modules/sub-modules of the ERP were modified to meet the new requirements from the customer

MC4a: The interface between the ERP modules or its sub-modules was re-configured

Database customization (Brehm et al. 2001; Light 2005)

DB1c: The database in the ERP software was redesigned so as to accommodate the new constraints from the customer and the respective changes in the modules/sub-modules

DB2a: The tables in the database of the ERP software were modified to and a new database was defined

DB3: The database of the ERP software was verified and validated often for data integrity

DB4: The modified software design was mapped with the database of the ERP software for correctness

DB5: A change in a module or one of its sub-modules of ERP software brought about a change in its database

Source code customization (Brehm et al. 2001; Light 2005)

SC1a: The source code of ERP software underwent changes, as and when a change takes place in the modular architecture of ERP, or on its database

SC2a: The modification of source code of ERP software originates from a change made to its user interface design or database or its modularity

SC3: Source code customization of the ERP originated from either the module customization or from the database customization

SC4: A change in a database either partially or completely brought about a change in the corresponding source code

  1. * Operationalized by drawing on Sprott (2000), Jung (2007), Schulmeyer (2008), and Aydin (2012)
  2. aDropped after factor analysis because of loading of 0.40 or above on two items
  3. bDropped after reliability analysis because of low item-to-factor loading
  4. cReverse coded

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Parthasarathy, S., Sharma, S. Impact of customization over software quality in ERP projects: an empirical study. Software Qual J 25, 581–598 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11219-016-9314-x

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