Effectiveness of Enterprise Resource Planning System in Mining Company

This study evaluated the enterprise resource planning system using the Dangote Cement factory in Obajana- Nigeria as a case study. The justification for this location was provided in the study. Relevant literature on the benefits of ERP and the implementation challenge was reviewed to develop a robust approach to the impact of ERP in the mining industry. It is evident in this study that effective deployment of ERP will streamline the complex manual mining process. Strategic alignment of business needs is required for ERP to yield the desired result. Organizational needs must be clearly understood before ERP is aligned to provide solutions to mining challenges. Some of the challenges that mining companies faced were discussed. Research questions were crafted to validate the impact of ERP in the mining sector. The conceptual framework of ERP was discussed using existing theories from different authors. It is obvious from the literature reviewed that the information that was fragmented before the advent of ERP has been centralized with effective integration with all the departments in the organization. The role and implementation of ERP was discussed. ERP effectiveness was discussed using some critical indicators. It is evident from the research that the effectiveness of IT innovation depends on the impact on the organization's goals and objectives. The research methodology used for this study is qualitative given the quest of the researcher to provide in-depth analysis on the study. The interview was conducted using four persons from different departments to provide an unbiased assessment of the impact of ERP in their organization. The data collected was analyzed with grounded theory using NVivo software for analysis. This software made it possible to have a deep understanding and assessment of this IT innovation. Ethical concerns and safeguard issues were discussed for participants to have confidence in their anonymity and for them to know that the study was an academic exercise. From the analyzed result, it is evident that the adoption of ERP brought a marginal increase in the production of cement in Dangote. However, there was an initial decline in organization performance within a few months of adoption because the management team did not sensitize other staff on the adoption of ERP. It is evident that the adoption of ERP has brought about real-time information to guide management teams in strategic decision-making There are some limitations concerning the sample and the data used for evaluation. The sample includes a large mining company (Dangote Cement Factory). Future research could use smaller mining companies to evaluate. Consequently, an effort should be made in the future to use a mining company that has not deployed ERP as a control organization with another mining company that has deployed ERP. This will provide a better comparison model to evaluate effectiveness. The geographical location of this study is Nigeria in Africa, it may not have wide acceptance in other continents where there are varying organizational cultures.