Critical success factors for enterprise resource planning (ERP) implementation in Turkish construction industry

Abstract

Even though the construction industry is one of the largest contributors to the economy, it is considered as one of the highly fragmented, inefficient, and project oriented industries. Also, the construction industry has always been criticized for its low performance due to lack of high quality performance evaluation, project monitoring, cost effectiveness, security, and sustainability. In order to overcome this ineffectiveness, several solutions have long been offered including adaptation of information technology (IT) and information systems. Since each project is unique, they create some distinct challenges. Enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems present an integrated system that has the knowledge and databases of the different departments in a construction company. However, it is not easy to compensate all the functions of construction enterprise resource planning (C-ERP) systems by a regular IT system that is planned to automate all project management operations of the whole construction companies. C-ERP systems provide construction companies with much more integrated and effective system to overcome this ineffectiveness, fragmentation of departments and low performance issues. Not only acquiring ERP systems but also the implementation phase of them is very significant subject because there are many failure stories. Implementation of a system is a stage that all planned tasks and activities are realized. At this implementation stage, monitoring of implementation is essential to make sure that the system is implemented successfully as per the schedule and on the budget. Therefore, the investigation of the implementation phases and determination of Critical Success Factors (CSF) of ERP implementation in construction industry is a crucial subject in this context. In this thesis, this subject is studied based on data collected through a questionnaire survey and real experience case studies. Construction firms can benefit from the findings of this study as learning the negative and positive case study experiences of three different construction companies, critical success factors that companies should focus on at the implementation phase of their ERP system.