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Bob Swedroe

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President & CEO, Expandable Software

475 points

Currently the President and CEO of Expandable Software. Previous employment has included pre-revenue start-ups, a company with $4B of revenue and everything in between.

Early career focused on getting detailed knowledge of the basic building blocks in Finance including General ...

Currently the President and CEO of Expandable Software. Previous employment has included pre-revenue start-ups, a company with $4B of revenue and everything in between.

Early career focused on getting detailed knowledge of the basic building blocks in Finance including General Accounting, Cost Accounting, and Financial Planning & Analysis.

After the basic foundation was established, moved into more strategic roles in Finance including a CFO role and contract negotiations for large/strategic transactions.

Fundamental beliefs include:
* Add value above and beyond job expectations
* Integrity, Integrity and Integrity
* Process, Process and Process
* Customer "come first" attitude
* Think strategically and execute with detailed logistics and dedicated passion
* Treat all employees with respect

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Bob Swedroe and 1 other person answered this question at this roundtable

Jan. 20, 2012

Drive ERP Selection Success – Ask Our Experts How to Make Your Project a Winner [1/17 @ 1 pm]

What percentage of companies seek out new ERP solutions versus being approached by vendors?

Today, many companies tend to do some preliminary research on their own by web browsing and asking their business network. In addition, ERP vendors will try to find prospects in their target market, just like any company would do, and then market to that company. ... more

Information Technology

Enterprise Software

Bob Swedroe answered this question at this roundtable

Jan. 20, 2012

Drive ERP Selection Success – Ask Our Experts How to Make Your Project a Winner [1/17 @ 1 pm]

What are some helpful resources to learn more about ERP selection?

Hi Lauren,
I just typed "erp selection" into Google and came up with a bunch of helpful looking resources. If you want to contact me directly, I can send you the link of a few that looked reasonable at a quick glance. In addition, I ... more

Information Technology

Enterprise Software

Bob Swedroe and 1 other person answered this question at this roundtable

Jan. 15, 2012

Drive ERP Selection Success – Ask Our Experts How to Make Your Project a Winner [1/17 @ 1 pm]

Are ERP selection methods applicable to other enterprise software solutions such as BPM, BI, etc?

I would suggest that they are, but cost, size, complexity, and risk of the software solution needs to be taken into account as performing proper evaluation and due diligence for an ERP system can be very time consuming.
Having said that, there are always some ... more

Information Technology

Enterprise Software

Bob Swedroe and 1 other person answered this question at this roundtable

Jan. 15, 2012

Drive ERP Selection Success – Ask Our Experts How to Make Your Project a Winner [1/17 @ 1 pm]

Is it better for an SMB to select software on its own or hire an outside ERP Consultant?

I agree with John. The cost of a good consultant will pay for themselves many times over.
Having said that, I do want to provide a word of caution to John's statement that "A competent consultant can provide unbiased advice and guidance through the process.....". ... more

Information Technology

Enterprise Software

Bob Swedroe and 3 other people answered this question at this roundtable

Jan. 13, 2012

Drive ERP Selection Success – Ask Our Experts How to Make Your Project a Winner [1/17 @ 1 pm]

Do ERP vendors require the customer to buy an annual maintenance contract?

I don't know about most ERP vendors "requiring" the customer to buy maintenance, but if my memory serves me correctly, Oracle did require their customers to purchase maintenance for using the database (not their ERP, which they might treat differently), else the license to use ... more

Information Technology

Enterprise Software

Bob Swedroe is speaking at this roundtable

Jan. 9, 2012

Drive ERP Selection Success – Ask Our Experts How to Make Your Project a Winner

Information Technology

Enterprise Software

Bob Swedroe and 2 other people answered this question at this roundtable

Dec. 14, 2011

ERP: A Year in Review and Predictions for 2012 [12/12 @ 11 am]

What are the important elements to cover when planning an ERP implementation?

Agree with both Dana and Jonathan. Assuming the vision and direction of the company and processes/work flows are agreed upon prior to implementation, below are my top five critical success factors:
1. Executive sponsorship/committee and support: Without the key executives holding people accountable and providing guidance ... more

Information Technology

Bob Swedroe and 13 other people answered this question

Oct. 10, 2011

What are the qualifications to be a mentor?

Top 5 Key Factors for being a successful mentor:
1) Expertise in the area required. The expertise may be in a specific function (R&D, Marketing, Sales, etc.) &/or from the behavioral side of life/business. Being an expert in a specific technical aspect is great, but don't ... more

General Management

Human Resources

Career Development

Bob Swedroe and 7 other people answered this question

Sept. 30, 2011

Why do many ERP customers under-invest in training and change management?

Leo, one final point regarding the disclaimer. While I appreciate your thinking it was both clever and smart, the main reason for the disclaimer was Integrity. I don't want someone looking at the quote and thinking it is something we recommend. more

Enterprise Resource Planning

Organizational Change Management

Bob Swedroe and 10 other people answered this question

Aug. 15, 2011

Why has the user experience on ERP products historically been so bad?

Steve and David, you continue to throw all ERP solutions under the bus as if they are one company.
If you are not happy with a Toyota, do you refuse to buy a different a car from a different manufacturer or do you do research and ... more

Information Technology

Enterprise Resource Planning

Bob Swedroe and 2 other people answered this question

Aug. 5, 2011

How often should a company expect to need to update its ERP?

Caty, I am assuming that you mean update to the latest version of the software that is currently being deployed at their site. For example; the company is on 4.1 version of the ERP and there is a 5.0 version that is now available.
The answer ... more

Information Technology

Enterprise Software

Bob Swedroe and 5 other people answered this question

July 30, 2011

Tips for talking your boss out of legacy software and into ERP?

David,
With all due respect, unless you have been involved in an FDA certification process and in a manufacturing environment for MedTech devices, your opinions are not based on fact or the appropriate level of experience. In addition, unless you can point to an efficient, cost ... more

Information Technology

Enterprise Software

Bob Swedroe and 6 other people answered this question

June 24, 2011

When choosing enterprise software, do you hire independent selection consultants?

Being an ERP vendor, I have no problem with an unbiased 3rd party consultant as long as they are really unbiased. There have been instances where the playing field is not level. For instance, we experienced a situation where the consultant sent me an e-mail ... more

Information Technology

Bob Swedroe and 4 other people answered this question

June 21, 2011

What are the top questions to ask a potential ERP consultant?

You need to make sure they are ERP agnostic. If they are a reseller or represent only a few ERP vendors, then they won't present an unbiased opinion or recommendation. more

Information Technology

Enterprise Software

Bob Swedroe and 1 other person answered this question

June 9, 2011

Why can't OPEC reach a deal on increasing oil output?

Hi Courtney,
OPEC's inability to reach agreement on oil output has been around for a long time. The main problem is that there are extreme differences of opinion, within OPEC, on what the objectives should be, both short-term and long-term. In addition, each OPEC member's opinion ... more

Bob Swedroe and 1 other person answered this question

May 30, 2011

What are the best characteristics to look for in a strong CFO?

The wording of you question and summary is interesting as 1) you talk about characteristics as opposed to tasks or responsibilities.and 2) you state "I am the creative, mile-high "big picture" guy. I have struggled with finding and identifying a partner with stronger CFO characteristics ... more

General Management

Bob Swedroe and 3 other people answered this question

May 23, 2011

How can ERP buyers write services contracts that link payment to performance?

One more point. Obviously, the goal of the linking payment to performance is to have a successful and timely implementation. The best way to get comfort with the vendor's ability to deliver is to ask for references (my favorite answer to so many questions). If ... more

Information Technology

Bob Swedroe and 4 other people answered this question

May 17, 2011

What are the warning signs for an ERP project going out of control?

Steve, please stop. It is getting to the point where most people will soon ignore you, if they haven't already.
From my perspective, there needs to be an agreed upon schedule for tasks/deliverables with one person from the company or the ERP vendor (if they are ... more

Information Technology

Project Management

Bob Swedroe and 6 other people answered this question

May 17, 2011

How can organizations speed up the roll-out time of an ERP

To Steve's point, which always has a negative slant with regards to ERPs, there is some truth in his statement. That is why, in my response, I used the words "to successfully deploy an ERP solution in a efficient and effective way" as opposed to ... more

Information Technology

Cloud Computing

Bob Swedroe and 5 other people answered this question

April 30, 2011

Why is ERP change management so difficult?

The degree of difficulty is dependent on numerous things including:
1) Does the ERP implementation have full executive: a) support, b) sponsorship, c) participation?
2) Have project tasks/responsibilities been assigned and accountability expectations set?
3) Are the resources assigned to the ERP project sufficient for the project such ... more

Human Resources

Bob Swedroe and 2 other people answered this question

April 28, 2011

Is integration with existing systems a major obstacle for cloud-based ERP?

Hi Rob,
I do have some disagreements with your comments:
1) While customizations in the cloud will "travel forward automatically", the degree of customization that one can do in the cloud is typically less than an on-premise deployment. Said another way, while you are able to avoid ... more

Enterprise Resource Planning

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Enterprise Resource Planning

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