Integration first: why data flows decide the result of automation

Most automation projects are planned around screens and reports. The result depends on what happens between systems: where a customer, an item or a contract is created, who may change it, and how fast the change reaches everyone else.

The symptoms

The signs are familiar. The same invoice is typed into two programs. The sales report of the commercial department differs from the one made by accounting, and the meeting starts with a discussion of whose number is right. Month-end closing waits for a file that one person prepares by hand.

None of this is solved by a new module. A new module added to disconnected systems becomes one more place where the data is entered again.

Draw the map first

Before choosing tools, draw the map of data flows. For each key object, such as a customer, an item, a contract, a price or an employee, write down:

• which system is its source, the only place where it is created and changed;
• which systems receive it and what they do with it;
• how the transfer happens today: an exchange, a file or a person;
• which delay the business can accept: a minute, an hour or a day.

The map usually fits on one sheet. It shows double entry, manual files and reports that will never match, because they are built on different copies of the same data.

Decide the order of work

With the map in hand, the order of work becomes a business question. Integration that removes double entry often brings a result earlier than a new module: people stop retyping, errors disappear and the month is closed earlier.

It also makes the next module cheaper. A warehouse or production system that receives clean master data from the first day is introduced faster than one that starts with its own lists.

Rules that keep an integration alive

An exchange that works on the day of launch can stop working quietly a month later. A few rules prevent that.

• One owner for each kind of data. If two systems may change the same field, sooner or later they will disagree.
• Every exchange writes a log, and a failed exchange reaches a responsible person the same day.
• Totals are reconciled on both sides on a schedule, not when somebody notices a difference.
• The exchange rules are documented and belong to the company, not to the person who wrote them.

Where to begin

Pick the flow that costs the most manual work today, usually the one between sales, the warehouse and accounting, and connect it properly. The effect is visible at the first month-end closing, and the map shows what to connect next.