ERP Project Recovery

A global food service manufacturer supplying bakery products to some of the world's most recognizable restaurant chains and retailers embarked on a major Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) transformation to modernize its business operations. As a highly complex manufacturing organization producing more than five million bakery products each day across multiple production facilities, the company depends on its ERP system to coordinate planning, production, inventory, warehousing, and distribution across its operations. To support continued growth and modernize the company’s technology, the organization selected Microsoft Dynamics 365 Finance & Operations (D365 F&O) to replace its legacy ERP platform.

After two years of ongoing implementation, the ERP project was at risk due to escalating delivery challenges. Project timelines continued to slip, scope was increasingly difficult to manage, and collaboration between the client and implementation partner had become strained. With these growing challenges, the client engaged Cascadia to provide independent project leadership and stabilize the implementation for a successful path to go-live.

The scope of the ERP transformation included implementation of several core business capabilities, including:

• Core finance and accounting
• Warehousing and inventory management
• Production
• Maintenance (EAM)
• Procurement
• Customer service
• Reporting and analytics
• Electronic data interchange (EDI)

The client partnered with Cascadia to restore control of the ERP program by establishing the governance, project management disciplines, and business analysis capabilities needed to achieve a successful go-live. Working alongside the client's leadership team, project team, and implementation partner, Cascadia provided hands-on project leadership and support across key workstreams. Our team strengthened the internal project team, managed project risks, improved cross-functional coordination, and maintained alignment among all stakeholders throughout the implementation.

Project Assessment and Planning: Cascadia started with a detailed review of each workstream to identify the highest-risk areas. This assessment included current-state workshops with each workstream, analysis of existing project documentation, and a review of completed and outstanding customizations and integrations.

Based on this assessment, Cascadia collaborated with the implementation partner to develop a revised project plan. The plan included an updated go-live timeline, rationalization of go-live critical customizations to prioritize the most important work items, a revised team engagement model, and the placement of dedicated business analysts within the workstreams requiring the greatest support.

Project Management and Execution: Cascadia implemented a structured project management framework which aligned with the revised delivery plan. This included vendor management, business analysis support, change management, stakeholder communications, training coordination, and regular executive reporting.

Internal Team Augmentation: Following the initial assessment, Cascadia and client leadership deployed dedicated business analysts into the work areas requiring the greatest support. These analysts worked directly within the internal team to increase project capacity and accelerate progress. Cascadia’s analysts facilitated workshops, led problem analysis and solutioning activities, and worked closely with the implementation partner and internal subject matter experts to evaluate options and drive key decisions. Cascadia analysts supported testing activities, developed and maintained project documentation, created training materials, and managed communications and status updates across workstreams, including coordination with the implementation partner and project leadership.

This augmentation was particularly critical given the internal team’s need to balance project responsibilities with their existing day job. Cascadia helped bridge this capacity gap while providing targeted expertise to support decision-making and solution design. This ensured the project timeline stayed on track and helped to identify challenges and decisions that required executive input.

Customizations, Integrations, and Process Mapping: Our team collaborated with the system implementor to address outstanding customization and integration backlogs, working across the project team to prioritize and advance the most critical items required for go-live. In parallel, Cascadia worked with workstreams to document and validate process maps to help ensure the processes were known for go-live and there were no remaining gaps in the solution design.

User Acceptance Testing (UAT): The internal team, system implementor, and Cascadia collaborated to execute a comprehensive UAT strategy, including developing test scripts, issue management processes, and supporting documentation. Where needed, Cascadia executed testing to ensure business scenarios were fully validated, defects were escalated, and timelines were achieved.

Data Migration: Cascadia led the migration execution, including the development of a detailed migration schedule, supported mapping rules, and the coordination of multiple mock cutovers. The team established repeatable processes for migrating historical data and open transactions into the new ERP system, ensuring accuracy, completeness, and readiness for go-live.

System Security and Licensing: Cascadia supported the definition, configuration, execution, and validation of the system access and security model within D365 F&O. This included hands-on configuration of roles, duties, and permissions, as well as validation of end-to-end security access across business processes. Cascadia also worked with the client to optimize licensing, ensuring alignment to actual user needs and minimizing unnecessary license costs.

Communication, Change Management, and Training: Cascadia implemented a communications strategy to maintain alignment across stakeholders, including regular steering committee updates, cross-functional working sessions, and clearly defined escalation paths to support quick issue resolution. Cascadia also supported change management activities and helped coordinate training efforts in critical areas to prepare business teams for go-live.

The organization successfully achieved go-live of the new ERP system and is now using the platform to support their business operations with improved data visibility, process consistency, and operational control. Cascadia’s engagement stabilized the ERP project and re-established a clear path to go-live. Key outcomes included:

• Project Recovery: Implemented governance, a new project plan, executive reporting, restoring leadership visibility into project status, risks, and decisions.
• Stronger Stakeholder Alignment: Established effective communication channels, and escalation paths, improving coordination between internal teams and the system implementor.
• Reduced Delivery Risk: Addressed critical risks across customizations, integrations, user acceptance testing, and data migration, helping the organization to move toward go-live with greater confidence.
• Improved Organizational Readiness: Prepared business teams and processes for the transition to the new ERP platform through testing, training, and change management activities.