Responsibilities and operational control in an ERP

Data governance and user training

A missing invoice or incorrect unit can affect several departments. Data quality requires clear responsibility for producing, checking and validating information.

Data quality must be organised under management’s authority. It involves operational owners, accounting, finance, IT and the system provider.

Business teams produce source information: sales, deliveries, receipts and inventory movements. Accounting records transactions and reconciles documents, payments and balances. Finance defines reporting rules, validates migrated data and tracks anomalies.

IT supports technical operation, permissions, backups and continuity. The integrator configures the system, documents interventions and transfers necessary skills.

Management sets priorities, assigns resources and resolves difficulties. Its responsibility for the accounts is not transferred to the provider.

Mistakes to avoid

Do not assign data reliability to IT alone. Training limited to screens leaves transactions and checks poorly understood. Excessive or shared access can weaken traceability and separation of duties.

Recommended actions

Assign a named producer, checker and validator to each critical item of information. Train users on documents and a complete workflow, then test their independence. Align access with responsibilities. Examine recurring delays and errors to distinguish training, procedure and tool issues. Assign corrections to owners with deadlines.

Does your governance specify who produces, checks and validates each critical item of information?