The clearest sign of whether your software platform still serves your business is the number of workarounds your team has built around it.
If you have run the same ERP, CRM or operations platform for six years or more, it was chosen for a smaller, simpler version of your company. It may still be the right system. It may also be costing you hours every week through spreadsheets, side apps and manual steps nobody planned. Before you replace anything, measure the gap.
Why workarounds are the best evidence
Feature lists and vendor roadmaps tell you what a platform could do. Workarounds tell you where it falls short for your business today. Each one exists because someone needed something the system did not give them and found another way.
They usually look like this:
- A spreadsheet exported every week to produce a report the system cannot.
- Data typed into two systems because they do not talk to each other.
- A side app, shared inbox or whiteboard doing a job the platform was supposed to do.
- Steps that live only in one long-serving employee's head.
Run a workaround inventory
Spend two weeks collecting them. Ask each team one question: "What do you do outside the system to get your job done?" For each answer, record:
- What the workaround is and which team owns it.
- How often it happens and roughly how long it takes.
- What goes wrong when it is missed or done badly.
- Whether the platform could handle it with settings or modules you are not using.
Add up the weekly hours across every workaround. That total, and the risk attached to the ones that fail quietly, is the figure to weigh against the cost and disruption of any change.
That last question matters. Some gaps close with configuration, training or a module you already pay for, which is far cheaper than a new system.
Four other checks
Data you can trust
Can you pull a number from the system and act on it without checking it against a spreadsheet? If not, find out whether the problem is the platform or how data gets entered. A new system will not fix entry habits.
Connections
Does the platform connect cleanly to the tools you have added since you bought it, or does every link depend on manual exports or a fragile script someone wrote years ago?
Speed of change
How long does a simple change take, such as a new field, a new approval step or a new report? If every small change needs the vendor or a consultant, the platform is setting the pace of your business.
The vendor's direction
Is the product still being developed for companies like yours, or is your version approaching the end of support? Ask your account manager directly and get the answer in writing.
Decide: fix, extend or replace
- Fix. Most of the workarounds trace back to configuration, training or data-entry habits. Clean up, retrain and switch on what you already own.
- Extend. The core is sound, but a few important jobs fall outside it. Add an integration or a small purpose-built tool around the platform.
- Replace. Workarounds touch your core processes, changes are slow and expensive, and the vendor is heading somewhere else. Start planning the move, beginning with the processes the inventory showed matter most.
Replacing a core system is disruptive, so the bar should be high. Staying put has costs too. They are spread across every team, so they rarely show up on a single budget line, and the inventory is how you make them visible.
If you would like a second set of eyes on your workaround inventory, or help deciding what it tells you, book a conversation with me at daks.me.
