ERP and Information Systems

3The Research Question and Methodology

This chapter presents the research question and methodology. Researchers have often built their analyses on the fact that enterprise resource planning (ERP) is a package contributing to the information system (IS) integration. As a result, research has not made sufficient effort to study the possible involvement of ERP systems in IS disintegration, although such a possibility could exist. Whatever the reason for the disintegration, the lack of investigation in this field is significant and it should be studied. A possible disintegration or regression from a total integration of IS (TIIS) to a hybrid integration of IS (HIIS) or to a disintegrated information system (DIS) will be taken into consideration in our book. This matter could be important because practitioners and end users who manage an ERP project to improve the architecture’s integration could sometimes be surprised once the project ends and the ERP is deployed. Instead of a desired integration, a kind of IS disintegration can occur. For example, within an IS, an evolution from an ERP 1st G toward a new architecture could lead to a regression of the integration rate which existed before this evolution.

This chapter aims to understand and explain the main reasons why these unwanted scenarios could happen. Knowing these reasons allows all stakeholders to avoid these scenarios, which could lead to IS disintegration instead of integration. This research attempts to explore and identify ...