We have all done it - we have migrated from one employer to another employer in hopes that the work/life balance can improve (spoiler: it never does).
I have just made such a transition, and I the same thought crossing my mind as I acclimate myself to my new home-away-from-home: “What now?”
Which brings me here: What is the 1st thing you find yourselves doing when you find yourself at a new company, needing to pick up the pieces of your predecessor? What is your ‘plan of attack’?
Yeah, that will be the feeling for the first few weeks. Some of the things I ran across yesterday (which was Day 1) have scarred me for life.
Having just been through this in April, I have some notes!
The new team is going to want to bring you into 1000 meetings so that everyone can give you their Epicor wish lists. I would request a week (or two, depending on the system) to get yourself familiar with the Epicor environment. Take the time to find active customizations, BPMs, Functions, uBAQs, and any integrations that are in place BEFORE you start taking any requests.
Make sure you take some time right away to get a handle on the manufacturing and shipping processes. You don’t need to be a pro right off the bat, but you’ll want to consistently make sure you know what’s going on in any shop or warehouse. You’ll work more with Sales / Finance / Accounting / Management, but the manufacturing and shipping are where the actual money is made. Optimizing and making sure you don’t interrupt anything there is a high priority.
Once people start giving you their wish lists, I’m sure there will be another series of meetings to talk priorities. When I started, I made sure to check at least one thing off of everyone’s list, even if it wasn’t as important. Knock out any small annoyances people have if it won’t bump the more important projects by too much. It will buy a lot of goodwill for later if you have to tell someone you can’t get to their project for a while.
No matter how bad one of you predecessors f***ed up, don’t complain about their competence to your new coworkers. They may have been good friends.
If there’s another Epicor admin/dev/etc, or if they currently have a consulting company they contract with, take the time to meet with them to learn what may be more critical (or hard to find) functionality. In the last 5 months I may or may not have broken half a dozen things trying to add or alter a feature, only to get hosed by a customization or BPM I hadn’t realized would interact with whatever I was doing.
Get a good handle on custom reports, Dashboards, and BAQs. People like to make BAQs, but don’t always make them well. 2 months in I found out that there was some misreporting going on because of a custom WIP Rec Report.
I have done this kind of work for about 15 years now. I have worked at multiple companies.
One thing I realize now, that I hadn’t before, is I tend to overestimate the importance of understanding the unique challenges the business faces, and how this company is different.
If you are doing this kind of work with any amount of competency, for any amount of time, you already know the challenges. You already know what is important. You already know the right and wrong way to do things. You know what needs to be improved and what doesn’t, how to improve it, and with what priority.
If I could give any advice to someone moving to a new company, I would say do not lose sight of your own knowledge, expericence, acumen, and ability, through the haze of trying to figure out the unique aspects of your new company. Spoiler: There aren’t any
I am still working on getting access to the front end of Epicor, but once I finally have that I will be putting your thoughts into practice.
(I should probably work on a way of getting access to the back-end systems too…
)
Not sure if this is serious or humorous exaggeration, but I’m sorry either way.
I believe it.
*checks to make sure boss isn't reading over my shoulder...*
Oh…it is only humorous because it is serious.