Create better quality in your product master data

Product master data is the foundation for many critical business processes, and the quality of this data has a direct influence on your company's efficiency and decision-making. But how does your company create the best possible conditions for good quality in your master data? This article focuses on that. And you will get our suggestions on how to achieve more efficient workflows with better control and fewer possibilities for errors.

Your company's product master data forms the basis for a wide range of critical functions – from procurement and inventory management to sales and financial management. And therefore it is important that they are correct, complete and accessible across the organisation. But many companies experience challenges with managing their product master data, and this results in poor data quality.

We see especially three reasons why companies have challenges with their product master data:

Insufficient rights management: In an ERP system, you cannot control the different users' rights at a particularly detailed level. Either they do not have access to something, or they have access to everything – including the parts of the data flow they are not involved in. And this leads to users being able to change data inappropriately.

Multiple systems without synchronisation: We often see that when working across several separate systems, which are not necessarily synchronised, it leads to duplication of work. Because either you need to copy or actually re-enter information from one system to another, and this negatively affects your company's data quality.

Lack of overview in the ERP system: Standard ERP user interfaces can be complex and confusing. This makes it difficult to maintain an overview of work processes and increases the risk of input errors.

It is important to mention that there are no watertight bulkheads between the points on the list. On the contrary, they are often connected through either overlap or mutual dependence. For example, the ERP system's user interface often further exacerbates the problems with rights management. The poor overview increases the risk that a user accidentally enters incorrect information in a field that they should not have access to at all.

But what can you do to improve the quality of your product master data when many of the challenges are rooted in the systems you use – and which you cannot just change?

We see many companies using an intermediary layer for product master data outside the ERP system. Some have comprehensive systems for managing all types of master data, but we also experience several who use Excel.

As the automation geeks we are at Basico, we have built our own app where you can check and validate your master data before it is transferred to the ERP system.

The app we have built is simple and user-friendly and can be adapted to the individual company's needs. The app is built with Microsoft Power Apps, which is part of the Microsoft Power platform, and can be integrated directly with the ERP system.

In short, it breaks down processes for product creation and maintenance into smaller components, all of which have built-in validation and logic.

With this solution, different departments – from procurement and inventory management to sales and finance – can collaborate on the product master data outside the ERP system. Each user only has access to the parts of the process they are responsible for and cannot change information that they should not have access to.

The result is a more controlled process, fewer errors and a higher data quality, as the risk of incorrect entries is significantly reduced.

Good data quality is becoming only more and more important, especially as increased automation and AI gain ground – also in ERP systems. Without accurate and well-structured product master data, your company risks inefficient workflows, errors and poor decisions.

But improving data quality need not be either a long or complicated process. With the right tools and methods, you can quickly achieve a more streamlined workflow where efficiency increases. It is not about making the work more complex – but about making it smarter.