An anatomy of User Communities in Enterprise Packaged Applications

While the importance of user-vendor link in the bespoke information system development has been widely addressed by scholars, the research on this relationship in the case of packaged enterprise systems (PES) is yet to gain momentum. This paper transcends the study of PES user-vendor relationship at the system development stage and throws light on a broader link that exists during different stages of a PES lifecycle. The paper explores the fine grain details of an ERP user community consisting of users at different stages of their ERP lifecycle and shows how the community acts a as a multifunctional stage for interactions of various actors. The study provides typologies of functions of an ERP user community and explains how these functions meet the diverse motivations of different actors for taking part in the events. Finally it illustrates how the user community can provide an overarching platform for relationships between users and vendors, and other intermediaries

Keywords:

User Community , Enterprise Systems , ERP , User-Vendor Relationship