Why Most ERP RFPs Fail Before They’re Issued
Most ERP RFPs don’t fail during vendor selection.
They fail long before a single proposal is submitted.
By the time an RFP is released, the outcome is often already constrained by decisions no one remembers making — assumptions about scope, timelines, governance, and what problem the organization is actually trying to solve.
The RFP simply makes those assumptions official.
The Mistake Everyone Makes
Organizations treat the RFP as a discovery tool.
It isn’t.
An RFP is a confirmation document. It reflects the quality of thinking that happened before it existed. If that thinking was shallow, rushed, or politically negotiated, the RFP will faithfully preserve those flaws — in writing.
That’s why so many ERP projects start with confidence and end with surprise.
Three Failure Patterns That Appear Early
1. The Problem Is Described as a System
RFPs often begin with statements like:
“Our current ERP is outdated and no longer meets our needs.”
That isn’t a problem. It’s a symptom.
The real problems usually live elsewhere: governance gaps, process inconsistency, reporting ambiguity, unclear ownership. When the problem is framed as “we need new software,” every downstream decision follows the wrong logic.
2. Requirements Are Over-Specified and Understood
Long requirement lists feel thorough. They aren’t.
They’re often built from:
Legacy behaviors
Edge cases
Historical grievances
What’s missing is clarity on which requirements matter most, and which ones are negotiable. Vendors respond accordingly — optimizing for compliance instead of fit.
3. Governance Is Treated as a Constraint
Many RFPs quietly position governance as something to work around. Approval thresholds are vague. Decision rights are implied. Escalation paths are undefined.
That ambiguity doesn’t disappear after contract signature. It becomes the fault line where projects fracture.
Why This Matters
When an RFP is misaligned, even the “winning” proposal is compromised.
Vendors price defensively.
Timelines become aspirational.
Change management is oversold and under-resourced.
None of this is accidental.
What Better Looks Like
Strong ERP RFPs share a few traits:
They articulate the decision the organization is trying to make
They distinguish needs from preferences
They acknowledge constraints honestly
They treat governance as a design input, not an obstacle
These aren’t writing improvements.
They’re thinking improvements.
Final Thought
If an ERP RFP feels difficult to write, that’s usually a signal — not a problem.
It means the organization is confronting questions it can’t delegate to software or vendors. That discomfort is where better outcomes begin.
This kind of early-stage clarity work is often where ERP efforts succeed or fail. It’s also the kind of thinking we support in advisory engagements at 7Dimensions Consulting, long before an RFP ever hits the street.
