coming alongsideThe Alliancecoming alongsideThe AllianceHelping the people of the Alliance draw the full value from the ERP they worked so hard to put in place.
Prepared for the Alliance's leadership by Ho Goh, founder of Trinity, Geneva. October 2026.
Built with real investment and goodwill across the Secretariat.
Each team's output is another team's input.
The efficiency it was designed for is still waiting.
Listen to every team. Find the big rocks.
In around twelve weeks: prioritised, bundled, owned by the Alliance.
Putting an ERP in place asks a lot: budget, months of design and testing, data migration, and people giving time alongside their day jobs. Once it is live, a quieter question follows. Is it making the work easier for everyone who touches it?
Below are some early signals from an initial conversation. They are a partial view, seen from one part of the organisation, and the exercise itself will test them, widen them and add what the Alliance's people see.
Habits and side spreadsheets can grow up around the system.
People see their own screens, and may see less of who receives their work.
The capabilities are there, and more of the benefit is still to come.
Hours spent chasing and re-keying could go back to the mission.
A partial view to start from. The Alliance's people will complete the picture.
A vaccine stays potent because every link in the cold chain holds its temperature, from the manufacturer to the last mile. An ERP works the same way. A clean supplier record, a correctly coded grant, an approval given on time: each one keeps the value intact for the next person along. Choose a team to see what it hands on, and who receives it.
Budgets, cost centres, payments and the cash position.
Grants and countries, procurement, people and HR, reporting.
Grants pay out on time, suppliers are paid once, and leadership reads one number.
An illustration to start the conversation. The real map is drawn with your teams in the first workshops.
Every ERP project has a go-live date, and a great deal of complexity to manage on the way: data migration, integrations, testing cycles, budgets and decisions. With so much to hold together, the engagement with the end user community can fall short, even with the project team's very best intentions.
The exercise listens to a representative group from each unit, chosen with the business leads. Champions then carry the conversation to the colleagues around them.
These are possible origins, to be tested with the Alliance's people in the exercise itself. Each one reflects the pull of a timeline on a committed project team.
Testing confirms the system works as designed. With the timeline pressing, a smaller group may carry it, so many colleagues first meet the system at go-live.
Talking through how each role changes, and who depends on whom, competes with the go-live date. Screens get designed in detail, and the ways of working between teams may get less airtime.
Training centres on the clicks: raise a request, approve an invoice, run a report. The why and the who-next can travel more slowly, and colleagues who join later learn from whoever sits nearby.
The Alliance has kept moving: a new strategy period, a reshaped Secretariat, fresh priorities. Each change adds a new layer on top of the original design and training, and asks people to adapt again.
Each moment reflects the pull of a timeline. This exercise gives that time back to the Alliance's people.
Think of it as a coverage survey for your ERP: a clear view of where uptake is strong, where it is still building, and what will move it.
This is the heart of the exercise. Each barrier, wish and question raised is captured in people's own words, then qualified, prioritised and bundled, so each one has a clear next step and an owner ready to act on it.
Every workstream gets time and a voice. People who were busy during the implementation are heard in their own words, and see what happens with what they say.
An adoption score for every workstream and team, so the Alliance sees where uptake is strong and where it is building, in numbers rather than impressions. Figures shown are illustrative.
A named champion in each area, trusted by colleagues, who becomes the point of contact for every future release, training and change.
What success should feel like, and which measures matter most to the Alliance.
Workshops by business function and unit, mirroring how the Alliance is organised, in groups of up to eight, with leads, users, process and technology together.
Each big rock qualified and scored, and an adoption score built for every team.
Every big rock on a single quadrant, so the eye goes straight to what comes first.
Big rocks that share a cause, a team or a fix are bundled, to be solved together.
A playback to leadership, a champion in each area, and the roadmap in your partner's hands.
I bring the method and an independent view. The partner from inside the Alliance brings the organisation: its people, its history and its priorities. They are present in every meeting, which I would expect to take around 20 to 25 percent of their time over the twelve weeks.
Over the engagement, they move from beside me to out in front, and carry the roadmap once I step back.
Understands the overall operations, end to end, and how the teams connect.
Commands respect on both sides, so people speak openly and leadership listens.
Can quantify each rock with authority: priority, business value, cost of change and time.
Around 20 to 25 percent of their time, across the whole exercise.
A big rock is anything that stands between people and the full use of the system, captured in people's own words. It comes in three types.
Steps that slow the work, data that needs care, and handovers between teams that need tightening.
The report they would love to have, the approval that could be simpler, the screen that would save an hour a week.
Questions about why the system works the way it does, and the training that would build real confidence.
The smallest are solved in a conversation: an answer or a pointer, with nothing to build. Some are pebbles, resolved with a short training or a setting. Others are boulders that need investment and time. Some are easy to move, others need several teams to lift together.
Sizing them well takes two views working side by side: a colleague from the Alliance who knows the operations and the people, and Trinity as an independent advisor. In partnership, they qualify every rock, so the priorities are fair, consistent and trusted.
Illustrative example.
Each rock takes its colour from the team that raised it, and its size from a third measure of your choice. Which measures sit where is agreed with you in the first week. Try a few combinations.
Illustrative big rocks, typical of any ERP a year or two after go-live. The Alliance's own come from the Alliance's people. Bundles cut across teams, which is why the teams solve them together.
The quadrant shows what to do first. The bundles show what to do together, so each fix lands once, for everyone it touches.
Each time, the business was moving onto the group's single ERP and operating model. Each time, the result was practical and usable, and it opened the door to easier, more transparent conversations between parts of the business that had experienced friction in the past.
The figures below come from the first, a pilot with one regional business line that ran from April to September, and from its playback to the group's transformation forum.
Conversations between the business, process and technology, capturing everything that needs a resolution.
Each big rock qualified by category and workstream, forming the basis of the score and the priorities.
A consolidated view of readiness by category and by workstream.
Every big rock on one page, using three measures: priority, business value and feasibility. Swap in other measures and the process repeats.
Big rocks per bundle.
The workshop was well run and cohesive in what it covered… and allowed for direct and open conversations. Those running the workshop were fully up to speed on what was happening in [our business], as well as other parts of the business, and provided great insights across the board. Overall, two enthusiastic thumbs up.Participant, operations
This has been extremely helpful. Thank you for listening to us.Participant, service delivery
For the past couple of years people had been talking to us about [the ERP] as a tech solution, now you have shown us [it] is more of a way of working… how we are all going to be driving the same way.Participant, operations
Figures, lessons and quotes are taken from the pilot's playback, with names removed.
My name is Ho. I founded Trinity, an advisory that helps organisations change through their people. My career began at Capgemini delivering ERP programmes, and grew inside BP, Ralph Lauren, Richemont and global marketing services groups, across SAP, Oracle, Dynamics and Salesforce.
My specialism is the moment a system meets its users: user acceptance, readiness and adoption. I sit between technology and the business, and translate until both sides share one picture. This month I lectured at HEG Genève on ERP in real life, following a polo shirt from design into the customer's hand to show how every team depends on the next.
Helping organisations move, with people brought along.
ERP and operating model programmes, run with users at the centre.
Engagement, communication and identity that people feel.
Ho's soft skills, happy warrior demeanor and common sense approach were important in successfully changing the way business and technology stakeholders cooperate on such large ERP programs.Olivier Barbieri, Chief Information Officer
Ho brought a level of clarity, sanity and collaboration into a fast moving, high stress, high pressure environment.Chris McCall, Publishing CTO, Bauer Media Group
Very professional and structured but also a kind and well spirited human. His polite, calm but still distinct nature created the perfect work environment.Sebastian Schlueter, Business Process Integrator, Supply Chain
You have done the hard part. The system is in, and your people are committed to making it work. I would welcome the chance to help the Alliance draw out the value waiting in it, by listening first, and by keeping your people at the centre of the work.
A simple first step would be one conversation with the sponsors of the ERP, to agree what success should feel like and which measures matter most. From there, we shape the exercise together, at a pace that suits the Secretariat.
Thank you for reading. I look forward to meeting the team.
