Explaining the Competitive Advantage of Enterprise Resource Planning Adoption: Insights Egyptian Higher Education Institutions

Organizations nowadays focus on, not implementing ERP systems, but also leveraging ERP systems as part of their digital strategy. They holistically address people, processes, and technology for a digital transformation. Meanwhile, higher education institutions (HEIs) are also facing an imperative need for the implementation of modern technologies to stay competitive and differentiate them as an innovation leader. Higher education management is challenged with maintaining high-level information systems. These systems can generate complex real-time reports for effective resource allocation and better decision making. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems can help HEIs manage their resources and operations effectively. A study of ERP among 112 HEIs in Egypt was conducted. This study originally investigates the Egyptian HEIs’ perception of the ERP system as a new integrating tool for its value. The results showed that Egyptian HEIs are still at the embryonic level as the majority have not adopted these systems yet. However, ERP value has been undoubtedly perceived by HEIs’ managers. Therefore, the present study fruitfully reflected HEIs’ understanding of the imperative need of ERP systems as strategic systems for their competitiveness. Consequently, the study suggests that Egyptian HEIs and ERP vendors take steps to remove any barriers and accelerate the ERP adoption process. Also, this research contributes to the advancement of ERP concepts and characteristics from HEIs' standpoint and a grants practical verification to the higher education context. Overall, the study advances existing knowledge and research on ERP, strategic management systems, and HEIs.