Step 1: Kick off your project

From an organizational point of view, it’s important to have one contact (or contact per country) as a mediator between Purchasing and IT departments.
Define the scope. Decide on the data you want to exchange, choose a technical communication protocol, define which messages (e.g. orders, confirmations, delivery notes, invoices) to exchange, and check if there are any special circumstances you need to account for.
Key groups involved in EDI are Purchasing and IT on the customer side, and Sales and IT departments on the supplier side.
From an IT perspective, it is important to consult experts and choose highly efficient conversion software.

Step 2: One person is responsible between IT and Sales/Purchasing

Seamless coordination inside your company and between companies is crucial. This works best when one person is responsible for aligning IT and Sales (supplier side), and IT and Purchasing (customer side). Each respective department in the one company talks to the respective department in the other, and with each other inside their own company.

Step 3: Where is your data coming from?

Make sure both companies have agreed on specific designations for purchases and sales before the project begins. This avoids misunderstandings about item numbers, and avoids ordering mistakes.

Step 4: It’s all about standards

EDI is about common standards for exchanging documents and each party being able to see the same information. Make sure you use a data format standard that is well-established and familiar to everyone involved. EDIFACT (Electronic Data Interchange for Administration, Commerce and Transport) is one example.

Step 5: Tap into existing knowledge

This can save you a lot of headaches and heartache in your project. Don’t reinvent the wheel. If you have existing knowledge of EDI in your organization, use it, learn from it.

Step 6: You’ve got a timeline, stick to it

 Meet on a weekly basis to rain-check implementation and make sure you’re keeping pace with the project sprints. If you’re slipping behind, you will need to escalate the problem and resolve it. Keep in mind staff availability (i.e. holiday periods, etc.).

Step 7: Define and perform standard tests

The project has now reached an advanced stage and you’re ready to define, perform and evaluate standard tests involving all parties in both companies.

Step 8: User acceptance tests

Now’s the time to go deeper into the various departments of each company to test any special or individual circumstances that have become evident. Here the Sales and the Purchasing departments in the respective companies give the go ahead once everything is running smoothly.

Step 9: Customer technical delivery standards

If I’m a customer, I should make sure I’ve defined one standard for all of its suppliers. This allows the customer to create uniform ways of working with all its suppliers.

Step 10: Go live and run parallel systems

You’re up, but you’re not quite running yet. To best manage your risk, you need to run parallel processes – one on paper and other with EDI. This might last from several days to weeks.
Deciding which specific EDI conversion software to use is a fundamental step before the project is launched. Using qualified experts (in-house, or outsourced) is crucial to successful operation. Have you consulted experts and implemented the previous 10 steps? Then the chances are that you’ve implemented your EDI project successfully!


We’d like to thank Woyb for their input and feedback on implementing EDI.