Enterprise resource planning (ERP) system usage in Small and Medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Selangor / Nursyahida Zulkifli

The 2012 Budget announced by the Prime Minister of Malaysia indicated that small and medium enterprises (SMEs) continue to play an important role in the nation’s economy and are therefore, given sufficient allocation to sustain the various enterprise. As in all contemporary SMEs, the enabler for successful business ventures is through the use of information and communication technology (ICT). With premeditated information systems implementation, SMEs would be able to survive the demands of the current volatile economic conditions for competitive advantage. One such system is the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) for information mining in making strategic decision making. The ERP system provides the capability for fast, high quality data retrieval from large volumes of data for SME’s sustainability. Hence, the objectives of this study are; to examine the influence and relationship of the socio psychological factors toward the ERP system usage, and to investigate the effect of the socio psychological factors with the interaction of system complexity as moderator on the ERP system usage. The socio-psychological factors are perceived usefulness, rewards, perceived benefits and social influence. Consequently, the scope of this study is the SME’s in Selangor that are involved in the manufacturing industry. The methodology employed for this project is cross-sectional with purposive sampling technique for the identification of the units of analysis - the managers. Through a list provided by the SME Corporation (SME Corp) of Malaysia, five hundred SMEs that fit the pre-identified criteria were sent questionnaires for data collection. Prior to the actual data collection, a pilot study was undertaken to ensure the reliability and validity of the instrument. Subsequently, the study found that 43.8 percent of SMEs in Selangor have the ERP system experience with an average ERP system usage is between 1-5 years. Moreover, the perceived benefits (r=0.23, p<0.05) and social influence (r=0.35, p<0.01) were significantly correlated with the ERP system usage and the social influence (P=0.41, p