The Mid-Market ERP System Health Playbook

Your ERP has a reading. Here is what it tells you

Mid-market operations teams expect a lot from their ERP. NetSuite should help the business run smoothly, give leaders better insight, and support growth without extra hires. But most COOs and Ops Directors face something else: manual workarounds, slow reporting, ongoing integration problems, and a team always reacting to issues.

If that sounds familiar, your ERP is telling you something. It needs a health check. You don’t need to be technical to spot the signs. You only need a clear way to evaluate where you stand and what to do next. That is why we built this non-technical ERP System Health Playbook.

This guide is the quick way to understand whether your ERP is helping you scale or quietly draining productivity and revenue behind the scenes.

Why this matters now

High-growth companies usually ride momentum for as long as they can. Processes get patched. Workarounds pile up. Then the business hits a ceiling. Leadership starts asking for better visibility, faster reporting, cleaner handoffs, and more automation. The system can handle it, but the configuration can’t. That is the moment when teams realize they have been relying on tribal knowledge and wishful thinking more than actual system health.

This is usually when they come to us.

When we partner with you through AlturaCare, we move with you from chaos to clarity by making steady, proactive improvements that help your COO and Ops Director get what they’re really after. Predictable scale. One client cut its month-end close from 10 days to 4. Another opened the door to $2.3 million in annual revenue once we stabilized their integrations and removed the manual order entry work that had been slowing them down. 

These results are what a healthy ERP makes possible.

The idea behind an ERP Health Check

A solid health check is not just about digging into technical details. It’s also a business review that ties everyday operational impact to how your system behaves. You want to understand how your ERP is shaping real outcomes like reporting speed, order accuracy, cash flow timing, labor cost, and your capacity to scale into new channels or warehouses. Once you start looking at the system through that lens, things become clearer quickly.

Here’s the short version. A healthy ERP gives you:

• A unified view of operational performance

• Accurate, timely financials

• Automated handoffs with minimal exceptions

• Stable integrations that don't disrupt sales

• Scalability without extra headcount

• Leadership confidence in the data

If your team can’t rely on these, you’re running the business based on gut feeling instead of real data.

Introducing the ERP Maturity Model

To help you see where you stand, we developed a simple three-level maturity model. We use this same framework in our AlturaCare assessments.

Level 1: Reactive mode

Symptoms:

• Frequent NetSuite or Celigo errors

• Finance teams working nights to close each month

• eCommerce data out of sync with inventory

• Too much work done in spreadsheets

• High dependency on a single internal “ERP champion”

Impact on the business:

• Lost productivity

• Hidden revenue loss

• Slower decisions

• High operational risk

Level 2: Stabilized mode

Symptoms:

• Reporting delays have narrowed

• Integrations run but still require babysitting

• Some automations exist, but need refinement

• Workarounds are documented but not eliminated

Impact on the business:

• Operations function, but growth strains the system

• Leadership spends too much time validating data

• Teams lose trust in the numbers

Level 3: Proactive mode

Symptoms:

• Reporting is timely and accurate

• Integrations are stable with minimal exceptions

• Automations handle the majority of repeat work

• Issues are identified and fixed before they create impact

• ERP evolves with the business strategy

Impact on the business:

• Teams move faster

• Hiring pressure decreases

• Operations scale smoothly

• Leadership has the visibility to expand channels confidently

Most mid-market companies are somewhere between Levels 1 and 2. Getting to Level 3 is what sets apart businesses that are constantly solving problems from those that are ready to grow.

Why AlturaCare is the path forward

AlturaCare gives COOs and Ops leaders the partner they wish they had from the start. We do more than just fix issues—we make ongoing improvements that help the whole business move forward. It’s like having ERP management and operational strategy together. You get a team that learns your business, supports your growth, and keeps making measurable improvements.

This is why our clients end up with less manual work, steadier integrations, and real savings they can point to. It is also why they stick with us. We help them move faster, scale with more confidence, and keep costs in check.

Download the playbook

If you want the complete maturity model with scorecards, indicators, and next steps, click here to get your free Mid-Market ERP System Health Playbook. It can help you review your system in less than 10 minutes, even if you’re not technical.

NetSuite Optimization Self-Audit: Identify performance gaps in 30 minutes

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If your NetSuite feels slower, clunkier, or more manual than it should, you’re not alone. Many growing companies hit a wall after their initial NetSuite implementation. Processes that once worked fine start dragging. Reports take longer to run. Teams rely on workarounds, and leadership loses visibility into what’s really happening across the business.

The good news? Most of these problems can be spotted quickly with the right framework. This 30-minute self-audit will help you identify where performance gaps are costing you time, money, and momentum.

Step 1: Evaluate your financial close process

If your month-end close is taking longer than five days, it’s a red flag. Review your journal entries, reconciliations, and approval chains. Ask: which parts could be automated or simplified? Many clients have reduced their close from ten days to four just by optimizing NetSuite workflows and approvals.

Step 2: Review automation and workflow uptime

Automation is only powerful when it’s reliable. Check for failed workflows, scripts, or integrations. If your automation uptime isn’t near 99%, you’re spending too much time firefighting instead of forecasting.

Step 3: Assess integration stability

Shopify, Amazon, 3PL, EDI—if any of these connections break, your business slows down. Audit your integration logs for recurring Celigo or API errors. Even a 2% failure rate can mean hundreds of delayed or lost orders a month.

Step 4: Measure reporting and visibility

How quickly can finance and operations leaders get answers to basic questions? If dashboards lag or data requires multiple exports, it’s time to tighten your data pipelines. A well-optimized NetSuite delivers real-time visibility across your entire business.

Step 5: Examine user experience and training

A powerful system is only as effective as its users. If your team relies on manual steps or can’t find what they need, productivity stalls. Review permissions, saved searches, and training resources to make everyday tasks easier.

When a self-audit isn’t enough

Sometimes, the gaps you uncover go deeper than expected. That’s where AlturaCare comes in. Every new AlturaCare engagement begins with a comprehensive HealthCheck, a deep, data-driven analysis that pinpoints exactly where inefficiencies are hiding and builds the roadmap to fix them. From there, our team stays hands-on to keep your NetSuite performing at its best, month after month.

Take the next step

Don’t wait for inefficiencies to become bottlenecks. Download the 30-Minute Optimization Checklist to pinpoint your biggest opportunities and see what’s possible when your systems are seamless.

Download your 30-Minute Optimization Checklist and uncover what’s slowing you down.