ERP Is Not Digital Spreadsheets: Model the Workflow, Not the Screen

<h2>CRUD is the easy part</h2><p>An ERP becomes difficult when a reservation changes inventory, creates financial obligations, affects commissions, advances credit, updates dashboards, and notifies people at the same time. Copying spreadsheet columns into database tables does not solve that problem.</p><h2>Model business transitions</h2><p>The useful unit of design is the business transition: what state is allowed now, who may change it, what must be locked, which facts must be snapshotted, and which downstream domains consume the result.</p><h2>Preserve history</h2><p>Prices, policies, commissions, and responsibilities change. An operational system should preserve the context used for an accepted transaction instead of silently recalculating history with today's settings.</p><h2>One source of truth means one set of rules</h2><p>Centralization is not putting every screen in one menu. It is making CRM, contracts, finance, marketing, and operations agree on the same accepted business state.</p>