Robust system not used to fullest potential
Updated March 17, 2023
Robust system not used to fullest potential
Score 3 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with Arena PLM and QMS
Quality Document Management System and component drawing/bill of materials management. [Arena PLM and QMS] keeps track of our changes and manages phase gate approvals. Not all of our business systems are incorporated into arena such as manufacturing metrics and procurement related pricing information and cost management. It does however allow for documentation of supply chain sources.
- Navigation is logical
- Can incorporate and expand on linking different parts of the organization
- Phase gate system automatically prevents improper approval or purchasing of parts
- System modifications take a long time to implement
- Users cannot pullback their own change order submissions without admin support
- Navigation tabs in change orders make it difficult to access important information without advanced knowledge of the system. Need to be able to put important information in obvious and easy to reach locations.
- Product Features
- Product Usability
Although I did not make the decision to move to Arena PLM [and QMS], but the most important factor to me would be usability and functionality of the system to aggregate different documents and processes across the business in one central location. Arena seems to do a good job of this, but our company needs to optimize it.
It was extremely difficult to deploy. We did not adequately assess the functionality prior to launch and we retained artifacts of the paper system such as signature pages in the PLM system. Hard to tell if this was purely due to our launch team missing some key changes, or if the system was difficult in other ways.
Do you think Arena PLM and QMS delivers good value for the price?
Not sure
Are you happy with Arena PLM and QMS's feature set?
Yes
Did Arena PLM and QMS live up to sales and marketing promises?
I wasn't involved with the selection/purchase process
Did implementation of Arena PLM and QMS go as expected?
No
Would you buy Arena PLM and QMS again?
No
Using Arena PLM and QMS
It stores documents that are used in regulatory filings such as FDA submissions. Since I am not on the Regulatory Team I cannot speak much to other Regulatory efforts that Arena may be used for. It does, however, help with stage gating. That does support compliance with our quality system.
Although I do not work from home, many of our employees do. Having some people in the office and others remote has made it challenging to collaborate and Arena has helped make it easier. Prior to Arena PLM we had a paper system, which would have been an unimaginable pain during the transition to work from home orders. It is an incomparably better option than paper document management.
The initial implementation was difficult due to the sheer volume of documents and there were a number of inefficiencies. Since then there have been several key improvements. In particular, the change management process has been iterated on and is much improved. We are finally reaching a point where the system can link all relevant information in one place and it makes everything a lot easier.
Arena is a powerful tool that can help any business suffering the woes of document management.
I have had no interaction with the customer success team. However, as I understand, they have been supportive of our efforts to roll out new processes.