Spreadsheets in an ERP environment: not what the doctor ordered

Modern ERP systems contain flexible report generators but the tendency exists for users to export data to spreadsheets for manipulation, reporting and decision making. A purported reason for this is that some users are more familiar with personal reporting tools (spreadsheets) as opposed to enterprise reporting tools. The author's doctoral research intends to measure the extent of spreadsheet usage in ERP environments and to determine which factors facilitate this.