ERP Decommissioning Process: A CIO’s Step-by-Step Guide

Why ERP decommissioning matters in healthcare

Healthcare organizations operate under strict data retention, audit, and security requirements. Payroll records, HR files, financial transactions, and supply chain data must remain accessible for years after systems are replaced.

As a result, many health systems continue paying for legacy ERP platforms long after they stop delivering operational value. These systems drive unnecessary licensing costs, increase security exposure, and drain IT resources. Alternatively, some practices store legacy data in the form of data dump exports and PDF’s, rendering the critical data inaccessible, unsearchable, and unusable.

As outlined in MediQuant’s discussion of ERP data archiving for healthcare, decommissioning only becomes possible when data access and compliance are addressed deliberately.

The ERP decommissioning process at a high level

For healthcare CIOs, proper ERP decommissioning is a structured data lifecycle rather than a single event. It begins with executive alignment and ends with validated, long-term data access outside the legacy system.

At a high level, the ERP decommissioning process includes:

1. Building an ROI-based business case for decommissioning
2. Defining a clear ERP application sunset strategy
3. Determining what data to migrate, archive, or retire
4. Archiving ERP data to preserve access and compliance
5. Executing system shutdown
6. Checking post-decommissioning access and audits

Each phase reinforces the next, reducing risk and enabling confident system retirement.

Step 1: Build the business case to retire legacy ERP systems

Identifying cost, risk, and operational drag

Legacy ERP systems impose costs beyond just licensing fees. CIOs often uncover ongoing infrastructure spend, security tooling, and staff time tied to systems that no longer support active operations. As vendor support declines, these platforms also introduce greater security exposure and audit risk.

Just as important is the opportunity cost of that time spent keeping up the old system. Maintaining obsolete ERP systems pulls IT resources away from modernization initiatives that improve care delivery, analytics, and financial performance.

These risks often intensify during ERP transitions. Organizations frequently focus on moving data into the new system while assuming the legacy platform can be addressed later. In practice, delaying archiving and decommissioning decisions leads to prolonged system overlap, wasted budget, and unnecessary security exposure.

Planning for ERP data archiving and system retirement from the start of the transition is what enables a clean shutdown instead of years of operational drag.

Understanding decommissioning in terms of ROI

To secure executive and board alignment, healthcare leaders must connect ERP decommissioning to measurable outcomes. As detailed in MediQuant’s analysis of the ROI of archiving legacy ERP data, successful decommissioning delivers:

• Elimination of recurring license and support fees
• Reduced infrastructure and security overhead
• Lower audit risk and improved regulatory posture
• Reclaimed IT capacity for strategic initiatives

Put simply, properly decommissioning ERP systems and archiving legacy data is a value-generating initiative, not a technical cleanup.

Step 2: Define an ERP application sunset strategy

What an ERP application sunset strategy includes

An ERP application sunset strategy defines when, how, and under what conditions a legacy ERP system will be retired. It establishes ownership, timelines, data disposition decisions, and validation criteria before any technical shutdown occurs, so decommissioning is intentional rather than reactive.

At a minimum, an effective sunset strategy should clarify:

• Which ERP applications are being retired, and in what sequence, especially when multiple systems support finance, HR, or supply chain functions
• How historical ERP data will be handled, including what is archived, what is migrated, and what can be defensibly disposed of
• Who owns post-retirement access and validation, ensuring finance, HR, legal, and compliance teams can still retrieve records as needed
• What “done” looks like, including confirmation that reporting, audits, and regulatory access no longer require the live ERP system

Most importantly, a sunset strategy separates data access requirements from system dependency. When that distinction is not made upfront, organizations default to keeping ERP systems online simply to answer historical questions, which is where decommissioning efforts begin to stall.

Avoiding systems that never fully shut down

One of the most common failure points in the ERP decommissioning process is allowing legacy systems to remain online indefinitely because they are still used for historical access. Finance, HR, compliance, or legal teams often depend on these systems to answer questions, run reports, or support audits. Without a clear alternative, the safest option becomes leaving the ERP running “just in case.”

This dependency is rarely about the application itself. It is about access to the data inside it. When organizations do not separate data access requirements from system dependency early, they end up carrying unnecessary licensing costs, infrastructure overhead, and security risk long after the system’s operational value has expired.

The retirement of ERP platforms like Infor Lawson illustrates this challenge well. Many healthcare organizations are preparing to transition away from Infor Lawson, but success depends on understanding both the nuances of the retiring the ERP system and the data it holds. Working with a partner that has system-specific experience, like MediQuant does, helps organizations extract and preserve the right data while ensuring reporting, audits, and compliance needs remain intact after shutdown.

Planning for data access and archiving early in the ERP transition allows organizations to break this cycle. By giving stakeholders confidence that historical data will remain secure, searchable, and compliant outside the legacy system, CIOs can fully decommission ERP platforms instead of carrying them forward as permanent liabilities.

Step 3: Determine what to migrate, archive, or retire

Why most ERP data should be archived, not migrated

Not all ERP data belongs in a new system. Migrating decades of historical payroll, HR, or finance data often adds cost and complexity without operational benefit.

An effective ERP decommissioning process distinguishes between:

• Data required for active operations
• Data needed for compliance, audits, or reporting
• Data eligible for retirement based on retention rules

Aligning data decisions with retention and audit requirements

Healthcare retention requirements vary by data type and jurisdiction. CIOs must ensure that archived ERP data remains accessible, defensible, and auditable after system retirement. Learn more about the requirements for each ERP data type in this guide.

This planning discipline is a core component of a successful ERP data migration plan and prevents last-minute decisions that delay decommissioning.

Step 4: Archive ERP data to preserve access and compliance

What archived ERP data must support after shutdown

Archiving is the foundation that makes ERP decommissioning possible, but not all archives are created equal. After a legacy ERP system is shut down, archived data must continue to support the real-world needs of finance, HR, compliance, and legal teams. This includes fast search and retrieval, the ability to generate reports on demand, role-based access controls, and detailed audit trails that document every interaction with the data.

Equally important is retention enforcement. Archived ERP data must follow healthcare-specific retention schedules and automatically manage expiration without manual intervention. Generic file storage or low-cost cloud repositories often fail here, leaving organizations with data that technically exists but is difficult to retrieve, defend, or govern during audits. When archived data is hard to access or validate, stakeholders inevitably push to keep the legacy ERP system online, undermining decommissioning efforts.

How purpose-built platforms enable confident decommissioning

When planning an ERP system decommission, CIOs should be aware of active archive platforms that go above simply storing data by replacing legacy system dependency. Active archive solutions like DataArk preserve the structure, context, and relationships within ERP datasets so users can run reports, answer audit questions, and retrieve records without relying on the original application.

By separating data access from the ERP platform itself, organizations gain confidence that all business and compliance needs are met after shutdown. This shift eliminates the “just in case” argument for keeping systems alive, reduces security exposure tied to unsupported software, and allows organizations to fully realize the financial and operational benefits of ERP decommissioning.

Step 5: Execute system shutdown and validate access

Validate access before pulling the plug

Before turning off a legacy ERP system, HIT leaders must confirm that archived data fully supports day-to-day and exception-based access needs. Validation should go further than a simple login test and reflect real scenarios stakeholders will encounter after shutdown.

At a minimum, this validation should confirm that teams can:

• Retrieve historical payroll, HR, and financial records on demand
• Run standard and ad-hoc reports without relying on the legacy ERP
• Support audit requests with complete, time-stamped data and access logs
• Respond to legal or compliance inquiries with defensible chain-of-custody documentation
• Enforce role-based access so users only see what they are authorized to view

This step is critical for building internal confidence. When stakeholders trust that archived ERP data is usable and reliable, resistance to system retirement drops significantly.

Confirming the ERP system can be fully retired

Once access and usability are validated, CIOs can move forward with formally retiring the ERP system. This includes terminating licenses and support contracts, shutting down servers or cloud environments, and removing the system from security monitoring and patching cycles.

This is where the hard-cost benefits of ERP decommissioning are realized. Organizations eliminate ongoing licensing and infrastructure costs, reduce exposure tied to unsupported software, and free IT teams from maintaining obsolete platforms. Just as important, CIOs gain clarity and control, knowing the legacy system is no longer a hidden dependency but a closed chapter supported by a secure, compliant archive.

Step 6: Govern post-decommissioning data access and audits

Supporting audits years after ERP retirement

Decommissioning an ERP system does not end an organization’s responsibility for the data it once housed. Archived ERP data must remain accessible, traceable, and defensible for the full duration of its retention period. This includes the ability to support financial audits, HR inquiries, legal discovery, and regulatory reviews years after the original system is offline.

Effective post-decommissioning governance ensures that access controls, audit logs, and retention policies remain enforced regardless of staff changes, organizational growth, or system transitions. Without this step, archived data can become difficult to locate or validate, undermining the very compliance goals decommissioning was meant to support.

Reducing long-term compliance stress for organizations

Strong governance frameworks extend the value of ERP decommissioning well beyond system shutdown. When access rules and audit readiness are built into the archive itself, CIOs are no longer forced to react to unexpected requests or scramble to reconstruct historical records.

This theme comes through clearly in MediQuant’s Confessions of a CIO: Archival Success guide, where healthcare IT leaders share how intentional post-retirement governance helped them maintain audit readiness, reduce risk, and move forward without reopening retired systems. These experiences reinforce a critical lesson: ERP decommissioning only delivers lasting value when governance continues after the system is gone.

Why the right partner determines decommissioning success

Attempting to manage this process without an experienced partner increases risk and prolongs system dependency. That’s why organizations trust MediQuant to help them move through the decommissioning process with clarity, control, and confidence.