Odoo connects accounting, inventory, and business processes in one system.
Odoo is often described as a simple and affordable ERP system for small businesses. That image is understandable, but now much too limited.
Odoo is an integrated ERP system that allows organizations to manage their key business processes in one environment. Think of sales, customer management, purchasing, inventory, production, accounting, projects, time tracking, helpdesk, subscriptions, website, and web store.
Yet there are still three persistent misconceptions about Odoo:
Odoo is only suitable for small businesses.
Odoo is not suitable for Dutch accounting.
You can easily implement Odoo yourself.
None of these statements are correct without further explanation. Odoo is widely applicable, but the system must fit well with the organization. The software is usually not the most difficult part. The real complexity lies in processes, people, exceptions, and the choices made during an implementation.
What exactly is Odoo?
Odoo is business software in which different applications work together. Each application focuses on a specific process. For example, you use customer management for relationships and sales for quotes and sales orders. You use accounting for, among other things, invoices, payments, and financial reports.
The difference with many traditional software packages is that these applications are not separate from each other. A sales order can, for example, lead to a delivery and an invoice. A purchase order can be linked to a receipt and a supplier invoice. Hours worked on a project can be directly invoiced.
As a result, you need to enter data less often and departments work with the same information. Sales looks at the same customer data as administration. Inventory is not maintained in a separate system that is only later connected to accounting.
This makes processes clearer and reduces the chance of errors.
Odoo consists of different applications, but it is not a collection of separate islands. It is precisely the coherence between the applications that makes Odoo an ERP system.
Odoo is more than a collection of applications
The modular structure of Odoo makes it possible to start small. An organization can, for example, start with customer management, sales, and invoicing. Later, inventory, purchasing, accounting, projects, or production can be added.
That does not mean that every organization needs all applications. A service company probably benefits more from customer management, sales, projects, time tracking, and accounting. A trading company, on the other hand, has much to gain from sales, purchasing, inventory management, and accounting. A manufacturing company adds production, quality management, and maintenance to that.
The advantage is that the processes can continue to grow in the same environment. You do not need to acquire a completely new system for every new need.
It is also important to remain realistic. An ERP system does not get better by activating as many applications as possible. The question should always be: what business problem are we solving with this?
Is Odoo only suitable for small businesses?
No. Odoo is used by organizations of various sizes and in diverse industries.
A good example is Circular IT Group. This international organization has more than 340 employees and consists of more than twenty companies in different European countries. Within the group, Odoo is widely used. Inventory management is the central component of the business operations.
Circular IT Group purchases IT hardware, refurbishes this equipment, and then resells the hardware. This is a circular process in which inventory is not just an administrative list.
The organization needs to know which equipment is incoming, what processes are taking place, where products are located, and when they can be resold.
Here, various business processes come together:
purchasing of IT hardware;
receipt and registration of equipment;
inventory management;
repairing and processing of equipment;
sales;
financial administration;
collaboration between multiple companies;
reporting on the performance of the organization.
This is not a simple process that is only suitable for a small company with a few employees. It requires an ERP system that can connect large amounts of data and various business processes.
The size of an organization does not automatically determine whether Odoo is suitable. More important are the processes, the number of companies, the inventory flows, the reporting needs, and the way the organization operates.
A small company can also have complex processes. And a large company can be relatively simply organized. The number of employees counts, but does not tell the whole story.
Is Odoo suitable for Dutch accounting?
Yes. Odoo is suitable for Dutch accounting and does not fall short in that area compared to traditional accounting packages like Exact.
All customers of Odoo Experts use Odoo as their accounting system. Odoo includes the features you would expect from a full-fledged accounting package. Think of general ledger accounts, VAT, payment terms, sales invoices, purchase invoices, bank transactions, payments, reports, and financial closures.
You can read more about this on our page about Odoo accounting.
The main difference is that the accounting in Odoo is directly connected to the rest of the organization.
With a separate accounting package, data from other systems must be transferred or re-entered. In Odoo, financial data arises as part of the process itself.
A sales invoice originates from a sales order. A supplier invoice can be linked to a purchase order and goods receipt. Inventory movements can be processed financially without anyone having to manually merge this information afterwards.
This not only saves time. It also ensures that the financial administration is closer to daily reality.
If the inventory is incorrect, it has consequences for the financial administration. If a sales order is set up incorrectly, it can affect the invoice. Precisely because processes are interconnected, errors become visible sooner.
Odoo for multiple countries and companies
Odoo supports accounting for more than a hundred countries. In addition, multiple languages and currencies are available. The current capabilities and country support can be found in the official documentation of Odoo.
This makes Odoo interesting for organizations with branches or companies in multiple countries. An international group can manage its business processes in one ERP system, while each company retains its own administration and reporting.
A group can house multiple companies in one database. Each company retains its own financial administration, settings, and reports. At the same time, companies within the group can collaborate in a controlled manner.
Transactions between companies within the same group become easier as a result. When one company within the group sells something to another company, both transactions do not need to be entered completely separately. The mutual sale and purchase can be linked together and created automatically.
This prevents duplicate work and makes the mutual administration more controllable. Especially for groups with many transactions between companies, this is an important advantage.
More information about these possibilities can be found in the Odoo documentation on multiple companies.
One database does not mean that international setup is automatically simple. Each entity may have to deal with its own legislation, VAT rules, reports, and administrative procedures. Roles and responsibilities must also be clearly defined.
The software offers the possibilities. The organization must ensure that these possibilities are set up correctly.
Can you easily implement Odoo yourself?
You can easily open Odoo and get started. That is something different than properly implementing Odoo.
Anyone can, after a little trying, get a car to drive away. But can you also drive well?
It works the same way with Odoo. You can create a customer, make a quote, and send an invoice yourself. However, that does not mean you have a well-structured ERP system.
An implementation requires much more than activating applications and filling in settings. You first need to understand how the organization works.
What processes are there? Who is responsible for what? What exceptions occur? What information needs to be recorded? When can an order be confirmed? When is something delivered or invoiced?
Daarna moet Odoo zo worden ingericht dat het de gekozen werkwijze ondersteunt. Medewerkers moeten weten hoe zij met het systeem werken. Gegevens moeten worden gecontroleerd en eventueel worden gemigreerd.
Then processes need to be tested. If that test shows that something is not working properly, you need to adjust it and test again.
So: test and then test again.
The complexity depends on the organization.
A small organization with simple processes can carry out a larger part of the implementation itself. When there are few exceptions and the administration is clear, that can work just fine.
In a larger or more complex organization, it is different. There, multiple departments, companies, warehouses, countries, currencies, roles, and reporting needs often play a role.
The most important question is therefore not: can I install Odoo myself?
The better question is: can I analyze my organization well enough to set up Odoo responsibly?
That is often where it goes wrong in practice. Companies underestimate how many choices are needed. They see a demonstration, recognize a few screens, and think that the implementation mainly consists of transferring data.
But an ERP system does not only support existing processes. It also makes visible where processes are unclear.
Who approves a purchase order? When is stock available? Who can adjust an invoice? What information must a seller record? What happens to a device that is returned? Who checks if a project stays within budget?
These are organizational questions. Odoo can support them, but cannot answer them on behalf of the organization.
Read more about our approach to Odoo implementations.
Odoo standard as a starting point
In a good implementation, you start with the standard capabilities of Odoo. First, it must be clear what Odoo can already do before you have custom development done.
Customization may sometimes be necessary. For example, when a company has a distinctive process that cannot be set up with the standard functionality. But customization should be a conscious business choice, not a reflex because an existing process does not fit one-to-one in Odoo right away.
Sometimes it is wiser to adjust a process. Not because the software is always right, but because organizations often work with historical habits that once made sense but now mainly cause extra work.
An implementation is therefore also a moment to critically review processes.
What must absolutely be retained? What can be simpler? Which controls are necessary? And which exceptions occur so rarely that you should not build the process entirely around them?
Read also: Is customization in Odoo a good idea?
Odoo is not a magic button
Odoo can support many business processes. It can be used for sales, customer management, inventory, production, accounting, projects, helpdesk, subscriptions, websites, and much more.
But Odoo does not resolve unclear responsibilities. It does not automatically make bad data reliable. And it does not ensure that employees will naturally embrace a new process.
The quality of an implementation is determined by a combination of factors:
the configuration of the software;
the quality of the processes;
the reliability of the data;
the involvement of employees;
training and guidance;
testing with realistic scenarios;
clear responsibility after commissioning.
Therefore, an ERP implementation is not an IT project that you can fully delegate to the software vendor. The organization must make its own choices and allocate time.
So what is Odoo ultimately?
Odoo is a fully-fledged ERP system for organizations that want to connect their business processes. It is suitable for small companies, but also for larger organizations and international groups.
The strength of Odoo lies in the combination of breadth and integration. You can manage sales, purchasing, inventory, production, projects, and accounting in one environment. Dutch accounting is supported, as well as accounting in more than a hundred other countries. Multiple languages, currencies, and transactions between companies within one group are also possible.
Circular IT Group shows that Odoo is also suitable for an international organization with more than twenty companies and over 340 employees. In their business model, inventory management forms the connection between purchasing, refurbishing equipment, and sales.
At the same time, Odoo is not automatically well set up as soon as you have activated the system. The software is a tool. The organization must determine how processes work, what information is needed, and who is responsible for what.
Therefore, Odoo is easy to start with, but not always easy to implement well. Those who understand that difference make better choices and get much more out of the system.
