HandsFree ERP, founded in 2021, was built on a simple but powerful idea: ERP projects don’t fail because of technology, they fail because of decisions made long before ERP implementation begins.
Led by President Peter Joeckel and COO & Partner Kati Hvidtfeldt, the company focuses on helping organizations avoid the costly missteps that have historically defined enterprise resource planning initiatives. ERP projects have earned a reputation for being some of the most complex and high-risk investments a company can make. Despite decades of innovation in ERP software, cloud ERP systems, and digital transformation, the same issues continue to surface.
Misaligned expectations, poorly defined ERP requirements, weak data foundations, unclear business processes, and vendor-driven agendas often derail even the most well-funded ERP initiatives. HandsFree ERP was created in direct response to this pattern.
The founders had seen it too many times. Organizations would commit millions of dollars to ERP systems, only to face delays, budget overruns, failed implementations, or outcomes that failed to meet business needs. What stood out was that the root cause was rarely the software itself. Instead, problems originated in the early ERP planning and ERP selection stages, where critical decisions were made without clear strategy, business alignment, or unbiased guidance.
This insight led to the creation of a different kind of ERP consulting and advisory firm. HandsFree ERP positions itself as a purely client-side ERP advisory partner, independent from software vendors and implementation providers. That independence is central to its value. Without incentives tied to selling ERP software or implementation services, the firm can focus entirely on what is right for the client.
Serving a C-suite audience, HandsFree ERP works closely with executive leaders to bring clarity and structure to ERP decision-making. Its approach emphasizes preparation, executive alignment, business process clarity, ERP readiness, data quality, and informed choice before any major commitments are made. This ensures that organizations enter ERP projects with a solid foundation rather than reacting to problems later.
With offices in Dallas and Seattle, the company has already built a strong portfolio of clients, including Pizza Properties, Workers Associations, and Microsoft. These partnerships reflect a growing demand for independent ERP expertise in a space traditionally dominated by vendor influence.
HandsFree ERP exists to change how ERP decisions are made. By acting as an independent ERP advocate, the firm helps organizations reduce ERP risk, control costs, improve ERP selection outcomes, and ultimately achieve results that align with their strategic business goals.
In conversation with Peter Joeckel, President of HandsFree ERP
Can you explain your services in brief?
HandsFree ERP provides a structured, end-to-end ERP advisory model designed to de-risk ERP initiatives before major investments are made. Core services include:
Discover Assessment: A data-driven ERP requirements and business process evaluation of organizational needs, system fit, and solution readiness.
Vendor and Partner Selection: Objective guidance to identify the best-fit ERP solution and implementation partner.
Data Health Check: Analysis and preparation of ERP data to improve data migration success and reduce implementation risk.
ERP Success Academy: Training programs that empower internal teams to lead ERP projects and digital transformation initiatives more effectively.
Workshops and Advisory Engagements: Deep-dive sessions to refine priorities, ERP scope, business requirements, project roadmap, and executive alignment.
The common thread across all services is independence. HandsFree ERP does not sell or implement ERP software, ensuring advice is always aligned with the client’s best interest.
Your mission is to “eliminate painful ERP failures” with “unbiased client-side advisory.” How does this unique positioning fundamentally change the dynamics for a company evaluating or implementing an ERP system?
Traditional ERP projects are heavily influenced by vendors and implementation partners whose incentives are tied to selling ERP software, cloud platforms, and consulting services. This often leads to overpromising, underestimating complexity, and pushing solutions that may not truly fit the client’s needs.
HandsFree ERP fundamentally shifts this dynamic by:
Acting solely on behalf of the client
Removing sales bias from ERP decision-making
Bringing transparency to ERP costs, risks, trade-offs, timelines, and implementation realities
This creates a more balanced environment where decisions are driven by business outcomes rather than sales agendas. As a result, companies enter ERP projects with clarity, realistic expectations, stronger negotiating power, and a much better chance of ERP implementation success.
Your “Discover” assessment tool is described as a “next generation of requirements gathering.” What makes this automated, data-driven approach more effective than traditional, months-long consulting workshops for achieving clarity and accurate budget estimates?
Traditional ERP requirements gathering can take months, involving lengthy workshops, subjective input, and inconsistent documentation. Even after all that effort, results are often incomplete, unclear, or biased.
The Discover assessment introduces a next-generation approach to ERP selection and requirements gathering:
Automated and structured data capture
Standardized ERP evaluation frameworks
Quantifiable insights into business requirements and ERP fit
Faster timelines with greater accuracy
Clearer visibility into budget, scope, risk, and implementation readiness
Instead of relying solely on interviews and opinions, Discover uses data to create clarity. This leads to more accurate ERP budget estimates, better vendor alignment, improved solution fit, and significantly reduced risk early in the process.
HandsFree ERP champions a “business-first approach” over a feature-checklist one. Can you share an example where this focus on business outcomes prevented a client from making a costly, technically impressive but misaligned ERP choice?
In one case, a company was leaning toward a highly sophisticated ERP platform because of its advanced features and strong market reputation. On paper, it appeared to be a “best-in-class” ERP solution.
However, through HandsFree ERP’s business-first ERP evaluation, it became clear that:
The company’s processes were not mature enough to leverage the advanced capabilities
The cost of ERP implementation and maintenance would far exceed the business value
A simpler, more flexible ERP solution would better support their growth
By shifting the focus from software features to business outcomes, the company avoided a costly and complex ERP implementation that would likely have failed. Instead, they selected a right-sized ERP solution aligned with their operational reality, business maturity, and future growth plans.
You highlight that “if you’re not ready for ERP, you’re not ready for AI.” How does your methodology for data health and process clarity not only set the stage for ERP success but also build the essential foundation for future AI integration?
The statement “if you’re not ready for ERP, you’re not ready for AI” reflects a critical truth: AI depends on clean data, trusted systems, governed information, and well-defined business processes.
HandsFree ERP’s methodology emphasizes:
Data integrity and governance
ERP data quality and migration readiness
Process clarity and standardization
System alignment with business goals
Business ownership of data and decisions
These are the same foundational elements required for successful AI adoption, AI agents, automation, analytics, and digital transformation. Without clean ERP data and clear business processes, AI initiatives often produce unreliable, misleading, or low-value results.
By addressing these fundamentals during the ERP readiness and ERP planning phase, HandsFree ERP ensures clients are not only prepared for ERP success but also positioned to leverage AI effectively in the future.
Your services include the “ERP Success Academy” online course. Why is educating and empowering internal client teams a critical part of your strategy for ensuring long-term project success, beyond just providing an assessment report?
ERP success is not just about selecting the right system. It is about how well the organization executes, adopts, governs, and sustains the transformation.
The ERP Success Academy was created to:
Equip internal teams with knowledge and confidence
Reduce dependency on external consultants
Improve ERP decision-making throughout the project lifecycle
Strengthen change management and executive alignment
Foster accountability, ownership, and business readiness
When internal stakeholders understand the ERP process, risks, decisions, and best practices, they become active drivers of success rather than passive participants. This dramatically improves long-term outcomes and helps companies avoid the common ERP failure traps that lead to delays, change orders, budget overruns, and poor adoption.
The company has been recognized as a “Top ERP Solutions Provider” by multiple outlets. Beyond the awards, what specific client result or feedback validates that your model is truly a “game-changer” for the industry?
While industry recognition is meaningful, the most powerful validation comes from client outcomes.
Common feedback from clients includes:
“We avoided a decision we would have regretted.”
“We finally have clarity on what we actually need.”
“This saved us months of time and significant cost.”
In many cases, organizations report that the Discover process alone prevented misaligned ERP investments worth millions of dollars.
This ability to prevent ERP failure before it happens is what truly differentiates HandsFree ERP. Instead of waiting until an ERP implementation is already in trouble, the company helps leaders make better decisions before software contracts are signed, implementation partners are selected, and budgets are committed.
With a trend towards vendor consolidation, how does your vendor-agnostic, tool-based advisory model protect client interests and ensure they get the best-fit solution rather than the most heavily marketed one?
As ERP vendors grow through consolidation, their ecosystems become more complex and often more sales-driven. This increases the risk of clients being steered toward ERP solutions that prioritize vendor strategy over client fit.
HandsFree ERP mitigates this by:
Remaining completely vendor-agnostic
Evaluating multiple ERP solutions objectively
Focusing on business requirements rather than brand recognition
Helping clients understand trade-offs across cost, complexity, fit, risk, and scalability
This ensures that clients select the ERP solution that best fits their needs — not the one with the strongest marketing presence, largest sales team, or most aggressive implementation proposal.
Data quality is cited as the “#1 Reason ERP Projects Fail.” How does your Data Health Check service proactively turn this major project risk into a controlled, manageable part of the migration plan?
ERP data migration is one of the most underestimated risks in ERP projects. Poor data quality can derail ERP implementations, delay timelines, increase cost, compromise reporting, and reduce trust in the new system.
The Data Health Check addresses this proactively by:
Identifying inconsistencies, duplicates, and gaps
Assessing data readiness for ERP migration
Defining cleanup and data governance strategies
Prioritizing master data, customer data, vendor data, item data, and transactional data risks
Integrating data planning into the overall ERP project roadmap
By turning data into a controlled and managed component of the project, HandsFree ERP eliminates one of the most common causes of ERP implementation failure. The result is a stronger ERP foundation, better reporting, smoother migration, and improved readiness for automation and AI.
What does the future hold for HandsFree ERP?
The future is focused on scaling impact through technology, education, AI readiness, and global reach.
Key areas of growth include:
Expanding the Discover platform with more advanced analytics
Enhancing ERP training programs to reach more organizations
Building partnerships that maintain independence while increasing accessibility
Helping clients connect ERP, data, and AI strategies
Continuing to refine methodologies based on real-world ERP outcomes
The ultimate goal is to make ERP success predictable, not accidental.
Meet the leaders behind the success of HandsFree ERP
Peter Joeckel, President and Kati Hvidtfeldt, COO & Partner
Both Kati Hvidtfeldt and Peter Joeckel are recognized leaders in ERP advisory, known for their pragmatic, no-nonsense approach to solving complex business challenges. With extensive experience across ERP selection, ERP implementation, ERP recovery, business process improvement, and digital transformation, they have developed a deep understanding of why ERP projects succeed or fail.
Their philosophy centers on clarity, independence, and accountability. Rather than accepting industry norms, they challenge them by advocating for a model where clients are empowered, informed, and in control of their ERP journey.
Through HandsFree ERP, Peter and Kati have transformed that vision into a structured, scalable approach that is helping organizations avoid costly ERP mistakes, improve business outcomes, and build a stronger foundation for data, AI, and long-term growth.
“Data migration is one of the most underestimated risks in ERP projects. Poor data quality can derail implementations, delay timelines, and compromise system performance.”
“ERP success is not just about selecting the right system, it’s about how well the organization executes and sustains the transformation.”
“When internal stakeholders understand the process, risks, and best practices, they become active drivers of success rather than passive participants. This dramatically improves long-term outcomes.”
