Change was the topic, and, fittingly, it was also the reason we were all there. On August 19, B&L Information Systems kicked off Taking the Lead on Change: An Odyssey ERP User Roundtable, the first event in our newly reimagined Spectrum Events series.
Attendees heard from Terry Clark, a 35-year veteran of organizational change management, sat in on peer breakout discussions, and got a first look at where Odyssey is headed next. Here's the recap — starting with the news our users have been waiting for.
First Look: Two New AI Capabilities Coming to Odyssey ERP
Before the change management conversation began, Brad Clark, B&L's VP of R&D, opened the event with a preview of the product roadmap — and AI is now front and center in it.
1. Odyssey AI Assistant — arriving in the November 2026 release
Odyssey's new AI Assistant connects directly to B&L's help documentation and knowledge base, so users can ask a question in plain language and get a clear, guided answer — whether that's how to set up surcharges, configure a feature, or learn a part of the system for the first time. Brad shared an early prototype during the event, showing how the assistant will live right in the application with a simple icon to launch it.
The AI Assistant is built on Claude, and it's coming to every Odyssey user at no additional cost. This is the first step in a broader AI strategy Brad described as central to Odyssey's roadmap: putting the power of AI directly into users' hands, starting with this instant access to answers and know-how.
2. AI Analytics — on the roadmap for the May 2027 release
Looking further out, Brad previewed a second capability: AI Analytics, planned for the spring release in May 2027. Where the AI Assistant helps users find answers, AI Analytics will connect directly to a company's own data and enable users to generate graphs, gauges, and reports, and analyze their business performance through AI. It's being built as an add-on component to Odyssey ERP. There will be more details to come as development progresses.
These two capabilities represent the first acts of B&L's AI investment in Odyssey ERP: help and guidance now, deeper data intelligence next. We can’t wait to bring these new capabilities to your team.
Terry Clark's Keynote: Change Management, in Plain Terms
The headline session of the event was a keynote from Terry Clark, Change Management and Implementation Expert, whose background spans large-scale ERP transformations, a Six Sigma black belt, and a Prosci change management certification. His focus was on the part of every implementation that determines whether a good system actually gets used well: the people.
A few of the ideas that resonated most with the room:
Every change touches four things: people, process, technology, and data. Terry's experience across dozens of implementations pointed to the same lesson every time — the system is the easy part. It's whether people are ready, whether processes have been rethought (not just ported over), and whether the underlying data is clean enough to trust.
Project management and change management are not the same job. In Terry's words, project management gets you to go-live — what he called "270 degrees of done." The remaining pieces are adoption and sustainability, and that is where change management picks up. Without it, teams can implement a system but never truly adopt it.
Strong change management makes success roughly seven times more likely — a figure Terry cited from Prosci's research after 25-plus years studying organizational change.
Change often follows a grieving process. Denial, frustration, and even resistance are normal reactions to a new system replacing something familiar — even when the old way wasn't working well. Naming that reaction, rather than dismissing it, is part of managing it successfully.
Fear is the biggest barrier — and Terry broke it down using the familiar acronym: False Evidence Appearing Real. Most resistance isn't really about the change; it's about uncertainty over how a new way of working will affect someone's day-to-day.
People need to change with a system, not have it changed at them. Terry's framing throughout: bring people along by showing them how their job gets better (faster, easier, more accurate) rather than simply announcing what's changing.
Leadership engagement is non-negotiable. Using Prosci's model, Terry outlined the roles that have to be actively engaged for a change to stick: senior leadership setting the vision, business sponsors backing it, a project management team executing it, and change agents reinforcing it day to day.
What Came Out of the Breakout Rooms
Following the keynote, attendees split into peer breakout groups to work through two questions: what's one change your organization made in the past year, and what actually got people on board with it? A few themes surfaced across groups:
Get ahead of it, and stay ahead of it. One group's takeaway centered on doing the upfront work, such as understanding how a change will ripple across departments before rolling it out, and then keeping pace with ongoing product updates, since falling behind on releases makes every subsequent change harder to absorb.
Visible results are what turn skepticism into buy-in. Another group's experience: pushback is common when new workflows are introduced, but once people can see the transparency behind a decision and the actual numbers showing a change is working, resistance tends to fade quickly.
Fear showed up again and again — and so did the turnaround. In one group, the standout theme was fear of the unknown, echoing Terry's keynote directly. Two examples stood out: a requisition module that faced real pushback at first but ultimately cut unauthorized purchasing and reduced costs, and a purchase order process change where, once people worked through it, the common reaction became "why didn't we do this sooner?"
Across every room, the pattern lined up with Terry's core message: the technology wasn't the sticking point. Communication, transparency, and giving people a reason to want the change were what moved the needle.
Looking Ahead
This was the first of many events in the new Spectrum Events series, and the response in attendance, in chat engagement, and in the energy once we got into the breakout rooms has us looking forward to what's next.
And for those tracking the roadmap: keep an eye out this November for the free Odyssey AI Assistant, with AI Analytics to follow in May 2027. The future of Odyssey ERP is leaning further into AI, and this was just the first look.