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When you write of Microsoft Dynamics GP, this FizzBuzz Enterprise Edition repo comes to mind: https://github.com/EnterpriseQualityCoding/FizzBuzzEnterpris...

> It's as if the system was designed to be so complex as to require a team of people to operate, plus a manager to supervise, plus a support person to field phone calls

This is exactly it. Even if not intentionally designed, it ends up that way. As andrewstuart2 mentioned above, "[customers] also got the full expertise of the salesforce engineering organization (which clearly is far from incompetent) being brought to bear on the problem, at no extra charge to them as a customer". This is great I guess, but if your home-grown solution doesn't use, say, Oracle, to start out with, you're going to eliminate a heck of a lot of necessary engineering expertise when things go wrong. Break up systems even more and suddenly just one generalist can do it all on the side...

A classic build vs. buy situation where the purchase seems like the solution and in reality, it is a purchase plus development plus support. In many cases the internally designed, function specific, application is better because of its constrained functionality. Many companies, mine included, have made the mistake of purchasing a silver bullet rather than forging one with our own time, talent, and treasure.