OpenERP was renamed Odoo in 2014, so an “OpenERP consultant” today is simply an Odoo consultant working under the software’s older name. Nothing about what makes one consultant safer to hire than another changed when the name did. Whether you landed on this page searching the old term or the new one, choosing the right person comes down to a short list of checks that rule out most of the risk before a contract gets signed.
A quick history: OpenERP became Odoo
OpenERP was the original name of the open-source business software now sold as Odoo. The company behind it rebranded in 2014, once the product had grown well past its early accounting and inventory roots into the full suite of CRM, sales, purchasing, manufacturing, accounting, HR, and website tools it sells today. You will also see it written as “Open ERP” or “open source ERP”, two words, which is the same product under a slightly different spelling rather than a separate one. If you set up your system a decade ago, or inherited a database still labeled OpenERP internally, you are running an earlier version of the same lineage, not a different product. The software has moved through several major version numbers since the rename, and Odoo now publishes a new one on a yearly cycle. The name on the box changed, and the version number keeps changing. What is worth checking in a consultant did not.
What an Odoo consultant does
The job covers more ground than most buyers expect going in. A consultant scopes your requirements, works out which parts of Odoo’s standard modules already cover your workflow, plans the data migration out of your current system or spreadsheets, sets up integrations with the tools you are keeping, trains your staff, and stays available for support after go-live. The better ones treat your business process as the starting point and the software as the output, not the other way around.
Engagements come in different sizes, and “OpenERP consultant” or “Odoo consultant” covers all of them. It could mean a single configuration fix on a system you already run, a full implementation starting from a blank database, or pure selection advice for a business that has not committed to Odoo, or any ERP, yet. The title does not tell you which one you are hiring for, so it is worth asking directly before a project starts.
Implementation itself, the configuration, the migration, the integrations, the actual go-live, is a job of its own; we cover it in full on our Odoo implementation page. A consultant’s role is to make sure that work solves the right problem before anyone starts building it.
The checklist: how to choose the right consultant
Six checks cover most of what separates a safe hire from an expensive mistake.
- Official Odoo partner status you can verify. Do not take a claim of “we are Odoo experts” on faith. Odoo publishes its partner directory publicly, so you can look up a firm’s actual standing in under a minute. Our Odoo partner page covers what that status means and why it is worth checking before you hire anyone.
- Real references in your size and industry. Ask for two contacts you can call directly, not a slide of logos. A consultant who has already solved your scale of problem, in your kind of business, asks sharper questions than one who has not.
- They ask about your workflows before quoting. A number that arrives before anyone has asked how your orders, stock, and invoices move is a guess dressed up as a quote.
- A fixed, written scope, not hourly billing. Hourly arrangements put the risk of an overrun on you. A written scope with a fixed price puts that risk on the consultant, which is where it belongs.
- An in-house team, not a chain of subcontractors. Ask directly who will do the work and whether that person is an employee of the firm you are hiring. Advice priced against real, in-house delivery tends to be more honest than advice sold by a firm that hands the build to someone else.
- A concrete plan for training and handover. Go-live is not the finish line. Ask what training looks like, for which roles, and what support exists in the weeks right after launch.
Red flags that should make you slow down
Three moments early in a consulting relationship predict most of what goes wrong later.
- Custom code proposed before standard Odoo has been ruled out. Odoo ships with a large amount of functionality already built. A consultant who jumps to custom development before checking what the standard system already does is either inexperienced or padding the invoice.
- No discovery questions. If the first conversation is a pitch instead of a set of questions about how you currently work, that is a preview of how the whole engagement will run.
- No written scope. A verbal estimate is not a commitment. If a consultant will not put the deliverables, timeline, and price in writing before you sign, assume none of the three are actually fixed.
Independent consultant or a partner who also builds?
Some firms sell pure advice and refuse to touch implementation, on the logic that it keeps them unbiased. Others only build, and the “consulting” conversation is really a sales pitch for the package they had already decided to sell you. Index World is an official Odoo partner and we do build what we recommend, so weigh that the way you would weigh it from any vendor, and hold us to the same checklist above that you would hold anyone else to.
What matters more than which category a firm falls into is whether it will tell you, plainly, when Odoo is not the right fit, or when your existing setup does not need a rebuild at all. If you already run Odoo and are unsure whether the problem is the software or how it was configured, an independent look at what you have is a smaller commitment than a full consulting engagement. That is what our Odoo audit service is for.
What it costs
Consultants price this work as an hourly rate, a fixed project fee, or a monthly retainer, and the going rate varies enough by scope and region that any specific figure you find online is closer to folklore than a quote for your project. What matters more than the number is the structure: a fixed fee agreed in writing before work starts protects you from the overrun that hourly billing does not. Index World prices consulting and implementation this way, with a one-month, no-obligation trial available before any longer commitment. For the fuller breakdown of how we scope and price an engagement, see our Odoo consultant services page.
The structure matters because the cheap hire that turns out wrong is the expensive one. A configuration that has to be redone, modules set up and then abandoned, a data migration run twice because nobody reconciled it the first time: each of those costs more than the day-rate difference between the consultant who looked expensive and the one who looked like a bargain. The right consultant lowers your total cost even when their quote is the higher number on the page. Weigh it against the whole checklist above, not against the number on its own.
Frequently asked questions
What is an OpenERP consultant?
An OpenERP consultant is what Odoo consultants were called before the 2014 rename. The job has not changed: scoping requirements, configuring the system, migrating data, connecting other tools, and training staff. Anyone advertising OpenERP consulting today is describing Odoo work under the older name.
Is OpenERP the same as Odoo?
Yes. Odoo is the current name of the software once called OpenERP, not a fork or a competing product. The company renamed it in 2014 and has developed it continuously since, well beyond its original scope.
How do I choose an Odoo consultant?
Check official partner status, ask for references in your size and industry, and notice whether they ask about your workflows before quoting a price. Favor a fixed, written scope over hourly billing, confirm the team doing the work is in-house, and ask what training and support look like after go-live. The full checklist is above.
What does an Odoo consultant cost?
It depends on scope. Firms price the work as an hourly rate, a fixed project fee, or a monthly retainer. Treat any figure you see online as a rough market range rather than a quote for your project, and ask for a fixed, written price tied to a defined scope instead of an open-ended hourly arrangement.
Should I hire an independent consultant or an Odoo partner?
Either can be the right call. An independent consultant who does not implement has less incentive to steer you toward a specific build. An Odoo partner who also builds carries more accountability, because the people who scoped the work are the same people who have to deliver it. Judge either one against the same standard: verifiable partner status where it applies, real references, a written scope, and a willingness to tell you when Odoo is not the answer.
What questions should I ask an Odoo consultant before hiring?
Ask to see their Odoo partner listing directly, ask for two references in your industry and size, ask them to describe your current workflow back to you before they quote a price, ask for the scope and price in writing, ask who on their team will do the work, and ask what training and support look like after go-live.
If you would rather skip the search and talk to someone directly, a free demo is the fastest way to find out whether Odoo, and which consultant, fits your business.