Customizing NetSuite is often essential for tailoring the platform to meet the unique needs of your business. However, without a structured release process, even minor updates can lead to significant challenges—like system instability, downtime, or unexpected errors. For teams managing complex configurations, the stakes are even higher.

The good news? We don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Many of the best practices for release management in software development can be adapted to NetSuite customizations. In this blog, we’ll walk you through the key principles of an effective release process and how tools like Salto can simplify managing NetSuite customizations by bringing the rigor of software development to your business systems. 

‍The Importance of a Release Process

NetSuite is more than just another software —it’s the foundation of your organization’s financial processes. As an ERP system, it holds some of your most sensitive data, from financial transactions to customer and vendor information. This critical role means that even minor changes to your NetSuite environment can have far-reaching consequences, making a structured release process essential to maintain system stability and security.

1. Protecting the Integrity of Your ERP System - Your ERP system is highly sensitive, housing critical financial data. Without a clear release process, changes can unintentionally disrupt accounting, procurement, or inventory management. A robust release process ensures that every change is carefully vetted to safeguard the system's integrity.

2. Minimizing Downtime and Business Disruptions - Downtime or errors in an ERP can cause major disruptions to business operations. A structured release process ensures changes are tested in lower environments, validated for potential impact, and deployed in a way that minimizes downtime, keeping your business running smoothly.

3. Enabling Growth and Scalability - As businesses grow, their ERP systems often become more complex, with additional modules, customizations, and integrations. A scalable release process is critical for maintaining control over this complexity, ensuring that every change supports the business’s long-term goals.

Principles of a Strong Release Process

A successful NetSuite release process is built on a few key principles that prioritize security, stability, and efficiency. These principles are inspired by software development best practices but tailored to the unique needs of an ERP system:

1. Start with a Business Request

Every change should begin with a clear business request, logged in a ticketing system like Jira, ServiceNow, or Asana. This approach ensures that customizations are tied to specific business objectives and aligned with organizational priorities. Using a ticketing system provides visibility for all stakeholders and strengthens audit readiness, as you can clearly document and trace the business context behind each update.

2. Test Changes in Lower Environments

Always validate customizations in sandbox environments before deploying them to production. A recommended pipeline includes:

• Shared Integration Environment: Where developers can work on their changes and test them alongside other components. 
• UAT (User Acceptance Testing) Environment: Stakeholders test the changes in a shared UAT environment to ensure they meet business requirements.
• Production: Only after passing UAT are changes deployed to the live environment.

3. Track Changes with Git

Using Git ensures every modification to your NetSuite customizations is tracked and auditable. Link each environment in your pipeline to a corresponding branch, and use feature branches for isolated development and testing. Each change should also be linked to the original business request ticket, providing clear traceability from the request to deployment. Merge changes into the main branch only after validation.

4. Establish a Review and Approval Process

Use Pull Requests (PRs) in Git as part of your review and approval process. PRs allow your team to:

• Collaborate on Changes: Team members can review the proposed changes, provide feedback, and suggest improvements before they’re merged.
• Enforce Standards: PRs serve as checkpoints to ensure all changes meet quality standards.
• Catch Errors Early: By reviewing code and configurations collaboratively, your team can identify potential issues before they are introduced into shared environments.

PRs not only improve code quality but also foster collaboration and accountability across teams.

5. Ensure Resilience in the Process

Resilience is key for protecting critical systems. Git simplifies rollback by allowing you to revert problematic changes to a stable state quickly. Regularly test rollback procedures and disaster recovery protocols to minimize downtime and ensure business continuity.

6. Automate Where Possible

Automate repetitive tasks like deployments and testing to reduce human error and improve consistency. Automation frees up your team to focus on higher-value work.

By adhering to these principles, your team can create a release process that balances agility with the rigor needed to protect a sensitive system like NetSuite. Want to start implementing such a process? Our experienced DevOps engineers can help you customize a release process that works for your team. Click here to book a 1:1 consultation >>

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