The engineering change order, the ECO, is the heart of PLM: it is the mechanism that carries a product change through a controlled path. This piece is about the ECO workflow in Odoo.
The edition note
The ECO capability is part of Odoo's PLM, which is an Odoo Enterprise application. This piece describes the ECO workflow as it works in that capability.
What an ECO is
An engineering change order is a controlled, tracked record of a proposed change to a product or, most often, its bill of materials. The whole point of the ECO is that a change is not made by editing a production BOM directly. Instead, the change is raised as an ECO, and the ECO carries it through a defined workflow. The ECO is the controlled wrapper around a product change.
The shape of the ECO workflow
The ECO workflow is a controlled path from a proposed change to an applied one. Its shape is recognisable. A change is raised as an ECO, where the proposed change is described, what is to change, and why. The ECO is then worked, the change is defined in detail. It is reviewed, the proposed change is examined, including its effect, by whoever should review it. It is approved, a deliberate decision that the change should go ahead. And only then is the change applied, becoming the production BOM. The ECO moves through these states, so at any point it is clear where a change stands: proposed, in review, approved, applied.
Why the workflow matters
The ECO workflow matters because of what it replaces: the uncontrolled direct edit. Without it, a product change is someone editing a BOM, with no record of what changed or why, no review, no deliberate approval, and the change simply takes effect. That is risky, the change might be wrong, might have unconsidered consequences, and there is no trace of it. The ECO workflow replaces that with control: the change is described, so there is a record; it is reviewed, so its consequences are considered; it is approved, so it takes effect only by a deliberate decision; and the whole thing is traceable. The ECO workflow turns product change from a silent risk into a managed, recorded process.
Review: the heart of the workflow
The most valuable step in the ECO workflow is review. A product change can have consequences beyond the obvious, a BOM change affects planning, purchasing, costing, and possibly production already in progress, and review is where those consequences are considered before the change is applied, rather than discovered after. An ECO workflow where review is genuine and thorough catches problems with a proposed change while it is still just a proposal. An ECO workflow where review is a rubber stamp delivers far less. The workflow provides the review step; the manufacturer makes it valuable by reviewing genuinely.
The workflow gives a controlled history
Because every product change goes through an ECO, the ECOs accumulate into a controlled history of how the manufacturer's products have changed: what changed, when, why, who approved it. That history is valuable. It means the manufacturer always knows the current state of its products and can see how they got there. The ECO workflow is not only about controlling each change as it happens; it builds the traceable record of product change over time.
The takeaway
The engineering change order workflow in Odoo, part of the Enterprise PLM capability, carries a product or BOM change through a controlled path: raised as an ECO, worked, reviewed, approved, and only then applied. It replaces the uncontrolled direct edit with a managed, recorded, traceable process. Review is the heart of the workflow, where a change's consequences are considered before it takes effect, and it is most valuable when review is genuine. The ECOs accumulate into a controlled history of product change. For how we approach Odoo for manufacturers, see our manufacturing work.