For this assignment I have been asked to discuss how information technology could be used to improve the way in which a business is run, and secondly to suggest a new mission statement assuming the firm were to change their customers. I will do this by looking into the strengths and weaknesses of the firm and then suggest ways in which information technology could help the operating and efficiency of the business. To answer the second part of the question I will evaluate what changes are likely to take place if the firm changes their strategy and add a suitable new mission statement for the business. Although the business had a lot of areas which needed work on there were firstly a couple strengths that it held with the current system. Firstly there are three managers; they are the sales, purchasing and manufacturing managers.
[...] All of the suggestions I have made are based on my opinion on how to make the business better and run more effectively. There are obviously other issues which need to be addressed in more detail such as how much money is available to be spent, which type of manager needs which type of software or hardware. And also it needs to be analysed whether or not the cost of implementing something will in return bring in more money to the business than the initial cost of buying it or setting it up. [...]
[...] Another type of information technology they could use in the running of their business would be some form of a database. ‘Most managers and executives believe a database is one of the most valuable and important parts of a computer-based information system (CBIS)'[3]. At the moment they have no database, which means they have no records of past customers, how much each customer purchased or how frequently they purchased the cards. A database would be a far more effective and efficient way of organising data. [...]
[...] If the business was to change its strategy and instead of just selling to 25 companies they begin selling to the public there would be more changes to be made to the information technology of the business. They would now have a far larger amount of customers to deal with and this means they are going to need to advertise, display and sell their product over a wider area. I will explain various ways in which this can be done. [...]
[...] They would then be able to share the information over the internet regularly to make sure they are all kept up to date, instead of having to meet once a month. The managers will be all over the country so this will affect the type of network they need. wide area network (WAN) ties together large geographic regions using microwave and satellite transmission or telephone lines”[1]. This would allow them to connect with each other over the whole country at any time. [...]
[...] This means they can still use a relational model database as it can hold large amounts of information and link tables to other tables. If they now begin to sell online they will need to set up some form of transaction processing software (TPS). ‘This software connects users in the e-commerce economy and allows communication between the trading partners, regardless of their technical infrastructure.'[7] The consumers will then need to have some sort of electronic cash or wallet to pay for the cards. [...]
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