Monday 19 August 2013

CHAPTER NINE:ENABLING THE ORGANIZATION

CHAPTER NINE:ENABLING THE ORGANIZATION

Reason for Growth of Decision Making Information System
1. People need to analyze large amounts of information :- improvement in technology itself, innovations in communication, and globalisation have resulted in a dramatic increase in the alternatives and dimension people need to consider when making a decision or appraising an opportunity.
2. People must make decision quickly :- time is of the essence and people simply do not have time to sift through all the information manually.
3. People must apply sophisticated analysis technique such as modelling and forecasting to make good decision :- information system substantially reduce the time required to perform this sophisticated analysis technique.
4. People must protect the corporate asset of organizational information :- information systems offer the security required to ensure organization information remains safe.
Model - a simplified representation or abstraction of reality.

Transaction Processing System

Ø  Moving up through the organizational pyramid users move from requiring transactional information to analytical information

 Ø  Transaction processing system – the basic business system that serves the operational level (analysis) in an organization
Ø  Online transaction processing (OLTP) – the capturing of transaction and event information using technology to (1) process the information according to defined business rules, (2) store the information, (3) update existing information to reflect the new information
Ø  Online analytical processing (OLAP) – the manipulation of information to create business intelligence in support of strategic decision making




Decision support systems
Ø  Decision support system (DSS) – models information to support managers and business professionals during the decision-making process
Ø  Three quantitative models used by DSSs include;
1.       Sensitivity analysis – the study of the impact that changes in one (or more) parts of the model have on other parts of the model
2.       What-if analysis – checks the impact of a change in an assumption on the proposed solution
Goal-seeking analysis – finds the inputs necessary to achieve a goal such as a desired level of outputs

Executive information system
Ø  Executive information system (EIS) – A specialized DSS that supports senior level executives within the organization
Ø  Most EISs offering the following capabilities;
-          Consolidation – involves the aggregation of information and features simple roll-ups to complex groupings of interrelated information
-          Drill-down – enables users to get details, and details of information
-          Slice-and-dice – looks at information from different perspectives
Ø  Interaction between a TPS and an EIS
Ø  Digital dashboard – integrates information from multiple components and presents it in a united display
Artificial intelligence (AI)
Ø  The ultimate goal of AI is the ability to build a system that can mimic human intelligence
Ø  Intelligent system – various commercial applications of artificial intelligence
Ø  Artificial intelligence (AI) – simulates human intelligence such as the ability to reason and learn


Four most common categories of AI include;

1.       Expert system – computerized advisory programs that imitate the reasoning processes of experts in               solving difficult problems
2.       Neural network – attempts to emulate the way the human brain works
          Fuzzy logic – a mathematical method of handling imprecise or subjective information
3.       Genetic algorithm – an artificial intelligent system that mimics the evolutionary, survival-of-the-fittest                process to generate increasingly better solutions to a problem
4.       Intelligent agent – special-purposed knowledge-based information system that accomplishes specific             tasks on behalf of its users

Data Mining

Ø  Data-mining software includes many forms of AI such as neutral networks and expert systems


CHAPTER EIGHT – ACCESSING ORGANIZATIONAL INFORMATION-DATA WAREHOUSE

CHAPTER EIGHT – ACCESSING ORGANIZATIONAL INFORMATION-DATA WAREHOUSE

What is Data Warehouse?

Ø  Defined in many different ways, but not rigorously
-          A decision support database that is maintained separately from the organization’s operational database.
-          A consistent database source that bring together information from multiple sources for decision support queries.
-          Support information processing by providing a solid platform of consolidated, historical data for analysis.
History of Data Warehousing
Ø  In the 1990’s executives became less concerned with the day-to-day business operations and more concerned with overall business functions
Ø  The data warehouse provided the ability to support decision making without disrupting the day-to-day operations, because;
-          Operational information is mainly current – does not include the history for better decision making
-          Issues of quality information
-          Without information history, it is difficult to tell how and why things change over time
Data warehouse fundamentals
Ø  Data warehouse – A logical collection of information – gathered from many different operational databases – that supports business analysis activities and decision-making takes
Ø  The primary purpose of a data warehouse is to combined information throughout an organization into a single repository for decision-making purposes – data warehouse support only analytical processing
Data warehouse model
Ø  Extraction, transformation and loading (ETL) – A process that extracts information from internal and external databases, transforms the information using a common set of enterprise definitions, and loads the information into a data warehouse.
Ø  Data warehouse then send subsets of the information to data mart.

Ø  Data mart – contains a subset of data warehouse information.


Multidimensional Analysis and Data Mining
Ø  Relational Database contains information in a series of two-dimensional tables.
Ø  In a data warehouse and data mart, information is multidimensional, it contains layers of columns and rows
-          Dimension – A particular attribute of information
Ø  Once a cube of information is created, users can begin to slice and dice the cube to drill down into the information.
Ø  Users can analyze information in a number of different ways and with number of different dimensions.
Ø  Data Mining – the process of analyzing data to extract information not offered by the raw data alone. Also known as “knowledge discovery” – computer-assisted tools and techniques for sifting through and analyzing vast data stores in order to finds trends, patterns and correlations that can guide decision making and increase understanding
Ø  To perform data mining users need data-mining tools
-          Data-mining tool – uses a variety of techniques to finds patterns and relationships in large volumes of information. Eg: retailers and use knowledge of these patterns to improve the placement of items in the layout of a mail-order catalog page or Web page.
Information Cleansing or Scrubbing
Ø  An organization must maintain high-quality data in the data warehouse
Ø  Information cleansing or scrubbing – A process that weeds out and fixes or discards inconsistent, incorrect or incomplete information
Ø  Occurs during ETL process and second on the information once if is in the data warehouse
Ø  Contract information in an operational system
Ø  Standardizing Customer  name from Operational Systems
Ø  Information cleansing activities
-          Missing Records or Attributes
-          Redundant Records
-          Missing Keys or Other Required Data
-          Erroneous Relationships or References
-          Inaccurate Data

Business Intelligence
Ø  Business Intelligence – refers to applications and technologies that are used to gather, provides access, analyze data and information to support decision making efforts
Ø  These systems will illustrate business intelligence in the areas of customer profiling, customer support, market research, market segmentation, product profitability, statistical analysis, and inventory and distribution analysis to name a few

Ø  Eg; Excel, Access

Chapter 7 - Storing Organizational Information - Database

Chapter 7 - Storing Organizational Information - Database




RELATIONAL DATABASE FUNDAMENTALS

 -    Information is everywhere in an organization
-  Information is stored in databases
Ø   Database – maintains information about various types of objects (inventory), events (transactions), people (employees), and places (warehouses)
 -     Database models include;
Ø   Hierarchical database model – information is organized into a tree-like structure (using parent/child relationships) in such a way that it cannot have too many relationships
 Ø  Network database model – a flexible way of representing objects and their relationship
  Ø  Relational database model – stores information in the form of logically related two-dimensional tables


ENTITIES AND ATTRIBUTES

-    Entity – a person, place, thing, transaction, or event about which information is stored
Ø  The rows in each table contains the entities
-    Attributes (fields, columns) – characteristics or properties of an entity class
Ø  The columns in each table contain the attributes

KEYS AND RELATIONSHIPS

-    Primary keys and foreign keys identity the various entity classes (tables) in the database
Ø  Primary key – a fields (or group of fields) that uniquely identities a given entity in a table
Ø  Foreign key – a primary key of one table that appears an attribute in another table and acts to provide a logical relationships among the two tables

RELATIONAL DATABASE ADVANTAGES

-    Database advantages from a business perspective include;
Ø  Increased flexibility
Ø  Increased scalability and performance
Ø  Reduced information redundancy
Ø  Increased information integrity (quality)
Ø  Increased information security


 INCREASED FLEXIBILITY
-     A well-designed database should;
Ø  Handle changes quickly and easily
Ø  Provide users with different views
Ø  Have only one physical views
§  Physical view – deals with the physical storage of information on a storage device
Ø  Have multiple logical views
§  Logical view – focuses on how users logically access information

INCREASED SCALABILITY AND PERFORMANCE

-      A database must scale to meet increased demand, while maintaining acceptable performance levels
Ø  Scalability – refers to how well a system can adapt to increased demands
Ø  Performance – measures how quickly a system performs a certain process or transaction

REDUCED INFORMATION REDUNDANCY

-      Databases reduce information redundancy
Ø  Redundancy – the duplication of information or storing the same information in multiple places
-     Inconsistency is one of the primary problems with redundant information

INCREASED INFORMATION SECURITY

-      Information is an organization asset and must be protected
-      Databases offer several security features including;
Ø  Password – provides authentication of the user
Ø  Access level – determines who has access to the different types of information

DATABASE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS
-     Database management systems (DBMS) – software through which users and application programs interact with a database

DATA-DRIVEN WEB SITES
-       Data-driven Web sites – an interactive Web site kept constantly updated and relevant to the needs of its   customers through the use of database

DATA-DRIVEN WEB SITE BUSINESS ADVANTAGES

-         Development
-         Content Management
-         Future Expandability
-         Minimizing Human Error
-         Cutting Production and Update Costs
-         More Efficient
-         Improved Stability

DATA-DRIVEN BUSINESS INTELLIGENT
-         BI in a data-driven Web site

INTEGRATING INFORMATION AMONG MULTIPLE DATABASES
-      Integration – allows separate systems to communicate directly with each other
Ø  Forward integration – takes information entered into a given system and sends it automatically to all downstream systems and processes













Friday 26 July 2013

Chapter 6 – Valuing Organizational Information

ORGANIZATIONAL INFORMATION
Information is everywhere in an organization
Employees must be able to obtain and analyze the many different levels, formats and granularity of organizational information to make decisions
Successfully collecting, compiling, sorting and analyzing information can provide tremendous insight into how an organization is performing

 Levels, formats and granularity of organizational information


                                                      




THE VALUE OF TRANSNATIONAL AND ANALYTICALLY INFORMATION


Transaction information verses analytically information

                                                  



THE VALUE OF TIMELY INFORMATION

-   Timeliness is an aspect of information that depends on the situation
-   Real-time information – immediate, up-to-date information
-   Real-time system – provides real-time information in response to query requests

THE VALUE OF QUALITY INFORMATION

-    Business decisions are only as good as the quality of the information used to make the decisions
-   You never want to find yourself using technology to help you make a bad decision faster
-   Characteristics of high-quality information include;


                                                                  



UNDERSTANDING THE COSTS OF POOR INFORMATION

-   The four primary sources of low quality information include;

- Online customers intentionally enter inaccurate information to protect their privacy
- Information from different systems have different entry standards and formats
- Call center operators enter abbreviated or erroneous information by accident or to save time
- Third party and external information contains inconsistencies, inaccuracies and errors

-   Potential business effects resulting from low quality information include;

- Inability to accurately track customers
- Difficulty identifying valuable customers
- Inability to identify selling opportunities
- Marketing to nonexistent customers
- Difficulty tracking revenue due to inaccurate invoices
- Inability to build strong customer relationships

UNDERSTANDING THE BENEFITS OF GOOD INFORMATION

-   High quality information can significantly improve the chances of making a good decision
-   Good decisions can directly impact an organization’s bottom line








Monday 22 July 2013

Chapter 5 – Organizational Structures that Support Strategic Initiatives
ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURES
Organizational employees must work closely together to develop strategic initiatives that create competitive advantages.
Ethics and security are two fundamental building blocks that organizations must base their businesses upon.

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES
Information technology is a relatively new functional area, having only been around formally for around 40 years.
Recent IT – related strategic positions:
             -   Chief Information Officer (CIO)
             -   Chief Technology Officer (CTO)
             -   Chief Security Officer (CSO)
             -   Chief Privacy Officer (CPO)
             -   Chief Knowledge Officer (CKO)

 Chief Information Officer (CIO) – oversees all uses of IT and ensures the strategic alignment of IT with business goals and objectives.

-  Broad CIO functions include;
   
     Manager – ensuring the delivery of all IT projects, on time and within budget.
     Leader – ensuring the strategic vision of IT is in line with the strategic vision of the organization.
    Communicator – building and maintaining strong executive relationships.

   Chief Technology Officer (CTO) – responsible for ensuring the throughput , speed, accuracy, availability and reliability of IT
o    Chief Security Officer (CSO) – responsible for ensuring the security of IT systems
o   Chief Privacy Officer (CPO) – responsible for ensuring the ethical and legal use of information
o   Chief Knowledge Officer (CKO) – responsible for collecting, maintaining and distributing the organization’s knowledge  


                                                         

THE GAP BETWEEN BUSINESS PERSONNEL AND IT PRSONNEL
 Business personnel possess expertise in functional areas such as marketing, accounting and sales
 IT personnel have the technological expertise
This typically causes a communications gap between the business personnel and IT personnel

IMPROVING COMMUNICATIONS
Business personnel must seek to increase their understanding of IT
IT personnel must seek to increase their understanding of the business
 It is the responsibility of the CIO to ensure effective communication between business personnel and IT personnel


ORGANIZATIONAL FUNDAMENTALS – ETHICS AND SECURITY
 Ethics and security are two fundamental building blocks that organizations must base their businesses on to be successful
In recent years, such event as the 9/11 have shed new light on the meaning of ethics and security

ETHICS
Ethics – the principles and standards that guide our behavior toward other people
Privacy is a major ethical issues;
Privacy – the right to be left alone when you want to be to have control ever your own personnel possessions and not to be observed without your consent
Issues affected by technology advances


PROTECTING INTELLECTUAL ASSETS
    

           Organizational information is intellectual capital – it must be protected
·         Information security – the protection of information from accidental or intentional misuse by persons                inside or outside an organization
·         E-business automatically crates tremendous information security risks for organization
  

  








Wednesday 17 July 2013

Chapter 4

CHAPTER 4


MEASURING INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY’S SUCCESS
·         Key performance indicator – measures that are tied to business drivers
·         Metrics are detailed measures that feed KPIs
·         Performance metrics fall into the nebulous area of business intelligence that is neither technology, nor business centered, but requires input from both IT and business professionals

EFFICIENCY AND EFFECTIVENESS
·         Efficiency IT metric – measure the performance of the IT system itself including throughout speed and availability
·         Effectiveness IT metric – measures the impact IT has on business processes  and activities including customers satisfaction conversion rates and self-through increases

BENCHMARKING – BASELINING METRICS
·         Regardless  or what is measured, how it is measured and whether it is for the sake of efficiency or effectiveness, there must be benchmarks – beseline values the system seek to attain
·         Benchmarking – a process of continuously measuring system results, comparing those results to optimal system performance and identifying to improve system performance

THE INTERRELATIONSHIPS OF EFFICIENCY AND EFFECTIVENESS IT METRICS
·Efficiency IT metrics focus on technology and include :
*  Throughput - the amount of information that can travel trough a system at any point
Transaction speed - the amount of time a system takes to perform a transaction
System availability – the number of hours a system is available for users
*  Information accuracy – the extent to which a system generates the correct results when executing the same transaction numerous times
Web traffic – includes a host of benchmarks such as the number of page views, the number of unique visitors, and the average time spent viewing a Web page
Response time –the time it takes to respond to user interactions such as a mouse click


Effectiveness IT metrics focus on an organization’s goals, strategies, and objectives and include:
Usability –  The ease with which people perform transactions and/or find information. A popular usability metric on the Internet is degrees of freedom, which measures the numbers of clicks required to find desired information.
Customer satisfaction –  Measured by such benchmarks as satisfaction surveys, percentage of existing customers retained, and increases in revenue dollars per customer.
Conversion rates –  The number of customers an organization “touches” for the first time and persuades to purchase its products or services. This is a popular metric for evaluating the effectiveness of banner, pop-up, and pop-under ads on the Internet.
*  Financial –  Such as return on investment (the earning power of an organization’s assets), cost-benefit analysis (the comparison of projected revenues  and costs including development, maintenance, fixed, and variable), and break-even analysis (the point at which constant revenues equal ongoing costs).
·         Security is an issue for any organization offering products or services over the Internet.
·         It is inefficient for an organization to implement Internet security, since it slows down processing
*  However, to be effective it must implement Internet security
*  Secure Internet connections must offer encryption and Secure Sockets Layers (SSL denoted by the lock symbol in the lower corner of a browser) .

·         Web Site Metrics:
*  Abandoned registrations –  Number of visitors who start the process of completing a registration page and then abandon the activity.
Abandoned shopping carts –  Number of visitors who create a shopping cart and start shopping and then abandon the activity before paying for the merchandise.
Click-through –  people who visit a site, click on an ad, and are taken to the site of the advertiser.
Conversion rate –  potential customers who visit a site and actually buy something.
Cost-per-thousand (CPM) –  sales dollar generated per dollar of advertising. This is commonly used to make the case for spending money to appear on a search engine.
Page exposures –  average number of page exposure to an individual visitor.
Total hits –  number of visits to a web site, many of which may be by the same visitor.
Unique visitor –  number of unique visitors to a site in a given time. This is commonly used by Nielsen/Net ratings to rank the most popular Web site.

SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT METRICS
*  Back order – an unfilled customer order.
*  Customer order promised cycle time – the anticipated or agreed upon cycle time of a purchase order.
*  Customer order actual cycle time – to actually fill a customer’s purchase order.
*  Inventory replenishment cycle time – measure of the manufacturing cycle time plus  the time included to deploy the product to the appropriate distribution center.
*  Inventory turns ( inventory turnover ) – the number of times that a company’s inventory cycles or turns over per year.






· 
Chapter 3 STRATEGIC INITIATIVES FOR IMPLEMENTING COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGES
 STRATEGIC INITIATIVES


 Organizations can undertake high-profile strategic initiatives including :
Supply chain management (SCM)
 Customer relationship management (CRM)
Business process reengineering (BPR)
Enterprise resource planning (ERP)

Supply Chain Management (SCM)
Involves the management of information flows between and among stages in a supply chain to maximize total supply chain effectiveness and profitability.
4 basic components of supply chain management :
1. Supply chain strategy – strategy for managing all resources to meet customer demand
2. Supply chain partner – partners throughout the supply chain that deliver finished products, raw   materials, and services.
3. Supply chain operation – schedule for production activities
4. Supply chain logistics – product delivery process

 CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIP MANAGEMENT
 Involve managing all aspects of a customer’s relationship with an organization to
increase customer loyalty and retention and an organization’s profitability.




BUSINESS PROCESS REENGINEERING
A standardized set of activities that accomplish a specific task, such as
processing a customer’s order  
The analysis and redesign of workflow within and between enterprises
ENTERPRISE RESOURCE PLANNING.
Intergrates all departments and functions troughout 



IT system so that employees can make decisions by viewing enterprisewide
information on all business operations..
ERP systems collect data from across an organization and correlates the data
generating an enterprisewide view