SHAH ABDUL LATIF UNIVERSITY KHAIRRPUR

INSTITUTE OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

SUBJECT
Management Information System
Assignment
Chapter 2 Remaining Topics
Roll No. BBA-19-50
 Strategic Uses of IT
A company that emphasizes strategic business use of IT would use it to gain a
competitive differentiation

Business strategy is a set of activities and decisions firms make that determine the
following:

 Products and services the firm produces

Firms can use information systems to create unique new products and services that
can be easily distinguished from those of competitors. Strategic information
systems for product differentiation can prevent the competition from responding in
kind so that firms with these differentiated products and services no longer have to
compete on the basis of cost.

Reengineering Business Processes:-

Business Process Reengineering involves the radical redesign of core business
processes to achieve dramatic improvements in productivity, cycle times and
quality. In Business Process Reengineering, companies start with a blank sheet of
paper and rethink existing processes to deliver more value to the customer.

 Fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of business processes

 Seeks to achieve improvements in cost, quality, speed, and service
 Potential payback is high, but so is risk of disruption and failure
 Organizational redesign approaches are an important enabler of
reengineering.
 Includes use of IT, process teams, case managers
The Role of IT:- The IT department oversees the installation and maintenance of
computer network systems within a company. ... Its primary function is to ensure
that the network runs smoothly. The IT department must evaluate and install the
proper hardware and software necessary to keep the network functioning properly.

 IT plays a major role in reengineering most business processes

 Can substantially increase process efficiencies
 Improves communication
 Facilitates collaboration
Cross functional business processes are different functional areas of an
organization working to complete the same piece of work, goal or aim. ... This is a
clear example of how a firm uses cross- functional business processes to improve
efficiency and work in synchronization to get the order out.

 Many processes are reengineered with…

 Enterprise resource planning software

 Web-enabled electronic business and commerce systems

Reengineering Order Management
 IT that supports this process…
 CRM systems using intranets and the Internet
 Supplier-managed inventory systems using the Internet and extranets
 Cross-functional ERP software to integrate manufacturing, distribution,
finance, and human resource processes
 Customer-accessible e-commerce websites for order entry, status
checking, payment, and service
 Customer, product, and order status databases accessed via intranets
and extranets
 Becoming an Agile Company

 Within the business context, agility means being able to respond to

consumer or market changes at a moment's notice -- or make adjustments
proactively ahead of them. It means that even remote workers can fully
participate in meetings, brainstorming sessions, and projects. It means a
company can adapt to changing conditions and reinvent itself for continued
success.

 The agile business is one that can respond quickly to market changes,
customer and client demands, and its own accelerated timelines. It can make
decisions quickly, and take action on those decisions. It can move easily
from project to project.

 Agility also arises out of the collaborative environment, and leads to further
innovation and adaptability. An agile enterprise gains competitive advantage
by responding faster to internal and external changes, being more
 productive, getting products and services to market rapidly, and responding
quickly to customer feedback and needs.

Agility is the ability to grow

 In rapidly changing, continually fragmenting global markets

 By selling high-quality, high-performance, customer-configured

products and services

 By using Internet technologies

 An agile company profits in spite of

 Broad product ranges

 Short model lifetimes

 Individualized products

 Arbitrary lot sizes

Strategies for Agility

An agile company…

¨ Presents products as solutions to customers’ problems

¨ Cooperates with customers, suppliers and competitors
¨ Brings products to market as quickly and cost- effectively as possible
¨Organizes to thrive on change and uncertainty
 ¨ Leverages the impact of its people and the knowledge they possess

Creating a Virtual Company

A virtual business is any business that conducts all or most of its business via the
internet. It may or may not have some kind of physical presence—such as an office
or warehouse—but there isn't a physical location that customers can visit.
Essentially, virtual companies exist without a main office building, and their teams
don't report to the same location when they “go to work” each day. Art & Logic, a
software development company, is a classic example of a virtual company, having
operated this way since it’s founding in 1991.

A virtual company uses IT to link…

 People
 Organizations
 Assets
 Ideas
Inter-enterprise information systems link…
 Customers
 Suppliers
 Subcontractors
 Competitors

A virtual organization is a network of companies which support each other

around a product and or a service idea. ... First a VO should have a product
strategy and should focus on competitive priorities such as cost, quality, time,
flexibility.

Basic business strategies of Virtual Company

 ¨Share information and risk with alliance partners
 Link complimentary core competencies
 ¨Reduce concept-to-cash time through sharing
 ¨Increase facilities and market coverage
 Gain access to new markets and share market or customer loyalty
 ¨Migrate from selling products to selling solutions

Building a Knowledge-Creating Company

Knowledge enterprises are defined as enterprises where knowledge and
knowledge-based products are offered to the market. The products and
services can vary from plans to prototypes or mass-produced products
 where R&D costs are a large part. Employees of knowledge enterprises
usually have an academic education

A knowledge-creating company or learning organization…

 Consistently creates new business knowledge

 Disseminates it throughout the company
 Builds it into its products and services

Kinds of Knowledge

 Explicit Knowledge: Knowledge that is easy to articulate, write down, and share.
 Implicit Knowledge: The application of explicit knowledge. ...
 Tacit Knowledge: Knowledge gained from personal experience that is more difficult to
express.

Knowledge Management
Knowledge management (KM) is the process of creating, sharing, using and
managing the knowledge and information of an organization. It refers to a
multidisciplinary approach to achieve organizational objectives by making
the best use of knowledge.
Successful knowledge management
¨ Creates techniques, technologies, systems, and rewards for getting
employees to share what they knows.
Makes better use of accumulated workplace and enterprise knowledge
Knowledge management systems (KMS)
¨A major strategic use of IT
¨Manages organizational learning and know-how
¨Helps knowledge workers create, organize, and make available important
Knowledge. Makes this knowledge available wherever and whenever it is
needed
Knowledge includes
 ¨Processes, procedures, patents, reference works, formulas, best
practices, forecasts, and fixes