CS Inter :: Management Information Systems and Corporate Communication : December 2005

Immuno Ltd. is a multinational pharmaceutical company. It has sales offices in most of the large cities in the world, and production plants in Europe, Asia and North America. In order to maintain its competitiveness, Immuno Ltd. made a strategic decision three years ago to develop a data warehouse to address the organisation's need for timely and accurate information.

The data warehouse has been under development for two years. Although, users have seen small portions of the new system during prototyping, nothing substantial has been delivered. The response from the IT department is that due to the complexity of the operation, which is further complicated by its diverse international operations, a fully developed data warehouse will not be ready for quite sometime. Management and staff are becoming frustrated and impatient, feeling there is an urgent need for a quicker solution.

(i)

Explain how a data warehouse differs from a typical corporate relational database.

(ii)

Suresh, a business analyst for the project, is often caught between anxious users and the technical staff because of the delay. He has heard that data marts can be a solution for this kind of dilemma. However, he is not familiar with the concept of data marts. —Explain what a data mart is. —Could a data mart be a solution to the frustration of waiting ? —Should Immuno Ltd. replace its data warehouse project with data marts ? Give reasons for your answer.

Gogetter Company is interested to install an information system to facilitate electronic data interchange (EDI) with its customers and suppliers. As its Information Technologist, you are required to suggest whether to develop or purchase an EDI translator. List the factors to trade off between developing and purchasing an EDI translator.

In a meeting of the Board of directors of a bank held in June, 2005, Ajoy, a nominee of Reserve Bank India on the Board, insists that before taking any decision about one-time settlement compromising a bad loan portfolio, he should be provided with details of the said account, from day-one. That particular account was good account till 2003 and had become NPA only in the first quarter of 2004. The account was operational with the bank for the last 15 years. Credit officers find it very difficult and time consuming to collect the desired information and collate documents of last 15 years.What kind of MIS is desirable which would avoid any conflict between the Board of directors and executives ? Support your answer

"Expert system is a knowledge intensive computer programme, yet it is not devoid of limitations." Do you agree ? Why ?

There are various types of information systems in organisations. For the following scenarios, identify the type of information system being used and explain why that type of information system is being used. (Attempt any three):

(i)	Alok is using a spreadsheet to help him model the financial implications of a new merger that his company is considering. Alok is a financial analyst and has been using spreadsheet models to assess potential mergers for a number of years.
(ii)	Biren is a clerk in the accounts payable department. His task is to ensure that all daily transactions are processed correctly. He uses his information system to enter transactions and check that they have been entered properly so that further accounts payable processing can be conducted.
(iii)	Gauri is a senior vice-president for marketing in a large consumer products company. She must continually monitor sales in the major product categories and make decisions about marketing campaigns, sales force allocations, and other marketing activities related to the sales figures. Her system allows her to monitor sales up-to-the-minute and 'drill down' to see what factors are affecting those sales.
(iv)	Dimple is a consumer loan analyst for a large bank. Her job is to assess consumer loan applications and approve or reject those applications. The information system she uses asks her a number of questions about the loan application, which Dimple answers by typing in answers from the client's application form. The system then makes a recommendation for approval or rejection based on the data entered and the rules embedded in the system. The system then provides Dimple with an explanation of its reasoning. Dimple can either agree with the system's recommendation or overrule it.

Briefly explain any three of the following concepts:

(i) (ii) (iii) (iv)

Global village WAN B2C JAVA.

You own a consultancy company that specialises in providing integrated business solutions. Recently, you received a call from Nick, an old college friend of yours who is the manager of the production department of a baking company, Healthy Choice Corporation (HCC). He is asking for your advice regarding some problems that HCC is facing after a recent business re-engineering and restructuring.

Company History:
HCC has two product lines - organic baked products and regular baked goods. HCC was one of the first companies to identify the niche market for organic bakery products. Now, it owns the largest share of the market for organic baked products in its province. It supplies nearly 80% of the supermarkets, restaurant chains and small specialty stores. It also has approximately 25% of the market share for regular baked products.

Although, HCC has a healthy market share in the industry, Nick indicated that the company has been operating close to the break-even-point in recent years. Many factors have contributed to HCC's inability to sustain its profitability. Some of the reasons are increasing competition in the industry as more and more companies have introduced health food products; increasing costs of energy and raw materials; and inefficient operations at HCC.

HCC started as a family owned company. To this day, most of the mid-level managers and supervisors are people who joined the company when it was first established. The company culture has been dominated by the belief in 'making baked goods in old-fashioned way'. Its managerial style also reflects a belief in doing things the traditional way.

Organisational Problems:
According to Nick, the outdated production processes and inefficient management proved to be detrimental to HCC's competitiveness. For example, HCC had the opportunity to bid for a new customer with large orders. When Nick asked the accounting department what the lowest cost would be to produce the required products, the answer was unclear because the record keeping was incomplete and not up-to-date.

In addition to lacking up-to-date information, Nick was also spending much of his time simply verifying production orders, which were carbon copies of the sales orders sent to him from the marketing department. He also spent a lot of time tracking down the ordering and management of the raw materials. Sometimes, he had to stop the production lines to wait for the arrival of a particular ingredient. In order to improve operations, HCC hired a new Chief Executive Officer (CEO), who contracted with a business consultant to launch a business re-engineering process. The objective was to streamline the production and business processes, and to restructure the organisation. The CEO asked the consultant to recommend an enterprise system to support the new business processes.

The consultant recommended a turnkey system that would integrate the business processes from sales to production, to inventory management and accounting. The system also had some customer relationship management functionalities and EDI capability. Managers of all departments were informed of the mandate for.change. However, to save time, there was little mid-level management and end-user involvement during the process.

As a result of the re-engineering, several mid-level managers' positions were eliminated. Many job descriptions were changed. For example, Nick's quality control information used to be written manually on a worksheet by the inspector, and input by data entry clerk into a spreadsheet, which was in turn analysed by a production analyst. With the new system, the quality control data are captured electronically at the point of inspection. Standard reports are generated automatically, while exceptions are flagged for Nick's attention. However, instead of viewing this streamlined operation as more efficient, most employees believe that the re-engineering was simply a way to downsize and eliminate their jobs.

It has been one year since the new enterprise system went live. HCC has not seen the promised improvement in bottom-line from more efficient operations. Instead, it is experiencing tremendous resistance from the employees. Morale is at an all-time low, and the family-like atmosphere and culture have disappeared. The new turnkey system does not resemble the way business was conducted at HOC. People feel insecure about their jobs and uncertain about the new tasks assigned to them.

Recognising your expertise in the area of business process re-engineering and implementing enterprise systems, Nick has asked you to prepare a report outlining the current problems faced by HCC and the possible actions to be taken to amend the situation.

Prepare a report for the HCC in the following format:

(i) (ii) (iii) (iv)

Introduction and executive summary, Problem identification, Alternatives and analysis, Recommendations and conclusions.

"The knowledge and practice of SWOT analysis and force field analysis help both at individual level to emerge as a' better human being and also at corporate level to be a winner all the time by reducing uncertainties and risks." Discuss.

"Meetings cannot be effective without an agenda." In the light of this statement, you are required to give guidelines for making an agenda for a meeting.

State with reasons whether the following statements are true or false :

(i)	"Employees' unresolved problems, whether home or work related, cost industry crores of rupees every year in absenteeism, lost productivity and decreased efficiency."
(ii)	"Strategic corporate advertising has a measurable positive influence on public opinion about the company and is called general promotion advertising.''
(iii)	"Non-directive counselling will not contribute to the quality of inter-personal relations and organisational effectiveness because the manager will not be able to help the other person in solving his or her own problem."
(iv)	"Though their education has emphasized verbal communication and neglected the non-verbal aspect, all people effectively use body language."
(v)	"Persuasion is gentler than influencing."