Week 5

Question 1

IS

Answer 1

IS automates business processes that were doe manually.

Question 2

IT

Answer 2

IT changes the way a business works and supports new business models.

Question 3

Systems for different management groups

Answer 3

• Transaction processing system
• Management information system
• Business intelligence system
• Decision-support system
• Executive support system

Question 4

Transaction processing system

Answer 4

Keeps track of elementary transactions (sales, receipts, cash depostis, payrolls). Computerized system necessary to conduct everyday business.

Question 5

Business Intelligence System

Answer 5

Contemporary term for data and software tools for analyzing, organizing and providing access to managers and other enterprise users to help make informed decisions.

Question 6

Management Information Systems

Answer 6

Provide middle managers with report on organization’s current performance. This information helps them monitor and control current performance and predict future performance.

Question 7

Decision-Support System

Answer 7

Focus on problems that are unique and rapidly changing and don’t have predefined solutions. System brings in external resources.

Question 8

Executive Support System

Answer 8

Helps senior management make decisions about strategic issues and long-term needs both external and internal. Address non-routine decisions requiring judgement, evaluation and insight.

Question 9

Intranets

Answer 9

Internal company websites, accessible only to employees.

Question 10

Extranets

Answer 10

Company website accessible to authorized vendors and suppliers, used to coordinate the movement of supplies to the firm’s production apparatus.

Question 11

What is an Organization?

Answer 11

1. Technical perspective: Organizations are a formal social structures with internal rules and procedures that use environment resources to produce output.
2. Organizational perspective: Collection of rights, privileges and responsibilities that delicately balance over a period conflict and conflict resolution.

Question 12

Business processes

Answer 12

Define how organizations operate, how they turn input into output.
- Logically related set of task that desccribe how specific business processes are performed.
- Specific processes in all departments of an organization and cross functional process.
- IT make business processes mor efficient or completely change them

Question 13

Collaboration technology

Answer 13

Collaboration comes in different forms due to duration (short vs long-term) and setting (formal vs informal).

Question 14

Importance of collaboration to organizations increases due to:

Answer 14

• changing culture of work
• emphasis on innovation
• growth of professional work
• changing organization of work
• changing nature of work

Question 15

Social business

Answer 15

Social business refers to the use of social networking paltforms to engage employees, customers and supplier to deepen relationships and expedite information. (facebook, twiter, internal corporate tools)

Question 16

Benefits from collaboration technology

Answer 16

Rewards in sales&marketing, research&development.
- productivity: sharing knowledge and resolving problems
- quality: faster resolution of quality issues
- innovation: new ideas for products
- customer service: complaints addressed rapidly
- financial performance: generated by improvements above

Question 17

Collaborative business culture

Answer 17

• Senior managers rely on teams of employees
• Processes, policies, products and systems rely on teams
• The manager’s purpose is to build teams

Question 17

Time/space collaboration

Answer 17

• same place, same time: face-to-face interaction
• same place, different times: continuous tasks
• different place, same time: remote interaction
• different place, different time: communication&coordination

Question 18

Keeping lean

Answer 18

Decision to not have a clear structure or strict strtegy

Question 19

Requirement for software

Answer 19

Must be able to change over time
CRM: Customer Relationship Management
ERP: Enterprise Resource Planning

Question 20

The first services Geospin offered

Answer 20

First: work-intensive process to create predicitions and conducts sales
- Data scientist had to manually apply trained models to the city in question, create PDF report for customer
- Sales required reaching out to customer and intensive interaction

Then: service integrated into online platfrom
- Customers can register and acquire this or other services with just a click

Question 21

Transaction cost theory

Answer 21

Firms aim to economize the transaction costs (costs of entering markets) through vertical integration, hiring employees, buyingsuppliers and distributors.
IT can reduce transaction costs making it worthwhile for firms to transact with other firms with no need to hire more emplyees.

Question 22

Agency theory

Answer 22

Contradiction between self-interested parties that require supervision. => Agency costs
IT can reduce agency costs allowing firms to grow without adding to the costs of supervising or without adding employees.

Question 23

Flatter organizaions

Answer 23

IS allows for more self-management and managers to supervise more employees. IT flattens organizations.

Question 24

Post-industrial organizations

Answer 24

Post-industrial organizations put greater weight on knowldge and competencies rather than formal positions.

Question 25

Organizational politics

Answer 25

All employees have access to all data of the company IS potentially change organization’s culture, structure, politics and work.

Question 26

What does IS innovation resistence depend on?

Answer 26

It depends on:
- nature of innovation
- organization’s culture
- organization’s structure
- tasks affected by the innovation

Question 27

Porter’s five forces model

Answer 27

• competitors
• suppliers
• customers
• threat of new entrants
• substitute products

Question 28

IT strategies to handle competitive forces

Answer 28

• low-cost leadership: produce at lower prices than competitors
• product differentiation: enable new products, change customer experience. mass customization
• focus on market niche: use IS to enable a focused strategy to a single niche market.
• strengthen customer and supplier intimacy: use IS to develop strong ties and loyalty with customer and suppliers. Increases switching costs.

Question 29

What kind of technology does Netflix use?

Answer 29

Netflix uses collaborative thinking which collects and analyses customer’s viewing habits to provide personalised reccomendadtions.
- increases customer satisfaction
- enables netflix to predict hoe shows will be perceived