Chapter One: The Modern Organisation in the Global, Web Based Environment

Question One: What are the characteristics of the modern business environment?

A modern business environment is identified through the following characteristics:

- Global

- Massively interconnected

- 24/7/365

- Real time

- Rapidly changing & dynamic

- Information- intensive

- Operates through e-commerce

- Increasing use social networking

Question Two: What is meant by a web-based, global platform, what does it provide, and how has it affected business?

The global, web-based platform consists of the hardware, software and communications technologies that comprise the Internet and the functionality of the World Wide Web. This platform enables individuals to connect, compute, communicate, compete and collaborate everywhere and anywhere, anytime and all the time, and to access limitless amounts of information services and entertainment. This platform operates without regard to geography, time, distance, and language barriers. The web-based platform has created today’s business environment, which is global massively interconnected, 24/7/365, real time, rapidly changing & dynamic and information- intensive.

The below diagram is an example of a global, web-based platform:

When a query is searched on the Internet through a search engine like Google, Yahoo or Amazon, the query request travels over the Internet to one of their data centers. As many servers as are needed are brought to bear answering the query and the response is then sent back.

Question Three: What are the main pressures that characterize the modern global business environment?

The modern global business pressures can be defined as:

• Market pressures

• Technology pressures

• Societal pressures (includes legal and political pressures)

o Market Pressures: generated by the global economy and strong competition, the changing nature of the workforce and powerful customers

- Global Economy and Strong Competition:

o facilitated by the emergence of the global, web based platform

o many labour intensive industries move their operations to countries with low labour costs with IT making these much easier to implement

- The Changing Nature of the Workforce

o The workforce is becoming more diversified (e.g. increasing numbers of women, single parents, minorities)

o IT is easing the integration of these employees into the traditional workforce and is enabling people to work from home

- Powerful Customers

o Consumer sophistication and expectations increase as customers become more knowledgeable about the availability and quality of products and services

o Technological Pressures

- Technological Innovation and Obsolescence:

o New and improved technologies rapidly create/ support substitutes for products, alternative service options and superb quality and therefore today’s state-of-the-art products may be obsolete tomorrow

- Information Overload

o To make decisions effectively and efficiently, managers must be able to access, navigate and utilize these vast stores of data information and knowledge; information technologies (e.g. search engines and data mining) provide valuable support in these efforts

o Societal/ Political and Legal Pressures

- Social Responsibility

o Social issues that affect businesses range----the efforts are known as organisational social responsibility

o Example: social problem= digital divide; solution = cybercafés

- Compliance with government regulation and deregulation

o Businesses see these regulations as expensive and time consuming on its activities; deregulation intensifies the competition

o IT helps process as it provides the necessary controls and information for compliance

- Protection against terrorist attacks

o Businesses need to protect themselves against terrorist attacks(including cyber attacks)

o IT can help protect businesses by providing security systems and possibly identifying patterns of behaviour associated with terrorist activities that will prevent attacks

- Ethical issues

o Ethical issues can damage an organisation’s image and destroy employees’ morale

o Pressures on an organisation are increasing and orgs. need to be prepared to take responsive actions if they are to succeed

Question Four: What are/discuss some of the common, IT oriented organizational responses to these pressures?

Organisational responses respond to business pressures by implementing IT strategies however, businesses need to react frequently and quickly to both the threats and the opportunities resulting from these pressures and the resulting new business environment. Technology is often seen as providing the answer however, finding the appropriate IT solution can be a difficult task however. The following are different organisational responses that are implemented by businesses:

o Strategic Systems: provide organisations with advantages that enable them to increase their market share and/ or profits to better to negotiate with suppliers or to prevent competitors entering the market

o Customer Focus: attempts to provide superb customer service can make the difference between attracting and keeping customers than losing them to competitors

o Made-to-order and Mass Customisation: made to order can be expensive; solution is to change from mass production to mass customisation; this is a simple attempt to perform make-to-order on a large scale

o E-Business and E-Commerce: this is an essential strategy for competing in today’s business environment

Question Five: How are IT architecture and IT infrastructure are interrelated?

An organisation’s information technology architecture is a high-level map or plan of the information assets in an organisation. The IT architecture integrates the information requirements of the overall organisation and all individual users, the IT infrastructure and all applications. An organisation’s information technology infrastructure consists of the physical facilities, IT components, IT services, and IT management that support the entire organisation.

Question Six: Is the Internet an infrastructure, an architecture, or an application program or something else? Why?

The Internet can be identified as being both IT infrastructure and IT architecture. The infrastructure of the Internet is made up of hardware components and a system of software is used by the Internet’s IT architecture. The Internet is a host to different types of services such as social networking, electronic mail services, the sharing and transferring of information resources, games and commercial and financial services.