Take Note.

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)

2010-02-11T19:40:00.005-08:00

ERP

From news article or internet information, find an example of an organization that is installing an ERP package. If possible get a copy of the over-all project plans and analyze the various activities and compare them with a standard SDLC.

ENTERPRISE RESOURCE PLANNING

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is the latest planning tool Information Technology has offered to business. It is an integrated computer-based system used to manage internal and external resources of an organization including tangible assets, financial resources, materials, and human resources through information between the organization and the external stakeholders.
Implementation of an ERP package was possible only for very large Multi National Companies and Infrastructure Companies due to high cost involved. But, it is expected in that 60% of the companies will be implementing one or the other ERP packages since this will become a must for gaining competitive advantage.

ERP Implementation

ERP package has to be implemented systematically rather on big-bang theory. This manner which constitutes every phase to be executed will yield a better result. Successful implementation of ERP package usually requires 1.5 to 2 years.

The normal steps involved in implementation of an ERP are the following:

o Project Planning
o Business & Operational analysis including Gap analysis
o Business Process Reengineering
o Installation and configuration
o Project team training
o Business Requirement mapping
o Module configuration
o System interfaces
o Data conversion
o Custom Documentation
o End user training
o Acceptance testing
o Post implementation/Audit support

Moreover, the above mentioned normal steps are divided into four major phases which are the following:

Detailed Discussion Phase:
In this particular phase, the following tasks are involved: Project initialization, Evaluation of current processes, business practices, Set-up project organization. Its deliverables include Accepted norms and Conditions, Project Organization chart, Identity work teams.

Design and Customization Phase:
This phase comprises the following tasks namely Map organization, Map business process, Define functions and processes, ERP software configuration and Build ERP system modifications. It includes the deliverables such as Organization structure, Design specification, Process Flow Diagrams, Function Model, Configuration recording and system modification.

Implementation Phase:
Implementation phase consists of the following tasks which are the following: Create go-live plan and documentation, Integrate applications, Test the ERP customization, Train users. Moreover, it has the following deliverables: Testing environment report, Customization Test Report and Implementation report

Production Phase:
Lastly, this phase has the following tasks: Run Trial Production, Maintain Systems and deliverables such as: Reconciliation reports and Conversion Plan Execution

ERP Packages

Some of the ERP packages with some of their players and software versions respectively are the following:
• Microsoft - Microsoft Great Plains version 7.5 and previews of Microsoft Great Plains version 8.0
• Oracle - Oracle E-Business Suite 11.5.9
• PeopleSoft - PeopleSoft Enterprise 8.8 and 8.9, EnterpriseOne 8.11
• Sap- SAP mySAP Business Suite R/3 4.6 and SAP R/3 Enterprise 4.7
• Siebel- Siebel 7.5 and Siebel 7.7

Microsoft
Microsoft offers basic functionality that does not require extensive training, but it also does not necessarily deliver the full value expected by the customer in view of the ownership experience.

Oracle
Based on the Oracle eBusiness Suite, an integrated suite of applications, Oracle claims that it can lower implementation costs by avoiding unnecessary costs, such as those associated with costly custom integration between applications. Although Oracle's approach has some merit - some measurable benefits have been highlighted through ROI case studies, serious concerns are still being raised regarding what Oracle has delivered to date.

PeopleSoft
PeopleSoft has rethought its entire set of applications to ensure that they are built from the ground up to minimize deployment and maintenance costs.

SAP
SAP highlights SAP NetWeaver as the centerpiece to SAP's product strategy for decreasing the complexity and cost of ownership for SAP applications. SAP has not yet provided proof points validating that its customers benefit from
improved ownership experience through the implementation of SAP's latest technology.

Siebel
Siebel's improvements to its software development process are guided by the experience and insight gained from close examination of 200 Siebel 7.x deployments.

Organizations that installs ERP package

Some of the companies that are installing the ERP package are the following:

• NIKE
• DHL
• Tektronix
• Fujitsu
• Millipore
• Sun Microsystems

Sun Microsystems and ERP Package

Sun Microsystems is one among the other organizations that uses one of the ERP packages. The company particularly employs the use Oracle ERP.

ERPwire.com, calling them The Right Channel for ERP, shows a particular case study discussion about the success of employing Oracle ERP in Sun Microsystems. The discussion entitled Analyzing Oracle ERP’s success in Sun Microsystems.

About Sun Microsystems
Sun Microsystems is a pioneer in providing IT services to companies and has been instrumental in capitalizing their expertise and converting them into advantages in a particular organization by making an accurate analysis of the requirements and functions of the organization. They merge technology with the business process and have demonstrated excellent results in diverse companies. Their clientele list is quiet impressive and includes everyone the top notch players in any business requiring IT services.

Oracle ERP in Sun Microsystems

Sun Microsystems installed Oracle ERP application Suite. The hardware and software employed in the company were their high performance Ultra SPARC III server technology, Sun Ray desktop appliances and Solaris operating environment. It was installed in Linlithgow Manufacturing Facility of Sun Microsoft Systems. Sun Microsystems experienced the following as a result of Oracle ERP's implementation.

Impact of Oracle ERP in Sun Microsystems
Saving in costs

Sun Microsystems were not able to make use of the IT facilities cost effectively because of their multiple platforms that lacked connectivity and integration.

This problem was removed by oracle ERP applications. Aside from answering the issue of connectivity Oracle ERP helped in faster transmission. This helped to speed up the business process gradually. The amount of money invested on It operations went down on a staggering pace. This not only reduced the money invested but also brought down the time spent on the same. The connectivity eased other process in turn and benefited the business in all possible ways.

Accessibility
Before the ERP was installed, the company suffers from poor accessibility because their servers were not really connected and dependent from each other. The ERP process changed the situation through consolidation.

Mechanization
Through the installation of ERP, some processes that need the operation of manpower are now intervened with the process of intervention which can save time and money and improve productivity as well.

Better results
The organization observed better results especially in terms of time which became quicker and cost which became cheaper. Also, the organization was able to analyze its flaws and errors.
Enables change both present and future

Because of the large size of the organization and its different IT operation, the company find it hard to change instantly especially in their business process even if the large interest of the business is at stake.

This situation, was however changed through the implementation of Oracle ERP. It was now possible for changes to be made now and then. This feature is very important not only for enterprise operation but for the business process as such. The business was capable of frequently adapting to change and staying in tunes with the market and competition. ERP intervention made this possible in this company and now the company is able to accumulate a whooping amount both in terms of incurring profits and reducing costs.

Comparison of ERP and SDLC

Enterprise resource planning (ERP) and Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC) differ in many ways.

Such difference will be the case of ERP’s features. It includes facilitate of company-wide Integrated Information System, performing core Corporate activities and increases customer service, belief that it is the only solution for better Project Management compared to the other planning tools, addressing not only the current requirements of the company but also providing the opportunity of continually improving and refining business processes and above all, providing business intelligence tools like Decision Support Systems (DSS), Executive Information System (EIS), Reporting, Data Mining and Early Warning Systems (Robots) for enabling people to make better decisions and thus improve their business processes

References:

http://www.erpfans.com/erpfans/erpca.htm
http://search400.techtarget.com/expert/KnowledgebaseAnswer/0,289625,sid3_gci835451,00.html
http://www.tc.umn.edu/~hause011/article/ERPchoose.html
Elisabeth Rainier (Project Manager/Strategic Planning).http://it.toolbox.com/blogs/crm-trends/erp-packages-feature-comparison-4309
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enterprise_resource_planning
http://www.erpwire.com/erp-articles/erp-success-in-sun-microsystems.htm

USEP Enrollment System: An Assessment

2010-02-11T19:40:00.003-08:00

You were tasked by the IC-dean to evaluate the enrollment system of the university, list and briefly describe the characteristics that an analyst (you) examines when choosing or defining deployment environment.

Supposing I am an analyst hired by the IC-dean, I was asked to evaluate the enrollment system of the university. Before evaluating the system, I have to understand the enrollment process first. The university’s enrolment process includes advisement, registration and payment of fees. Each college prescribes a set of requirements in the different course offered by them provided that is duly approved by the university president.
For freshmen, they are to present the requirements such as the HS grades, USEPAT exam results (passed), Admission Slips through passing the interview, medical certificate, among others. For upper classmen, they are to present the clearance duly signed by the different authorities and the Student Handbook or College Passbook with Scholastic Record duly signed by subject teachers. There are also requirements for the transferees such as the 2.0 grades, Copy of the Transcript of Records, Certificate of the Eligibility to Transfer, Certificate of Good Moral Character from the former school, Medical Certificate among others. For cross enrollees, written permit from his dean or the registrar is required. For former students, Official Transcript of Records and clearance required. For foreign students, they are required to comply with the academic standards and evaluation of CHED.

The university has its own enrolment system. From my own observations, some university residents, be it a staff, faculty and especially the students, are not satisfied with the said system. They have complaints such as the long line and the time wasted or consumed in complying just a single requirement. It is not that effective compared to the other university who could cater hundreds of enrollees by just a day. Because if it is, a student be enrolled in a day without that hassle and hypertension feelings. Sometimes, developers of the system think that they already did the things required in their system. Only that they find out that their clients are not that satisfied. The success of the system also depends upon the environment on which it is being deployed.

Thus, here is the brief list and description of the characteristics we have to examine when choosing or defining the deployment environment of the system.

• Fully Assessed business requirements
It is important to assess the business requirements of the organization in which the system is to be deployed. Assessing business requirements involved the assessment of business models and their integration with technology. Business analysis involves the analysis if the business needs, policies and market business approaches, modeling and the interpretation of business rules and requirements for technical systems (generally IT)

Within the systems development life cycle domain (SDLC), the business analyst basically performs as a bridge person of the business side of an enterprise and the providers of services to the enterprise. A Common alternative role in the IT sector is business analyst, systems analyst, and functional analyst, although some organizations may differentiate between these titles and corresponding responsibilities.

• Identified available resources
It is equally important to identify the resources available in developing the system. It is in the form of software, hardware, peopleware, time plan, costs, etc. It may also mean the physical components of a computer system, in the form of computer hardware. Software includes all the various forms and roles that digitally stored data may have and play in a computer (or similar system), regardless of whether the data is used as code for a CPU, or other interpreter, or whether it represents other kinds of information. Peopleware can refer to anything that has to do with the role of people in the development or use of computer software and hardware systems, including such issues as developer productivity, teamwork, group dynamics, the psychology of programming, project management, organizational factors, human interface design, and human-machine-interaction. Time is part of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify the motions of objects. In business, retail, and accounting, a cost is the value of money that has been used up to produce something, and hence is not available for use anymore.

In one of my researches, I found out that deployment environment does not only talk about the physical environment such as the university itself along with its residents. It has something to do with the development and deployment phase; not just the actual implementation. But unfortunately, I can’t define the exact meaning.
To define the Deployment Environment is just one of the steps in the Software development. Its characteristics include the specifications of the important information about the deployment environment. It includes database, match engine, and standardization engine vendors.

To Define the Deployment Environment
1. Complete Step 3: Define Source Systems.
2. On the Define Deployment Environment window, enter the following information:
o Database - The type of database being used for the master index application. You can select MySQL, Oracle or SQL Server.
o Match Engine - The type of match and standardization engine to use for the implementation.
o Date Format - The date format for the master index system. This defines how dates should be entered and how they appear on the MIDM.
o Transaction Mode - An indicator of whether transactions are distributed. Select one of the following options:
 XA (across applications), if the transactions will be distributed across multiple applications
 XA (within application only), if the transactions will be distributed just across the master index application.
 Local, if the transactions will not be distributed.

References:

http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/dmndhelp/v7r0mx/index.jsp?topic=/com.ibm.websphere.wps.doc/doc/tpln_choosetop.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_analyst
http://www.usep.edu.ph/admissions/

My blog:
http://shielamariepnara.blogspot.com/2010/02/sad-1-11.html

Data Flow Diagram: An Evaluation

2010-02-11T19:40:00.001-08:00

Before discussing the important characteristics a data flow diagram (DFD) must have, let us first understand the concept of the diagram. As the name suggests, data flow diagram is a description of the data with respect to the processes performed in a system. It shows the permanent storage of such data and its transformation into the system.

SYMBOLS

DFDS uses different symbols to show the data, entities and the processes in the system.

Process symbol has got the following entities, process number (tells the number of the process), locality (where activity is happening) and a process name.
Rules:
• Must represent transformation of data
• Must have data flows into/out the process
• Process with no out is said to be null

Data store Symbol comprises the data store number and name of data store. Rules of
Rules:

• The symbol and the numbering remain the same

Data flow symbol signifies the movement of data.
Rules:
• Double arrows indicates that activities occurs simultaneously
• Data flow in is not equal to data flow out

Extended entity symbol shows sources and destination of data.
Rules:
• External entity never communicate with each other
• External entity should not communicate directly with data store

In order to produce a quality dfd, it is important to analyze the data flow of the system. Data analysis comprises of four main questions the analyst ought to answer:

• What processes make up a system?

• What data are used in each process?

• What data are stored?

• What data enter and leave the system?

Data flow analysis tracks the flow of data through business processes and determines how organization objectives are met. It studies the use of data in each activity and documents the findings in data flow diagrams, graphically showing the relation between processes and data.

There are two types of data flow diagrams, namely physical data flow diagrams and logical data flow diagrams and it is important to distinguish clearly between the two:

Physical DFD

Using PDFD is desirable for analysts for the following reasons:

1. It is easier to describe the interaction between physical components than to understand the policies used to manage the application. Identifying people, what they do, which documents and forms trigger which activities and what equipment is used in the processing. The movement of people, documents and information between departments and locations is also identified.

2. Physical data flow diagrams are useful for communicating with users. Users relate easily to people, locations and documents as they work with these each day. Users may consider logical DFDs abstract as they do not contain these familiar components, however, with physical DFDs users can quickly identify incorrect or missing steps.

3. Physical DFDs provide a way to validate or verify the user's current view of the system with the way it is actually operating. If there are differences, they will be noted and discussed. It is not unusual to find that what a users thinks is happening differs in an important way from what actually occurs.

Steps in Developing a Physical DFD:
(using a top-down approach)
1. Make "a context level DFD" or Level 0. It illustrates the "interaction" (data flows) between "the system" (represented by one process) and "the system environment" (represented by terminators).
2. Have a system "decomposed in lower-level DFD (Level 1)" into a set of "processes, data stores, and the data flows between these processes and data stores".
3. Each process is then decomposed into an "even-lower-level diagram containing its subprocesses".
4. This approach "then continues on the subsequent subprocesses", until a necessary and sufficient level of detail is reached which is called the primitive process (aka chewable in one bite).

Steps in Developing a Logical DFD:
1. Develop a physical dfd
2. Explore the process
3. Maintain consistency between the process
4. Following meaningful leveling convention
5. Ensure that dfd diagrams clarifies what is happening in the system
6. Remember dfd audience
7. Add control on the lower level dfd only
8. Assign meaningful level
9. Evaluate dfd for correctness

Rules:

• Data flow output must be based on data input to the process.
• Data flows must have names; the name reflects that data flowing between processes, data stores, sources and sinks(destination).
• Input to the process are the only data needed to perform certain
• Process should be independent from other process in the system
• Process should depend only on its own input and output.
• Processes are always running; they do not start or stop.
• Output from processes can take one of several forms:

a) Input data flow with information added by the
b) A response or change of data form
c) Change of status
d) Change of content
e) Change in organization

Deriving the Logical View from Physical DFD

Physical DFDs are a means to an end, not an end in themselves. They are drawn to describe an implementation of the existing system for two reasons:

•To guarantee a correct understanding of the current implementation (users are generally better able to discuss the physical system as they know it through people, workstations and days of the week.)

•The implementation itself may be a problem or limiting factor; changing the implementation, rather than the system concept may provide the desired results.

A logical view steps back from the actual implementation and provides a basis for examining the combination of processes, data flows, data stores, inputs and outputs without concern for the physical devices, people or control issues that characterise the implementation.

Steps:

•Show actual data needed in a process, not the documents that contain them.
•Remove routing information; that is, show the flow between procedures, not between people, offices or locations.
•Remove references to physical devices.
•Remove references to control information
•Consolidate redundant data stores.
•Remove unnecessary processes, such as those that do not change the data or data flows.
• Maintain Consistency between Processes

When developing DFDs in more detail it is important to maintain consistency between levels. Consistency means reliability and reliability in dfd is significant in developing a system. IN other words, consistency is one of the feature-factors that can affect the success of the system through the dfd.No new inputs or outputs to a process should be introduced at a lower level that was not identified at a higher level. However, within a process, new data flows and data stores may be identified.

• Follow Meaningful Levelling Conventions

Levelling refers to the handling of local files (those that are used within a process). The details that pertain only to a single process on a particular level should be held within the process. Data stores and data flows that are relevant only to the inside of a process are concealed until that process is exploded into greater detail.

• Add Control on Lower-Level Diagrams Only

The logical data flow diagrams developed to this point do not include control information. No mention has been made of how to handle errors or exceptions. Although this information is necessary in the final analysis, it should not be a concern while identifying the overall data flow. The secondary diagrams (below second or third level) show error and exception handling in the process being exploded.

Some physical control information is unnecessary in logical DFDs. Copy numbers or annotations for documents (e.g. Copy 1, Copy 2, Shipping copy or Accounting copy), procedural orders (e.g. Find the record; Review the record; Annotate the record), or day-of-the-week triggers (e.g. Do on Monday; Do the last day of the month) do not belong with the logical and data aspects of requirements determination. The important elements for understanding a process during logical data flow analysis are not document copy numbers but descriptions of the data needed to perform the process.

Evaluating Data Flow Diagrams for Correctness

A quality DFD should consider correctness as its primary characteristic. Correct DFD indicates that the analyst understand the data flows in the business processes of its clients. Understanding between the clients and the developer is the key factor in producing a good system. And developing a good system starts from its developing particularly in creating diagrams such as the DFD.

It is essential to evaluate all DFDs carefully to determine if they are correct. Errors, omissions and inconsistencies can occur for several reasons, including mistakes in drawing the diagrams. But the presence of what appears to be an error may in fact point out a deficiency in the system or a situation in which users are not aware of how certain processes operate.

These questions are useful in evaluating data flow diagrams:

• Are there any unnamed components in the data flow diagram (data flows, processes, stores, inputs or outputs)?

• Are there any data stores that are input but never referenced?

• Are there any processes that do not receive input?

• Are there any processes that do not produce output?

• Are there any processes that serve multiple purposes? If so, simplify by exploding them into multiple processes that can be better studied).

• Are there data stores that are never referenced?

• Is the inflow of data adequate to perform the process?

• Is there excessive storage of data in a data store (more than the necessary details)?

• Is the inflow of data into a process too much for the output that is produced?

• Are aliases introduced in the system description?

• Is each process independent of other processes and dependent only on the data it receives as input?

References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_flow_diagram
http://hubpages.com/hub/What-is-a-data-flow-diagram
http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:U6PxQ9Uy2iQJ:repository.binus.ac.id/content/D0602/D060265475.doc+evaluating+data+flow+diagrams&cd=6&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=pha

USEP Pre-enrollment System: A DFD

2010-02-11T19:39:00.004-08:00

on USeP Pre-enrollment system

Context DFD: The emphasis is on the relationship between the system and its environment the system as a whole is represented by a bubble, and the external entities are shown as squares from which input flows and to which output is directed. No information about the structure of the system itself is pictured in a context DFD.

Diagram 0: A diagram 0 is a diagram showing the system itself. It pictures the major processes along with the external entities, data stores and data flow. It is a single ,top-level diagram of the system, and does not describe each process in detail. Parts of the diagram can be expended or exploded using more detail sub diagrams.

Detailed DFD: Detailed DFD are explosions of higher level presentations and are detailed pictures of major processes or subsystems. They are likely to be used by designers in their own work rather than for presentations to users or managers. If more detail is needed each of the processes can be further exploded using a still more detail diagram. For example if we wish to expand the "Check Class counts" process, we would construct a diagram called detail DFD.

References:

http://www.blurtit.com/q808726.html

http://www.google.com.ph/url?sa=t&source=web&ct=res&cd=5&ved=0CB0QFjAE&url=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.guilittle.multiply.multiplycontent.com%2Fattachment%2F0%2FR9tjpAoKCrEAAB2m8dA1%2FDFD%2520part%25202.ppt%3Fnmid%3D84120216&rct=j&q=data+flow+diagram%2B+Diagram+0&ei=Okx-S6q7LorYsQPg7Mj7Cw&usg=AFQjCNFNsMf6yuo52liAWq6qYmr3ndNh4g

my blog:http://shielamariepnara.blogspot.com/2010/02/sad-1-9.html

USEP Information

2010-02-11T19:39:00.003-08:00

Information is everywhere and everyone uses it. Manipulating information with the use of the technology is widely emerging. It includes the use of computers, software, hardware, and even people ware for storing, protecting, processing, transmitting, retrieving information. Thus, creating the notion of Information technology in which name means itself.

The only constant thing in the world is nothing but change. In the new millennium, the rapid change in Information technology became apparent that almost all of the aspects in life are affected; even education. Organizations cope up with these changes which are said to be of competitive edge. Organizations including the universities use Information Technology to perform their business processes effectively and efficiently.

Universities such as the University of Southeastern Philippines use Information Technology as an instrument in achieving their goals. The university envisioned itself to be a premier university in the ASEAN Region. Furthermore, it has a mission to provide world-class quality graduates thro8ugh quality education ans sustainalble resource managemet. to the deserving students and to provide them with competencies in Science and Technology, Entrepreneurial and leadership abilities and so on. Additionally, the university has program mandates which include promoting professional training in the medicine, fisheries, engineering and industrial fields; advanced studies, research and extension services for the socio-economic development of Mindanao; courses and specialization that responds to the needs in the academe; non-formal education for the development; and scholarship and part-time job opportunities for the deserving students.

In line with the university’s aim, the school partnered with various agencies which and rendered services that ensures development. International agencies include: Knowledge for Development Center (with World Bank); Philippine-Australia Basic Education Assistance for Mindanao ith the Australian Agency for International Development);
Institute of Languages (with Sung-Duk College, South Korea); Pamulaan Center for Indigenous Peoples’ Education (with Assisi Development Foundation); Philippine-Australia Basic Education Assistance for Mindanao; (with the Australian Agency for International Development); for Pre-Service Education; Southeast Asian Ministries of Education Organization Regional Center for Vocational and Technical Education and
Training in Brunei Darussalam (with SEAMEO-VOCTECH); Resources for the Blind, Inc. (with Christoffel-Blinden Mission of Germany) ; Confucius Institute (with the Republic of China); Human Resource Development in Teacher Education and Languages (with the Australian Government, under PAHRDF) among others.

Also, to maintain the quality education the university is boosting for, USeP is offering various services and is using different systems. Systems and management scheme includes Dynamic Administration and Management System; Highly Motivated and Competent University Faculty; Ladderized System of Education; to provide wider access to higher education; Equivalency Program and Accreditation Schemes; Pamulaan Center for Indigenous Peoples’ Education and Mindanao e-Learning Space (MiSpace) so on and so forth.

Also, the university provides its residents with different facilities such as the Speech Laboratories ; Dormitory/Training Center ; Social Hall ; Conference Rooms ; Computer Center ; Sports Facilities ; Virtual Library ; Tissue Culture Laboratories; Mindanao eLearning Space; WB Knowledge for Development Center ; Physical and Natural Science Laboratories ; SWEEP Wireless Laboratory ; Science and Technology Learning Resource Center ; Crop and Animal Production Projects ; Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical & Astronomical Services; Administration (PAGASA) Station; Affiliated Non-conventional Energy Center; College of Education Training and Review Center; Expanded Tertiary Education Equivalency an Accreditation Program; Institute of Languages; WB-Knowledge for Development Center; Lifelong Study Center; Mindanao Center for Policy Studies; Mindanao Center for Technical Education & Staff Development; Mindanao e-Learning Space; Pamulaan Center for Indigenous Peoples Education; Regional Center for Human Rights Education; Regional Trades and Crafts Training and Production Center; Teacher Training Center-Mindanao and Zonal Computerization Center.

As mentioned above, it is very evident that the university uses the application of Information Technology in its operations. The university not only offers programs related to Information Technology but also employs IT in the other programs and services. It also partnered with the IT-reliant organizations to undertake development.

Assuming I have with me the crystal ball and I would have to foresee on what USeP shall be three years from now (that would be along 2013), I have to identify three IT changes in IT which has significant impact on the school services of the university. These changes include system integration, improved enrollment system and organizational plan that adopts to the fast changing IT environment.

According to Morton, IT may consist of five basic components - computers, communications technology, work stations, robotics, and computer chips. It may also mean devices that transmit, manipulate, analyze, or exploit information; in which a digital computer processes information integral to the user's communication or decision task; and that have made their appearance since 1970 or exist in a form that aids in communication or decision tasks to a significantly greater degree than did pre-1971 forms,” as defined by Huber.

According to Edward J. Bride in his Transitions - changes to Information Technology Association of America, Information Technology not only talks of the software, network services, and systems integration and consulting, it also includes the entire IT environment.

According to Malhotra, Yogesh in his Role of Information Technology in Managing Organizational Change and Organizational Interdependence, organizational changes are in line with the changes in Information technology. The growth of the organization depends on the effective usage of IT. Thus, organizational environment and the information preferences creates symbiotic relationship.

As Norbert Wiener quoted “, we modified our environment so radically that we must modify ourselves in order to exist in this new environment. “

IT changes in USeP include:

1.) Integrated systems utilization

Faculties and students in the university with certain initiatives powered by motivations are able to create information systems which have different goals. These systems if successfully deployed will be of great help in the services of the university. The university integrated system also known as the “uniisys” encompasses several batches of system which include: Ebenta which is an online bidding system for the students to engage in E-Commerce activity; Edikit, an An online publication system; Upahibalo, an organizational information system; Iskolar which is a scholarship information system Alumnay sa USeP, a university alumni information system, Shareit, an online file sharing social site; Etudlo, an online tutorial service provider; Escheduler, and scheduling information system among others.

I believe these are few of the changes that could happen in the university which has a great impact on the operations of the university. Systems are created to bring benefit to the residents such as the students, faculty and staff.

The university strives for more developed systems which bring forth more productive operations. And because of this, students are still initiating and developing for the possible systems that could be integrated on the said system. Also, staff is making other systems, although not for the intent of integrating the uniisys, but for the development of the other operations’ concerns.

For years of the systems integration and development, it is possible to look at the university utilizing the systems developed by the students.

2.) Improved enrollment system

Although the university already has its own enrollment system which for years have been developed, involved parties seem not really satisfied. With this, I consider the improvement of the said system to take place in the next three years. With the goal of minimizing the cost and time spent among the students, faculty and staff, the enrollment system is expected to be developed in a way that it is being efficiently utilized.

3.) Organizational structure

According to (Malone and Crowston, the increasing speed pace of change require more flexible and adaptive organizations. Rockart and Short cites the ballooning need for the interdependence of organizational structure to IT in managing competitive pressures that included globalization, time-based competition, increased market risk, and a greater emphasis on customer service and cost reduction. Bennis states that "the organization's response to the environment will continue to be the crucial determinant for its effectiveness."

As organizations use information, effective usage of Information Technology likely results to the organizations development and growth.

It is apparent that IT has great impact in the university, and whatever changes in IT has the university as an IT-reliant organization has to go with the changes in order not to be behind. As Keen (1991) noted that IT increasingly and continuously affects the organizations operations as well as its behavior including issues as on how the organization organize, transact business, and contend with other organization.

REFERENCES:

http://jobsearchtech.about.com/od/careersintechnology/p/ITDefinition.htm

http://www.usep.edu.ph/version/

http://uniisys.usep.edu.ph/index.php?link=links

Malhotra, Yogesh. (1993). Role of Information Technology in Managing Organizational Change and Organizational Interdependence [WWW document]. URL http://www.brint.com/papers/change/

Bride,Edward J. (1991). Transitions - changes to Information Technology Association of America. URL http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0SMG/is_n15_v11/ai_11608052/

USEP Pre-enrollment System: A Class Diagram and Use Case

2010-02-11T19:39:00.001-08:00

DESCRIPTION OF USE CASE

Actors:
Freshmen
Cashier
UGTO
College dean
Interviewer
Clinic

Use cases:*
*Based on the use case diagram of
USeP pre-enrollment system as required in Assignment 7

Pass USEPAT
Pass interview
Pass English plus
Pass English bridge
Secure Medical certificate
Secure other requirements

ACTIVITY DIAGRAM

Actor: Freshmen
Use case: Pass USEPAT
Description: Prospective student have to
take the USEP Admission Test and must pass it
Main flow:
• Pay USEPAT fee
• Secure Admission form
• Schedule examination day
• Take examination
• Get results
• Consider failure
• Secure results

Possible variations and error conditions:
• If results failed

Actor: Freshmen
Use case: Pass Interview
Description: After passing the exam, prospective
student have to undergo by an in-charged interviewer of
the respective college he would like to be admitted
Main flow:

• Submit high school grades
• Submit USEPAT results
• Undergo an interview
• Get results
• Consider failure
• Secure results

Possible variations and error conditions:
• If results failed

Actor: Freshmen
Use case: Pass English plus exam
Description: After passing the interview,
prospective student have to take another
examination to test English language
competency and he must pass it
Main flow:

• Schedule examination day
• Take examination
• Get results
• Take English Bridge Program
• Secure results

Possible variations and error conditions:
• If results failed

Actor: Freshmen
Use case: Pass English Bridge program
Description: If the prospective student failed
the English Plus examination, he has to enroll
the English Bridge Program and must pass it
Main flow:

• Enroll EBP
• Pay enrollment fees
• Pay EBP module
• Undergo EBP
• Get results
• Consider failure
• Secure results

Possible variations and error conditions:
• If results failed

Actor: Freshmen
Use case: Secure Medical certificate
Description: The prospective student after
passing series of examinations and interviews,
he is then required to secure medical certificate
by the university clinic personnel provided that
he must undergo physical examination first
Main flow:

• Go to USeP Clinic
• Undergo physical examination
• Get certificate

Actor: Freshmen
Use case: Secure other requirements
Description: Aside from complying the main
requirements,it is also important to comply
the other requirements
Main flow:

• Present NSO authenticated birth certificate
• Present 2”x2” valid ID
• Present brown envelope

Actor: UGTO
Use case: Evaluate USEPAT paper
Description: University guidnace and Testing Office
is responsible for detailing the students the flow
upon Entrance examinations
Main flow:
• Receive requirements
• Schedule exams
• Take charge of examination
• Evaluate the paper
• Issue results

Actor: Cashier
Use case: Issue receipts
Description: the university cashier is responsible
for the payment transactions with the student.
After issuing the bills, he then receives the payments,
record it and then issue a receipt
Main flow:

• Receive payments
• Encode and save the details
• Disburse receipt

Possible variations and error conditions:
• If results received no payments

Actor: Interviewer
Use case: Interview student
Description: Each college assigned interviewers have
to interview the prospective student which is one of
the bases of giving assessments
Main flow:
• Receive requirements
• Interview students
• Issue results

Actor: College dean
Use case: Evaluate student
Description: Each college of the university will have
its own set of standards. The dean is responsible for
evaluating the student if he passed the standards
Main flow:
• Receive requirements
• Evaluate students
• Issue results

Actor: Clinic
Use case: Secure medical records
Description: One of the requirements of the university
is for the students to undergo medical examination
through the USEP clinic which means that he also has
to provide medical certificate
Main flow:
• Schedule physical exam
• Examine students
• Keep medical records
• Issue medical certificate

References:

http://f1.grp.yahoofs.com/v1/EMdzSwadLcVZiM3bX_r1j_ludfaeRajdSv374wss2w3emM6EyQkptZVypUNr59av06ZkT9eWOGDLdcKjvuwIj8IFWKYBJM0zww/Requirements%20Analysis%201.pdf

http://www.developer.com/design/article.php/2247041/Activity-Diagram-in-UML.htm

USEP Pre-enrollment System: An Activity Diagram

2010-02-05T00:00:00.001-08:00

DIAGRAM:

BRIEF DESCRIPTION:

The use case diagram as shown in the figure above describes the pre-enrollment system of the University of Southeastern Philippines. Moreover, the diagram shows the primary actor which is the prospective student of the university. In order to be admitted, the student must comply with the requirement which includes the passing the USEP Admission Test (USePAT) which is conducted by the University Guidance Office (UGTO). If the student passed in the exam, he is required to pass the English Plus exam, otherwise, he has to undergo English Summer Bridge Program. I he passed the exam provided by the program, secure the other requirements such as the medical certificate provided by the USEP Clinic, passing the interview, high school grades especially in English, Math and Science which complies with the required grades in the chosen college and program, 85% for Baccalaureate Degree Programs and 83% for Diploma / Certificate / Associate Programs, birth certificate, 2”x2” passport pictures. After the requirements are secured, the forthcoming student is then admitted to the university but he is not yet officially enrolled unless he undergo USEP enrollment process and have the COR duly signed by the registrar as Officially Enrolled.

Strategic Information Systems Plan

2010-02-04T22:08:00.000-08:00

The task for this particular assignment is to assume myself hired by a certain company to develop a strategic information systems plan or SISP. The company officers have invited me to meet with them to discuss the direction of the company. Before the meeting, I was asked to provide a set of questions so that they can be prepared. Moreover, these questions should be answered with explanations to maximize the output.

Thus, I have to develop questions that start with “why”. Or I can also include questions that begin in “what” or “how” for as long as it is followed up with “why” or needs some elaborations.

I have provided set of queries which touches the behavioral aspects of the company which encompasses the adaptability to change, flexibility, development, management, business goals, analysis and decision making, business thinking, skills, innovation, orientation, motivation, planning and organization so on and so forth.

Provided the explanations and justifications, below are possible questions I would provide the officers which are obviously things that relate to the forthcoming meeting.

1. What are the mission, vision, goals, and objectives of your company? How and why did the company obtain these ambitions?
2. How does each of the department or unit contribute to the attainment of the over-all company goals?
3. How does your company reach your goals?
4. How do you develop a project team's goals and project plan?
5. How do you adapt to the changes affecting your company?
6. How do you prioritize things in your company?
7. Why do you consider IT as an important aspect in the development of the company?
8. What is the importance of having an Information System in the business processes of the company?
9. How important is developing a strategic information systems plan or SISP in your company?
10. How do you handle unexpected circumstances on the way of the project development?
11. What are the risks that your company has faced in the past? How did you handle it?
12. What are the challenges that your company has succeeded and what are those that you have failed to struggle? How did you arrive with the outcome?
13. What projects have you started on your own recently? What motivated you to get started?
14. How important is building a good relationship in your company?
15. What are the keys in building a good relationship in your company?
16. Do you consider communication as an important toll in the development of the project? Why?
17. Give me an example of a time when you were able to successfully communicate
18. How do you handle things such as language gap or communication between the parties who are technically oriented and those that are not?
19. Have you undergone to choose a tough decision? How did you go about choosing one?
20. Give me examples of projects/tasks you started on your own.
21. Do you consider innovation as an important part in building success in the company? Why?
22. What innovative procedures have you developed? How did you develop them? Who was involved? Where did the ideas come from?
23. Have you taken a risk to achieve a certain goal? What was the outcome?
24. Have you consider the traditional way of developing things or try to have the new approach? What was the outcome? What is the most effective way applicable in your organization
25. Have you experienced having a tough problem on ethical issues? How did you handle it?
26. Tell us about a specific time when you had to handle a tough problem which challenged fairness or ethnical issues.
27. Have you ever had to introduce a policy change to your work group? How did you do it?
28. Have you ever met resistance when implementing a new idea or policy to a work group? How did you deal with it? What happened?
29. Describe the most challenging negotiation in which you were involved. What did you do? What were the results for you? What were the results for the other party?
30. Tell us about a specific development plan that you created and carried out with one or more of your employees. What was the specific situation? What were the components of the development plan? What was the outcome?
31. Problem Solving
32. Describe the most difficult working relationship you've had with an individual. What specific actions did you take to improve the relationship? What was the outcome?
33. In having a development plan, have you experienced encountering a team member that has no contribution? How do you handle with it?
34. How did you deal with all types of conflict?
35. How do you communicate goals to subordinates? Give an example.
36. How do you involve people in developing your unit's goals?
37. What company plans have you developed? Which ones have you reached? How did you reach them? Which have you missed? Why did you miss them?
38. What goals did you miss? Why did you miss them?
39. What goals have you met? What did you do to meet them?
40. Describe what steps/methods you have used to define/identify a vision for your unit/position.

Reference:

http://blog.emurse.com/2007/05/21/complete-list-of-behavioral-interview-questions/

Information System: Juan or Pedro

2010-02-03T01:41:00.000-08:00

THE SCENARIO

The following is a dialogue between a systems professional, John Juan, and a manager of a department targeted for a new information system, Peter Pedro:

Juan: The way to go about the analysis is to first examine the old system, such as reviewing key documents and observing the workers perform their tasks. Then we can determine which aspects are working well and which should be preserved.

Pedro: We have been through these types of projects before and what always ends up happening is that we do not get the new system we are promised; we get a modified version of the old system.

Juan: Well, I can assure you that will not happen this time. We just want a thorough understanding of what is working well and what isn’t.

Pedro: I would feel much more comfortable if we first started with a list of our requirements. We should spend some time up-front determining exactly what we want the system to do for my department. Then you systems people can come in and determine what portions to salvage if you wish. Just don’t constrain us to the old system.

Required:

a.Obviously these two workers have different views on how the systems analysis phase should be conducted. Comment on whose position you sympathize with the most.
b.What method would you propose they take? Why?

For me, both methods are essential in creating and implementing new information system. But in the dialogue, the two personnel have their own ideas which would result to conflicts. Two have their own points on choosing one over the other. These ideas would convince you to choose one and then again, at some point to the other. Anyways, for me to decide to whom between the two I should share my sympathy with if it’s needed, I have to understand the points the two parties are implying.

JUAN'S POINT

Let us start with John Juan, who is said to be systems professional. As the title suggests, he has claimed an expertise in the field of systems development. So probably, his ideas are better for the department.

He points out that in analyzing the problem, it is better if they have to first examine the old system first. By reviewing the key documents and observing the workers perform their tasks and a lot of things pertaining to the old system. By that, they could determine the strengths and weaknesses of the existing system. By assessing it, they could provide solutions for the weaknesses and improvements for the strengths.

An organization planning to have anew information system starts with the analysis of the capacity and status of existing information system. Current status, system performance, different functionalities, advantages, disadvantages, risks and opportunities are being considered in the analysis process of developing the system. These data are needed to capture the current situation of the business process with regard to the existing system. It also helps explore the possibilities of expansion, revision or renewal of the current system involved. By that, the actual needs of the people involved will be answered. Information systems are big help in an organization to carry out their business processes. .

Assessing current information system is believed to be of considerable benefit when planning new information systems. The development of Information Systems Strategies is often performed through the support of frameworks. Some of these frameworks include the documentation of the existing practice regarding the existing system, while others are the merely result of theory development. Some are tried and trusted, while the other are unsuccessfully unused (in case of Peter Pedro’s department).

PEDRO'S POINT

At this end, we have to discuss the ideas of Peter Pedro, he said that assessing the strengths and weaknesses of an old system is not a successful method in getting new system. They have made different types of projects with the use of such method, and what they found out is just the modified version of the old system whose outcome doesn’t satisfy him.

With that idea, he stresses the need to identify the requirements which is the first phase of creating a new system rather than specifying the old system. He wants to evaluate the true needs of his department to come up with the system that suffice their wants.

A requirement is defined as a state or capacity needed by a user to solve a problem or achieve certain goals. It is “a must ” in the system. (IEEE Standard Glossary of Software Engineering Terminology). It is the basis for the succeeding development and verification processes of producing a system.

A successful system depends on the specification of the requirements. Even if you have lot of requirements gathered but it is insignificant to the system, then your system could be considered as incomplete and inconsistent. However, there are no systems ever created that is considered complete yet. That is why we have this systems evolution. But the goal here is to have at least “close to perfect system.”

Requirements engineering as a process involving requirements, helps earlier detection of errors which are much expensive if discovered later, forces clients study their requirements, and others.

Having captured significant requirements in the system is important in the agreement among the stakeholders involved. It is a good source for resource estimation. It improves the system’s quality.

There are two classifications of requirements: the Functional and the Nonfunctional Requirements. Functional requirements talks about the specific behavior of the system. It is the focus of acquiring requirements. On the other hand, Non-Functional Requirements cites the constraints on the over all quality of the system. Moreover, the classifications of the NON-functional requirements include Safety requirements, Security requirements, Interface requirements, Human engineering requirements Qualification requirements, Operational requirements, Maintenance requirements, Design constraints. Both requirements are important considerations in the system.

Requirements can be acquired through the following sources such as the customers or end-users for the user requirements and other stakeholders that are involved in the system such as the marketing experts, regulators and developer. Requirements can also be gotten through non-human source such as the other devices or systems in the environment.

Since Requirement Engineering is a systematic approach to acquire, analyze, validate, document and manage requirements, it includes a set of activities as in Requirements elicitation, Requirements analysis, Requirements specification and documentation, Requirements validation and Requirements management.

In the RE process, there are tow considered domains: the problem which tells about something that the organization want to solve by developing a system and the solution which speaks of the “system” that will be developed based on the requirements.

In the process of developing the system, the first to note is to understand the problem which comprises the elicitation and analysis activities. After which is to specify the solution which is in the form of specification and documentation activity. After the solution has been provided and then validated through the validation activity, is then implemented and managed in the management activity.

The ones who are responsible for preparing the requirements specification are the primary users itself, in this case, is the department. Another is the developer organisation in which the said process is considered as the first step in overall development contract, in this case, Juan’s and company or the systems people as Pedro cited. It can also be in the third party organisation .

MY POINT

After considering each point, my stand would be on the side of Peter Pedro, provided that the point of John Juan is also considered.

New system is created because of the imperfections found in the old system or because people in the organization cited a need to have a system which may answer their problems. Understanding the real problems is the aim of requirements elicitation which is said to be the main point of the department manager.

The problem can only be clearly understood by discovering who or what is really affected by the problem. In this case, the department manager knows what his department really needs. And so, he is able to identify the problems in his department. Even though the systems people are able to identify these by conducting an interview or company visit on the actual business process of the company, if he has a different way of establishing a new system, the definitely, it wouldn’t align with the actual needs of the organization.

In analyzing the problem, one has to establish their goals on why they develop a system. Goals are considered as requirements in themselves, particularly high level. Goals speak of the domains.

However, in providing the solutions to problems in the department, the point of the systems analyst should also be considered because of the constraints which are to have an existing system look-and-feel. In short, it is also a need to study the old system including its functionalities, the benefits and the weaknesses. By that, they can retain the comfort and the acceptance of the people in the department.

Therefore, in developing a new system for the department, the first step is to understand the problem by identifying the needs and requirements of the company. In addition, it is also a need to have knowledge with similar systems.

It is because identifying the requirements and understanding the functionalities of the system main factors for having a success in developing the project.

As to what method should they take, it is up to both parties on what method really suits in the type of system they are going to implement in the department.

THE METHOD

Choosing the type of methods require the considerations of the different factors. The department manager so as the systems analyst should consider a lot of things pertaining to the project such as the system scope, budget, the stakeholders, the time frame and other constraints. It also depends on what type of methodology they are comfortable with which is proven to bring success in the development of their system.

But for me, thinking that the system is planned to be implemented in a certain department of the company, I would consider Agile Methodologies. It is because developers won’t strive to have new methodologies if they are contented in the existing methodologies such as the waterfall, or traditional sequential development. However, each methodology is advantageous over the other in its own way.

But for this particular scenario, I introduce Agile methodogy simply because it offers the assessment to the direction of the project throughout the SDLC or Software development lifecycle. It is in the form of iterative process which implies the thorough inspection of each iterations. Unlike in Waterfall model (which inspired the Agile methodolgy), the developers using the said methodology will have many chances to acquire the acceptable requirements and to correct the errors until the system is finally implemented.
Agile Methodolgy is said to have “inspect-and-adapt” approach which can benefit the department in terms of financial budget and time allocations. As a result, the said methodology helps the organization to develop a system that will really answer their problem and can satisfy the head and the members.

REFERENCES:

http://f1.grp.yahoofs.com/v1/8B5pS1b6JbAzeFmbfZpSrg3aOA3qzkgewjVEz44kiuc9Y3p3xWo6gqvgXRwf2Ri0SCqmsro5PhdG8_QfVw2VDcYQciAmn7S6yw/Requirements%20Engineering.pdf

http://f1.grp.yahoofs.com/v1/8B5pSyHE4iMzeFmbto9-V6eivXHgrbcWmstA4r3T8a8w0F7fsMcN1KLk2wQqpFDsbXrJLVdJfiUqpte-k9syRWCIwDPpqD5Q_g/Requirements%20Elicitation.pdf

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VD0-3XNT1WB-2&_user=10&_coverDate=11%2F30%2F1999&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1191562378&_rerunOrigin=google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=f7fb0e87de26c31fe33d7c0d88f383c9

http://agilemethodology.org/

Google on Google

2010-02-01T04:05:00.000-08:00

Google onGoogle

Google is a highly successful Internet business. Recently they have broadened their scope with a multitude of new tools. Research Google’s business model and answer the following questions below. You may add additional information not included in these questions.

Questions :
Explain Google’s business model.
1. Who are their competitors?
2. How have they used information technology to their advantage?
3. How competitive are they in the market?
4. What new services do they offer?
5. What makes them so unique?
6. How competitive are they in the international market?

To discuss Google is quite an interesting exercise. I am using this useful search engine over the other because of its quicker response to my query and more relevant answers to what I have expected. And it was confirmed by the PC magazine in 1998 which reports, “Google has an uncanny knack for returning extremely relevant results.” And recognize it as the search engine of choice in the top 100 web sites for 1998.”Yes, I use it frequently every time I search but I never was able to explore the root of what Google has become. And I guess, it is great opportunity to dig in some of the interesting facts about google including its milestones and principles.

SOME TRIVIA

In case you didn’t know, the word Google was derived from the mathematical term “googol” for a 1 followed by 100 zeros. It is quite immense huh. The name in fact reflects the vast existence of information and the scope of Goggle’s mission: to organize the world’s information and make it accessible and useful.

The search engine that has known today as Google was originally named as BackRub. In 1997, founders Larry page and Sergey Bin decide to renew the name and it’s Google.

In August 1997, Sun co-founder Andy Bechtolsheim writes a check for $100,000 to a company called Google Inc, an entity that doesn’t exist yet that time.

Craig Silverstein was Google’s first employee; he's a fellow computer science grad student at Stanford.

GOOGLE’S COMPETITORS

When we talk of Google’s competitors, the ones that put in my mind are the other prominent internet businesses which are also proven successful. Some of these are the Yahoo!, MSN and AOL. But as my researches are concerned, even though they compete on a lot of things, they also agreed to work hand in hand in a form of a business deal. IN June 1998, Google had made a partnership with Yahoo! to become their default search provider. In October 2001, Google partnered with UOL (Universo Online) which makes Google the major search service for Latin Americans. In May 2002, Google had a major partnership with AOL to offer Google search and sponsored links using Compuserve, Netsacape and AOL.com. Also, Google made a partnership with Salesforce.com, combining that company's on-demand CRM applications with AdWords.

GOOGLE’S COMPETITIVENESS

It is said that Google’s competitive advantages is surprise.

Google’s success can be seen in different partnerships in the other internet business and the acquisition of the different companies which bring forth the different services Google has offered through the years.

Google acquire Pyra Labs, the creators of Blogger. They also obtain Applied Semantics, sustain the service named AdSense. The company also get Keyhole, a digital mapping company whose technology will later become Google Earth.Urchin, a web analytics company whose technology is used to create Google Analytics. They also had the acquisition of dMarc, a digital radio advertising company. Also, is the acquisition of Writely, a web-based word processing application that subsequently becomes the basis for Google Docs. Google also acquired the famous video streaming company, YouTube.
It also gets JotSpot, a collaborative wiki platform, which later becomes Google Sites
Google completed acquisition deal for DoubleClick.

Aside from the different acquisitions, Google has also dealt with various partnerships. Some are those with the greatest competitors as mentioned earlier and some with no competing parties such as with publishers to digitize millions of magazine articles and make them readily available on Google Book Search and in-kind organizations. The company has also dealt with Google Ventures: a venture capital fund aimed at using our resources to support innovation and encourage promising new technology companies

Another thing that proves Google as a competitive internet business is that Google scores well in the U.S. government’s machine translation evaluation. Google’s prominence shone even in dictionary as The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) adds "Google" as a verb.

GOOGLE’S UNIQUENESS

Google is considered unique for various factors. Google has a very humble beginning and hitherto, its humility is seen in parallel with their success. No matter how distant Google's business model grows from its origins, the root remains providing useful and relevant information to those who are the most important part of the ecosystem, the people who needs information..

They stand in their focus in quietly building a better search engine when great competing venture capital firms spent millions to “build brands.”

“Search” is the word for google. “Perfect search engine” is its target description. Larry Page said “understands exactly what you mean and gives back exactly what you want.”

They persistently pursued on Innovation and refused on the limitations of the existing models.

Google has the PageRank Technology and Hypertext-Matching Analysis for the better quality of their search engine. These technologies are what others are trying to imitate.

Google chose to ignore conventional wisdom in designing its business. Google grow, and so business bloom especially when its managers identified two initial opportunities for generating revenue: search services and advertising.

Google continues to think about ways in which technology can improve upon existing ways of doing business.

Google still maintain a small company feel. Commitment to innovation depends on everyone being comfortable sharing ideas and opinions. Every employee is a hands-on contributor, and everyone wears several hats. Because they believe that each Googler is an equally important part of their success, no one hesitates to pose questions directly to Larry or Sergey in our weekly all-hands ("TGIF") meetings.

They are comprehensive in hiring, they favor ability over experience. As we continue to grow, we are always looking for those who share a commitment to creating search perfection and having a great time doing it.

GOOGLE’S DEVELOPMENT

The time started for Google was in 1995 when the two founders met. But it officially was transacting its business in 1998. Along the ways of development, new areas are identified and new services are offered. Here are some of the services Google Inc. has offered across time.

SERVICES:

• Google Toolbar - a browser plug-in that makes it possible to search without visiting the Google homepage
• (2002) Google Search Appliance- hardware that businesses can plug into their computer network to enable search capabilities for their own documents
• (2002) Froogle (later called Google Product Search)- enables to search stuff to buy
• (2003) Google Grants- in-kind advertising program for nonprofit organizations to run in-kind ad campaigns for their cause
• (2003) Google Print (later called Google Book Search) - indexes small excerpts from books to appear in search results.
• (2004) Google Local-offers relevant neighborhood business listings, maps, and directions
• (2004) Googlunaplex-research facility on the Moon.
• (2004) Google SMS (short message service) – sends your text search queries to GOOGL or 466453 on your mobile device.
• (2004) Google Desktop Search - searches for files and documents stored on your hard drive using Google technology.
• (2004) Google Scholar- a free service for searching scholarly literature
• (2005) code.google.com- place for developer-oriented resources
• (2005) My Search History in Labs-allows you to view all the web pages you've visited and Google searches you've made over time
• (2005) Site Targeting- an AdWords feature giving advertisers the ability to better target their ads to specific content sites
• (2005) Blogger Mobile
• (2005) Personalized Homepage (now iGoogle)-for people to customize their own Google homepage
• (2005) Google Mobile Web Search
• (2005) Google Earth: a satellite imagery-based mapping service combining 3D buildings and terrain with mapping capabilities and Google search
• (2005) API for Maps- developers can embed Google Maps on many kinds of mapping services and sites
• (2005) Google Talk- a downloadable Windows application that enables you to talk or IM with friends quickly and easily
• (2005) Google Reader- for feed aficionados
• (2006) Google Calendar
• Google Trends-a way to visualize the popularity of searches over time
• Picasa Web Albums- allows you to upload and share your photos online
• Google Checkout- way to pay for online purchases
• Google Book Search begins offering free PDF downloads of books in the public domain
• Google News
• Google Custom Search Engine – gives bloggers and website owners the ability to create a search engine tailored to their own interests
• Gmail to everyone
• Gmail Paper Archive and TiSP (Toilet Internet Service Provider)
• RechargeIT- green intiative aimed at accelerating the adoption of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles
• Google Earth Outreach- help nonprofit organizations use Google Earth to advocate their causes
• Presently- a new application for making slide presentations, to Google Docs
• OpenSocial - set of common APIs for developers to build applications for social networks
• Android- the first open platform for mobile devices, and a collaboration with other companies in the Open Handset Alliance
• Sites enables you to create collaborative websites with embedded videos, documents, and calendars
• FriendConnect-set of functions and applications enabling website owners to easily make their sites social by adding registration, invitations, members gallery, message
• Google Health – allows people to safely and securely collect, store, and manage their medical records and health information online
• Google Blog
• Gmail Labs- set of experimental Gmail features, including saved searches and different kinds of stars, which let you customize your Gmail experience
• Our first downloadable iPhone app, featuring My Location and word suggestions for quicker mobile searching, debuts with the launch of the Apple 3G iPhone
• Google Suggest -feature on Google.com; helps in formulating queries, reduce spelling errors, and reduce keystrokes
• Android Software Developer Kit
• Google Earth for the iPhone and iPod touch, complete with photos, geo-located Wikipedia articles, and the ability to tilt your phone to view 3D terrain
• SearchWiki- a way for you to customize your own search experience by re-ranking, deleting, adding, and commenting.
• Measurement Lab (M-Lab),-an open platform that provides tools to test broadband connections
• Google Latitude, a Google Maps for mobile feature and an iGoogle gadget that lets you share your location with friends and see the approximate location of people who have decided to share their location with you
• Google Voice -improves the way you use your phone, with features like voicemail transcription and archive and search of all of your SMS text messages
• iGoogle backdrops
• Sky Map for Android- uses Android phone to help identify stars, constellations and planets
• Google Squared, a new experiment in Labs intended for certain kinds of complex search queries, collects facts from the web and presents them in an organized collection, similar to a spreadsheet
• The Google Translator Toolkit-set of editing tools that helps people translate and publish work in other languages faster and at a higher quality
• Google Chrome OS- an open source, lightweight operating system initially targeted at netbooks
• Moon in Google Earth -features lunar imagery, information about the Apollo landing sites, panoramic images shot by the Apollo astronauts and narrated tours.

I.T. AS AN ADVANTAGE

Information is so that Google found it as an opportunity. As the name suggests, It has managed to obtain its mission: to have Information be accessible and useful worldwide.

Google is an internet business and it is very evident how they use Information Technology as its advantage. Primarily, Google has the goal to have “Perfect Search Engine”. Search is how Google started its venture and is still the focus of the company today. That is why they are creating new ways to improve the search engine over the additional services they offered.

To that end, Google has determinedly pursued innovation and refused to accept the limitations of existing models. As a result, they developed their serving infrastructure and breakthrough PageRank™ technology. The innovation rewarded off in faster response times, greater scalability and lower costs.

PageRank Technology: mirrors the importance of web pages. It considers more than 500 million variables and 2 billion terms. Pages that we believe are important pages receive a higher PageRank and are more likely to appear at the top of the search results. It also considers the importance of each page that casts a vote, as votes from some pages are considered to have greater value, thus giving the linked page greater value.

Hypertext-Matching Analysis: search engine also analyzes page content.
The technology analyzes the full content of a page and factors in fonts, subdivisions and the precise location of each word. We also analyze the content of neighboring web pages to ensure the results returned are the most relevant to a user's query.

Google has viewed innovation as not limited to desktops. Thus, they develop new mobile applications and services that are more accessible and customizable.

Reference:

http://www.google.com/corporate/

USEP Life Cycle

2009-12-18T19:16:00.000-08:00

Our assignment is to consider the school and answer the question on how do we that the life cycle was developed specifically for the university and if it meets our needs.

At first, I was wondering what this particular “life cycle” really means. I was thinking of living things that is developing and maturing just for instance the metamorphosis of a butterfly. But it’s all about the university that’s why I’m trying to realize the true meaning of the phrase “life cycle of the university” if I’m not mistaken to understand the task.

When I searched in the internet about the “life cycle”, I found variations of meaning in varied fields. From biological to enterprise and from the new product development to life cycle assessment; also from Product life cycle management to project life cycle; there’s also from software life cycle to Systems Development Life Cycle so as the SOA Lifecycle.

I know, some of the terms in which the phrase “life cycle” is referred to be insignificant for this assignment but some relates to the topic especially that this topic is in the course System Analysis and Design which means it has something to do with the Systems. Be it on its planning, implementation or deployment in the organization. And the University of Southeastern Philippines is an organization or shall w say an institution whatever you call it.

So I considered Systems Development Life Cycle.

Let me discuss first about the university primarily its vision, mission, goals and objectives which are part of the university’s information system planning.

About USEP

The University of Southeastern Philippines (USEP) is a regional state university created in 1978 through Batas Pambansa Bilang 12. The university is an integration of four state institutions, particularly, the Mindanao State University-Davao, the University of the Philippines-Master of Management Program in Davao, the Davao School of Arts and Trades, and the Davao National Regional Agricultural School.

The university has four campuses, namely, Obrero (main) and Mintal Campuses in Davao City, Tagum-Mabini Campus which has two units – one in Tagum City and one in Compostela Valley Province, and Bislig Campus in Surigao del Sur.

The USEP offers graduate and undergraduate academic programs in the fields of engineering, education, arts and sciences, economics, business, computing, governance, development, resource management, technology, agriculture and forestry.

The University of Southeastern Philippines has the following mandate:

To provide programs of instruction and professional training primarily in the fields of science and technology, especially medicine, fisheries, engineering and industrial fields.
To promote advanced studies, research and extension services and progressive leadership in science, agriculture, forestry, fisheries, engineering and industrial fields and other courses needed in the socio-economic development of Mindanao.

To develop courses at the graduate level along the fields of specialization and to respond to the needs of development workers in the academic community.

To provide non-formal education and undertake vigorous extension and research programs in food production, nutrition, health and sports development.
To offer scholarship and/or part-time job opportunities to deserving students from low-income families.

Mission

USEP shall produce world-class graduates
and relevant research and extension
through quality education and sustainable resource management.

Particularly, USEP is committed to:
Provide quality education for students to grow in knowledge, promote their well-rounded development, and make them globally competitive in the world of work;
Engage in high impact research, not only for knowledge’s sake, but also for its practical benefits to society; and,
Promote entrepreneurship and industry collaboration.

Vision

A PREMIER UNIVERSITY IN THE ASEAN REGION

By becoming a premier university in the ASEAN Region, the USEP shall be a center of excellence and development, responsive and adaptive to fast-changing environments. USEP shall also be known as the leading university in the country that fosters innovation and applies knowledge to create value towards social, economic, and technological developments.

Goals

Aligned with the university 's vision and mission are specific goals for Key Result Areas (KRA) on Instruction; Research, Development, and Extension; and Resource Management:

KRA 1. Instruction

Produce globally competitive and morally upright graduates

KRA 2. Research, Development, and Extension (RDE)

Develop a strong R,D,&E culture with competent human resource and responsive and relevant researches that are adopted and utilized for development

KRA 3. Resource Management

Upon mentioning about the university, the term ISP is included. It is said that an information system (IS) within an organisation should be established on the basis of clearly defined potential benefits (Galliers & Sutherland, 1991). To achieve these, the organisation should have a strong and well-developed strategic information system plan (SISP), that consists of a strategy for both information planning and management, including the use of functions and features of information technology (IT) (Galliers, Swatman & Swatman, 1995). Users should perceive the value of the system and the information delivered (Strauss, 1992a). SISP within a tertiary educational institutions, is important for the successful use of an IS service.

The university, as far as we know it is already developing an IS in the move towards the creation of university information systems the value of a CWIS is dependent on its effective utilization, fostered by effective planning. However, it appears that strategic planning in our university has not yet been observed especially by the students and the faculties and the even the staffs.

Information Systems in Higher Education

Traditionally, information sharing among university members has relied on a range of printed materials. Computer technology created opportunities on university campuses for sharing data and information among the staff and the students, and has been deployed since the late fifties (Sullivan, 1996, p.117). University information systems range from library systems, registration systems and financial systems, to campus-housing systems and other university service systems.

Systems were often established in an uncoordinated manner, reflecting interests in different areas, and resulting in issues of redundancy and inefficiency. For example, student affairs, library, and a faculty may have the same information about a student although they use different systems to keep it (Malaney & Alvarez, 1996, p.75). Moves beyond this have resulted in “a single well-known service”, from which information can be accessed regardless of the information providers within the university (Wiggins, 1995, p.510). Such a service, an early example of which was CUINFO at Cornell University, has now been recognised as a CWIS, which is implemented as a central information service for the whole university community.

Strategic planning for information systems

Remenyi (1990) explains what makes IS "strategic" is that it directly supports and shapes the competitive strategy of an organisation. He considers that it may function as a management information system or a management support system. He argues that because SIS deals directly in the business line of the organisation by “finding, getting, and keeping clients, it is therefore a strategic resource. Orna (1990) describes strategic IS using her concept of “enterprise information policy” (EIP). She contends that as a dynamic tool, EIP can be used:

- to relate everything done with information to an enterprise’s overall objective;
- to enable effective decisions on resource allocation;
- to promote interaction, communication and mutual support between all parts of the enterprise, and between the enterprise and its ‘customers’ and ‘public’;
- to provide objective criteria for assessing results of information-based activities;
- to give feedback to the process of developing the corporate policies enterprise.

Ward, Griffiths & Whitmore (1990, p.88) see that objectives for strategic planning should be to build a robust information management framework for the long-term management of information and its supporting technologies, and to:

- identify current and future information needs for the organisation that reflect close alignment of business and IS/IT strategies, objectives and functions;
- determine policies for the management, creation, maintenance, control and accessibility of the corporate information resource;
- reposition IS/IT function more centrally in the business, with representation at top management level;
- ensure that sound IS architecture is created so that high quality systems can be built and maintained;
- identify a portfolio of skills that will be required over the lifetime of the plans;

- determine an effective and achievable organisation structure for the IS/IT function;
- ensure that the IS/IT function is outward looking and not focused internally on technology issues, and that the aims are widely communicated;
- ensure that there is an acceptance of shared responsibility between IS/IT and business people for the successful exploitation of information and IT.

SISP in higher education

Van Valey & Poole (1994) surveyed existing computing activities at Western Michigan University (WMU) in order to put forward a plan for the expansion of the computer technology to facilitate its effective use. The result of this survey indicates that information about existing computing activities, although not explicitly described as a strategic issue, is very useful for further planning and decision making processes in the university.

Tellis (1997) conducted a similar study using documentation analysis and a survey questionnaire. He investigated the managerial and economic aspects of employing information technology in Fairfield University. Like the WMU study before, which does not explicitly acknowledge strategic planning, Tellis's work indicates how a university should manage its information system with respect to IT management planning.
Luby (1996) conducted semi-structured interviews in order to investigate the process of strategic planning in the University of Paisley. The study shows that the process of strategic planning requires the university managers to recognise the complexity of a university environment and to create university staff awareness of this complexity. Accordingly, Luby recommends that all university staff should have what is called a "strategic perspective" for basic action in the planning process. With this perspective, each staff member should have a personal development plan relevant to the university strategic plan.

Project management

I also mentioned on Project management.

So what is it? It is the discipline of planning, organizing, and managing resources to bring about the successful completion of specific project goals and objectives. It is often closely related to and sometimes conflated with program management.

The primary challenge of project management is to achieve all of the project goalsand objectives while honoring the preconceived project constraints. Typical constraints are scope, time, and budget. The secondary—and more ambitious—challenge is to optimize the allocation and integration of inputs necessary to meet pre-defined objectives.

Regardless of the methodology employed, careful consideration must be given to the overall project objectives, timeline, and cost, as well as the roles and responsibilities of all participants and stakeholders.

A traditional phased approach identifies a sequence of steps to be completed. In the "traditional approach", we can distinguish 5 components of a project (4 stages plus control) in the development of a project:

• Typical development phases of a project
• Project initiation stage;
• Project planning or design stage;
• Project execution or production stage;
• Project monitoring and controlling systems;
• Project completion stage.

Regardless of the methodology employed, careful consideration must be given to the overall project objectives, timeline, and cost, as well as the roles and responsibilities of all participants and stakeholders.

A traditional phased approach identifies a sequence of steps to be completed. In the "traditional approach", we can distinguish 5 components of a project (4 stages plus control) in the development of a project:

Typical development phases of a project

• Project initiation stage;
• Project planning or design stage;
• Project execution or production stage;
• Project monitoring and controlling systems;
• Project completion stage.

Part of the ISP is the Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC), or Software Development Life Cycle in systems engineering and software engineering, is the process of creating or altering systems, and the models and methodologies that people use to develop these systems. The concept generally refers to computer or information systems.

In software engineering the SDLC concept underpins many kinds of software development methodologies. These methodologies form the framework for planning and controlling the creation of an information system or the software development process.

A Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC) is any logical process used by a systems analyst to develop an information system, including requirements, validation, training, and user (stakeholder) ownership. Any SDLC should result in a high quality system that meets or exceeds customer expectations, reaches completion within time and cost estimates, works effectively and efficiently in the current and planned Information Technology infrastructure, and is inexpensive to maintain and cost-effective to enhance.

Computer systems have become more complex and often (especially with the advent of Service-Oriented Architecture) link multiple traditional systems potentially supplied by different software vendors. To manage this level of complexity, a number of systems development life cycle (SDLC) models have been created: "waterfall"; "fountain"; "spiral"; "build and fix"; "rapid prototyping"; "incremental"; and "synchronize and stabilize".[citation needed]

SDLC models can be described along a spectrum of agile to iterative to sequential. Agile methodologies, such as XP and Scrum, focus on light-weight processes which allow for rapid changes along the development cycle. Iterative methodologies, such as Rational Unified Process and Dynamic Systems Development Method, focus on limited project scopes and expanding or improving products by multiple iterations. Sequential or big-design-upfront (BDUF) models, such as Waterfall, focus on complete and correct planning to guide large projects and risks to successful and predictable results.

In project management a project can be defined both with a project life cycle (PLC) and an SDLC, during which slightly different activities occur. According to Taylor (2004) "the project life cycle encompasses all the activities of the project, while the systems development life cycle focuses on realizing the product requirements".

University context and IS

(How do we know that the life cycle was developed specifically for the university?)

There was significant correlation between perception of effectiveness of information providers and perceived functioning of the IS.

How the IS would strategically be planned, and staff awareness of the importance of an IS, would influence the functioning or the performance of the IS.

Although appropriate organizational culture was regarded as necessary for development of IS, strong support was given to the following factors of influence: institutional guidelines and priorities; clear objectives for the campus IS; infrastructure; staff demands; budget planning and control; feasible and appropriate resources; management support and consistency; academic staff awareness.

There was also support for the need for strategic planning, the improvement of staff’s skills, and for an information policy with respect to the development of IS.

(How do we know that the life cycle meets our needs?)

For me, the life cycle of the university certainly meets our needs but it is also a reality that it is not yet properly implemented. I really know when that time will come that the ISP will be visible in the university. And when that is time the student come to realize the essence of the existing life cycle of the university so that, it not just documentation but a realization. ISP is a great help to achieve our visions and recognize our goals and objectives. What we really need is to work by hand not just on tongue.

References:

http://www.usep.edu.ph
http://eprints.qut.edu.au/96/1/Middleton_CWIS_99_eprint.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_life_cycle#Project_development_stages
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_Development_Life_Cycle

System Analyst as Project Manager

2009-12-18T16:18:00.000-08:00

Our task in this particular assignment is to discuss the role of a systems analyst as a project manager. Regarding this, we have to interview an analyst or project manager. The person in the company that we had visited was an MIS Department head and at the same times a system analyst.

On December 7, 2009, after the letter was approved by the respective university personnel, we immediately visited the AMS Group of Companies located at F Torres , Davao City and we interviewed Mr. Gemrald Calibara about our topic in the group representation in SAD1. It is about systems analyst as a project manager. Aside from that, he has also touched the some discussions in which some of our assignments are answered prior to its post. That’s why, we are able to answer our assignments and tackle about our discussion. That made me think that we are lucky and should I say grateful enough to have this coincidences or whatever you call it.

Concerning the topic, he discussed a lot of things. From identifying the problems found in their organization such as the lack of programmers, time pressures and constraints to the sharing of the type of model they are implementing during the software development cycle which is the rapid Model. He also stated that the budgetary requirement for the project management is very minimal because they normally don’t outsource the systems. The tasked teams are the ones who create the systems in their organization. Whenever they have to outsource some systems, they are to customize it to meet the specifications needed by the organization itself.

Although he tackled a lot, it is not enough that enough to answer this assessment and discuss or topic in the class without searching other references. And the internet is available.

From our topic discussion I found one of relevant objectives which is explain the elements of project management and the responsibilities of a project manager. So, let me discuss the role of the systems analyst as a project manager.

The Reasons to Initiate IS Project are: The new information system is part of an overall strategic plan and the new information system is to respond an immediate business need.

What Is a Project? It is a planned undertaking with a beginning and an end that produce predetermined result and is usually constrained by a schedule and resource.

What is Project Management? It is the act of organizing and directing people to achieve a planned result within budget and on schedule. Success or failure of project depends on skills of the project manager. The responsibilities of project manager are both internal and external.

Internal Responsibilities of the Project Manager include: Identify project tasks and build a work breakdown structure; develop the project schedule; recruit and train team members; assign team members to tasks; coordinate activities of team members and subteams; assess project risks; monitor and control project deliverables and milestones and verify the quality of project deliverables.

External Responsibilities of the Project Manager include: Report the project’s status and progress; establish good working relationships with those who identify the needed system requirements; the people who will use the system; work directly with the client (the project’s sponsor) and other stakeholders and identify resource needs and obtain resources.

• Project Management Tasks are:
• Beginning of project
o Overall project planning
• During project
o Project execution management
o Project control management
o Project closeout
• Project management approach differs for
o Predictive SDLC
o Adaptive SDLC

In one of my researches, I found an interesting summary of the role of Systems analyst as a project manager and here it is:

The Project Manager / Business System Analyst will be responsible for the project planning, execution, and implementation of technology-enabled solutions to an internal business unit which provides revenue generating services for the district. Through a highly successful ASP model, the internal business unit has expanded its services to school districts throughout the State of Texas. In addition to the project management responsibilities, this position requires demonstrated abilities to partner, collaborate and manage the relationship of a customer –focused and excellence driven team. The right candidate will have extensive organizational, strong leadership and relationship management skills in a multifaceted matrix organization.

As the Project Manager / Business System Analyst you will be a full partner with the business unit in setting the strategic vision for future growth and expansion. This position requires a level of understanding where system enhancements, process design trade-offs and plan prioritization are discussed in business language, which in turn will lead to better decisions. Previous experience in business process re-engineering of process improvement; utilizing project best practice techniques and tools to effect business change is desirable. HISD is broadly recognized for its innovative approach to educating children through leading initiatives such as the respected Teacher “Pay for Performance” Program (ASPIRE) Through programs such as this one, HISD has been able to increase its number of recognized and exemplary schools from 8 to 200 in four years.

And the required Key Skills and Experience include;

• At least 5 years of direct experience leading teams in a matrix organization, with responsibility for customer driven-products, software and fee-for-service solutions on a regional basis.
• Manages all activities related to line-of business software upgrades, new releases, and emergency fixes from conception through post implementation. Projects often involve managing both internal and external network server configurations and testing. Ensures that projects meet budget, timing, client expectations and organizational standards.
• Coordinates work performed by IT staff and line-of-business customer by defining project requirements, performance feasibility and needs/impact assessments. Acts as a senior technical advisor to others to meet schedules and/or resolve technical problems.
• Interprets line-of-business strategies and services, resolves conflicts, and influences outcomes on matters of significance for the division, conducts negotiations and coordinates approvals/decision.
• Works with line-of-business customers to develop business requirements; including analysis of the competitive situation, understanding business practices and approaches and recommending business process changes.
• Develops detailed project plans and manages all implementation processes including resource allocation, progress tracking, monitoring change control processes, testing, documenting training and on-time, on-budget and on-scope delivery.
• Regularly provides project management or team leadership to a group of Software Developers, but does not have formal supervisory responsibility. Leading and directing typically involves monitoring work and providing guidance on escalated issues.
• Will be experienced in working to complete activities in process engineering, information engineering, use case modeling, facilitation, and organizational change management.
• Analyzes the most complex business problems in the areas of identifying, evaluating and developing processes, procedures, policies, training, functional testing, data quality and workflows that are cost effective and meet business requirements.

References:
www.itk.ilstu.edu/.../Chapter%203%20-%20Analyst%20as%20a%20Project%20Manager.ppt
http://hotjobs.yahoo.com/job-JYL72A75BRO

USEP: Information Systems Plan

2009-12-15T14:07:00.001-08:00

Our fourth assignment in MIS 2 was about visualizing ourselves being invited by the university (University of Southeastern Philippines) to prepare an Information systems plan for the university, and then discussing the steps in order to expedite the implementation of the ISP.

Since the university is also an organization and is in the trend in Information Technology, Though, seldom noticed because of its lack of implementation not realizing the dreams, vision, mission, goals, It is also practicing to have an Information systems Plan the same approach with the other organizations.

Although the university is visualizing for an unreachable dream through its strategic Information System’s planning, it can be thought that its actual implementation is yet too far from the truth.

As a result, students, faculties, staffs and other residents and the university itself seem not to recognize the existing ISP and the plans to improve it.

IN this particular assignment, I was assumed or presumed to be an IT expert or even a Systems Analyst who was hired by the university to prepare an ISP.

It is not necessarily for me to create a new ISP, what are the things I must do is to study and understand the real scenario of the university, And then, study the existing ISP. And decide to create modifications, changes, improvement and possibly integration with the current ISP that was not yet realized.

Also, I have to consider the various specifications and constraints. Considering that it is a state university which is subsidized by the government, so budget allotted for ISP must be optimized.

In the article Information Systems Plan: The Bet-Your-Business Project by by Michael M. Gorman, the rationale for an Information plan is stated.

Every year, $300-700 million dollar corporations spend about 5% of their gross income on information systems and their supports. That's from about $15,000,000 to $35,000,000! A significant part of those funds support enterprise databases, a philosophy of database system applications that enable corporations to research the past, control the present, and plan for the future.

Even though an information system costs from $1,000,000 to $10,000,000, and even through most chief information officers (CIOs) can specify exactly how much money is being spent for hardware, software, and staff, CIOs cannot however state with any degree of certainty why one system is being done this year versus next, why it is being done ahead of another, or finally, why it is being done at all.

Many enterprises do not have model-based information systems development environments that allow system designers to see the benefits of rearranging an information systems development schedule. Consequently, the questions that cannot be answered include: What effect will there be on the overall schedule if an information system is purchased versus developed?

At what point does it pay to hire an abnormal quantity of contract staff to advance a schedule?

What is the long term benefit from 4GL versus 3GL?

Is it better to generate 3GL than to generate/use a 4GL?

What are the real costs of distributed software development over centralized development?

If these questions were transformed and applied to any other component of a business (e.g., accounting, manufacturing, distribution and marketing), and remained unanswered, that unit's manager would surely be fired!

We not only need answers to these questions NOW!, we also need them quickly, cost effectively, and in a form that they can be modeled and changed in response to unfolding realities. This paper provides a brief review of a successful 10-step strategy that answers these questions.

Too many half-billion dollar organizations have only a vague notion of the names and interactions of the existing and under development information systems. Whenever they need to know, a meeting is held among the critical few, an inventory is taken, interactions confirmed, and accomplishment schedules are updated.

This ad hoc information systems plan was possible only because all design and development was centralized, the only computer was a main-frame, and the past was acceptable prologue because budgets were ever increasing, schedules always slipping, and information was not yet part of the corporation's critical edge.

Well, today is different, really different! Budgets are decreasing, and slipped schedules are being cited as preventing business alternatives. Confounding the computing environment are different operating systems, DBMSs, development tools, telecommunications (LAN, WAN, Intra-, Inter-, and Extra-net), and distributed hard- and software.

Rather than having centralized, long-range planning and management activities that address these problems, today's business units are using readily available tools to design and build ad hoc stop-gap solutions. These ad hoc systems not only do not interconnect, support common semantics, or provide synchronized views of critical corporate policy, they are soon to form the almost impossible to comprehend confusion of systems and data from which systems order and semantic harmony must spring.

Not only has the computing landscape become profoundly different and more difficult to comprehend, the need for just the right--and correct--information at just the right time is escalating. Late or wrong information is worse than no information.

Information systems managers need a model of their information systems environment. A model that is malleable. As new requirements are discovered, budgets modified, new hardware/software introduced, this model must be such that it can reconstitute the information systems plan in a timely and efficient manner.

Characteristics of a Quality ISP

A quality ISP must exhibit five distinct characteristics before it is useful. These five are presented in the table that follows.

Characteristic

Description

Timely The ISP must be timely. An ISP that is created long after it is needed is useless. In almost all cases, it makes no sense to take longer to plan work than to perform the work planned.

Useable The ISP must be useable. It must be so for all the projects as well as for each project. The ISP should exist in sections that once adopted can be parceled out to project managers and immediately started.

Maintainable The ISP must be maintainable. New business opportunities, new computers, business mergers, etc. all affect the ISP. The ISP must support quick changes to the estimates, technologies employed, and possibly even to the fundamental project sequences. Once these changes are accomplished, the new ISP should be just a few computer program executions away.

Quality While the ISP must be a quality product, no ISP is ever perfect on the first try. As the ISP is executed, the metrics employed to derive the individual project estimates become refined as a consequence of new hardware technologies, code generators, techniques, or faster working staff. As these changes occur, their effects should be installable into the data that supports ISP computation. In short, the ISP is a living document. It should be updated with every technology event, and certainly no less often than quarterly.

Reproducible The ISP must be reproducible. That is, when its development activities are performed by any other staff, the ISP produced should essentially be the same. The ISP should not significantly vary by staff assigned.

Whenever a proposal for the development of an ISP is created it must be assessed against these five characteristics. If any fail or not addressed in an optimum way, the entire set of funds for the development of an ISP is risked.

ISP Within the Context of the Meta data Environment

The information systems plan is the plan by which databases and information systems of the enterprise are accomplished in a timely manner. A key facility through which the ISP obtains its Adata@ is the meta data repository. The domain of the meta data repository is set forth in Figure 1, and, as seen through Figure 1, persons through their role within an organization perform functions in the accomplishment of enterprise missions, they have information needs. These information needs reflect the state of certain enterprise resources such as finance, people, and products that are known to the enterprises. The states are created through business information systems and databases.

The majority of the meta data employed to develop the ISP resides in the meta entities supporting the enterprise=s resource life cycles (see TDAN issue #7, December 1998, Resource Life Cycle Analysis), the databases and information systems, and project management. All these meta entities are depicted within the meta data repository meta model in Figure 2.

The ISP Steps

The information systems plan project determines the sequence for implementing specific information systems. The goal of the strategy is to deliver the most valuable business information at the earliest time possible in the most cost-effective manner.

The end product of the information systems project is an information systems plan (ISP). Once deployed, the information systems department can implement the plan with confidence that they are doing the correct information systems project at the right time and in the right sequence. The focus of the ISP is not one information system but the entire suite of information systems for the enterprise. Once developed, each identified information system is seen in context with all other information systems within the enterprise.

Information Systems Plan Development Steps

Step

Name

Description

1. Create the mission model The mission model, generally shorter than 30 pages presents end-result characterizations of the essential raison d=etre of the enterprise. Missions are strategic, long range, and a-political because they are stripped of the Awho@ and the Ahow.@
2. Develop a high-level data model The high-level data model is an Entity Relationship diagram created to meet the data needs of the mission descriptions. No attributes or keys are created.
3. Create the resource life cycles (RLC) and their nodes Resources are drawn from both the mission descriptions and the high level data model. Resources and their life cycles are the names, descriptions and life cycles of the critical assets of the enterprise, which, when exercised achieve one or more aspect of the missions. Each enterprise resource Alives@ through its resource life cycle.
4. Allocate precedence vectors among RLC nodes Tied together into a enablement network, the resulting resource life cycle network forms a framework of enterprise=s assets that represent an order and set of inter-resource relationships. The enterprise Alives@ through its resource life cycle network.
5. Allocate existing information systems and databases to the RLC nodes The resource life cycle network presents a Alattice-work@onto which the Aas is@ business information systems and databases can be Aattached.@ See for example, the meta model in Figure 2. The Ato-be@ databases and information systems are similarly attached. ADifference projects@ between the Aas-is@ and the Ato-be@ are then formulated. Achievement of all the difference projects is the achievement of the Information Systems Plan.
6. Allocate standard work break down structures (WBS) to each RLC node Detailed planning of the Adifference projects@ entails allocating the appropriate canned work breakdown structures and metrics. Employing WBS and metrics from a comprehensive methodology supports project management standardization, repeatability, and self-learning.
7. Load resources into each WBS node Once the resources are determined, these are loaded into the project management meta entities of the meta data repository, that is, metrics, project, work plan and deliverables. The meta entities are those inferred by Figure 2.
8. Schedule the RLC nodes through a project management package facilities. The entire suite of projects is then scheduled on an enterprise-wide basis. The PERT chart used by project management is the APERT@ chart represented by the Resource Life Cycle enablement network.
9. Produce and review of the ISP The scheduled result is predicable: Too long, too costly, and too ambitious. At that point, the real work starts: paring down the suite of projects to a realistic set within time and budget. Because of the meta data environment (see Figure 1), the integrated project management meta data (see Figure 2), and because all projects are configured against fundamental business-rationale based designs, the results of the inevitable trade-offs can be set against business basics. Although the process is painful, the results can be justified and rationalized.
10. Execute and adjust the ISP through time. As the ISP is set into execution, technology changes occur that affect resource loadings. In this case, only steps 6-9 need to be repeated. As work progresses, the underlying meta data built or used in steps 1-5 will also change. Because a quality ISP is Aautomated@ the recasting of the ISP should only take a week or less.

Collectively, the first nine steps take about 5000 staff hours, or about $500,000. Compared to an IS budget $15-35 million, that's only about 3.0% to 1.0%.

If the pundits are to be believed, that is, that the right information at the right time is the competitive edge, then paying for an information systems plan that is accurate, repeatable, and reliable is a small price indeed.

Executive and Adjusting the ISP Through Time

IT projects are accomplished within distinct development environments. The two most common are: discrete project and release. The discrete project environment is typified by completely encapsulated projects accomplished through a water-fall methodology.

In release environments, there are a number of different projects underway by different organizations and staff of varying skill levels. Once a large number of projects are underway, the ability of the enterprise to know about and manage all the different projects degrades rapidly. That is because the project management environment has been transformed from discrete encapsulated projects into a continuous flow process of product or functionality improvements that are released on a set time schedule. Figure 3 illustrates the continuous flow process environment that supports releases. The continuous flow process environment is characterized by: Multiple, concurrent, but differently scheduled projects against the same enterprise resource

Single projects that affect multiple enterprise resources

Projects that develop completely new capabilities, or changes to existing capabilities within enterprise resources

It is precisely because enterprises have transformed themselves from a project to a release environment that information systems plans that can be created, evolved, and maintained on an enterprise-wide basis are essential.

There are four major sets of activities within the continuous flow process environment. The user/client is represented at the top in the small rectangular box. Each of the ellipses represents an activity targeted to a specific need. The four basic needs are:

Need Identification

Need Assessment

Design

Deployment

The box in the center is the meta data repository. Specification and impact analysis is represented through the left two processes. Implementation design and accomplishment is represented by the right two processes. Two key characteristics should be immediately apparent. First, unlike the water-fall approach, the activities do not flow one to the other. They are disjoint. In fact, they may be done by different teams, on different time schedules, and involve different quantities of products under management. In short, these four activities are independent one from the other. Their only interdependence is through the meta data repository.

The second characteristic flows from the first. Because these four activities are independent one from the other, the enterprise evolves by means of releases rather than through whole systems. If it evolved through whole systems, then the four activities would be connected either in a waterfall or a spiral approach, and the enterprise would be evolving through major upgrades to encapsulated functionality within specific business resources. In contrast, the release approach causes coordinated sets of changes to multiple business resources to be placed into production. This causes simultaneous, enterprise-wide capability upgrades across multiple business resources.

Through this continuous-flow process, several unique features are present:

All four processes are concurrently executing.

Changes to enterprise resources occur in unison, periodically, and in a very controlled manner.

The meta data repository is always contains all the enterprise resource specifications: current or planned. Simply put, if an enterprise resource semantic is not within the meta data repository, it is not enterprise policy.

All changes are planned, scheduled, measured, and subject to auditing, accounting, and traceability.

All documentation of all types is generated from the meta data repository.

ISP Summary

In summary, any technique employed to achieve an ISP must be accomplishable with less than 3% of the IT budget. Additionally, it must be timely, useable, maintainable, able to be iterated into a quality product, and reproducible. IT organizations, once they have completed their initial set of databases and business information systems will find themselves transformed from a project to a release environment.

The continuous flow environment then becomes the only viable alternative for moving the enterprise forward. It is precisely because of the release environment that enterprise-wide information systems plans that can be created, evolved, and maintained are essential.

Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP) - An IS Strategy for ERP Implementation

Written by:

Cecil Bozarth, SCRC

The following is based on Dr. Bozarth’s research on “ERP Implementation Efforts at Three Firms: Applying lessons from the SISP and IT-enabled change literature” which is scheduled to appear in the International Journal of Operations and Production Management.

Strategic information systems planning, or SISP, is based on two core arguments. The first is that, at a minimum, a firm’s information systems investments should be aligned with the overall business strategy, and in some cases may even become an emerging source of competitive advantage. While no one disagrees with this, operations management researchers are just starting to study how this alignment takes place and what the measurable benefits are. An issue under examination is how a manufacturer’s business strategy, characterized as either “market focused” or “operations focused,” affects its ability to garner efficiency versus customer service benefits from its ERP investments.

The second core argument behind SISP is that companies can best achieve IS-based alignment or competitive advantage by following a proactive, formal and comprehensive process that includes the development of broad organizational information requirements. This is in contrast to a “reactive” strategy, in which the IS group sits back and responds to other areas of the business only when a need arises. Such a process is especially relevant to ERP investments, given their costs and long-term impact. Seegars, Grover and Teng (1) have identified six dimensions that define an excellent SISP process (notice that many of these would apply to the strategic planning process in other areas as well):

1. Comprehensiveness

Comprehensiveness is “the extent to which an organization attempts to be exhaustive or inclusive in making and integrating strategic decisions”.

2. Formalization

Formalization is “the existence of structures, techniques, written procedures, and policies that guide the planning process”.

3. Focus

Focus is “the balance between creativity and control orientations inherent within the strategic planning system”. An innovative orientation emphasizes innovative solutions to deal with opportunities and threats. An integrative orientation emphasizes control, as implemented through budgets, resource allocation, and asset management.

4. Top-down flow

SISP should be initiated by top managers, with the aid of support staff.

5. Broad participation

Even though the planning flow is top-down, participation must involve multiple functional areas and, as necessary, key stakeholders at lower levels of the organization.

6. High consistency

SISP should be characterized by frequent meetings and reassessments of the overall strategy.

The recommendations found in the SISP literature have been echoed in the operations management literature. It has been suggested that firms should institutionalize a formal top-down planning process for linking information systems strategy to business needs as they move toward evolution in their management orientation, planning, organization, and control aspects of the IT function.
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Six Steps to Implementation

Many organizations have invested a great deal of effort in educating and informing consumers about health care quality. The most ambitious of these sponsors have embarked on multi-year projects to measure quality of care at various level of the health care system and report their findings to the public. Others with more limited resources and expertise may adapt publicly available materials to their own needs or recommend alternative sources of information for their audiences.

Although no two projects are exactly alike, successful sponsors generally follow the following six steps. Understanding what is involved in implementing a quality measurement and reporting project from start to finish is especially important for those sponsors that do it all themselves. But even sponsors that borrow as much as they can from others need to be aware of these steps so that they can make a conscious choice to skip those that do not apply.
Step 1. Getting Started
The first step in a consumer information project is to lay the foundation for the project—financially, politically, and organizationally. While this may sound obvious, many projects fail because sponsors do not take the time to prepare. They dive right into the process of collecting and reporting data, only to be taken by surprise when someone objects to the project or the money runs out.
On the other hand, some projects never even get off the ground because the sponsors can't move beyond the planning process. The key to moving beyond the organizational stage is to develop and stick to a schedule that will force decisions and push the participants forward in the process.
Step 2. Collecting and Analyzing Data
During the planning stage (Step 1), sponsors choose what types of quality measures to share with the audience.
For many sponsors, the next step in a consumer information project is to gather that data and conduct the appropriate analyses so that these measures have meaning for consumers.
Step 3. Presenting the Information
Presentation—or how you say what you have to say—plays a critical part in ensuring that your efforts to convey quality information are successful. One of the most challenging aspects of a performance measurement project is figuring out how to present the data in a way that helps consumers interpret the information and apply it to their health care-related decisions. Many sponsors have struggled with this question, only to find themselves making the same mistakes as others before them. One of the key objectives of this site is to support project sponsors in learning from the experiences of their peers as well as from the findings of researchers regarding the best ways to discuss, format, and display information on quality.
Five Key Points About Presentation

Here are the five most important things to remember about presenting information on health care quality:

1. There is no one way to do this—but there are better ways and worse ways.

At this time, there is no universally accepted approach to providing information on quality to consumers. The marketplace is full of experiments, most of which have not been evaluated. But we do know that some approaches to presenting quality information work better than others in the sense that consumers find it easier to understand the data and evaluate their options.

2. The answer that's best for you depends on who your audience is and how they'll use the information.

The way you present information—and even the information itself—should be driven by the needs of whoever is supposed to be reading it. Consumers are the focus of this Web site, but they are not the only audience for health care quality information. Sponsors can develop information for:
Public or private purchasers.
Non-purchasing intermediary organizations, such as consumer advocacy groups.
Policymakers.
Provider organizations.
Individual providers.
Health plans.

Each of these audiences has different needs for quality information. As a result, an approach that is appropriate for individual consumers may not be at all useful for a different audience.

For example:
Plans and providers may want more detail in order to identify specific opportunities to improve quality.
Policymakers, on the other hand, may want a higher level of aggregation that would reveal larger trends in the marketplace.
Intermediary organizations and purchasers may want enough data to draw their own conclusions rather than having the information interpreted for them.

3. Data cannot be presented in a vacuum.

The context you provide (or fail to provide) for the information affects what your audience pays attention to and how they interpret it. In particular, consumers are more likely to care about the information if you can connect it to their concerns about health care and the health care system. For instance, data on ease of referrals has greater relevance to an audience that understands how a health plan may limit their access to specialists. This implies that it is not enough to provide data; a quality report must include some explanation of how the health care system works and what the data reveal about a health care organization.

4. For the typical consumer, a quality measure has no meaning on its own.

It is the sponsor's job to turn quality measures into information that consumers can easily comprehend, evaluate, and use. You can do this by doing one or more of the following:
Grouping measures into consumer-friendly categories.
Offering a basis for comparison, such as an average or benchmark for the market.
Interpreting the information for your audience by making it clear which results are truly better than others.

For explanations and examples of each of these tasks, go to How To Say It.

5. The medium shapes the message.

Whether you rely on printed reports, Web sites, or live presentations, the medium you choose to deliver the information can determine how much you present and how you display it. For instance, you can offer many more layers of detail on the Web than you can in print without overwhelming your audience. A printed report, on the other hand, offers the ability to create large displays of information across multiple pages. This suggests that you will need to have some sense of what the final product will be before you can decide on a design and format for quality information.
Making Sure Your Materials Work for Your Audience

No matter how limited your resources may be, do what you can to test the materials as you develop them to make sure they are suitable for your audience. This approach allows you to identify and remedy trouble spots along the way rather than waiting until the information has been disseminated to discover any problems. Specifically, sponsors can conduct ongoing testing to assess:
Whether consumers can read the information easily.
Whether they can understand it.
Whether the content is appropriate for your audience.
Whether people are interested in your content (i.e., its salience).
Whether consumers can use your materials for the purpose for which they are intended.
Whether they can navigate through the materials to find the information they want.

Techniques for this kind of iterative testing include one-on-one interviews as well as focus groups.

For specifics on testing your materials, conducting interviews, and focus groups, go to Refining What You Do.

Step 4. Disseminating Information
Long before you have the information to distribute, you need to be thinking about how and when to get it into the hands of consumers. Sponsors should ask themselves:
What can we do to ensure that our audience is aware of our information and motivated to use it?
When is the best time to make the information available? Is this timing realistic?
What channels can we use to distribute the information to our audience? How can we make sure they see it?
How should we package the information? Should it stand alone or be incorporated into other information?
The answers to these questions will affect how much time you have to produce the report as well as the kinds of measures and depth of content that you can include. For example:
If the goal is to release a performance report in early fall so that consumers have it in time for the open enrollment season, you may not have enough time to conduct your own survey of enrollees but you could ask your plans to share the HEDIS® scores—which include results of the CAHPS® survey—that they have to report to NCQA by early summer.
If the most sensible way to package the performance information is to integrate it into open enrollment materials, you will have to deal with space constraints that would not be necessary in a stand-alone document. This may affect the way you present the data or how much data you can include.

Step 5. Supporting Consumers
For many sponsors of consumer information projects, the job ends once the reports have been distributed. But both experienced sponsors and researchers testing consumer behavior have demonstrated that it is not enough to give consumers data. They need help in interpreting the information on quality, integrating it with other relevant data (such as costs), and using it to make decisions. Without this help, many simply ignore the information they have, or worse, use it inappropriately.
Strategies for providing "decision support" include the following:
Refer consumers to consumer advocates and other "information intermediaries" who can help your audience understand and use the information you provide..
Offer consumers a worksheet that guides them through the process of evaluating their options. Design computer-based systems that facilitate decisionmaking by allowing the user to weight different factors or by ranking the available choices based on the user's response to a set of questions.
To determine which strategy will work best for your audience, you may want to consult with representative consumers and/or appropriate intermediaries. Also, be sure to evaluate your support strategy once it is implemented to find out how well it is serving the needs of your audience and how you can improve it.

Step 6. Evaluating the Project
Finally, the last step for sponsors is to evaluate the extent to which the project achieved its objectives. This could be as simple as asking whether consumers are aware of the information you produced or as complicated as finding out whether and how consumers used the information to help make decisions.
Evaluations are important for internal purposes because they enable you to determine how effective your project is and how it can be improved. But they are equally critical for external reasons. First, being able to demonstrate that the project has had a positive impact will help you secure political support and continued funding. In addition, an evaluation allows other sponsors to learn from your experience.
The following methods are commonly used to evaluate projects:Focus groups.Surveys.Usability testing.Analysis of changes in enrollment patterns.

References:
http://www.tdan.com/view-articles/5262
http://scm.ncsu.edu/public/facts/facs060329.html
http://www.talkingquality.gov/docs/section1/1_2.htm

Critical Success Factors

2009-12-15T13:13:00.000-08:00

Critical Success Factors

Identifying the things that really matter for success
So many important matters can compete for your attention in business that it's often difficult to see the "wood for the trees". What's more, it can be extremely difficult to get everyone in the team pulling in the same direction and focusing on the true essentials.

Most smaller and more pragmatic businesses can still use CSF’s but we need to take a different, more pragmatic approach. Critical Success Factors have been used significantly to present or identify a few key factors that organizations should focus on to be successful. As a definition, critical success factors refer to "the limited number of areas in which satisfactory results will ensure successful competitive performance for the individual, department, or organization”.

That's where Critical Success Factors (CSFs) can help. CSFs are the essential areas of activity that must be performed well if you are to achieve the mission, objectives or goals for your business or project. By identifying your Critical Success Factors, you can create a common point of reference to help you direct and measure the success of your business or project.

As a common point of reference, CSFs help everyone in the team to know exactly what's most important. And this helps people perform their own work in the right context and so pull together towards the same overall aims. The idea of CSFs was first presented by D. Ronald Daniel in the 1960s. It was then built on and popularized a decade later by John F. Rockart, of MIT's Sloan School of Management, and has since been used extensively to help businesses implement their strategies and projects. Inevitably, the CSF concept has evolved, and you may have seen it implemented in different ways. This article provides a simple definition and approach based on Rockart's original ideas.
Rockart defined CSFs as:
"The limited number of areas in which results, if they are satisfactory, will ensure successful competitive performance for the organization. They are the few key areas where things must go right for the business to flourish. If results in these areas are not adequate, the organization's efforts for the period will be less than desired."

He also concluded that CSFs are "areas of activity that should receive constant and careful attention from management."

Critical Success Factors are strongly related to the mission and strategic goals of your business or project. Whereas the mission and goals focus on the aims and what is to be achieved, Critical Success Factors focus on the most important areas and get to the very heart of both what is to be achieved and how you will achieve it.
Types of Critical Success Factor

There are four basic types of CSF's

They are:
Industry CSF's resulting from specific industry characteristics;
Strategy CSF's resulting from the chosen competitive strategy of the business;
Environmental CSF's resulting from economic or technological changes; and
Temporal CSF's resulting from internal organizational needs and changes.

Things that are measured get done more often than things that are not measured.

Each CSF should be measurable and associated with a target goal. You don't need exact measures to manage. Primary measures that should be listed include critical success levels (such as number of transactions per month) or, in cases where specific measurements are more difficult, general goals should be specified (such as moving up in an industry customer service survey).
Using the Tool: An Example

CSFs are best understood by example. Consider a produce store "Farm Fresh Produce", whose mission is:

"To become the number one produce store in Main Street by selling the highest quality, freshest farm produce, from farm to customer in under 24 hours on 75% of our range and with 98% customer satisfaction."

(For more on this example, and how to develop your mission statement, see our article on Vision Statements and Mission Statements.)

The strategic objectives of Farm Fresh are to:
Gain market share locally of 25%.
Achieve fresh supplies of "farm to customer" in 24 hours for 75% of products.
Sustain a customer satisfaction rate of 98%.
Expand product range to attract more customers.
Have sufficient store space to accommodate the range of products that customers want.

In order to identify possible CSFs, we must examine the mission and objectives and see which areas of the business need attention so that they can be achieved. We can start by brainstorming what the Critical Success Factors might be (these are the "Candidate" CSFs.)Objective Candidate Critical Success Factors
Gain market share locally of 25%
Increase competitiveness versus other local stores
Attract new customers
Achieve fresh supplies from "farm to customer" in 24 hours for 75% of products
Sustain successful relationships with local suppliers
Sustain a customer satisfaction rate of 98%
Retain staff and keep up customer-focused training
Expand product range to attract more customers
Source new products locally
Extend store space to accommodate new products and customers
Secure financing for expansion
Manage building work and any disruption to the business

Once you have a list of Candidate CSFs, it's time to consider what is absolutely essential and so identify the truly Critical Success Factors.

And this is certainly the case for Farm Fresh Produce. One CSF that we identify from the candidate list is "Sustain successful relationships with local suppliers." This is absolutely essential to ensure freshness and to source new products.

Another CSF is to attract new customers. Without new customers, the store will be unable to expand to increase market share.

A third CSF is financing for expansion. The store's objectives cannot be met without the funds to invest in expanding the store space.
Five key sources of Critical Success Factors

MAIN ASPECTS OF Critical Success Factors and their use in analysis

CSF's are tailored to a firm's or manager's particular situation as different situations (e.g. industry, division, individual) lead to different critical success factors. Rockart and Bullen presented five key sources of CSF's:
The industry,
Competitive strategy and industry position,
Environmental factors,
Temporal factors, and
Managerial position (if considered from an individual's point of view). Each of these factors is explained in greater detail below.

Using the Tool: Summary Steps

In reality, identifying your CSFs is a very iterative process. Your mission, strategic goals and CSFs are intrinsically linked and each will be refined as you develop them.

Here are the summary steps that, used iteratively, will help you identify the CSFs for your business or project:

Step One: Establish your business's or project's mission and strategic goals (click here for help doing this.)

Step Two: For each strategic goal, ask yourself "what area of business or project activity is essential to achieve this goal?" The answers to the question are your candidate CSFs.
To make sure you consider all types of possible CSFs, you can use Rockart's CSF types as a checklist.
Industry - these factors result from specific industry characteristics. These are the things that the organization must do to remain competitive.
Environmental - these factors result from macro-environmental influences on an organization. Things like the business climate, the economy, competitors, and technological advancements are included in this category.
Strategic - these factors result from the specific competitive strategy chosen by the organization. The way in which the company chooses to position themselves, market themselves, whether they are high volume low cost or low volume high cost producers, etc.
Temporal - these factors result from the organization's internal forces. Specific barriers, challenges, directions, and influences will determine these CSFs.

Step Three: Evaluate the list of candidate CSFs to find the absolute essential elements for achieving success - these are your Criticial Success Factors.

As you identify and evaluate candidate CSFs, you may uncover some new strategic objectives or more detailed objectives. So you may need to define your mission, objectives and CSFs iteratively.

Step Four: Identify how you will monitor and measure each of the CSFs.

Step Five:
Communicate your CSFs along with the other important elements of your business or project's strategy.

Step Six: Keep monitoring and reevaluating your CSFs to ensure you keep moving towards your aims. Indeed, whilst CSFs are sometimes less tangible than measurable goals, it is useful to identify as specifically as possible how you can measure or monitor each one.
Key Points

Critical Success Factors are the areas of your business or project that are absolutely essential to its success. By identifying and communicating these CSFs, you can help ensure your business or project is well-focused and avoid wasting effort and resources on less important areas. By making CSFs explicit, and communicating them with everyone involved, you can help keep the business and project on track towards common aims and goals.
References:

http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newLDR_80.htm

http://rapidbi.com/created/criticalsuccessfactors.html

Organizational Change

2009-12-15T12:58:00.000-08:00

In the spectrum of organizational change, which is the most radical type of change: automation, rationalization of procedures, business reengineering, or paradigm shifts?

(You are expected to read an article about this question.)

Adapted from “Field Guide to Consulting and Organizational Development” – to obtain the entire
When a topic (for example, organizational change and development) becomes very prominent, it often takes on many different interpretations and meanings. The advantage is that that topic becomes very accessible, interesting and enlightening to many. The disadvantage is that it's also increasingly vague and difficult for many to make practical. To make this topic of organizational change and development useful, we should reference some common definitions.

Even if not all people agree with the definitions, we at least have some definitions in common to disagree about -- that alone can enhance the communications about the topic. Having some understanding and discernment about the following phrases will help readers to benefit even more from literature about organizational change.

Organizational performance management
We're used to thinking of ongoing performance management for employees, for example, setting goals, monitoring the employee's achievement of those goals, sharing feedback with the employee, evaluating the employee's performance, rewarding performance or firing the employee. Performance management applies to organizations, too, and includes recurring activities to establish organizational goals, monitor progress toward the goals, and make adjustments to achieve those goals more effectively and efficiently.
Note that, in contrast to organizational change projects, organizational performance management activities are recurring in nature. Those recurring activities are much of what leaders and managers inherently do in their organizations -- some do them far better than others. An organizational change project is not likely to be successful if it is not within the context of the recurring activities of organizational performance management.

Organizational change

This phrase refers to the overall nature of activities, for example, their extent and rate, that occurs during a project that aims to enhance the overall performance of the organization. The activities are often led by a change agent, or person currently responsible to guide the overall change effort. The activities are often project-oriented (a one-time project) and geared to address a current overall problem or goal in the organization. (A relatively new phrase, capacity building, refers to these types of activities, as well.)
Why Is It Critical for Leaders and Managers to Be Successful at Organizational Change? Because It's Their Job

Significant organizational change occurs, for example, when an organization changes its overall strategy for success, adds or removes a major section or practice, and/or wants to change the very nature by which it operates. It also occurs when an organization evolves through various life cycles, just like people must successfully evolve through life cycles. For organizations to develop, they often must undergo significant change at various points in their development. That's why the topic of organizational change and development has become widespread in communications about business, organizations, leadership and management.

Leaders and managers continually make efforts to accomplish successful and significant change -- it's inherent in their jobs. Some are very good at this effort (probably more than we realize), while others continually struggle and fail. That's often the difference between people who thrive in their roles and those that get shuttled around from job to job, ultimately settling into a role where they're frustrated and ineffective. There are many schools with educational programs about organizations, business, leadership and management. Unfortunately, there still are not enough schools with programs about how to analyze organizations, identify critically important priorities to address (such as systemic problems or exciting visions for change) and then undertake successful and significant change to address those priorities. This Library topic aims to improve that situation.

WHAT IS A PARADIGM SHIFT?

n 1962, Thomas Kuhn wrote The Structure of Scientific Revolution, and fathered, defined and popularized the concept of "paradigm shift" (p.10). Kuhn argues that scientific advancement is not evolutionary, but rather is a "series of peaceful interludes punctuated by intellectually violent revolutions", and in those revolutions "one conceptual world view is replaced by another".

Think of a Paradigm Shift as a change from one way of thinking to another. It's a revolution, a transformation, a sort of metamorphosis. It just does not happen, but rather it is driven by agents of change.

For example, agriculture changed early primitive society. The primitive Indians existed for centuries roaming the earth constantly hunting and gathering for seasonal foods and water. However, by 2000 B.C., Middle America was a landscape of very small villages, each surrounded by patchy fields of corn and other vegetables.

Agents of change helped create a paradigm-shift moving scientific theory from the Plolemaic system (the earth at the center of the universe) to the Copernican system (the sun at the center of the universe), and moving from Newtonian physics to Relativity and Quantum Physics. Both movements eventually changed the world view. These transformations were gradual as old beliefs were replaced by the new paradigms creating "a new gestalt" (p. 112).

Likewise, the printing press, the making of books and the use of vernacular language inevitable changed the culture of a people and had a direct affect on the scientific revolution. Johann Gutenberg's invention in the 1440's of movable type was an agent of change. Books became readily available, smaller and easier to handle and cheap to purchase. Masses of people acquired direct access to the scriputures. Attitudes began to change as people were relieved from church domination.

Similarly, agents of change are driving a new paradigm shift today. The signs are all around us. For example, the introduction of the personal computer and the internet have impacted both personal and business environments, and is a catalyst for a Paradigm Shift. We are shifting from a mechanistic, manufacturing, industrial society to an organic, service based, information centered society, and increases in technology will continue to impact globally. Change is inevitable. It's the only true constant.

In conclusion, for millions of years we have been evolving and will continue to do so. Change is difficult. Human Beings resist change; however, the process has been set in motion long ago and we will continue to co-create our own experience. Kuhn states that "awareness is prerequisite to all acceptable changes of theory" (p. 67). It all begins in the mind of the person. What we perceive, whether normal or metanormal, conscious or unconscious, are subject to the limitations and distortions produced by our inherited and socially conditional nature. However, we are not restricted by this for we can change. We are moving at an accelerated rate of speed and our state of consciousness is transforming and transcend

Tapping out the Potential of IT

It is an amazing fact that most of the industries that relate to us in our daily life such as airline industry, automobiles, railways, manufacturing etc. generally exhibit high quality products, timeliness of service delivery, reasonable cost of service and low failure rates. The construction industry, on the other hand, is generally the opposite. Most projects exhibit cost overruns, time extensions, and conflicts among parties. According to a survey conducted by the Department of Trade and Industry in UK;

50% of all construction projects finish over budget
54% of all construction projects finish behind schedule
24% of construction projects are completed unsatisfactorily, 48% of those having a significant negative impact on business operations
. It has become painfully obvious over the past few years that many other industries have outpaced the construction industry when it comes to adopting technology based tools.

Another study of a research advisory firm, reports that companies across all industries spend an average of 2.54% of revenues on IT & technology. The same research shows that the construction industry, far behind most other industries, spends only 0.34%.

Firstly, by IT or Information Technology we mean a combination of computer hardware and software that is used in order to process data in some way to generate information that we use to do our job.
We all know construction project management attempts to achieve project mission objectives within specific constraints. It needs information to make decisions. Managers do not need loads of input data generated in the control process. It is the information extracted from the data that helps managers performing their functions efficiently and effectively. The worlds richest man Bill Gates, put it, “How you gather, manage, and use information will determine whether you win or loose.”

Spectrum Of IT
IT can promote various degrees of organizational change ranging from incremental to far-reaching. Three kinds of structural organizational change that are enabled by IT:

(1) Automation,
(2) Rationalization,

(3) Reengineering.

Each carries different rewards and risks.
The most common form of IT-enabled organizational change or the first phase of IT adoption is automation. This has allowed employees to automate a number of time-consuming and error-prone activities and gain benefits in cycle-time, productivity, and accuracy. For example, a main contractor makes use of standalone software to keep track all Request For Information (RFI) in a project.

A deeper form of organization change or the second phase of IT adoption is rationalization of procedures. Automation frequently reveals bottlenecks in production and makes the existing arrangement of procedures and structures painfully cumbersome. Rationalization of procedures involves the streamlining of standard operating procedures, which eliminates obvious bottlenecks, so that operating procedures become more efficient. Roughly speaking, it is a process of fine tuning the first step. For example, the main contractor implements an intranet and standardizes the data in RFI across all projects in the enterprise.

A more powerful type of organizational change or the third phase of IT adoption is business process reengineering, in which business processes are analyzed, simplified, and redesigned. Reengineering involves radically rethinking the flow of work and the construction business processes with the intention to radically reducing the costs of businesses. Using IT, organizations can rethink and streamline their business processes to improve speed, service, and quality. Business process reengineering reorganizes workflows, combining steps to cut waste and eliminating repetitive, paper-intensive tasks. It is much more ambitious than rationalization of procedures because it requires a new vision of how the process is to be organized. For example, the main contractor sets up an extranet to online collaborate with the architect for the RFI process.

Not many construction industry players have moved beyond the first phase of automation. However, there are some companies have committed to a continuing investment in technological advancement and organizational change. By changing how they are organized and do business, they have achieved far greater benefits than available through automation alone. Companies like this have succeeded in staying ahead of their competitors not merely by automating but by changing their organization as well. Their strategic advantage has been their preparedness and ability to continually innovative, and to manage the change necessary to gain substantial business benefits.

Industry Trends

The knowledge and information revolution began at the turn of the twentieth century and has gradually accelerated. In a knowledge and information based economy, knowledge and information are key ingredients in creating wealth. Never before have owners and directors of smaller construction, building & civil engineering companies felt so much pressure to do more with less. To ensure that the development meets the budget and remains profitable, developers must monitor tightly the project throughout the lifecycle. The imperative pressure from the top hierarchy to build cheaper, faster and better will force the whole project team for seeking enduring improvement in construction project management, and this demands a lot of data processing. The following simple example will tell you the importance of information in a work like earth work excavation. This illustration of a breakeven analysis would be to compare two methods of road construction for a road that involves a limited amount of cut-and-fill earthwork. A breakeven analysis determines the point at which one method becomes superior to another method of accomplishing some task or objective. Breakeven analysis is a common and important part of cost control.

It would be possible to do the earthwork by hand or by bulldozer. If the manual method were adopted, the fixed costs would be low or non-existent. Payment would be done on a daily basis and would call for direct supervision by a foreman. The cost would be calculated by estimating the time required and multiplying this time by the average wages of the men employed. The men could also be paid on a piece-work basis. Alternatively, this work could be done by a bulldozer which would have to be moved in from another site. Let us assume that the cost of the hand labor would be $0.60 per cubic meter and the bulldozer would cost $0.40 per cubic meter and would require $100 to move in from another site. The move-in cost for the bulldozer is a fixed cost, and is independent of the quantity of the earthwork handled. If the bulldozer is used, no economy will result unless the amount of earthwork is sufficient to carry the fixed cost plus the direct cost of the bulldozer operation.

Relationship existing between volume of production and costs can be expressed by the following equations:

Total cost = fixed cost + variable cost × output
In symbols using the first letters of the cost elements and N for the output or number of units of production, these simple formulas are
C = F + NV
UC = F/N + V
if, on a set of coordinates, cost in dollars is plotted on the vertical axis and units of production on the horizontal axis, we can indicate fixed cost for any process by a horizontal line parallel to the x-axis. If variable cost per unit output is constant, then the total cost for any number of units of production will be the sum of the fixed cost and the variable cost multiplied by the number of units of production, or F + NV. If the cost data for two processes or methods, one of which has a higher variable cost, but lower fixed cost than the other are plotted on the same graph, the total cost lines will intersect at some point. At this point the levels of production and total cost are the same. This point is known as the "breakeven" point, since at this level one method is as economical as the other. Referring to Figure 1.1 the breakeven point at which quantity the bulldozer alternative and the manual labor alternative become equal is at 500 cubic meters. We could have found this same result algebraically by writing F + NV = F' + NV' where F and V are the fixed and variable costs for the manual method, and F' and V' are the corresponding values for the bulldozer method. Since all values are known except N, we can solve for N using the formula N = (F' - F) / (V - V')

IT & Technological Push

The advent of various new technologies like the Internet and wireless network with the potential to address some of the limitations facing current construction project management practices has created a major impact on the industry. The role that IT & technology plays in the construction industry has gradually been changing the way companies conduct everyday business. What used to be a paper-and-pen world is starting to become a monitor-and-keyboard world in the immediate future.

Some technologies and advancements pushing the external project management & collaboration adoption change include:

Application software packages meeting the specific construction industry needs including project management, scheduling, document management, estimating, job costing, accounting, field administration etc;

Web based technologies enabling for the sharing and transmitting of information, including drawings, photos, voice, print and computer data. The Internet merges perfectly the time honoured adage that a picture is worth a thousand words, with the contract-mandated assertion that time is of the essence, to produce an on-line, visual construction management system.
Wireless technologies, including 3G, Satellite Broadband, WiFi, WAP, that enable the transfer of information to remote sites without the requirement for, or restrictions of, hard infrastructure such as cabling or wires and that are accessible via mobile phones and other hand held devices.

Interoperability, or seamless information exchange via integrated technologies and based on object modeling, allowing participants in the process to access and value add to the information in a form suitable for their needs. This allows all disciplines and project partners to share information thus avoiding duplicating effort and encouraging shared working processes.

Conclusion

Construction and Building company owners and directors are discovering that IT and technology in construction project management is becoming key to successful construction projects. The challenge they face is persuading other project team members to embrace the technology. The resistance to change, no matter how actively or passively, at the micro or macro levels of the industry, contributes to the major impediment of IT and technology take up in the construction industry. The simple, central argument presented here is that electronic project management & collaboration systems implementation is political as well as, sometimes far more so than, technical in nature. When that is understood and accepted, politics are then the process of getting commitment, or building support, or creating momentum for change.
In today’s world, people are talking about the ‘Real Time Enterprise”. Increasingly decisions need to be made quickly. It could be a few hours or even a day, but in today’s increasingly competitive environment it couldn’t be longer. Without the right information that is shared by everyone collaboratively, at the right time, you become a real-time enterprise - in the sense of making the decision making process swift - is not going to be able to compete let alone survive.

Depending on the investment time horizon, the specific challenges and tools available may change, but the overall direction is unmistakable. The construction industry is about to experience a profound change: leaner organisations, more consistent and rigorous performance metrics, and relentless productivity improvements. The net result of these changes should also be increased profitability for those who are successful at mastering the new IT & technology tools with the promise to enable these changes.

References:
http://www.softlogic.org/blog/
http://managementhelp.org/org_chng/org_chng.htm

Systems Anlayst in Designing Pocess Model

2009-12-15T12:00:00.000-08:00

Our task in the second assignment is to interview a System Analyst and ask the skills and characteristics must a Systems Analyst develop in order to be more effective in any design modeling process.

AMS Group of Companies

In our interview in the AMS Group of Companies located at F Torres , Davao City, we found out that the MIS Department Head was at the same time, Systems Analyst. His name was Mr. Jemrald.

He identified the problems found in their organization. Some of these are the lack of programmers, time pressures and constraints. He also shared the type of model they are implementing during the software development cycle and he cited the rapid Model. He also stated that the budgetary requirement for the project management is very minimal because they normally don’t outsource the systems. The tasked teams are the ones who create the systems in their organization. Whenever they have to outsource some systems, they are to customize it to meet the specifications needed by the organization itself.

Process models are processes of the same nature that are classified together into a model. Thus, a process model is a description of a process at the type level. Since the process model is at the type level, a process is an instantiation of it. The same process model is used repeatedly for the development of many applications and thus, has many instantiations. One possible use of a process model is to prescribe how things must/should/could be done in contrast to the process itself which is really what happens. A process model is roughly an anticipation of what the process will look like. What the process shall be will be determined during actual system development.

The goals of a process model are to be:

• Descriptive
o Track what actually happens during a process.
o Takes the point of view of an external observer who looks at the way a process has been performed and determines the improvements that have to be made to make it perform more effectively or efficiently.
• Prescriptive
o Defines the desired processes and how they should/could/might be performed.
o Lays down rules, guidelines, and behavior patterns which, if followed, would lead to the desired process performance. They can range from strict enforcement to flexible guidance.
• Explanatory
o Provides explanations about the rationale of processes.
o Explore and evaluate the several possible courses of action based on rational arguments.
o Establish an explicit link between processes and the requirements that the model needs to fulfill.
o Pre-defines points at which data can be extracted for reporting purposes.

From a theoretical point of view, the Meta-Process Modeling explains the key concepts needed to describe what happens in the development process, on what, when it happens, and why. From an operational point of view, the Meta-Process Modeling is aimed at providing guidance for method engineers and application developers.[1]

The activity of modeling a business process usually predicates a need to change processes or identify issues to be corrected. This transformation may or may not require IT involvement, although that is a common driver for the need to model a business process. Change management programmes are desired to put the processes into practice. With advances in technology from larger platform vendors, the vision of business process models (BPM) becoming fully executable (and capable of round-trip engineering) is coming closer to reality every day. Supporting technologies include Unified Modeling Language (UML), model-driven architecture, and service-oriented architecture.

Process Modeling addresses the process aspects of an Enterprise Business Architecture, leading to an all encompassing Enterprise Architecture. The relationships of a business processes in the context of the rest of the enterprise systems, data, organizational structure, strategies, etc. create greater capabilities in analyzing and planning a change. One real world example is in corporate mergers and acquisitions; understanding the processes in both companies in detail, allowing management to identify redundancies resulting in a smoother merge

The problems of designing large software systems were studied through interviewing personnel from 17 large projects. A layered behavioral model is used to analyze how three of these problems—the thin spread of application domain knowledge, fluctuating and conflicting requirements, and communication bottlenecks and breakdowns—affected software productivity and quality through their impact on cognitive, social, and organizational processes.

First, we introduce general design theory, from which a descriptive model of design processes is derived. In this model, the concept of metamodels plays a crucial role in describing the evolutionary nature of design. Second, we show a cognitive design process model obtained by observing design processes using a protocol analysis method. We then discuss a computable model that can explain most parts of the cognitive model and also interpret the descriptive model. In the computable model, a design process is regarded as an iterative logical process realized by abduction, deduction, and circumscription. We implemented a design simulator that can trace design processes in which design specifications and design solutions are gradually revised as the design.

A comprehensive model of design should address the following aspects of the design process:the state of the design ; the goal structure of the design process;design decisions; rationales for design decisions; control of the design process; and the role of learning in design. This article presents some of the most important ideas emerging from current AI research on design especially ideas for better models design. It is organized into sections dealing with each of the aspects of design listed above.

According to Ryan Magennis in his article What Does a Systems Analyst Really Do? The job of systems analyst was very exciting. He has to spent most of his time talking with users to understand the business and to other analysts to ensure compatibility between subsystems. He did a lot of design work, and created documentation for these designs, including reports, input forms, and programming specifications. He coded some of the programs himself. He learned how to test systems as well as implement them. He did some technical writing by documenting new systems, including technical documentation and user documentation. In his years being a System Analyst, he was able to making friends with all the other analysts (work was very social), learning all the time about both the business and technology, meeting new challenges such a public speaking and learning to adjust his “technical jargon” to his audience.

Systems Analyst must have the following skills:

Understanding written sentences and paragraphs in work related documents.

Writing computer programs for various purposes.

Determining causes of operating errors and deciding what to do about it.

Analyzing needs and product requirements to create a design.

Communicating effectively in writing as appropriate for the needs of the audience.

Conducting tests and inspections of products, services, or processes to evaluate quality or performance.

Giving full attention to what other people are saying, taking time to understand the points being made, asking questions as appropriate, and not interrupting at inappropriate times.

Using logic and reasoning to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions or approaches to problems.

Talking to others to convey information effectively.

Identifying complex problems and reviewing related information to develop and evaluate options and implement solutions.

Systems Analyst must have the knowledge of:

Circuit boards, processors, chips, electronic equipment, and computer hardware and software, including applications and programming.

Structure and content of the English language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition, and grammar.

Principles and methods for curriculum and training design, teaching and instruction for individuals and groups, and the measurement of training effects.
Arithmetic, `lgebra, geometry, calculus, statistics, and their applications.

Principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.

Systems Analyst must have the ability to:

Read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.

Communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.

Choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.

Listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.

Apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.

See details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).

Communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.

Come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).

Tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing there is a problem.

Combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).

A systems analyst must perform the following tasks:

Interact with the customers to know their requirements

Interact with designers to convey the possible interface of the software

Interact/guide the coders/developers to keep track of system development

Perform system testing with sample/live data with the help of testers

Implement the new system

Prepare High quality Documentation

Analyze information processing or computation needs and plan and design computer systems, using techniques such as structured analysis, data modeling and information engineering.

Assess the usefulness of pre-developed application packages and adapt them to a user environment.

Confer with clients regarding the nature of the information processing or computation needs a computer program is to address.

Define the goals of the system and devise flow charts and diagrams describing logical operational steps of programs.

Determine computer software or hardware needed to set up or alter system.

Develop, document and revise system design procedures, test procedures, and quality standards.

Expand or modify system to serve new purposes or improve work flow.

Interview or survey workers, observe job performance and/or perform the job in order to determine what information is processed and how it is processed.

Provide staff and users with assistance solving computer related problems, such as malfunctions and program problems.

Recommend new equipment or software packages.

A Systems Analyst must have the following characteristics:

Investigative — Investigative characteristic frequently involves working with ideas, and require an extensive amount of thinking. These characteristics can involve searching for facts and figuring out problems mentally.

Conventional — Conventional characteristic frequently involve following set procedures and routines. These characteristics can include working with data and details more than with ideas. Usually there is a clear line of authority to follow.

Realistic — Realistic characteristic frequently involve work activities that include practical, hands-on problems and solutions. Many of the occupations require working outside, and do not involve a lot of paperwork or working closely with others.

Systems analysts need to be independent thinkers-people who can “think out of the box” by grasping concepts quickly and seeing the big picture as opposed to the small details. “

Ability to see the big picture: translate geek-speak into plain English

Identify company needs, and get everybody on board.

The system analyst must be able to communicate in writing and orally.

The analyst must easily get along with people.

The analyst must be a good listener and be able to react to what people say.

The analyst must be knowledgeable of technology. The analyst is not expected to know the intricacies of programming, but a decent general knowledge of concepts and terms is essential.

The analyst must be knowledgeable of business. The analyst is not expected to be an expert in business but a decent understanding of the client's world is required.

One should be familiar with designing concepts that is appropriate for the particular development environment. This means one who is good at designing commercial buildings isn't necessarily a good person to design residential housing. Although a lot of concepts overlap, one who is good at designing mainframe system isn't necessarily a good candidate for web projects.

One should have the skills to use the tools to facilitate his/her work. i.e. design software tools. If someone is struggling to use a hammer s/he is worrying about putting a nail in straight not about building a good structure.

One should have the industry/business knowledge or the capacity to acquire them. System implementation is a lot like a bunch of blind people trying to figure out what an elephant looks like. Each person has his/her own field expertise. However, the more knowledge one person has would make the process easier and create better results.

References:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080725042042AA2MqMh
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_analyst
http://jobs.virginia.gov/careerguides/computersystemsanalyst.htm
http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=50089
http://www.aaai.org/ojs/index.php/aimagazine/article/viewArticle/855

Charactersitics of A Good Systems Analyst

2009-12-15T08:31:00.000-08:00

In our first assignment in Systems Analysis and Design I, we were tasked to discuss some characteristics we have to a good system analyst. It is based in our learnings in Chapter I.

Systems analyst

Technology exists to serve, not to be, the human need!
– Malcolm Watson, the Development Manager at Pronto Software in Melbourne

To begin with, let us describe the System Analyst first, their responsibilities and the role they have in the organization.

The Insular Life Assurance Co., Ltd. describes the responsibilities of a system analyst as the personnel that be tasked to design, develop, maintain, control, implement and provide support on assigned projects; acts as systems analyst in more than one systems development project or maintenance activity. The said company is one among others who considers systems analysts in their organization.

Government agencies and universities hire lots of systems analysts, and they’re often the most stable employers. Increasingly, the private sector is using temporary employees, hired just for a specific project.

ccording to Ryan Magennis in his article What Does a Systems Analyst Really Do? The job of systems analyst was very exciting. He has to spent most of his time talking with users to understand the business and to other analysts to ensure compatibility between subsystems. He did a lot of design work, and created documentation for these designs, including reports, input forms, and programming specifications. He coded some of the programs himself. He learned how to test systems as well as implement them. He did some technical writing by documenting new systems, including technical documentation and user documentation. In his years being a System Analyst, he was able to making friends with all the other analysts (work was very social), learning all the time about both the business and technology, meeting new challenges such a public speaking and learning to adjust his “technical jargon” to his audience.

As a Standard Occupational Description: Systems analysts are responsible to Analyze science, engineering, business, and all other data processing problems for application to electronic data processing systems. Analyze user requirements, procedures, and problems to automate or improve existing systems and review computer system capabilities, workflow, and scheduling limitations. May analyze or recommend commercially available software. May supervise computer programmers.

Systems analyst figures out how to use computers to get things done. They tell businesses and other organizations which computers and software to buy, and they decide how to get those tools to work together.

Systems analysts, as motivated and talented IT professionals, solve computer problems and apply computer technology, to meet the individual needs of an organization, realize the maximum benefit from investment in equipment, personnel, and business processes, plan and develop new computer systems, or devise ways to apply existing systems’ resources to additional operations.

As a systems analyst, you may design new systems, including both hardware and software, or add a new software application, to harness more of the computer’s power. Most system analysts work with specific types of systems-for example, business, accounting, or financial systems, or scientific and engineering systems-that vary within the organization and industry. Some system analysts are known as systems developers or systems architects.

After analysts understand what the system needs to do, they break down the task into small steps. They draw diagrams and charts to show how information will get into the computers, how that information will be processed, and how it will get to the people who need it. For example, analysts might decide how sales information will get into a store's computers and how the computer will add up the information in a way that makes it useful for store managers.

Analysts experiment with different computer system plans. They try various tools and steps until they find the system that is fastest, easiest, and least expensive.

Next, analysts decide which computers, software, and tools to buy. They also tell computer programmers how to make any new software that is needed. They give the programmers step-by-step instructions. Some analysts help make the software, too.

The main job for some systems analysts is getting computers to work together. They connect them into a network. Analysts decide how to get information from one computer to another. Many help people get data from the Internet.

After planning a system, analysts test it to make sure it works. They check to make sure that information is processed quickly and without mistakes. They also watch to see if the system is easy to use. Often, they have to change their plans to make the systems better.

Sometimes, these workers work long hours to get a project done on time.

Analysts usually work as part of a team.

Many systems analysts have a bachelor's degree in computer science, information science, or management information systems. Some analysts get college degrees in other subjects. Then, they take computer classes and get computer experience.

Some analysts also have a master's degree in business. This helps them to understand the types of computers that businesses need.

The number of computer systems analysts is expected to grow much faster than average between 2006 and 2016.

People with proper training should have good job prospects. Those who have college degrees in business and courses related to computers also should be able to find jobs in this field.

New jobs are expected as more businesses try to use computers and keep them safe from viruses and hacking. New Internet and wireless technologies are also expected to create more jobs because people will need to learn how to use these tools.

Role of Systems Analyst

Systems Analyst is said to be the solvers Of Computer Problems and Master-Craft Applicants of Computer Technology.

The systems analyst is the middleman, assessing the needs of the end-user and translating them into programming or turning over the programming responsibility to the development department. What are the business requirements? Who will comprise the user community? How large is the application going to be? Will it be internal or external? These are all questions facing the systems analyst, who spends much of the day in front of the computer poring over these issues. With a new product, other elements come into play, such as network location, user community, type of machine, and portability. If the analyst is reviewing an established product, the user community will dictate its changes and enhancements.

As highly trained skilled knowledge workers and information technology experts, they will be in demand. Some of the main duties and tasks include: design and development of new hardware and software systems, incorporating new technologies, new areas of specialization or changes in technology is prevalent.

A systems analyst is responsible for researching, planning, coordinating and recommending software and system choices to meet an organization's business requirements. The systems analyst plays a vital role in the systems development process. A successful systems analyst must acquire four skills: analytical, technical, managerial, and interpersonal. Analytical skills enable systems analysts to understand the organization and its functions, which helps him/her to identify opportunities and to analyze and solve problems. Technical skills help systems analysts understand the potential and the limitations of information technology. The systems analyst must be able to work with various programming languages, operating systems, and computer hardware platforms. Management skills help systems analysts manage projects, resources, risk, and change. Interpersonal skills help systems analysts work with end users as well as with analysts, programmers, and other systems professionals.

Because they must write user requests into technical specifications, the systems analysts are the liaisons between vendors and the IT professionals of the organization they represent[1] They may be responsible for developing cost analysis, design considerations, and implementation time-lines. They may also be responsible for feasibility studies of a computer system before making recommendations to senior management.

Systems Analyst must have the following skills:

Understanding written sentences and paragraphs in work related documents.

Writing computer programs for various purposes.

Determining causes of operating errors and deciding what to do about it.

Analyzing needs and product requirements to create a design.

Communicating effectively in writing as appropriate for the needs of the audience.

Conducting tests and inspections of products, services, or processes to evaluate quality or performance.

Giving full attention to what other people are saying, taking time to understand the points being made, asking questions as appropriate, and not interrupting at inappropriate times.

Using logic and reasoning to identify the strengths and weaknesses of alternative solutions, conclusions or approaches to problems.

Talking to others to convey information effectively.

Identifying complex problems and reviewing related information to develop and evaluate options and implement solutions.

Systems Analyst must have the knowledge of:

Circuit boards, processors, chips, electronic equipment, and computer hardware and software, including applications and programming.

Structure and content of the English language including the meaning and spelling of words, rules of composition, and grammar.

Principles and methods for curriculum and training design, teaching and instruction for individuals and groups, and the measurement of training effects.

Arithmetic, `lgebra, geometry, calculus, statistics, and their applications.

Principles and processes for providing customer and personal services. This includes customer needs assessment, meeting quality standards for services, and evaluation of customer satisfaction.

Systems Analyst must have the ability to:

Read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.

Communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.

Choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.

Listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.

Apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.

See details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).

Communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.

Come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).

Tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing there is a problem.

Combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).

A systems analyst must perform the following tasks:

Interact with the customers to know their requirements

Interact with designers to convey the possible interface of the software

Interact/guide the coders/developers to keep track of system development

Perform system testing with sample/live data with the help of testers

Implement the new system

Prepare High quality Documentation

Analyze information processing or computation needs and plan and design computer systems, using techniques such as structured analysis, data modeling and information engineering.

Assess the usefulness of pre-developed application packages and adapt them to a user environment.

Confer with clients regarding the nature of the information processing or computation needs a computer program is to address.

Define the goals of the system and devise flow charts and diagrams describing logical operational steps of programs.

Determine computer software or hardware needed to set up or alter system.

Develop, document and revise system design procedures, test procedures, and quality standards.

Expand or modify system to serve new purposes or improve work flow.

Interview or survey workers, observe job performance and/or perform the job in order to determine what information is processed and how it is processed.

Provide staff and users with assistance solving computer related problems, such as malfunctions and program problems.

Recommend new equipment or software packages.

A Good Systems Analyst must have the following characteristics:

Investigative — Investigative characteristic frequently involves working with ideas, and require an extensive amount of thinking. These characteristics can involve searching for facts and figuring out problems mentally.

Conventional — Conventional characteristic frequently involve following set procedures and routines. These characteristics can include working with data and details more than with ideas. Usually there is a clear line of authority to follow.

Realistic — Realistic characteristic frequently involve work activities that include practical, hands-on problems and solutions. Many of the occupations require working outside, and do not involve a lot of paperwork or working closely with others.

Systems analysts need to be independent thinkers-people who can “think out of the box” by grasping concepts quickly and seeing the big picture as opposed to the small details. “

Ability to see the big picture: translate geek-speak into plain English

Identify company needs, and get everybody on board.

The system analyst must be able to communicate in writing and orally.

The analyst must easily get along with people.

The analyst must be a good listener and be able to react to what people say.

The analyst must be knowledgeable of technology. The analyst is not expected to know the intricacies of programming, but a decent general knowledge of concepts and terms is essential.

The analyst must be knowledgeable of business. The analyst is not expected to be an expert in business but a decent understanding of the client's world is required.

One should be familiar with designing concepts that is appropriate for the particular development environment. This means one who is good at designing commercial buildings isn't necessarily a good person to design residential housing. Although a lot of concepts overlap, one who is good at designing mainframe system isn't necessarily a good candidate for web projects.

One should have the skills to use the tools to facilitate his/her work. i.e. design software tools. If someone is struggling to use a hammer s/he is worrying about putting a nail in straight not about building a good structure.

One should have the industry/business knowledge or the capacity to acquire them. System implementation is a lot like a bunch of blind people trying to figure out what an elephant looks like. Each person has his/her own field expertise. However, the more knowledge one person has would make the process easier and create better results.

Good communication skills without saying is very important

My characteristics:

Upon knowing the skills, abilities, knowledge and characteristics, I came to realize and believe that I have the potentials of being a systems analyst. I may not graduate with a business-related course, but I can a have a competitive edge in terms of the technology. What I must do, is to realize the great help my tertiary education in having my future job.

I am an independent thinker-people who can “think out of the box” by grasping concepts quickly and seeing the big picture as opposed to the small details. “

I am craving for the new knowledge and is good at following procedures and routines. I also have knowledge in technology and business.

Also, I believe am able to communicate in writing and orally. And easily get along with people. Not to mention, I am good listener and be able to react to what people say.

I believe, it is not very important that you have the expertise in one field and not good at the other. What is the knowledge in business if you don’t know technology? What is the knowledge in programming and mathematical skills if you don’t have the social ability?

Being Systems analysts requires me to be good at both.

References:
http://www.systemsanalyst.com
http://ph.jobstreet.com/jobs/2009/11/default/80/2232084.htm?fr=c
http://www.bls.gov/K12/computers06.htm
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080725042042AA2MqMh
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_analyst
http://jobs.virginia.gov/careerguides/computersystemsanalyst.htm

Frustrations in Information Systems Plan

2009-12-08T00:33:00.000-08:00

Based on our interview with the Management Information Systems (MIS) head of the AMS Group of Companies at AMS Group of Companies located at F. Torres St., Davao City., the two most frequently experienced causes of frustrations while working on an IS Plan is primarily the dissatisfaction and contrast in time plan to the time completion (Lederer and Sethi) Also, lack of support time concerns so as the communication and user’s fulfillment and acceptance.

Acoording to Wikipedia, Frustration is a common emotional response to opposition. Related to anger and disappointment, it arises from the perceived resistance to the fulfillment of individual will. The greater the obstruction, and the greater the will, the more the frustration is likely to be. Causes of frustration may be internal or external. In people, internal frustration may arise from challenges in fulfilling personal goals and desires, instinctual drives and needs, or dealing with perceived deficiencies, such as a lack of confidence or fear of social situations. Conflict can also be an internal source of frustration; when one has competing goals that interfere with one another, it can create cognitive dissonance. External causes of frustration involve conditions outside an individual, such as a blocked road or a difficult task. While coping with frustration, some individuals may engage in passive-aggressive behavior, making it difficult to identify the original cause(s) of their frustration, as the responses are indirect. A more direct, and common response, is a propensity towards aggression.

Like everything in the world, Information Technology is also evolving. In fact, its innovation is said to be fast in this millennium. And businesses in order to be in the era of fast changing world, link their processes and their plans with regard to the computerized and automated systems.

Strategic information systems planning (SISP) is the process whereby an organization establishes a long-range plan of computer-based applications in order to achieve its goals. A number of problems can potentially impede information systems planners as they carry out the process. A survey of 80 firms who completed the SISP process revealed that the problems constitute five factors: the organization, implementation, database, hardware, and cost. A discriminant analysis showed that three factors—the organization, implementation, and database—best distinguished satisfied from dissatisfied information systems planners. A research application of the five factors suggested that organizations with more sophisticated business planning endure significantly less severe hardware and implementation problems.

Strategic Information Systems Planning (SISP) is the process of aligning an organization's business strategy with effective computer-based information systems to achieve critical business objectives. SISP is a top concern of major executives and considerable resources (time and money) are spent in SISP activities. Many SISP initiatives are not successful due to the difficulty of implementing the recommendations.

In the late 1970s, the primary objectives of the Information Systems planning were to improve communication between end users and the MIS departments, increase top management support for computing, better forecast and allocate information system resource requirements, improve the MIS department and identify new computer application which can be beneficial in the company. Now, the objectives evolved and are now focusing on the identification of strategic information systems implementation which can give the company a competitive edge. Its main desire is to share common data and communicate with each other very easily. Because of the change, the businesses also needed to adopt this change and be flexible enough in a way that they can integrate their existing systems to the new ones.

However these ideals are oftentimes didn’t come into reality. Organizations have often failed to build such system. Complications in ISP may sometimes cause redundant efforts and costs.

ISP entails the search for applications that can give the organization a grate advantage over the competitors. ISP help the organizations use the information systems in innovative ways, change the basis of competition, generate new products and promote creativity.

ISP is the process of identifying a portfolio of computer-based applications to assist an organization in executing its current business plans and realizing its business goals.

In having the ISP, an organization must embark on a major study. It forms teams of business planners and MIS experts as the members and leaders. The duration depends on the scope of the study. It carries out a procedure to guide the study. It also prepares a schedule for developing and installing them.

Every year, $300-700 million dollar corporations spend about 5% of their gross income on information systems and their supports. That's from about $15,000,000 to $35,000,000! A significant part of those funds support enterprise database, a philosophy of database system applications that enable corporations to research the past, control the present, and plan for the future.

Even though an information system costs from $1,000,000 to $10,000,000, and even
through most chief information officers (CIOs) can specify exactly how much money is being spent for hardware, software, and staff, CIOs cannot however state with any degree of certainty why one system is being done this year versus next, why it is being done ahead of another, or finally, why it is being done at all.

A quality ISP must exhibit five distinct characteristics before it is useful. These five are presented in the table that follows.

Timely -The ISP must be timely. An ISP that is created long after it is needed is useless. In almost all cases, it makes no sense to take longer to plan work than to perform the work planned.
Useable-The ISP must be useable. It must be so for all the projects as well as for each project. The ISP should exist in sections that once adopted can be parceled out to project managers and immediately started.
Maintainable-The ISP should be maintainable. New business opportunities, new computers, business mergers, etc. all affect the ISP. The ISP must support quick changes to the estimates, technologies employed, and possibly even to the fundamental project sequences. Once these changes are accomplished, the new ISP should be just a few computer program executions away.
Quality- While the ISP must be a quality product, no ISP is ever perfect on the first try. As the ISP is executed, the metrics employed to derive the individual project estimates become refined as a consequence of new hardware technologies, code generators, techniques, or faster working staff. As these changes occur, their effects should be installable into the data that supports ISP computation. In short, the ISP is a living document. It should be updated with every technology event, and certainly no less often than quarterly.
Reproducible The ISP must be reproducible. That is, when its development activities are
performed by any other staff, the ISP produced should essentially be the same. The ISP should not significantly vary by staff assigned. Whenever a proposal for the development of an ISP is created it must be assessed against these five characteristics. If any fail or not addressed in an optimum way, the entire set of funds for the development of an ISP is risked.

However, upon the preparation and implementation of the system, the organization sometimes fell into the trap of failures. And one of the main causes of frustrations is the DISSATISFACTION and the other is CONRAST IN TIME PLAN TO THE TIME COMPLETION (Lederer and Sethi).

1.) DISSATISFACTION

Advances in information technology and perceived dissatisfaction with MIS performance is leading users to take over their own systems development work. This does not mean an end to the MIS department, but a staff rather than line responsibility will be required as users become the dominant developer of information systems. For a successful transition, HRD will be expected to operate as a change agent helping both groups adjust to their new roles.

Mr. Gernald Cabarilo cited one instance in which the said frustrations are found.
For a particular company system which is being outsourced from the other company, it is very important to seek and gather the data. You also have good sense of contact between the firm. It is said to have a proper closure of the project from the client in a way that upon the creation of the system, the client have to be fixed on his decision over time. He has to set his mind on what are the things he really wants to appear in the system It is so frustrating in the part of the developer to change and change his system because of the dissatisfaction of the clients.

Also, the developer and the client must have a constant communication regarding the project over time so that the possible dissatisfaction may be lessened in the implementation of the IS.

According to a survey released on Dec. 12, 2009, 'Information Disconnect -- The Weakest Link,' reveals that 96 per cent of enterprises interviewed, including many from the Global 500 and Fortune 1000 companies, are frustrated with their information management processes.

In addition, nearly 70 per cent of survey respondents felt that their current information systems deliver inconsistent reporting, and that it takes too long to collate information.

The survey, commissioned by Kalido Ltd. and conducted by Harte-Hanks, a leading IT market research agency, examines the current market understanding of information management and the most critical information issues that the world's leading companies are facing today. Additional findings reveal that:
-- Nearly 60 per cent of companies find that their current information systems
do not have the flexibility to handle change

-- Nearly 60 per cent of companies have concerns about the accuracy of their
data sources

-- Over 60 per cent of companies have planned data/information integration
projects

2.) CONRAST IN TIME PLAN TO THE TIME COMPLETION

To address this problem, it is a must to execute and Adjust the ISP Through Time.

Enterprises, once they evolve beyond their first round of information systems, find themselves transformed from a project and package mentality to a release mentality. The diagram on the next page illustrates this new continuous flow environment. It is characterized by:

! Multiple, concurrent, but differently scheduled projects against the same subject area database or warehouse database
! Single-database projects that affect multiple subject area and data warehouse databases
! Projects that develop completely new capabilities, that can assess required changes to existing capabilities, and that can accommodate a variety of systems generation alternatives (COTS, package, and custom programming)
The continuous flow environment contains four major sets of activities. The user/client is represented at the top in the small rectangular box. Each of the ellipses represents an activity list to accomplish a specific need. The four basic needs are essentially:
! Need Identification
! Need Assessment
! Design
! Deployment
The box in the center is the metabase. Specification and impact analysis are represented through the left two processes. Implementation design and accomplishment are represented by the right two processes.

Claudia Imhoff, industry expert in corporate information architecture, commented: "As new investments are mapped out, establishing an intelligent management information strategy is essential. Without a reliable company-wide view of a customer, working with your customers will be less effective. Similarly, without an enterprise-wide view of products and services, decisions will continue to be made without understanding their impact. This must change before businesses can operate efficiently and effectively on a truly global scale."

Doug Laney, vice president, META Group said: "To lessen business performance frustrations, enterprises must strive to establish consistent levels of information quality and information management throughout the organisation. Our research indicates that, while enabling technology exists, a change in how a company views its information assets, must accompany it. Suffering silently with information incongruence we believe, is a certain way of devaluing overall corporate assets."

Frank Buytendijk, senior research analyst at Gartner, Inc.: "Enterprises need to understand that in order to gain strategic value from business information, it's vital to connect data to strategic objectives and to deploy it strategically across an enterprise. This means that enterprises must solve the many challenges of data integration and ensure they have a scalable and reliable data warehouse infrastructure."

Chris Worsley, vice president of global marketing at Kalido Ltd, added: "Frustration equals inefficiency. In the current economic environment, it's more important than ever that companies reap their investment in information management systems in order to get timely, accurate, consistent information, to manage their business effectively. Unlocking value from existing technology and ensuring future investments are integrated painlessly is our mission and working with global companies such as Unilever, the Royal Dutch/Shell Group (Shell), and Phillips, is proving that it can be done."

The companies surveyed, including many from the Fortune 1000 and Global 500, operate in the US, UK and Netherlands and were cross-industry covering finance, products and services, retail, transport, primary resource, telecommunications and healthcare. At least 40 per cent have a turnover of over $US2billion. 171 interviews were completed over a six-week period beginning September 2001.

http://www.clarionmag.com/cmag/v3/informationsystemsplanning.pdf
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/119990266/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0
http://www.computer.org/portal/web/csdl/doi/10.1109/HICSS.2000.926735
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/96+Per+Cent+of+Global+Enterprises+Suffer+From+Information...-a080732718

Relationship Between Business Plan & Information Systems Plan

2009-11-26T01:07:00.000-08:00

It is quite difficult to answer the question because when searched in the internet using the keywords, the exact answers are hard to find. However, I found a related study which I hope can answer the problem.

The said research is entitled Differences in Stage of Integration between Business Planning and Information System Planning according to value configurations by Petter Gottschalk and Hans Solli-Sæther of Norwegian School of Management BI, Sandvika, Norway. It is concerned with how stages of integration between strategic business and IS planning are related to different value configurations and eras of IS growth. The aim of the study is to investigate how and Information System planning is integrated with business planning.

Integration between Information System planning and business planning is considered to play a significant impact on the extent of information systems involvement to organizational performance. It is an important enabler of business-IS alignment. The content analysis of IS plans is conducted to identify stages of integration. The companies were also classified according to value configurations and eras of IS growth.

The word planning is used in the literature in many and various meanings: as future thinking, as controlling the future, as decision making, as integrated decision making, and as a formalized procedure to produce an articulated result, in the form of an integrated system of decisions (Mintzberg 1994). In this paper, a planning approach is defined as strategic decision making through a rational process that allows managers to formulate and document strategies. The aim of this study was not to do process research, but rather to investigate how IS planning (ISP) is integrated with business planning (BP).

Business planning is usually conducted when starting a new organization or a new major venture, for example, new product, service or program. Essentially, a business plan is a combination of a marketing plan, strategic plan, operational/management plan and a financial plan. Far more important than the plan document, is the planning process itself.

Business planning usually includes a thorough examination of the idea for a new product/service, if there's really a market for it, who the competitors are, how the idea is uniquely positioned to be competitive and noticeable, how the idea will be produced to a product/service, how much it will cost, how it will be promoted, what overall goals must be accomplished, how the development and ongoing operations will be managed and what resources are needed (including money). As noted above, a business plan is a combination of a marketing plan, financial plan, strategic plan and a operational/management plan. Here are a variety of perspectives. (McNamara, 1998-2007)

The information systems plan is the plan by which databases and information systems of the enterprise are accomplished in a timely manner. A key facility through which the ISP obtains its Adata@ is the meta data repository. The domain of the meta data repository is set forth in Figure 1, and, as seen through Figure 1, persons through their role within an organization perform functions in the accomplishment of enterprise missions, they have information needs. These information needs reflect the state of certain enterprise resources such as finance, people, and products that are known to the enterprises. The states are created through business information systems and databases.

The information systems plan project determines the sequence for implementing specific information systems. The goal of the strategy is to deliver the most valuable business information at the earliest time possible in the most cost-effective manner.
The end product of the information systems project is an information systems plan (ISP). Once deployed, the information systems department can implement the plan with confidence that they are doing the correct information systems project at the right time and in the right sequence. The focus of the ISP is not one information system but the entire suite of information systems for the enterprise. Once developed, each identified information system is seen in context with all other information systems within the enterprise.
IT projects are accomplished within distinct development environments. The two most common are: discrete project and release. The discrete project environment is typified by completely encapsulated projects accomplished through a water-fall methodology.
In release environments, there are a number of different projects underway by different organizations and staff of varying skill levels. Once a large number of projects are underway, the ability of the enterprise to know about and manage all the different projects degrades rapidly. That is because the project management environment has been transformed from discrete encapsulated projects into a continuous flow process of product or functionality improvements that are released on a set time schedule. Figure 3 illustrates the continuous flow process environment that supports releases. The continuous flow process environment is characterized by:
• Multiple, concurrent, but differently scheduled projects against the same enterprise resource
• Single projects that affect multiple enterprise resources
• Projects that develop completely new capabilities, or changes to existing capabilities within enterprise resources

Value configuration can be defined as an organization of activities, resources, and technologies, in order to create firm level competitive advantage. Our assumption is that there exist three basic value creation logics. Based on this assumption, this paper discusses differences in stages of integration between businesses and IS planning according to companies’ value configurations, and attempts to relate these differences to eras of IS growth.

Today many companies make large investments in information systems (IS) (Earl and Feeny 1994). Yet executives often question the business-IS alignment, namely whether these investments support their strategic objectives or whether opportunities to exploit IS for competitive advantage are being overlooked (Henderson and Venkatraman 1993).

There are both enablers and inhibitors of business-IS alignment (Luftman, Papp et al. 1999) and one area considered important for improved alignment is integration of strategic business and IS planning (Teo and Ang 1999).

Strategic alignment is said to be present when:

i) business strategies are enabled, supported, and stimulated by information strategies (Broadbent and Weill 1993);

ii) the goals and activities of the business are in harmony with the information systems that support them (Woolfe 1993);

iii) information systems support organizational goals and activities at every level (Lederer and Mendelow 1989); and

iv) choices within content and process dimensions of IS planning are mutually supportive and the two dimensions themselves are harmonized in a manner that is consistent with competitive strategy (Das, Zahra et al. 1991).

Integration between business planning and information systems planning is one important enabler of business-IS alignment (Teo and King 1997; Luftman, Papp et al. 1999; Teo and Ang 1999). Teo and King (1997) found a significant positive relationship between the level of business and IS planning integration and the extent of information systems contribution to organizational performance.

King and Teo (1997) have suggested a stages of integration model for the evolution of integration between strategic business and IS planning. The first stage is a separate planning with administrative integration characterized by the integration mechanisms such as a technically oriented and non-strategic role of the IS function. The second is a one-way linked planning with sequential integration characterized by integration mechanisms such as performance criteria of business strategy contribution. The third is a two-way linked planning with reciprocal integration such as frequent IS executive participation in business planning. The fourth is joint planning with full integration.

Nolan’s (1973) theory, perhaps the best-known and most widely cited model of IS evolution of in organizations, provides an insight into the way IS evolves in organizations and offers IS management the possibility of managing this complex phenomenon. The model describing the theory does not appear in the literature as a single model, but rather as a number of versions of the same model, which have evolved over time (Khandelwal and Ferguson 1999). For example, the model has been expanded in the form of three S-curves, each curve describing an era, with a discontinuity between the preceding and the following eras. The three eras are identified as data processing (DP) era, information technology (IT) era, and network (NW) era. These eras are themselves subdivided into three phases each as shown in Table 3. The curves represent both the growth of the IS and the organization’s learning experience as IS progresses through these eras. Each era is characterized by a period of evolution, followed by a period of stability, ending with a period of discontinuity before the start of the next era. The discontinuity is more a revolution rather than an evolutionary transition. For example, the transition from DP era to IT era is characterized by technological discontinuities in the form of personal computers, data communication networks, and robotics, while the transition from IT era to NW era is characterized by business discontinuities in the form of strategic alliances with customers and suppliers, access to external data, and outsourcing.

Typically, value chains transform input into output (products) using a long-linked technology. Scale and capacity utilization are key cost drivers. For each basic activity in the business value system the effort of IS is to improve products and production processes. Information systems are developed to support the activities in the value chain: accounting systems, production planning and control systems, marketing and sales systems. A typical example of administrative integration between BP and ISP was the plan for a food producer: IT can assist business processes in realizing and exploiting solutions for value creation. Value chains belong to the IT era as indicated by their technology use and stage of planning integration.

Value shops rely on an intensive technology to solve a customer or client problem. Selection, combination, and order of application of resources and activities vary according to the problem at hand. The development and use of IS, such as diagnostics, simulations, project management tools, and collaborative technologies, is first of all to support or assist the solution of unique problems. A typical example of administrative integration between BP and ISP was the plan S for a municipal health and social sector: Our goal is for all health personnel to use IT as help in medical and administrative
matters better than before. Value shops belong to the DP era as indicated by their technology use and stage of planning integration.

Value networks rely on a mediating technology to link clients or customers who are or wish to be interdependent. The mediating technology facilitates exchange relationships among customers distributed in time and space. Technology development is basically a support activity, but technology may as well be core business in this value configuration. The growing convergence of telecommunications, computing and production technology is of special relevance for value networks. Development and use of IS might be to obtain operational efficiency and cost minimization, as well as to create new integrated
services or products. A typical example of reciprocal/full integration between BP and ISP was the plan AG for a telecommunication company: Business puts heavy demands on IT, as IT contributes heavily to new business. Value networks belong to the IT network era as physical and electronic networks converge towards each other.

References:

Gottschalk, Petter and Hans Solli-Sæther. “Differences in Stage of Integration between Business Planning and Information System Planning according to value configurations.”

http://managementhelp.org/plan_dec/bus_plan/bus_plan.htm

http://www.tdan.com/view-articles/5262

As IT Professional 10 years from now: A reflection

2009-11-17T22:01:00.000-08:00

Think about yourself worthy to be called as IT professional, how do you see yourself 10 years from now, what are your strategies to get there?

In the mirror of life reflecting ten years from now, I would probably be an Information Technology professional, expecting that I graduated with the degree of IT. But the word “worthy” makes a big difference. It implies that I should also be an IT professional not only by name but also by deeds.

In order to be worthy, I’m expected to possess valuable or useful qualities in the field of IT and have the good characteristics of a blue-collared job holder. I already have the expertise in my job and of course, I have to love what I am doing. In this high technology era, IT professional cannot lose its importance in the world. See how the companies are going with today’s innovations in order for them not to be obsolete and become even more competent despite the problems they are facing just like the global financial downturn scenario. We know that computers and using computers and other programmable devices are often more expensive than the manual system but the businesses and other organizations also consider the great advantages it offers. Thus, IT people has become as one of the important people for most organizations. “Let your profession be your vocation.”

I could still remember the day when I was still undecided to which path of the crossroads I have to take and now, I am already determined to stand with the career I am taking and I am eager to make it as a means to my aspirations. I already have the understandings of my present situation and where could it lead me in the future. I never knew I would come this far and suddenly realize, “This is it, I am really into it.” And I would try my best to prove it right.

Not so long ago, I dream on traveling abroad. Perhaps as a tourist, but I never dreamed to be a worker there. However, I wish to gain big salary. So what do you expect?
In one of our meeting in MIS2, our facilitator made me realize that I am a state university student. I am subsidized by the government which means that the government helps me sent to study a degree. In return, I have to thank the government by rendering the service I can offer to the country. The country needs us more than the foreign do.

In the near future, I’m not expecting to be an employer in an instant. Maybe, I could start from being a simple employee in a small company. I also had dreamed of becoming a database administrator and later on become an IT manager. It's really a dream.

Database Administrator

is responsible for installing, backing up, testing, securing and making changes to production databases within an IT environment. They work on ongoing development projects with developers and architects and, increasingly, with business-side workers. They also maintain operations on a day-to-day basis.

Duties

The duties of a database administrator vary and depend on the job description, corporate and Information Technology (IT) policies and the technical features and capabilities of the DBMS being administered. They nearly always include disaster recovery (backups and testing of backups), performance analysis and tuning, data dictionary maintenance, and some database design.

Some of the roles of the DBA may include:

* Installation of new software
* Configuration of hardware and software
* Security administration
* Data analysis
* Database design
* Data modeling and optimization
* Responsible for the administration of existing enterprise databases.

Striving hard for years maybe I would become a manager f a big company. I do dream about that. Ten years the, I would probably manage my own company Not only a company, but a company which strongly competes probably to the world. A company which is flexible to the demands of the fast-changing world.

IT MANAGER ROLE-SPECIFIC COMPETENCIES

Networking
Assists in the planning and implementation of additions, deletions and major modifications to the supporting regional infrastructure.
Implements network security at the regional level as established by corporate Security Director.
Oversees the administration and maintenance of the company's infrastructure, and directs more junior Innovators when necessary.
Oversees the administration of the company's WAN.

Telephony
Manages and develops upgrades to the company's telephone system at the regional level.
Oversees all telephone changes, including routing for seating assignments.

Training & Lab Maintenance
Oversees the administration and maintenance of computer stations and software for company training programs and the Learning Studio and provides additional support if necessary.

Internal Systems
Oversees troubleshooting, systems backups, archiving, and disaster recovery and provides expert support when necessary.
Works with project teams to help implement Internal Systems.

Help Desk Administration
Oversees all help desk activities at the regional level.
Responds to escalated help desk issues.
Oversees the administration and maintenance of our tracking software.
Interacts with internal clients on all levels to help resolve IT-related issues and provides answers in a timely manner.

Asset Management
Builds and maintains vendor relationships and manages the purchase of hardware and software products.
Manages the purchasing of all software, hardware and other IT supplies at the regional level.
Ensures that company assets are maintained responsibly.

CAREER PATH CORE COMPETENCIES

Communication
Facilitates team meetings effectively.
Holds regular status meetings with team.
Keeps team well informed of changes within the organization and general Etensity news.
Effectively communicates relevant IT-related information to superiors.
Delivers engaging, informative, well-organized presentations.
Resolves and/or escalates issues in a timely fashion.
Understands how to communicate difficult/sensitive information tactfully.
Relays relevant IT-related information to the company in a timely manner.

Management
Initiates and implements improvements in all areas of IT responsibility.
Serves as main point of contact on all IT-related matters for the office assigned.
Responds/acts on upper-management direction .
Identifies and provides standards for gathering information for use in trend analysis and reports information to company management.

PROFESSIONAL QUALITIES

Leadership
Challenges others to develop as leaders while serving as a role model and mentor.
Manages the development of team by ensuring, when possible, that project tasks are in line with each Innovator's career interests.
Inspires coworkers to attain goals and pursue excellence.
Identifies opportunities for improvement and makes constructive suggestions for change .
Manages the process of innovative change effectively.
Remains on the forefront of emerging industry practices.

Teamwork
Consistently acknowledges and appreciates each team member's contributions.
Effectively utilizes each team member to his/her fullest potential.
Motivates team to work together in the most efficient manner.
Keeps track of lessons learned and shares those lessons with team members.
Mitigates team conflict and communication problems.
Plans and facilitates regular team activities outside of the office.

Client Management

Manages day-to-day internal client interaction
Sets and manages internal client expectations.
Communicates effectively with internal clients to identify needs and evaluate alternative business solutions.
Continually seeks opportunities to increase internal client satisfaction and deepen client relationships.

ORGANIZATIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES

Innovator Development
Conducts effective performance evaluations and mentors those with less experience through formal channels.
Helps team execute career development plans.
Seeks and participates in development opportunities above and beyond training required by Etensity.
Trains other innovators and clients through both formal and informal training programs.
Encourages more junior Innovators to take responsibility for their development within the company.
Challenges fellow Innovators to progress toward their professional development goals.

Internal Operations

Suggests areas for improvement in internal processes along with possible solutions.
Leads internal teams/task forces
Approves team members' time and expense reports in a conscientious and timely manner.
Reviews the status reports of team members and addresses issues as appropriate.
Complies with and helps to enforce standard Etensity policies and procedures.

I don’t really dream to be manager merely to manage people. I want it because I do want to contribute to the success of the company. You might say that even a simple employee can contribute to that success but the level of contribution really matters. That’s what I believe. I want to provide jobs to the needy and equip them with the proper training needed. I also want to implement a reward system that would motivate the employees to work hard and eager to contribute to the company’s success.

For the growth of the company, I with my co-decision makers should foresee the possible demands of the clients and the possible changes. On the other hand, the company’s equity should allot a budget for our own foundation or encourage our employees to give some of to the existing foundations.

Is dreaming to be a manager doesn’t fit to the so-called “worthy IT professional?” Being a manager means to help the company’s improvement and growth with the coordination of he employees. A worthy IT professional means to stand by its name “solutions provider” is it on your organization or the benefit of the other people. So I guess, the answer is YES, because I could be an IT professional by being a manager of the company by providing the employees and the company itself the necessary solutions for the crucial problems and situations.

Life never disallows us to dream. Dream the impossible and the unreachable. In fact it is given to us for free. It is up to us to reach our dreams. But, life doesn’t promise that the way is easy. Life does not come to you in great long gulps but one day at a time. We surely have bad days and everything may turn out wrong. Life has its own trials, annoyances and difficulties. Stormy seas are part of life. Don’t think it will be a smooth sailing. Remember, rough seas make us stronger and courageous to reach our destination. Trials will come as they must into each life but with each burden comes the promise of compensating reward.

It’s up to us to set our own ways and means in achieving our dreams. Theses are our personal strategy. For me, the best strategy is merely based on the values and virtues and striving to at least practice them. Strive and survive.

My personal strategies:

• Trust in Divine Providence

Every path we take every step we make, trust in God. When you feel like you are not sure of your chosen path, trust in the Lord that you are taking the right one and if the day has come when you feel like you’re not really fit to it, then learn to let go of it. I had gone so many of this instance. So I could say, it is the best strategy. I have to pray that what I planned to myself abides and fits to what are his plans for me. We really don’t know our real purpose unless we learn to understand it and pray it to God. I have to pray that God guides me, enlightens me and helps me to have the knowledge and wisdom that I may enable to solve existing problems and obstacles along the way to reach my dream.

• Have that confidence

Following the trust in God is to trust and believe in ourselves. Even if others believe in you that you have the capacity to do certain jobs, you are skilled and everything all will be useless without your confidence. If you don’t have the confidence that you may surpass the challenges you are facing in you studies, then definitely, it’s also a blurry result that you can. In applying for a job, you also have to be confident enough to comply the necessary requirements the employee needed for you to be accepted in their organization. In working for your job, it is also the same thing. You need your confidence that you can do it properly lessening the scolds and chides of your boss. That’s how it is.

• Do a Hard work

Even if I already have the above two but I don’t have the third, then definitely, I would not be able to reach my goal. It is because doing works hard simply means that we want the best result out of it. And if the outcome would not be the same as one we expected, then we could not feel some guilt because we already know that we have done our best. And if the outcome would be pleasant to us, then we can say that that is the best result we can get for our hard work.

• Being responsible

I have to be responsible of my self. As much as possible don’t learn to depend on others and be responsible of the choices I make with no regrets. Not only this, I also have to do my responsibilities as a student now, and a successful employee in the future or even an employer. Do the necessary duties in doing my own job. It is because why do I expect of the success in the future when I’m not doing the right thing to be successful.

•Have the Spirit of sacrifice

Sometimes, you have to sacrifice something just to fulfill the desired outcome. A simple instance is from being a student who wants to enjoy with her many-year unseen friends, but because of her studies to do for the final exams and projects, he has to sacrifice one thing. Here comes the pressure but because of her determination to pass all of her subjects for the semester, she has to sacrifice one thing even if it cost her once in a lifetime enjoyment with her friend. It sounds to be a ridiculous example but at least I believe I already shared what I mean. Anyway, there are so many examples that relate to this strategy.

• Self-discipline or self-denial

It is also important to control myself in all circumstances in my studies and work. Sometimes I also have to deny yourself and your impulses towards things you really love for the sake of the goal you are achieving. Be it short-term or long-term. In order to succeed, I also have to train my conduct in order to improve myself as a student and a career woman and a person. Any improvement in your life is your improvement. Right? When you know how to control and manage yourself, then you could also be followed by you employees. Be a leader of yourself first before becoming a leader of the other.

• Manage time wisely

It’s in college days that I realized the essence of deadlines. Maybe because our teachers in elementary and high school are not that strict on implementing these things unlike our instructor and facilitators in college and maybe because I’m not that time conscious before. Now, I learned that time really is as precious as gold. When I watched at the news saying something which happened unexpectedly, that’s when I’m enlightened about the importance of every second of our life. That’s why I also consider being curious on time management. It’s also because you have to focus in everything and that everything should not be focused simultaneously. You are going to be insane. So I have to focus one thing at a time. In short, I should learn to wisely manage the time allotted and to be conscious on deadlines. It is a part of a good performance of a student and a worker.

• Be flexible

It means that I have the capacity to be bent over and over again without being damaged or injured but it doesn’t mean that I have to be like Lastikman. It is just that I have to have the capacity to perceive changes and is able to adapt easily and wisely on these changes. These adjectives refer literally to what is capable of withstanding stress without injury and figuratively to what can undergo change or modification.

• Understanding

It is also needed to understand things on how it is in the reality. Actually, I can have many definitions to it but the important thought is the name itself. Understanding means to have a comprehension, good sense, or discernment. Understanding on all things, be it on the unfavorable circumstances, problems, solutions, teachers, classmates, facilitators, instructors, employers, colleagues and even you job.

• Possess selflessness not selfish(ness)

Before, I have no distinction between the two terms. But when I listen to the songs and read some articles, I had noticed that selflessness always refer to the good side while the selfishness on the bad. Later, I had realized that I was simply right because the former is the complete opposite of the latter. Selflessness means showing unselfish concern for the welfare of others. It is just synonymous to self-denying, self-forgetful, self-forgetting, and unselfish. Selfishness is being self-centered and egoistic. The quality or state of being selfish; exclusive regard to one's own interest or happiness; that supreme self-love or self-preference which leads a person to direct his purposes to the advancement of his own interest, power, or happiness, without regarding those of others.

IT people are selfless in nature because they provide solutions for the benefit of the other but not all of these people are worthy to be called. “Solutions provider” as they call it is tagged to IT and it’s also important that IT have been given the credit for the service they render. Be it on cash, rewards or salaries. But some are too demanding for the price of the service to the level of thinking that it is okay for their clients do not know how to use computers. For me, IT people should get the proper credits of their services and so must I.

• Real life experience

All those aforementioned strategies will not be enough to really fulfill my dreams if do not have the last one. Experience means to apprehend an object, thought, or emotion through the senses or mind, active participation in events or activities, leading to the accumulation of knowledge or skill, the knowledge or skill so derived and the totality of such events in the past of an individual.

In the way to reaching our goals, we have to have experience on the different fields that are really useful. These experiences made us equipped with the necessary knowledge and skills needed for the fulfillment of our dream.

REFERENCES:

http://www.mariosalexandrou.com/free-job-descriptions/it-manager.asp
http://shielamariepnara.blogspot.com/2009/07/assignment-2-in-hrm.html

Human Resource: An interview

2009-10-01T18:01:00.000-07:00

Assignment 9: Interview a personnel/human resource manager on his concept on the nature, scope and role of human resource management. Do you agree with him? Explain. Is his concept similar to that of the management of his organization? If not, ask him how the differences are settled. (1500 words)

Regarding this task, I chose as my interviewee the administrative officer V of the Personnel Section of the Administrative Division of The Department of Education Regional Office XI.

Asked about her concept about human resource management, from its nature and scope to its role in their firm, the following are her answers based on her own insights and the views of the firm she involved in.

Human Resource Management

Nature

It is about managing the employees of the organization. It includes the keeping track of records their attendance, their benefits, their concerns, trainings of different office divisions. More recently, organizations consider the "HR Department" as playing a major role in staffing, training and helping to manage people so that people and the organization are performing at maximum capability in a highly fulfilling manner.

Scope

As she mentioned, the regional office consists of five divisions namely the Elementary Division, Secondary Division, Administrative Division, Budget and Finance, and Alternative Learning System. The Administrative Division classifies different sections which include Legal, Cashier, Supply, Record and the Personnel Section. The Personnel Section is considered as their Human Resource Management. The Human Resources Management (HRM) function includes a variety of activities including managing your approach to employee benefits and compensation, employee records and personnel policies. Aside from managing the office’s employees, The Dep Ed XI also caters the needs of the divisions of Region XI, from the divisions down to the districts and from the districts down to the schools in the said region.

Their management however is limited to some aspects. Of course, they are not ones who manage the office’s supplies, budget and finance. From the word itself, one can understand their scope of management. They only manage the important matters of their “employees” as great resource in their organization. It also includes the records of the employees as opposed to the function of the record section which keeps the records of the regional office.

Role

In all organizations, there should be someone concerned with the welfare and performance of persons who are a part of the operation. When an individual or a team of individuals takes on this task of seeing to programs and setting policies that impact everyone associated with the company, they are engaged in the process of personnel management, sometimes referred to as human resources (HR).

Human resources management comprises several processes. Together they are supposed to achieve the above mentioned goal. These processes can be performed in an HR department, but some tasks can also be outsourced or performed by line-managers or other departments. When effectively integrated they provide significant economic benefit to the company. Workforce planning, Recruitment (sometimes separated into attraction and selection)
Induction and Orientation, Skills management, Training and development, Personnel administration, Compensation in wage or salary, Time management, Travel management (sometimes assigned to accounting rather than HRM), Payroll (sometimes assigned to accounting rather than HRM), Employee benefits administration, Personnel cost planning and Performance appraisal.

Human resource management serves these key functions: Recruitment & Selection, Training and Development (People or Organization), Performance Evaluation and Management, Promotions/Transfer, Redundancy, Industrial and Employee Relations, Record keeping of all personal data., Compensation, pensions, bonuses etc in liaison with Payroll, Confidential advice to internal 'customers' in relation to problems at work , Career development , Competency Mapping (Competency mapping is a process an individual uses to identify and describe competencies that are the most critical to success in a work situation or work role.) , Time motion study is related to HR Function, and Performance Appraisal.

Is her concept similar to that of the organization?

Based on the answers of the interviewee, it is then concluded that her concepts and the organization’s are similar to each other. On previous discussions, it is realized that personnel management and human resource management are just synonymous to some organization while the other distinguished their differences. Dep Ed XI Personnel Section allows the similarity to take in the context of managing their workforce. It is evident in our visit. When we asked to be sent to the human resource department, we end up in their personnel section.

Administrative discipline of hiring and developing employees so that they become more valuable to the organization. It includes (1) conducting job analyses, (2) planning personnel needs, and recruitment, (3) selecting the right people for the job, (4) orienting and training, (5) determining and managing wages and salaries, (6) providing benefits and incentives, (7) appraising performance, (8) resolving disputes, (9) communicating with all employees at all levels.

It is stated that the term means an administrative discipline in the company which provides the specific needs of the people ware so as their benefits and incentives and other programs. Additionally, this discipline is merely concerned on the processes with regards to the "EMPLOYEES" in the company.

Personnel management is concerned with the effective use of the skills of people. They may be salespeople in a store, clerks in an office, operators in a factory, or technicians in a research laboratory. In a business, personnel management starts with the recruiting and hiring of qualified people and continues with directing and encouraging their growth as they encounter problems and tensions that arise in working toward established goals.

This definition is generally meant for all the people, their skills, and its development in their respective organizations. Personnel management is the discipline which manages all of the processes concerned in the people of the organization. These processes start in the hiring of the employees to their development or growth and also to the level of managing tensions that arises among the employees.

Source. http://www.zeromillion.com/business/personnel/personnel-mangement.html#ixzz0QfaMPmTf

Digital Information Environment

2009-09-30T06:24:00.000-07:00

Identify an information environment of your choice and write an essay to address the following questions: (3000 words)

• What should be your role within this environment?
• How can the principles of information organization and representation help you in performing this role?
• What are the challenges facing you in performing the role? How will you address these challenges?

DIGITAL INFORMATION ENVIRONMENT

Before getting into the topic, I think it is good to define the terms first. When I read the words “information environment”, the first thing that came up in my mind is that information environment means an environment where information exists; as the name suggests but I doubt it and so I look for its deeper meaning.

In computer science, information simply means processed, stored, or transmitted data while environment means the entire set of conditions under which one operates a computer, as it relates to the hardware, operating platform, or operating system. So those are the meanings of the individual terms but when you combine these two terms its meaning would be converted as the aggregate of individuals, organizations, or systems that collect, process, or disseminate information; also included is the information itself.

In the context of information environment, one may be confuse on what specific meaning is implied in this particular topic and I’m of no exception. However, dealing with the topic a little deeper gives me an idea to choose digital information environment as my choice.

I can compare this information environment as a library in itself but in a digital era.
Libraries inform their users of what materials are available in their collections and how to access that information. Before the computer age, this was accomplished by the card catalog — a cabinet containing many drawers filled with index cards that identified books and other materials. In a large library, the card catalog often filled a large room. The emergence of the Internet, however, has led to the adoption of electronic catalog databases (often referred to as "webcats" or as online public access catalogs, OPACs), which allow users to search the library's holdings from any location with Internet access. This style of catalog maintenance is compatible with new types of libraries, such as digital libraries and distributed libraries, as well as older libraries that have been retrofitted. Electronic catalog databases are criticized by some who believe that the old card catalog system was both easier to navigate and allowed retention of information, by writing directly on the cards, that is lost in the electronic systems. This argument is analogous to the debate over paper books and e-books. While libraries have been accused of precipitously throwing out valuable information in card catalogs, most modern ones have nonetheless made the move to electronic catalog databases. Large libraries may be scattered within multiple buildings across a town, each having multiple floors, with multiple rooms housing the resources across a series of shelves. Once a user has located a resource within the catalog, they must then use navigational guidance to retrieve the resource physically; a process that may be assisted through signage, maps, GPS systems or RFID tagging.
A digital library is a library in which collections are stored in digital formats (as opposed to print, microform, or other media) and accessible by computersThe digital content may be stored locally, or accessed remotely via computer networks. A digital library is a type of information retrieval system.

The DELOS Digital Library Reference Modeldefines a digital library as:
An organization, which might be virtual, that comprehensively collects, manages and preserves for the long term rich digital content, and offers to its user communities specialized functionality on that content, of measurable quality and according to codified policies.
The first use of the term digital library in print may have been in a 1988 report to the Corporation for National Research Initiatives[3] The term digital libraries was first popularized by the NSF/DARPA/NASA Digital Libraries Initiative in 1994.[4] These draw heavily on As We May Think by Vannevar Bush in 1945, which set out a vision not in terms of technology, but user experience. The term virtual library was initially used interchangeably with digital library, but is now primarily used for libraries that are virtual in other senses (such as libraries which aggregate distributed content).
There is now a critical mass of digital information resources that can be used to support researchers, learners, teachers and administrators in their work and study. The production of information is on the increase and ways to deal with this effectively are required. There is the need to ensure that quality information isn’t lost amongst the masses of digital data created everyday. If we can continue to improve the management, interrogation and serving of ‘quality’ information there is huge potential to enhance knowledge creation across learning and research communities. The aim of the Information Environment is to help provide convenient access to resources for research and learning through the use of resource discovery and resource management tools and the development of better services and practice. The Information Environment aims to allow discovery, access and use of resources for research and learning irrespective of their location.

http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/themes/informationenvironment.aspx

However, with the sets and collection of media and of media other than books for storing information, many libraries are now also repositories and access points for maps, prints, or other documents and various storage media such as microform (microfilm/microfiche), audio tapes, CDs, cassettes, videotapes, and DVDs. Libraries may also provide public facilities to access subscription databases and the Internet.
Thus, modern libraries are increasingly being redefined as places to get unrestricted access to information in many formats and from many sources. They are understood as extending beyond the physical walls of a building, by including material accessible by electronic means, and by providing the assistance of librarians in navigating and analyzing tremendous amounts of knowledge with a variety of digital tools.
Patrons may not know how to fully use the library's resources. This can be due to some individuals' unease in approaching a staff member. Ways in which a library's content is displayed or accessed may have the most impact on use. An antiquated or clumsy search system, or staff unwilling or untrained to engage their patrons, will limit a library's usefulness. In United States public libraries, beginning in the 19th century, these problems drove the emergence of the library instruction movement, which advocated library user education. One of the early leaders was John Cotton Dana. The basic form of library instruction is generally known as information literacy.

ROLE

The digital information environment has dramatically changed the way that faculty and students access information offered by academic libraries.
My role in the digital information environment is merely on the user side. I am the user of the information in the environment. I am the client who requests certain information from the server who in turn uses it for my helpful purpose. This kind of information technology made me use of the information I wanted by just a click on the mouse or by the press of the keys. The world is really flat in the sense that I don’t have to go anywhere else just to gather the information I needed. As long as there is a connection between me and the server, I have no problem.

In school, I am a student who is a patron in our library but usually I don’t hold books when I have to research certain things. Instead I use computers. Our school library really has a scarcity of books. So, what do you expect me to do? Instead of having high blood pressure of searching the books which is in the database but is nowhere to find in the actual, a very tiring stuff to do, all I have to perform is to go to our so called “virtual library”. But when our virtual library is full of my fellow schoolmates and when the information is badly needed, I just go to internet cafes, searching for the information I really needed.

In an overview of performance measures in higher education and libraries, Kyrillidou ( 1998) identified three issues that should be taken into account when assessing the reliability and validity of academic library data: consistency across institutions and time, ease versus utility in gathering data; and values, meanings, and measurement. The last issue refers to the interpretation of data as guided by local conditions. The methodology for Web surveys demonstrated in this study, given the appropriate networking topology, meets all three of these issues. It can be meaningfully applied with consistency across institutions and time. It is easy to implement and gathers useful data quickly. The data can be interpreted locally, and indeed, local questions can be asked to guide specific service decisions about networked electronic resources.
The vast majority of networked services use occurs on-campus, either in the library or from other locations on-campus, although resources in the electronic information environment are available to authorized faculty and students anywhere they have access to a computer and a network connection. Interestingly the purpose of use (sponsored research, etc.,) varied far more dramatically in both medical and academic libraries when comparing in-library use to remote use, than did the categories of users (graduate student, etc.). The categories of users, to generalize, are similar in the library and outside of the library, but the purpose of use is very different. Use of networked electronic resources for sponsored research occurs outside of the library. Since it is unlikely that faculty would divide their time in such a way, or would come into the library for instructional purposes but not for research, one might speculate that the faculty who come into the library are different people from those who do not, despite the similar percentage distributions.

These data support the conclusion that patrons who log into networked electronic resources from outside the library are different from those who come into the library, a point that came up frequently in discussions with medical librarians. Yet, many libraries make service decisions based upon activity at service points, for example, the reference desk. These service point data are often extended inferentially to represent the library population, for example, in collection development decisions. Although the vendors supply usage statistics for their networked electronic resources, they do not distinguish between usage inside or outside the library. Librarians may incorrectly assume that the usage of networked electronic resources in the library resembles the usage outside of the library.

Further, many libraries are re-inventing their library as a place to attract grant-funded researchers and scientists into the library. It may be felt that the lack of researchers or grant-funded scientists physically present in the library is a result of dissatisfaction with or disinterest in library services. The data presented here support the notion that the library is indeed doing its job, and delivering resources electronically to its patrons, even though they do not come into the library. To reach funded researchers, the library should offer more electronic services in a virtual library, and not worry about their lack of attendance in the physical library.

INFORMATION ORGANIZATION

The concept of information organization lies from the fact that information really needs to be organized. We organize information – in our minds and in information systems – in order to collect and record it, retrieve it, evaluate and select it, understand it, process and analyze it, apply it, and rearrange and reuse it. We also organize things, such as parts, merchandise in a store, or clothes in a closet, using similar principles for similar purposes.
Information organization can be understood from four perspectives: a data perspective, a relationship perspective, an operating system (OS) perspective, an application architecture perspective. But I chose the first perspective as the specific information organization I really needed

Data perspective of information organization

• the information organization of geographic data must be considered in terms of their descriptive elements and graphical elements because
o these two types of data elements have distinctly different characteristics
o the have different storage requirements
o they have different processing requirements
• for descriptive data, the most basic element of information organization is called a data item
o a data item represents an occurrence or instance of a particular characteristic pertaining to an entity (which can be a person, thing, event or phenomenon)
• a group of related data items form a record
o by related data items, it means that the items are occurrences of different characteristics pertaining to the same person, thing, event or phenomenon (e.g. in a forest resource inventory, a record may contain related data items such as stand identification number, dominant tree species, average height and average breast height diameter)
o a record may contain a combination of data items having different types of values (e.g. in the above example, a record has two character strings representing the stand identification number and dominant tree species; an integer representing the average tree height rounded to the nearest meter; and a floating-point number representing the average breast height diameter in meters)
• a set of related records constitutes a data file
o by related records, it means that the records represent different occurrences of the same type or class of people, things, events and phenomena
o a data file is individually identified by a filename
o a data file may contain records having different types of data values or having a single type of data value
o in data processing literature, collections of data items or records are sometimes referred to by other terms other than "data file" according to their characteristics and functions
• the concept of database is the approach to information organization in computer-based data processing today
o a database is defined as an automated, formally defined and centrally controlled collection of persistent data used and shared by different users in an enterprise (Date, 1995 and Everest, 1986)
? above definition excludes the informal, private and manual collection of data
? "centrally controlled" does not mean "physically centralized" --- databases today tend to be physically distributed in different computer systems, at the same or different locations
? a database is set up to serve the information needs of an organization
? data sharing is key to the concept of database
? data in a database are described as "permanent" in the sense that they are different from "transient" data such as input to and output from an information system
o the use of database does not mean the demise of data files
? data in a database are still organized and stored as data files
? the use of database represents a change in the perception of data, the mode of data processing and the purposes of using the data, rather than physical storage of the data
o databases can be organized in different ways known as database models
? the three conventional database models are: relational, network and hierarchical
? the emerging database model is object-oriented
• data are uniquely identified as individual objects that are classified into object types or classes according to the characteristics (attributes and operations) of the object

CHALLENGES

When we say challenge, what does it really mean in the context of my role in the information environment? Is it about confrontations? Problems? Tests? In some sense, all of these things.
Lack of ICT Training
There is lack of such expertise in working librarians. All participants viewed it as a major challenge. Establishing a digital library without refreshing the information technology and information retrieval skills of library professionals is a difficult task. A breed of experts and continuous training programmes to handle and operate the latest technology in libraries is a dire need.

Lack of Awareness

Many studies have found that a lack of awareness is associated with lower use of electronic collections (Ibrahim 2004; Said, 2006; Warraich, 2007; Bashir, 2008). Hussain (2006) explores the perception of LIS professionals regarding digital libraries. He found the low IT literacy rate in Pakistan to be a barrier to digital libraries (pp. 50-56). Sadique (2005) found that lack of awareness about Information Resource Center (IRC) in PUL and low digital literacy were the main causes of lower use of electronic services. In a similar vein, a low level of understanding and awareness of available sources and services by the science and technology teachers of Punjab University limit the use of information systems (Muzammil, 2008).

User Orientation

Orienting users to modern library services is another challenge. Mahmood, (2003), Ameen, (2006) and Rehman, (2008) warn LIS schools that they must produce graduates who are up to the demands of the changing and challenging information market place. A study by Naz (2007) depicts significantly lower use of OPACs due to lack of orientation by librarians and low level of IT information literacy among students. Bashir (2008) asserts that training needs attention from university authorities and HEC for better service in libraries.

Bandwidth and Infrastructure

Developing countries may have limited bandwidth available. Universities were faced with purchasing dedicated bandwidth, but HEC provides shared bandwidth via Pakistan Telecommunication Limited (PTCL). Poor connectivity has been a big challenge for accessing and downloading information especially large files.

Improve the Use of Electronic Resources

HEC databases are great source of electronic access for Pakistani universities, and are very costly. Overall use statistics show relatively more use by public universities users than private. The use statistics compiled for 2005 show that the cost per article is less than $2.30, and the cost is borne by the HEC (Said, 2006, p.20).
Universities whose use of e-resources is low have their subscriptions automatically canceled by the NDL programme. Use statistics justify the subscriptions and their effective use. Increasing the use of the databases is essential for maintaining institutional access and requesting subscriptions to more sources. Increased use of resources is the result of user awareness and orientation. Creating awareness and increased use is important for increased research productivity.

Preservation

Due to financial problems and poor infrastructure, it is a concern that digital libraries may lack their current resources in the future. Ameen (2005) and Haider (2004) anticipate the future of digital collections and state that subscriptions to online resources often provide only access rather than ownership. The library may be emptyhanded after the subscription ends.

Technical Support and Security

Security for digital information is a demanding challenge for librarians. Piracy, virus inversions, and parallel satellite networking stress are some of the problems for which solutions are needed. Information technology skills and applications are changing and developing quickly. To endure, digital libraries need the latest technology and more technical staff or experts for this purpose.

New Field of Research

This is new field of research for library and information professionals and researchers. User satisfaction, perception, use, and usability studies regarding digital library sources will be helpful for improving this programme.

Myths about Digital Collections

It is a challenge to combat the myths about electronic resources and libraries. Library users think that the web is a substitute for the library and that there is no need of librarians in the digital environment. In fact, the librarian is a mediator between the huge sea of information and its users, and the need for a trained mediator is more apparent than ever. Ameen (2005) rightly points out that library patrons have confusion. These confusions include the belief that the web is the equivalent of a library and feelings of fear and anxiety.

ADDRESSING THE CHALLENGES

Opportunities

It is a common saying that challenges are also opportunities. There are definitely opportunities for librarians at PUL and elsewhere.
Learning and Improvement of ICT Skills
Library professional can now get informal online education regarding about trends in librarianship on their desktops. They may improve their ability to retrieve information and serve users. Self learning regarding the use as well as understanding of new tools, acquisition of e-resources, and efficiency of retrieving information, dissemination, leadership qualities, and better use of human and financial resources can help meet digital library challenges.
Digital library services can play an increasing role in practical and specific tasks in teaching, learning, and research.

Marketing Strategies
Said (2006) points out that HEC allocated 7 percent of the NDL budget to marketing and promotion of e-resources and 12 percent for training researchers. This is great opportunity for LIS professionals to learn about marketing, develop marketing plans for better promotion , develop a marketing strategy to justify subscriptions to more databases or continuing existing sources, and learn about methods for internal and external communication. Marketing research, strategic analysis, and user segmentation can help librarians know their customers and develop a user-centered approach. Customer- centered services could enhance the use of electronic databases using marketing and promotion. Because of the market demand for more orientation, the LIS Department of the University of the Punjab conducted a workshop on this topic for working librarians. Such continuing education activities can help working professionals.

Improve the Image of Library

Punjab University librarians have a positive attitude towards the NDL. They are providing better services because of these digital sources. This programme not only improves the image of library but also the image of library professionals.

Awareness of Use of E-Resources and Researchers' Orientation

Library orientation can take place at the time of new enrollment, which is the practice at PUL. The role of departmental librarian is crucial. Hands-on exercises are helpful in introducing new students to electronic resources and services. Promotional material should also be distributed among all types of users. Said (2006) mentions that 8,850 faculty members and students were trained at the various seminars across the country from 2003-2006. The short courses and workshops conducted by HEC for library professionals can be a great opportunity for librarians to improve their IT literacy.

Design of Library Web Page

The library web page is used to promote library services and especially to provide access to e-resource links through ELIN. The library web page is an effective tool and should also be used to provide tips to researchers on search strategies and effective use of resources. LIS professionals have the opportunity to learn web page design and develop other ICT skills to help users.

REFERENCES:
http://www.thefreedictionary.com
http://www.clir.org/pubs/reports/pub110/introduction.html
http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~cyberia/PIE/
http://www.informationenvironments.org.uk/
http://www.google.com.ph/#hl=en&source=hp&q=information+environments&btnG=Google
+Search&meta=&aq=0&oq=information+environment&fp=cec5a45a8751de0f
http://informationr.net/ir/9-4/paper187.html
http://www.ncgia.ucsb.edu/giscc/units/u051/
http://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/~mbolin/wairrach.htm

Bible Study

2009-09-16T04:41:00.000-07:00

Bible study in our boarding house is an unforgettable event this year. It is because almost all of my boardmates were gathered again but not to settle certain issues but to enlighten by the words of God.

On September 15, 2009, Rooms 1-5 of our boarding boarding house were meeting at the same place. After some snacks, laughs and chats, we proceeded to the main event of the night, the first bible study in the history of our batch. The facilitator or the organizers have shown some video clips and stories which is all about people who are sinners and would naturally die. And when they die where do they eventually go? It’s between heaven and hell. As soon as the spirit leaves the physical body, they search for their world outside the world.

There’s a story that tells about two best friends. They share almost everything except the knowledge about GOD. In an unexpected moment, Josh met an accident and died. In his death, he wrote Zach a letter. He told him his every ways. Every single moment he experienced after his death. His agony..torment and such things. At first, he said he followed the crowd to the heaven but before entering the said kingdom, the angel spoke to him, only to hose whose names are written iin the book of life are allowed to enter. Unfortunately, he’s not one of them. So, he was destined to hell. He was in the lake of fire. He blamed his friend for what had happened to him. In result, Josh wished to Zach, “I wish you were here..”

From the video clip of the Passion of the Christ, Jesus was in front of the Hebrew council and suffered from the hands of the Romans. He greatly suffered but he sacrifices because of us sinners.

In that night alone, I’ve learned so many things and develop my curiosity even more. Upon watching the film, I also stared at the fellow board mates. Some have tears falling from their very own eyes. But I never cried, it’s unusual though, I am naturally sook. They said that the Spirit wasn’t on my kind. I just let their judgment. Instead, I hold my views by myself thinking that I wouldn’t have to pretend.

When an organizer let us raise our questions, I never did even though I have so  many questions and uncertainties.
First, Why did Christ is in the Hebrew council but he’s being punished by the Romans?
Note that Rome is far from the Hebrew place.

Second, isn’t it astonishing that Romans who put Jesus into great sufferings are the ones who founded the Christianism which is evolved into Roman Catholicism?

If people die and must go between heaven and hell, In the day of judgment, where do they go? Of course heaven and hell. But what really is the difference between the heaven and hell when people die and the heaven and hell mentioned in the Day of Judgment?

Also, if the heaven and hell mentioned after the judgment, where do dead people really go? I mean if they rise from the dead, ewhere did they rise from?
Of course, you can’t answer me hell.

Those are only some my questions that sought to be answered.

Am I sure that I’ll gonna be in heaven? Of course, all of us do not want to be in hell. Honestly, I was really iuncertain whether I’d be surely in heaven but of course I’m trying toi to qualify myself.

I was really happy to hear no religion nor could good deeds ever make you go to heaven. It’s faith. I felt that way because I have no specific religion. You see my father belongs to “Dating Daan” whilr my mother is an inactive RC. I was really doubtfuyl to answer whenever I’m asked about religion. It is because of those who judged my family. I neve hate them but I hate the thought. It makes me emotionela. I remember once, someone said that I must be RC because I was christened to that religion. But in my heart, I really go with the doctrines of my fathers excluding some exceptions. It is just that I don’t want to be in the company his religion. I don’t know why. I really had chandged.

The rest is history. It’s okay for me to have no relgion because I know I have  a strong faith in GOD. What am I after to is th sense of belongingnesss. Really, it seemed that I really don’t belong on the two religion or sect.

You know what, everytime I heard the chatterings of my friends abut their visit to church.
It made me miss thos days when our family go to church very siunday. I really miss those days. But in contrary, I also remembered my parents quarreled about my father’s vices such as by standing in the billiard halls, cock derby and liquor drinking. That’s the time hwen he was still in that religion (RC).

In the yaer 2000, he completely change. He completely was born again from his old way of life., full of vices, insufficiencies and religion.. Since then, our family grew happier. Also everthing my fatherasked was given to him. These blessings may be in terms of physical prospersity, menatal, social, etc.

Honestly, when asked about the thoughts when I heard the word/words born again, I will always remember my father having changed entirely. I guess It is just hius nature to search for belongningness in religion or sect. When he was still a child, he belonged to RC. In teenage, he was in the born again “church”. When he got married, he was in the RC again. In the new millennium, he belonged to the church of GOD.

It s really amazing to think of those things nmy father had done in his life. They said that, I am really similar to my father in almost all ways. Being intelligent, ehem../ Being philosophical, ,moody, pinkish skinned amongst others. But I guess, there’s only one thing I can’t have from him, the activeness in church organization.

In my college life, there’s so many persuasions such as in the bible study then after which join their church. I was once in the organization of my boardmate. Every Friday, I join their night of worshipping GOD. After few moments, I would realize that Idon’t belong to them. They would invite me from time to time. Of course, would give them so many alibis and would keep myself busy.

Inntheir time, I was also considered as born again. This time, from different invitation, the ones who showed us a film clip said that wether we believe it or not, we’re already born again. How was it> Everytime I agree and joined after their invitation of having bible study, I always have to be born again and again? What?

Of course, I believe and has faith in Jesus Christ. It is just that I am curios on what are they saying “Born again” in the group and “born again” in the other. Whatever they say “Born again,again….100 times. I would be born again if I completely change my life entirely.

By this second group, they invited us to join “ENCOUNTER”. Honestly, I really want to joj them but again, my parent have also a slot for decisions. Whatever it takes, the final decision depends upon me. Right?

Accept
Believe
Confess
Receive

John 3:16 For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, tha whoever believed in Him shal not perish but have a everlasting life.

Personnel Mgt and Human Resource Management

2009-09-09T20:55:00.000-07:00

PERSONNEL MANAGEMENT

Definition 1. In all organizations, there should be someone concerned with the welfare and performance of persons who are a part of the operation. When an individual or a team of individuals takes on this task of seeing to programs and setting policies that impact everyone associated with the company, they are engaged in the process of personnel management, sometimes referred to as human resources (HR).

Source. http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-personnel-management.htm

Critique. In this definition, the term personnel management is synonymous to human resource management. It implies that both have the same meaning, the management of the persons involved in the operations of all the organizations. They are the ones who are concern with the programs and activities for their company's persons.

Definition 2. Administrative discipline of hiring and developing employees so that they become more valuable to the organization. It includes (1) conducting job analyses, (2) planning personnel needs, and recruitment, (3) selecting the right people for the job, (4) orienting and training, (5) determining and managing wages and salaries, (6) providing benefits and incentives, (7) appraising performance, (8) resolving disputes, (9) communicating with all employees at all levels.

Source. http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/personnel-management.html

Critique.It is stated that the term means an administrative discipline in the company which provides the specific needs of the people ware so as their benefits and incentives and other programs. Additionally, this discipline is merely concerned on the processes with regards to the "EMPLOYEES" in the company.

Definition 3. Personnel Management is responsible for the provision of specialist personnel and human resource management advisory services to departments, and the development and implementation of a relevant, coherent and modern framework of employment policies and practices throughout the University.

Each member of Personnel Management is responsible for the provision of these services to a number of departments. This distribution is known as the Personnel Management Portfolio.

Personnel Management is also responsible for the delivery of the Human Resource Strategy and associated programmes of work.

Source. Staffordshire University
http://www.staffs.ac.uk/uniservices/personnel/management/index.php

Critique. This term is specifically meant in the university, particularly, the Staffordshire University. But the relevance of the meaning is just the same with the other definitions, only it is specific. Personnel Management is responsible for the implementation and distribution of the human resource management services throughout the university and its individual departments.

Definition 4. Personnel management is concerned with the effective use of the skills of people. They may be salespeople in a store, clerks in an office, operators in a factory, or technicians in a research laboratory. In a business, personnel management starts with the recruiting and hiring of qualified people and continues with directing and encouraging their growth as they encounter problems and tensions that arise in working toward established goals.

Source. http://www.zeromillion.com/business/personnel/personnel-mangement.html#ixzz0QfaMPmTf

Critique. This definition is generally meant for all the people, their skills, and its development in their respective organizations. Personnel management is the discipline which manages all of the processes concerned in the people of the organization. These processes start in the hiring of the employees to their development or growth and also to the level of managing tensions that arises among the employees.

Definition 5. the part of management that is concerned with people and their relationships at work. Personnel management is the responsibility of all those who manage people, as well as a description of the work of specialists. Personnel managers advise on, formulate, and implement personnel policies such as recruitment, conditions of employment, performance appraisal, training, industrial relations, and health and safety. There are various models of personnel management, of which human resource management is the most recent.

Source. http://dictionary.bnet.com/definition/personnel+management.html

Critique.5. In this definition, the personnel management is distinguished to human resource management. The former means a part of management that is concerned with the people and their relationships at work. The latter is the most recent model of the personnel management. To sum it up, the personnel management is part of the general management which has various models in which human resource management is the most recent.

HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

Definition 1. Human resource management (HRM) is the strategic and coherent approach to the management of an organization's most valued assets - the people working there who individually and collectively contribute to the achievement of the objectives of the business.[1] The terms "human resource management" and "human resources" (HR) have largely replaced the term "personnel management" as a description of the processes involved in managing people in organizations.[1] In simple sense, HRM means employing people, developing their resources, utilizing, maintaining and compensating their services in tune with the job and organizational requirement.

Source. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_resource_management

Critique. Here, it is clearly stated that the term human resource management replaces the term personnel management because of their significant distinction from each other. One means the strategic and coherent approach to the management of the organization's most prized assets- people. The other merely means the description of the processes involved in managing the people of the organization.

Definition 2. The Human Resources Management (HRM) function includes a variety of activities, and key among them is deciding what staffing needs you have and whether to use independent contractors or hire employees to fill these needs, recruiting and training the best employees, ensuring they are high performers, dealing with performance issues, and ensuring your personnel and management practices conform to various regulations. Activities also include managing your approach to employee benefits and compensation, employee records and personnel policies.

Source. Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD
http://managementhelp.org/hr_mgmnt/hr_mgmnt.htm

Critique. In this definition, the term HRM has the functions which is concerned in the staffing of the company., the processes involved in it and the various decisions and activities which conform to the regulations.

Definition 3. Administrative activities associated with human resources planning, recruitment, selection, orientation, training, appraisal, motivation, remuneration, etc. HRM aims at developing people through work.

Source.http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/human-resource-management-HRM.html

Critique. At this point, the term HRM implies the administrative activities associate within the human resources of the company. HRM aims at developing the people of the organization through work.

Definition 4. Human Resource Management (HRM) is the function within an organization that focuses on recruitment of, management of, and providing direction for the people who work in the organization. Human Resource Management can also be performed by line managers.

Source. Susan M. Heathfield
http://humanresources.about.com/od/glossaryh/f/hr_management.htm

Critique. in this definition, the term implies the function in the organization that is focused on the management of the people of the organization.

Definition 5. Term that is replacing personnel management and implying that personnel managers should not merely handle recruitment, pay, and discharging, but should maximize the use of an organization's human resources.

Source. http://www.answers.com/topic/human-resource-management

Critique. Here, the term HRM replaces personnel management. It implies that personnel management should not be concerned with the processes including recruitment, pay, discharging, etc... but should maximize the use of human resources. Then, it only means that the human resource management is the one who is concerned in the aspects which is beyond the scope of the personnel management.

Improving Internet Connectivity

2009-09-08T01:41:00.000-07:00

For me, there are so many ways to resolve the issue in terms of technology, infrastructures, innovations, steps, processes, amongst others. But before you think of the solutions, you have to consider the university’s budget first. Every organization and/ or institutions always have to consider the cost before planning the implement the changes or improvements in line with the pros and cons. And the university like the University of Southeastern Philippines is no exception. Aside form this fact, we have also to emphasize that USeP is a state university which means that its budget also depends from the budget allotted to them by the government and therefore, limited.

This means that as an IT consultant, I have to find ways to improve the university’s internet connection without spending so much money. So what are we focusing on is the cost and the speed of the internet connection.

But before we discuss about some solutions on the issue, let me introduce my job first, IT consultant.

What is IT consultant?

As the name suggests, Information Technology consultants work to improve the structure and efficiency of an organization’s IT systems. IT consultant works in partnership with clients, advising them how to use information technology in order to meet their objectives or overcome their problems.

IT consultants may be involved in many activities, including marketing, project management, client relationship management and systems development.

They may also be responsible for training and feedback. In many organizations, these tasks will be carried out by an IT project team. IT consultants are increasingly involved in sales and development, as well as technical duties. The following are some of the typical work activities of an IT consultant.

• meeting with clients to determine requirements;
• working with clients to define the scope of a project;
• planning timescales and the resources needed;
• clarifying a client's system specifications, understanding their work practices and the nature of their business;
• traveling to customer sites;
• liaising with staff at all levels of a client organization;
• defining software, hardware and network requirements;
• analyzing IT requirements within companies and giving independent and objective advice on the use of IT;
• developing agreed solutions and implementing new systems;
• presenting solutions in written or oral reports;
• helping clients with change-management activities;
• project managing the design and implementation of preferred solutions;
• purchasing systems where appropriate;
• designing, testing, installing and monitoring new systems;
• preparing documentation and presenting progress reports to customers;
• organizing training for users and other consultants;
• being involved in sales and support and, where appropriate, maintaining contact with client organizations;
• Identifying potential clients and building and maintaining contacts.

And now, we have to discuss the internet connectivity and its improvement in the university. As what I’ve said our focus will be on the speed of the internet.

But what is Internet?

Internet is a shortened term for Internetwork. Internetwork is simply defined as network of networks based on many underlying hardware technologies, but unified by an internetworking standard, the Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP). It is resulting from the connection of two or more computer networks via gateways using a common routing technology. Gateways are the original term for routers but were deprecated in this context because it brings confusion with the functionally different devices using at the same time.

The interconnection of networks with bridges (link layer devices) is sometimes incorrectly termed “internetworking”, but the resulting system is simply a larger, single subnetwork and no internetworking protocol (IP) is required to traverse it. However, a single computer network may be converted into an internetwork by dividing the network into segments and then adding routers between the segments.

At last, we are done with the definition of terms and now, we can start enumerating the helpful ways to improve the internet connection.

TECHNOLOGY

Technology can be most broadly defined as the entities, both material and immaterial, created by the application of mental and physical effort in order to achieve some value. In this usage, technology refers to tools and machines that may be used to solve real-world problems.
Speed is the most important thing in Internet. Most speeds are advertised in their bit speed, i.e. 1 mbps/256kbps, all with small bs. What’s the significance of this thought? It differentiates the capital B and the lower case b. B means byte while b is foe bits, the difference is that 1 byte equals 8 bits.
There are common methods of internet access which includes dial-up, landline (over coaxial cables, fiber optics or copper wires), T-lines, Wi-Fi, satellitre and cell phones.
Here is the table which summarizes the technologies and their characteristics in terms of typical and maximum speed.
Speed Table

Technology Typical Speed Maximum Speed
56K Modem 48kbps 56kbps
ISDN Single Channel: 64kbps
Dual Channel: 128kbps Same as Typical
ADSL 1-2mbps 8mbps
ADSL2+ not in use 25mbps
SDSL 1-2mbps 3mbps
Cable 2mbps 8mbps
Wireless 1mbps 12mbps

Dial-up connections

The most common type of the internet connection available from ISPsn and the slowest and yet the least expensive. In this case, if the university really needs to have an improved internet connection then, this is not the answer.

56K Modem

This is the original method most of us used to connect to the internet. It's limited to below 56kbps because of what the line can handle. This technology works by converting digital signals from your computer into a signal for the phone line, using a modem, at the other end, it's converted back again.

ISDN - Integrated Services Digital Network

This was the faster option available to many dialup users, with a guaranteed connection of 64 or 128, depending on the number of channels used. A line was typically split into 2 channels, and you would either use both for data, or one for data and the other for simultaneous voice.

DSL - Digital Subscriber Line

DSL or xDSL is a family of technologies that provides digital data transmission over the wires of a local telephone network. DSL originally stood for digital subscriber loop, but as of 2009 the term digital subscriber line has been widely adopted as a more marketing-friendly term for ADSL, the most popular version of consumer-ready DSL. DSL can be used at the same time and on the same telephone line with regular telephone, as it uses high frequency bands, while regular telephone uses low frequency.

This category of technologies is currently the fastest available right now. DSL is the superset of many technologies, where data is transmitted down your normal copper line as digital signals, because voice uses a different frequency, you can do both at once, splitters at either end split the voice and the data into separate streams.

DSL technologies have a limit on the distance between the premises and your local telephone exchange, which is usually between 3KM and 5KM depending on the speed of the service you are applying for. The download speed of consumer DSL services typically ranges from 256 kilobits per second (kbit/s) to 24,000 kbit/s, depending on DSL technology, line conditions and service-level implementation. Typically, upload speed is lower than download speed for Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL) and equal to download speed for the rarer Symmetric Digital Subscriber Line (SDSL).

ADSL - Asymetric Digital Subscriber Line

Often simply referred to as DSL in America, this method has a different upload and download speed, the download speed is usually much faster than upload, and is therefore ideal for the home user. It usually starts at about 256kbps rising all the way upto 8mbps in some areas, which in theory is the maximum.

Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Lines (ADSL)
have become a widely available broadband internet connection, providing a variety of data rates. The connections work by splitting the function of a phone line into separate channels for voice telephone calls and for data (intenet). Thus, a user can talk on the phone and be connected to the internet at the same time. ADSL connection services are sold with different speed specifications, below are some common configurations:

• 512 kbits/s/128 bit/s
• 1Mbit/s/256kbit/s
• 3 Mbit/s768kbit/s

ADSL2+

Probably able to carry upto 25mbps downstream, this is a new technology being trialled in some areas.

SDSL - Symetric Digital Subscriber Line

This method has the same upload and downloads speed, and so therefore the maximum download must be lower. This is more common for business use, or dedicated gamers, as the speed with which you can send data is faster than that of normal ADSL.

Cable

This system uses a mixture of fibre optics, and coaxial cable to your home, not your existing phone line, therefore the technology must be available in your area.
Cable Internet is the principal competitor of the DSL which offers a range of prices and speeds overlapping that of DSL, but tends to concentrate more on the high end of the market.

Wireless

This system uses radio technology, and a receiver based on your premises, depending on the technology, the receiver may be attached to your roof or inside the home. The speeds above were based on the UMTS TDD standards, in use by a UK wireless network (provided by Hong Kong).

To sum it up, among the above-mentioned types of common used connections, I highly recommend the use of DSL.

INFRASTRUCTURES

Infrastructure can be defined as the basic physical and organizational structures needed for the operation of a society or enterprise.

The Internet has placed heavy demands on infrastructure with its requirement for high-quality, high-speed connections. Internet service providers (ISPs) need access to international communication lines in order to interconnect with Internet backbones, as well as needing local access for their customers.

DSL connection is almost of no use if the university’s hardware can only comply with the minimum speed requirement. I mean, what is the use of fast internet connection if our computers and other devices have no capacity to manage large data in a second?
I also suggest in improving the computer units of the university. Units which are able to manage large amount of data I short span of time.

For the internet backbone, I suggest that the university only use the existing media in terms of what they only needed. Be it a copper wire or fiber optics. In consideration to the cost, fiber optics is known to be at least the most efficient in fast traversal of the data but it’s also expensive. Fiber optics is ideal for networks with a long distance. In the case of the university, the distances of the computer units are not too long to require fiber optics. Thus, I suggest the use of copper wires, it is just moderately expensive and yet effective.

INNOVATIONS

The term innovation refers to a new way of doing something. It may refer to incremental and emergent or radical and revolutionary changes in thinking, products, processes, or organizations.
The first tip is to get rid of your modem and move to ADSL. Yes, broadband is available at low cost in most areas.

Use a high speed port. This'll only apply to readers with really old computers. The serial port may use an old, slow chip called a UART. The answer is to fit a high speed serial port with a 16550 UART chip or to fit an internal modem which includes one of these beasties.

Organizations and institutions like the university would also have to have the acceptance to change. If in the current situation, they are not using the DSL connection or the copper wire media, then it’s the time they have to weigh the costs and advantages of the said technology and infrastructure with the existing ones.

This will guarantee a strong campus network infrastructure that will improve the University’s services, operations, managerial decision-making and strategic development.

PROCESSES

Process or method is a collection of related, structured activities or tasks that produce a specific service or product (serve a particular goal) for a particular customer or customers. It often can be visualized with a flowchart as a sequence of activities.

Here are some of the processes or steps which will help in improving the speed of the internet.

1.) Use Anti-Spyware:

There are numerous programs that can be obtained over the Internet that are harmful to your computer. These are not viruses or worms. Instead, they are known as "Spyware."

Spyware is not easy to define, because there are so many variations of it. In the most typical case, Spyware usually arrives on your computer because you agreed to permit it. Perhaps you signed up for a free tool bar, or downloaded free software, or you are using some web-based server such as a file-sharing site.

Some Spyware merely records information about what web sites you have visited, and transmits that information back to Spy. This slows down your computer because it takes time to send back this information. Some Spyware will actually hijack your computer. Many of the sophisticated Spammers (people who send junk mail) will hijack your computer and send off a few hundred junk emails without you ever knowing about it.

Spyware Blaster at: http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.html
Spyware Guard at:http://www.wilderssecurity.net/spywareguard.html
Spybot Search and Destroy at:http://spybot.eon.net.au/

2.) Use Firewall and kill Pop Ups

Another factor that slows down surfing, and is downright annoying anyway, is pop-up advertising. Pop-ups cost you bandwidth, which results in a loss of speed. Part of that suite of programs I mentioned earlier includes a pop-up killer.

Finally, there are problems that occur because others are attempting to gain information and/or control of your computer. They may do this by "pinging" your computer. A "Ping" is a request made by another computer for the identification number of your computer. Again, this information can be used to hijack your machine. Installing software known as a “Firewall” can prevent this.

Zone Alarm at: http://www.zonelabs.com/store/content/company/zap_za_grid.jsp
Popup Killer:EndPops.com at: http://endpopups.com

3.) Use Anti-Virus:

Another class of programs that we don't need are virus/worms. If you install the program I suggest for Anti-Virus, be sure to uninstall any other virus program you have running on your computer. It is not unusual for virus programs to disagree on which one is in control of your computer.

AVG Anti-Virus by Grisoft at: http://www.grisoft.com/us/us_index.php
Atomic Clock Sync at: http://www.worldtimeserver.com/

4.) Tweak your settings
Your PC has some settings that may improve modem throughput. All data sent over the internet goes in data packets.

5.) Use FTP download wherever possible.

If you want to download files, you can often choose between FTP or HTML download. FTP, (File Transfer Protocol,) is much faster for file transfers so you should choose that when you can.

6.) Use a download tool.

There's nothing more frustrating than losing a connection near the end of a one hour download.

7.) Use a faster browser.

Once you've connected to AOL, you can start any browser and run it in a second window. Opera is one of the fastest so why not download a free copy and give it a test run?

8.) Manage your cache.

Every time you use the internet, images and other files are downloaded onto your hard disk.

9.) Define a blank homepage.

Each time you start a browser outside your AOL window, the browser will go to the defined homepage.

10.) Don't display images.

Text only windows are much faster to download. You can easily restore images when required. Here's how to set whether to display images: From Internet Options (see above) select the Advanced tab. Scroll down until you see the multimedia section, then select or deselect "Show pictures." Select Apply then OK to save your change.

Finally, I strongly recommend that you keep informed these programs and their databases on a regular basis. If you don't, you won't be fully protected. My rule of thumb is twice a week.

11.)Update your Windows
If you are running any version of windows, you would also be well advised to download and install all available patches, fixes and updates from the Microsoft Windows Update web site at: http://v4.windowsupdate.microsoft.com/en/default.asp

That’s all. I hope I have successfully done my part as IT consultant.The above-mentioned tips and ways are only my suggestions to the university president if ever. In the end, it’s up to the president to weigh his decisions with the aide of my advice.

REFERENCES:

http://www.epinions.com/content_3428491396
http://www.practicalpc.co.uk/computing/comms/speedup.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org
http://www.helpbytes.co.uk/connections.php
http://www.epinions.com/content_3428491396
http://www.prospects.ac.uk/p/types_of_job/it_consultant_job_description.jsp

Human Resource

2009-08-27T22:51:00.001-07:00

“Human beings are the most important, potent, and critical resource of any organization and yet the least understood and worst managed.”

Human Resource is the most important

Human beings are considered as the assets and resource in any organization. Yet, compared to other resources such as physical ones such as the land, equipments and cash, human beings are considered the most important. Just think in a shallow manner, it’s already perceived that all of the other resources would just be useless without the human manipulation in the organization. It is because human beings are the ones responsible for the strategic development of the organization with the use of the other existing resources.

Without human beings, would you still think the concept of organization exists?

According to the Webster’s dictionary, organization is simply defined as a number of individuals systematically united for some end of work as a business enterprise, a political party, club, church, etc. Individuals mean the human beings which are also known as the organization men. Organization men are the members of the organization, party, company, etc. who is fully committed to its aims and methods of organization.

“Human resource” is a broad term that refers to “human capital,” the people of an organization. It’s a strategic function that links between talented and engaged people and the organizational success. However the terms “human resources” and “human capital” face the rational controversy. One of the reasons is that these terms may be perceived to as insulting to people because they bring the impressions that people are mere commodities, like equipments and other organizational assets despite the assurances to the contrary.

Another important controversy is the broader philosophical issue with the usage of the phrase “human resources” which is best illustrated in labor mobility. It is said that governments in developing countries often regard developed nations that encourage immigration or “guest workers” as appropriating human capital that is rightfully part of the developing nation and is required to further growth as civilization.

In this matter, modern analysis emphasizes that human beings are not “commodities” or mere “resources”. It is viewed that a strong social consensus on political economy and a good social welfare system facilitates labor mobility and tends to make the entire economy more productive as labor can develop skills and experience in various ways, and move from one enterprise to another with little controversy or difficulty in adapting.

So what is Human Resource Development by the way? Human Resource Development is the framework for the expansion of human capital within an organization. It’s a combination of training and education, in a broad context of adequate health and employment policies, which ensures the continual improvement and growth of the individual, the organization and the national human resourcefulness. Human Resource Development is not a defined object, but a series of organized processes with specific aiming of objectives. (Nadler, 1984)

Human Resource is the most potent

Every individual in an organization has the ability to develop itself which is a potential in satisfying the organizational goals. The development of the individual will benefit both the individual and the organization. In the corporate vision, the Human Resource Development framework views employees as an asset to the enterprise whose value will be enhanced by the development, “its primary focus is on growth and employee development…it emphasizes developing individual potentials and skills”(Elwood, Olton, Trott 1996). Its objective is to foster human resourcefulness through enlightened and cohesive policies in education, training, health and employment at all levels (JES Lawrence 2000). Human Resource Development in this treatment can be in-room group training, tertiary or vocational courses or mentoring and coaching by the senior employees with the aim for a desired outcome that will develop the individual’s performance.

At the organizational level, a successful Human Resources Development program will prepare the individual to undertake a higher level of work, “organized learning over a given period of time, to provide the possibility of performance change” (Nadler 1984). In these settings, Human Resources Development is the framework that focuses on the organizations competencies at the first stage, training, and then developing the employee, through education, to satisfy the organizations long-term needs and the individuals’ career goals and employee value to their present and future employers. Human Resources Development can be defined simply as developing the most important section of any business its human resource by, “attaining or upgrading the skills and attitudes of employees at all levels in order to maximize the effectiveness of the enterprise” (Kelly 2001).The people within an organization are its human resource. Human Resources Development from a business perspective is not entirely focused on the individual’s growth and development, “development occurs to enhance the organization's value, not solely for individual improvement.

Human Resource is the most critical

Only human beings have the capability to lead the organization. In nutshell, it is very absurd to think of other physical assets managing their own. Leadership, cohesion and loyalty played an important role in the organizational success. Although this view was increasingly challenged by more quantitatively rigorous and less soft management techniques in 1960s and beyond, Human Resource Development had gained a permanent role inn the organization. It’s very important o assess employee development needs and promotional potentials.

Another reason is that human beings are also decision-makers which affect the organization’s future. Their decisions will greatly influence the organization’s outcome. Wrong decisions may lead to the organization’s collapse while right decisions bring the organization’s success and growth.

Human Resource is hard to understand

It is a reality that every human individual is unique and always has differences with each other. And it’s very difficult to deal with differences.

For instance,, a certain employee complains that his boss is keep on demanding on the things he should do, to the level that the boss may seem to neglect the employee’s efforts and ideas. Boss’s sometimes have different ideas with the employees. It consequently results to misunderstanding between the senior employees and the employees themselves.

At the organizational level, Human Resource Management (HRM) has the objective to maximize the return on investment from the organization’s human capital and minimize the financial risks. It is the responsibility of the human resource managers to conduct these activities in an effective, legal, fair and consistent manner. It simply implies that managers in the organization is really expecting a lot from their employees as a mean in the success of the organization, be it on the return of the organization’s investment while minimizing the financial risks. There are times that employees can’t reach the expectations of their employers. Also employers can’t meet the demands of the employees. That is why they can’t be easily understood.

Human Resource is the worst to manage

It is also said that human beings are the most difficult to handle and to manage. They are the ones who can break or puzzle the heads of their senior employees or managers.

There are so many explanations that can answer the statement.
One, it is because of the individual differences. Also, it is because of the personal goals set by certain employees with the organizational goals. It is said that the greatest opponent of an individual is his self and defeating your own enemy also needs a great effort in part of for your self and the manager.

Two, there also individuals that are naturally stubborn, have behavioral abnormalities, inadequacies, have different life aspects that can affect his behavior and performance.

Lastly, human beings are not merely leveled to the other assets of the organization. Assets except people are easy to manage, even if we say, they are also difficult, still they can’t be compared to the level of difficulty in managing people.

The word “management” is a very crucial term especially when it pertains to human beings. It is because of the thought, “Human beings managing human themselves.” To elaborate, the Webster’s dictionary defines management as the act, art or manner of managing, controlling or conducting. It’s a skillful use of means to accomplish a purpose. “Individual development is a toll and means to an end, not the end goal itself” (Elwood F. Holton, James W. Trott Jr.)

Manage is sometimes referred to as control and to use which means that managers are to control the means (human) to accomplish a specific organizational goal. It’s very critical to note the phrase “person being controlled by another person”. It seems that you are like a puppet being controlled by a puppeteer for a certain movement you have to do so that you show (puppet show) would be successful.

Managers on the other hand, have also critical functions for the development of the organization. These are referred to as the Human Resource Management Key Functions which are the following: 1. Recruitment & Selection; 2. Training and Development (People or Organization); 3. Performance Evaluation and Management; 4. Promotions/Transfer; 5. Redundancy; 6. Industrial and Employee Relations; 7. Record keeping of all personal data. ; 8. Compensation, pensions, bonuses etc in liaison with Payroll ;9. Confidential advice to internal 'customers' in relation to problems at work; 10. Career development; 11. Competency Mapping; 12. Time motion study is related to HR Function; 13. Performance Appraisal

REFERENCES:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_resources

SONA 2009: Human Resource Management

2009-08-25T02:56:00.001-07:00

On her 9th State of the Nation Address (SONA), last July 27, 2009, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo cited the status and improvements of the nation in terms of different fields. One of which is related to Human Resource Management. Some of the areas related to HRM and the reasons that can help in the improvement in the quality of life are the following:

1.) Tourism Sectors

Tourism sectors serve as an additional engine of the growth of the country in whose development helps in creating wealth. It is said that the tourism is now a $ 5 billion industry. Tourism provides more jobs and generates more income.

Take the case of the 100 families living in the Suba fishing community on Olango Island.
At first, fishermen had caught less fishes which mean very low income, pushing them to do illegal fishing which results to more damaged coral reefs. Also, the village women feels like the market in making shell handicrafts has been oversaturated, that’s why they are facing the income challenges. Plus, scarcity in potable water, electricity, health services brought them to the low livelihood status. It is then found that the family income was only $37 a month.

Because of the initiative of USAID funding enabled the Philippine Department of Environment and Natural Resources’ Coastal Resource Management Project (CRMP) to conduct a series of workshops for community members. Its goal is to help the village attain their economic goals by creating the place as a tourist destination from the region’s migratory bird flyway.

After a trial tour by international tourism experts in 1998, and earning an “A” rating, the authentic community ecotourism product was launched. In 1999, the cooperative took over administration of the tour operations and formalized collective ownership of the business.

As a result, The Olango Birds and Seascape Tour, now managed by fifty-five cooperating community families, had thirty-three runs with 357 visitors during its introductory period, with 31% foreign guests from seventeen countries. More than thirty international organizations have visited the project. Familiarization tours were introduced for government agencies and tour operators to experience the potential of the project. Hopeful villagers are made as local tour guides which means additional income, so on and so forth.

Another major boon for Philippine tourism is the government’s current P2.4 trillion budget for infrastructure developments to be implemented from 2006-2010, which will be increased by nearly 60% per year until 2010.

One of its many importances is that it enables in the reduction of the Filipino jobless workforce. Within the last year, the country saw a continued reduction in unemployment, with 900,000 new jobs created as a result of government, a figure the Arroyo administration was able to accomplish annually since 2001 (an annual average of 897,000 versus the previous administrations yearly average of 134,000). Nine out of 10 working age Filipinos are now employed.

“The most important result of President Arroyo’s economic achievements is the elevation of Filipino citizens’ well-being,” said Emma Ruth Yulo, Director of the Philippine Department of Tourism in New York.

(Michael Verikios - Wednesday, June 27, 2007)

"Tourism means jobs. Where tourism advances, poverty retreats," said Richard Gordon, former secretary of the Department of Tourism

 He explained that the benefits from tourism "will trickle down to the members of the population, as seen in the Maldives experience. Just as in that island paradise, the cottage industries of this region, such as weaving and rattan furniture, will also profit from the advances in tourism. More importantly, the international market will be aware of the other, more established components of the regional economy, such as mining and agriculture."(http://www.senate.gov.ph/press_release/2007/1127_gordon1.asp)

2.) Microfinance

P165 billion worth of microfinance has given benefits in almost 7 million entrepreneurs.
The Philippine Microfinance Industry:

• Made remarkable progress the past ten years
• Reached a large number of the poor
• Market has grown
• Large unmet demand for microfinance services among the poor
• At end 2002, 25% of 4.3 million poor households reached
• Mostly married women
• MF clients clustered around the poverty threshold, including the vulnerable non-poor
• Estimated leakage to non-poor clients was 20%

(http://www.kms.aim.edu.ph/aim-adb/day1/mfp.pdf)

Microfinance Council of the Philippines, Inc. has the following objectives:

1. To help members serve significant numbers of poor households with financial and non-financial services.
2. To promote the adoption of poverty assessment tools and social performance monitoring systems.
3. To promote the adoption of and adherence to international performance standards.
4. To advocate for a policy environment that is conducive to the growth and development of a market-oriented microfinance sector.
5. To help build members' capacity for innovation that enhances the development of a market oriented microfinance sector.
6. To promote market-oriented microfinance products and services.
7. To initiate the conduct of international and national forums for best practice microfinance.
8. To mobilize resources and to network with government, donors, funding agencies, investors, and financial markets in order to enhance the development of the microfinance sector.
(http://www.microfinancecouncil.org/mission-vision.htm)

3.)Economic Resiliency Plan

Economic resiliency plan benefited 1,000 entrepreneurs including Gigi Gabiola, former Dubai household service worker who is now working in DOLE.

The P300-billion Economic Resiliency Plan of the country is aimed to pump prime the country's economy in 2009.
This was announced by Socioeconomic Planning Secretary and NEDA Director-General Ralph G. Recto as he recently bared the plan's framework.

The Plan, which is the country's own stimulus package, was borne out of President Gloria Macapagal - Arroyo's desire for the country "to hit the ground running in 2009" in response to the global economic crisis.
"What we intend to do is upgrade infrastructure and capital stock and expand social protection at the same time," Recto said.

[size=14]The resiliency plan hopes to ensure sustainable growth and attain the higher end of the growth targets for the year. The Development Budget Coordination Committee has pegged growth for 2009 at 3.7 percent to 4.7 percent.
In particular, the Plan aims to save and create jobs, protect the poorest of the poor, returning OFWs and workers in export industries, ensure low and stable prices to support consumer spending, and enhance competitiveness in preparation for the global rebound.
(http://www.pia.gov.ph/?m=12&fi=p090109.htm&no=43)

4.) Health Insurance

In Health Insurance, it almost covered 86 % of the over all population.
Philhealth is a premier government corporation that ensures sustainable, affordable and progressive social health insurance which endeavors to influence the delivery of accessible quality health care for all Filipinos.
As a financial intermediary, PhilHealth shall continuously evolve a sustainable National Health Insurance Program that shall:
• Lead towards universal coverage
• Ensure better benefits for its members at affordable premiums;
• Establish close coordination with its clients through a strong partnership with all stakeholders; and,
• Provide effective internal information and management systems to influence the delivery of quality health care services.
(http://www.philhealth.gov.ph/about_us/index.htm)

 It is significant because employees deserved different kinds of benefits and one of these benefits is related to health, an important asset of every workforce.

Securitization law didn’t encourage the recklessness that brought down giant banks and insurance companies elsewhere and laid their economies to waste. It monitors and regulates the new fangled financial schemes.

5.) Technical Education and skills training

In Technical Education and skills training, the government has invested three times that of three previous administrations combined. Jennifer Silbor, one of the 10 million trainees learned medical transcription and is now an independent contractor and lecturer for transcriptions in Davao and is earning Php 18, 000 per month.

Also, over 800,000 workers will be trained to help them find higher paying jobs and better employment opportunities this year through a P5.66-billion fund the government has set aside for massive skills training and technical education.
(Paolo Romero, The Philippine Star)

(http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleid=470711)

 It helps in the improvement of the life of the human resources to learn specific in demand needs of the industry.

6.) Benefits for OFWs

In the case of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs), the government is trying to create jobs which generates greater earnings so that oversea work will just be a career choice ; not the only option for a hardworking Filipino in search of a better life.

It is known that OFWs have a big help in the advantage of the nation’s economy. It records $ 16 B last year and is expected to grow this year. However, this is not a sacrifice joyfully borne. It is a lonely and hard work.

“Meanwhile, we should make their sacrifices worthwhile,” the president said. She noted the need to protect and give importance with the earnings the OFWs gained. That means stronger consumer protection for OFWs to property and products back home. In this connection, Investors Protection Task Force is addressed.

PGMA noted that she didn’t hesitate to visit the OFWs all over the world with their respective host countries such as Japan, Brazil, America, Middle East, and Europe, so and so forth. Its purpose is to listen and understand their needs and problems and how the government could answer these by working out better policies on migrant labor or by saving lives and restoring liberty.

Her visit to Saudi made way for King Abdullah pardon almost 700 OFWs in prison. Her visit to Spain made King Juan Carlos to communicate with other countries to address the problems of the OFWs. Same with Sheikh Khalifa, Prime Minister of Bahrain. Also, her visit to Kuwait made Emir al-Sabah to commute death sentences.

Other Overseas Filipino Workers Programs, Services , OFW Benefits,Charity and Welfare for General Filipino Community are the following:

* OWWA and Microsoft's Tulay Project for Overseas Filipino Workers (Added Mar 2007)
* Atikha - Economic and Social Services to OFWs and their Families (Added Mar 3 2007)
* ACHIEVE,INC - Action for Health Initiatives, Inc. (Added June 24 2007) - NEW
* Banco De Oro - BDO Asenso Kabayan Program (Added Mar 4 2007)
* BPI Express Online - Tulong Sa Pinoy Project (Updated Mar 3 2007)
* Classroom Galing Sa Mangagawang Pilipino Abroad (Updated Mar 3 2007)
* CFO Services for Overseas Filipino Workers and Filipino Immigrants (Updated Mar 3 2007)
* DBP (Development Bank of the Phils) Electronic Cash Remittance (EC REMIT) Program (Added JUn 24 2007) - NEW
* DOLE: Kasanayan at Hanapbuhay Program - KasH Program (Added Mar 2007)
* DOLE: KAbataan Program for Filipino Youth (Added Mar 22 2007)
* DTI: Order Regalo Program for OFWs (Added Mar 22 2007)
* Duty FREE Philippines Balikbayan Plus Program (Updated Mar 3 2007)
* ECONOMIC RESOURCE CENTER FOR OVERSEAS FILIPINOS (ERCOF) PHILIPPINES, INC. (Updated Mar 3 2007)
* Friend of Overseas Filipinos Incorporated Scholarship Program (Updated Mar 3 2007)
* Gabay ng OFW - Rated Public Service Radio Program for OFWs (Added Mar 3 2007)
* Gawad Kalinga (GK) - Building Houses for the Poorest of the Poor (Added Mar 4 2007)
* Globe Kababayan - makabagong mga serbisyo para sa mga OFWs at kapamilya (Added Mar 3 2007)
* GO Negosyo - Philippine Center for Entrepreneurship (PCE) promotes entrepreneurship nationwide (Added Mar 4 07)
* HONDA Motors - CAREmittace Program for Overseas Filipino Workers (Added Mar 2007)
* LIBRENG Aral Sa Computer - FREE Computer Course Training
* National Reintegration Center for Overseas Filipino Workers (NRCO) (Added June 24 2007) - NEW
* OFW E-Card - Equitable PCI Card Service for OFWs / Overseas Filipino Workers
* OWWA Credit Program for OFWs (Updated Mar 3 2007)
* OWWA EDUCATION AND TRAINING BENEFITS (Updated Mar 3 2007)
* OWWA Insurance and Health-Care Program Benefits (Updated Mar 3 2007)
* Pabahay Handog sa Pilipino, Inc. (Updated Mar 2007)
* Pag-Ibig Fund Overseas Program for Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW)
* Pamilyang OFW-SME Netwwork Foundation, Inc (Updated Mar 2007)
* Pasali Cooperative Nederland - Advance the Ecoonomic Empowerment of the Overseas Filipinos (Added Mar 4 07)
* Philhealth's Coverage for Overseas FIlipino Workers Medicare Program (Added Mar 22 2007)
* PNB: OWN A PHILIPPINE HOME LOAN PROGRAM for OFWs and Non-OFW (Added Mar 22 2007)
* POEA - The Bagong Bayani Awards
* POEA OFW Services ( Philippine Overseas Employment Agency)
* Scholarship on Professional Animation for OFW Dependants
* SMEF-Center for Overseas Filipino Workers! (Added June 24 2007) - NEW
* Social Security System (SSS) Flexi Fund for Overseas Filipino Workers
* SSS Housing Loan Facility for Trade Union Members and OFWs ( Updated Mar 3 2007 )
* Ugnayan at Tulong para sa Maralitang Pamilya Foundation, Inc. (Updated Mar 3 2007)
* UNLAD KABAYAN MIGRANT SERVICES FOUNDATION INC.

(http://vanie.ofw-connect.com/an_overseas_Filipino_Workers_Programs_Services_Welfare_Benefits.htm)

 It is important since it addresses the needs and problems our fellow Filipino workers in the other countries which is a big help in the growth of the countries economy.. It means that the government values them and offers the things they really deserved in exchange with their sacrifices.

MY BLOG:
http://shielamariepnara.blogspot.com/2009/08/assignment-8-in-mis-sona-2009.html

REFERENCES:

http://jlp-law.com/blog/state-of-the-nation-address-sona-2009/
http://archondigital.com/wp-content/uploads/sona.jpg
http://www.usaid.gov/stories/philippines/cs_philippines_tourism.html
http://www.traveldailynews.com/pages/show_page/18746-Philippines%60-sustainable-growth-benefits-tourism