Introduction to Information Technology

This document provides an introduction to information technology, focusing on its role in business success and failure, social and ethical issues faced by companies, different types of networking technologies, and the importance of intranet and internet in business. It also discusses the benefits and drawbacks of investing in information technology.

Introduction to
information technology

Abstract
In every organisation, there is a use of Information technology as it assist in managing work
and store information that is associated with the activities of the company. In addition to this, it
helps an entity to reach maximum number of people and boost their businesses. HSBC bank
implementing their operations and activities in proper manner by the assistance of advanced
technology. Information technology plays a vital role that leads to growth and success of an
entity such as tracking, maintain transparency, customer database management and many more.
There are various social & ethical issues that is faced by companies such as security of data,
discrimination & harassment etc. Moreover, there are various types of network technology that is
LAN, WAN, PAN that assist companies to develop connectivity within or outside the
organisation. There are many benefits and drawbacks of investing in information technology that
is important to identify before adopting it at workplace.

Contents
Abstract............................................................................................................................................2
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................4
LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................................................................4
Role of Information Technology in success and failure of company.....................................4
Ethical and social issues that affect to running business........................................................5
Differentiate among various types of networking technologies.............................................6
Discuss the importance of intranet and internet in business:.................................................6
List and explain the difference stages of system development life cycle...............................7
Analysis and Discussion..................................................................................................................9
Benefits and drawbacks of investing in Information technology...........................................9
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Information technology is defined as study, design, development & support of computer
based system that involves hardware as well as software applications. Along with this, it is also
termed as a subset of communication & information technology (Chuang and Huang, 2018). For
the present report, HSBC bank is taken into consideration. It is a multinational investment bank
and renowned as 7th largest bank globally by 2018. It was established by Sir Thomas Sutherland
in the year 1865 and its head office is located at London, United Kingdom. The report covers
role of information technology in business failure and success. Along with this, social & ethical
issues faced by companies while running business is discussed. The different form of networking
technology and importance of internet and intranet is describe in report. Later, system
development life cycle, benefits as well as drawbacks to invest in IT is discuss in detail in the
present report.
LITERATURE REVIEW
Role of Information Technology in success and failure of company
IT is mainly used in every organisation and in every sector in order to implement activities
and operations in an effective as well as smooth manner. If it is talking about HSBC, it deals in
banking sector and it is important for them to use advanced technology which help in gaining
higher growth and development in market. The role of information technology in company is
defined below:
Customer database management: Information technology plays an important as it help
Company to gather and maintain information of customer in a secure and safe manner (Rad,
Nilashi and Dahlan, 2018). By the assistance of IT, all the staff members and higher authorities
of HSBC maintain, collect data adequately which assist in transforming information into
customer centric sector that has a positive effect on its productivity.
Maintain transparency & Tracking: By using advance technology, HSBC is able to
track all the information of its customer that is associated with banking service as it will help
them to maintain appropriate and accurate data. In addition to this, it also assist in maintaining
transparency with customers that develops a trust and positive image in the mind of customers.
Communication: Another role that information technology plays is communication as it
helps an organisation to maintain good relationship with customers, suppliers and staff members

as well. In addition to this, it is adopt by HSBC for communicating with customers by emails,
messages, chatrooms and many more. Moreover, it also helps in spreading awareness about
services of HSBC by using various social media applications.
Ethical and social issues that affect to running business
Every organisation faces various social as well as ethical issues while implementing
activities that directly impact on performance and productivity of the company. Ethical issues is
considered as situation, activity or conditions that develop conflict that is associated with
principles and morale of societies. Social issues is arise when activities implement by company
has negative impact on people living in the society. These problems has different categories that
is pollution, health issue, discrimination and so on. The ethical & social issues that take place in
HSBC at the time of conducting activities are as follows:
Discrimination & Harassment: It is one of the major social & ethical issue that is faced
by companies. It arise because employees have the perception that they did not have the power
as other employee. It negatively effect on their mental as well as physical health. Along with
this, it decline morale of employees due to which their efficiency declines that leads to reduce in
profitability of the organisation (Chuang and Huang, 2018). Workplace discrimination take place
because of age, income, gender, colour, physical appearance and so on. It is important for higher
authorities of HSBC bank to follow all the legislation and rules as it assist in declining conflicts
at workplace.
Compliance &Governance Issues: It is important for mangers of an organisation to create
strategies and plans by considering all the government rules in order to avoid any legal issues.
With reference to HSBC bank, its mangers ensure that activities or strategies that is planned by
them undertaken after considering all compliance and government laws as it help in running
business in a smooth manner.
Security of customers and employees data: One of the most essential ethical issue that is
nowadays arise in every sector when data or information of customers and employees is hacked.
It is important for an entity to maintain privacy as it assist in satisfying customer and build
positive image in market. For this, HSBC bank adopt advanced system in order to protect
information of customers and staff members as it help them to gain loyalty of customers which
has a positive effect on its market position and profitability of the organisation.

Differentiate among various types of networking technologies
Network technology is defined as a tool that allow an organisation to exchange data,
information & statistics among small and large information system. Herein, an entity connects
with different resources such as wireless, satellite, optical cable and so on. This helps an
organisation to communicate in different ways such as video call, texting, and voice call. The
types of network technologies is given below in relation to HSBC:
WLAN: It is known as wireless local area network which is same as local area network. Wi-
Fi is such an example of WLAN that did not require any type of physical cables for connectivity.
HSBC used this networking technology on its particular branches in order to give internet
connectivity to employee to access accounts and to give on time service to customers.
PAN: Personal are network that is consider as smallest networking technology and is made
of wireless modem which is sufficient for two computers, tablets, phone and so on. HSBC used
this networking technology in order to give internet connectivity in cabins or among two or three
employees.
SAN: It is termed as storage area network that is mainly used by those companies where
large number of storage devices is connected with several servers. SAN technology did not
depend on other technologies such as LAN, Wan and so on (Stover, 2019). HSBC operates at
wide level and using this technology which enables them to pool information, statistics and data
in a proper manner.
By the assistance of this network technology, HSBC is able to implement activities in proper
manner that leads to attainment of objectives within stipulated time frame.
Discuss the importance of intranet and internet in business:
Nowadays, the effective business activities are relying on the use of the intranets to provide
tools such as scheduling, managing the customer relationship with the client, collaboration and
project management which will helps in increasing the productivity of the organisation in the
long run. An intranet is private network which is available to the employees of the HSBC bank.
It provide range of information and services to the staffs of the organisation but are not available
for the public it is important focal point for the internal communication and collaboration and
gives single point for the internal as well as for the external resources. The intranet is form with
the technologies for the local area networks (LANs) and wide area networks (WANs). Some of

importance of the intranet which are beneficial for the HSBC employees are stated as below:
(Bawden, and Robinson 2015)
 Workforce productivity: Intranets provide the users to locate and read the information
faster and use the applications which are related to their roles and responsibilities.
 Enhanced the collaboration: under this situation, the information is accessible to the
users which leads to enhance the performance of the HSBC bank.
 Time saving: it provide organisation to gives the information to its employees on the
needed basis in real world and it became easier for the employees to get the relevant
information as company them such information available on the intranet.
 Reduce the costs: user can browse the information, there is no need to maintain the
physical document files.
 Improve the communication: it can be used as medium to have effective
communication in the work related places. (Beynon-Davies, 2016)
Importance of internet:
 Real time data: it helps in providing the real data to its user at the work location
which helps the employees to perform better in the organisation.
 New methods of socialization: in the current scenario, the organisation has been
operating its activities from different location; internet helps them in increasing
their socialization at the work.
 Helps in research projects: with the access of the internet the employees are
able to conduct their research on various topic
 Helps in online assignment: it helps the organisation to submit their projects on
time and do it in most effective ways. (Lloyd,, 2017. )
 Accessibility : the organisation can easily access the internet and get the required
information which is need to execute their operations.
List and explain the difference stages of system development life cycle.
The system development cycle is a set of procedure of the software which is represented in the
methodical ways. It can be defined as project management system that shows different stages
that are involved in bringing the projects from the start point to the finish stage. This process is
used as model for the technical and non-technical activities to deliver the good quality system

which are needed to meets the business expectations. The stages which are involved under
making the system development life cycle are discussed as follows:
Planning: this is first part of the system development process, here planning is uses a
process to decide what new information should look in the systems and it also helps in
identifying the resources which are needed to make system.
System analysis and requirement: here performance of the software at different stages
are evaluate and analysis to make note for further requirement. Analysis is very important for
moving to next step. (Rajaraman,2018. )
Design: it is easy step in developing the system as it include making the blueprint who
software must look like. This process involve the design of the application, network, database,
user interfaces and system interfaces.
Development: this is very important part of developing the software as information are
uploaded in the system and hardware are purchased and installed in the system. Then the
software is coded and loaded on the testing platform. Various codes are developed for the
software which are implanted in the system in the form of codes and are loaded into the system
and then tested by the quality manager.
Integration and testing: under this stage, the quality analyst will conduct the testing
process on the software as make sure that new information can work flawlessly in the system.
Once the code of the software are develop then its time to test the effectiveness of such software
in the system so that they will be no difficult in the coming stages in the process.
Implementation: after the software is developed and tested, the implementation stages
comes here implementation take places by designing the source code though coding for this it
provide lot of time to code the system in accurate manner.
Maintenance: this is the final stage here maintenance process is done where the
software will be checked and upgraded from time to time so that it can provide accurate
information to its users. It also involved handling the errors which comes up in software and
resolve issues which can also exist even after testing phase. (Rivard and Aubert,. 2015)

Analysis and Discussion
Benefits and drawbacks of investing in Information technology
In today’s world, every company is investing in information technology in order to make
work easier and effective as well. IT involves some limitations and it is important for an
organisation to consider it before adopt any technology at workplace. The advantages and
disadvantages of investing in IT is mentioned below with relation to company:
Benefits:
Enhance data storage system: By the assistance of information technology, an
organisation is able to manage data of customers, staff members and other related persons in a
proper and effective manner. In context to HSBC, investing in IT assist them to store information
of all customers that leads to decline in issues and conflicts related to data.
Increases productivity: By investing in Information technology, an organisation is able to
use advanced technology that cut down their processing cost or decline the level of wastage that
is occurred at workplace (Long, 2018). With the help of new technology, HSBC is able to give
quick and quality service to customer due to which sales and profitability if organisation is
increases in a proper manner.
Drawbacks:
Expensive & Time consuming: It is determined that investing in information technology
occurs high cost to company and is a time consuming process that have a negative effect on
profit and revenue level of the organisation. In order to adopt new technology, companies is
require to give training session to employees that also occur cost and decline profit level of an
entity.
Increase job insecurity: Investing on information technology at high level creates job
insecurity between employees that effect on their motivation and productivity level. The
employees feel insecure if their skills are not match with new technology or any other colleague
have the idea about new technologies.
CONCLUSION
According to the above discussion, it can concluded that information technology is very
important as well as essential part of the organisation as it helps providing the accurate
information about the market and trends in the target markets. Further there is also discussion

different types of networks present in the organisation which helps in coordinating the activities
at different locations of the organisation. The importance of the intranet and internet is also
disused in this report and different stages of the system development life cycle are studied.
Information technology has essential part in the success and failure of the business as it helps in
giving correct information about the work environment which can be helpful for the organisation
to get success in the target market.

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