HC1041 IT for Business - Assessment of Point of Sale System for Four Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery

This report assesses the implementation of a Point of Sale system for Four Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery, analyzing its advantages, disadvantages, competitive advantage, centralization of database, decision-making facilitation, telecommunication options, and risk mitigation strategies.

HC1041 IT for Business
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Executive summary
Information technology advancement has become a crucial part for every industry and firms.
This report is based on assessment of Point of sale system (POS) for effective organisation
operation (specifically for four season greenhouse and Nursery). The report will assess
advantages and disadvantage of POS system, competitive advantage through POS system,
centralization of database and other associated terms such as facilitation in decision making,
telecommunication through POS system and safeguarding through POS system.
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Contents
Executive summary.....................................................................................................................................2
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................3
Analysis.......................................................................................................................................................4
Conclusion.................................................................................................................................................10
References.................................................................................................................................................11
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Introduction
Information technology is key thing for maintaining organization processes and organization
data. Technological advancement has provided various systems (comprising software’s) which
are useful for maintaining costing and accounting data and managing organization processes.
This report is formed for assessment of inclusion of POS system in “Four seasons Greenhouse
and Nursery”. This is a small nursery which is situation in Colorado and the organization is
currently working majorly manually for handling its costing and accounting details. This
organization is maintaining its manual register for recording financial transactions (sales) and
other cash entries. The company put in high efforts for maintaining data manually and this lead
to delay in effective management operations.
With such background, this report will analyse the benefit of inclusion of POS system in the
organization. POS is a system which keep proper track of sales transactions, it also maintain the
track of inventory and also stores operational data for long term view and for making any
possible changes. Thus, there will proper analyses about the pros and cons of POS system for
four season’s greenhouse and analyses of facilitation of it for effective management.
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Analysis
1) What are the advantages and disadvantages of new POS system?
The advantages and disadvantages of the new POS system implemented by the Four Seasons
Greenhouse and Nursery in its business operations are explained as follows:
Advantages:
 The new POS system helps in the automatic tracking of the business data and transaction
rather than accessing the business transactions manually. It also allows the compilation and
access of sales history.
 The system also helps in automatic storage of sales data and inventory timely and accurately.
 The system facilitates easy compilation of the sales transactions as soon as the transactions
are entered within the system.
 The new system allows inventory management by making entries for items sold and placing
orders for inventory.
 This system also allows in maintaining the cash transactions and recording cash entries in the
system with regards to sales and inventories.
 The new system supports sales management process by performing the functions of input,
tracking and disbursement of data for the purpose of decision-making. This assists in
managing the business operations.
Disadvantages
 The transactions and data recorded in the system are easily accessible and therefore the risk
of leakage of useful and confidential information exists with the new system.
 The new system delegates more responsibility to the staff and shift the burden of managers to
the employees and subordinates.
 The system process detailed reports about coting of products and other inventory and sales
data which become complex for the interpretation and understanding for decision-making
(Kirchmer, 2012).
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2) How will this POS system help the business gain competitive advantage?
The new POS system will help the business in gaining competitive advantage by facilitating the
leveraging of business data and achieving operational efficiency. The POS system supports the
system helps in establishing the accountability of the employees for the job performance and
allocating labour expenses to different functions. This will help the business in increasing
productivity (Kindstorm, 2010). Apart from this, the new system helps in preparation of detailed
cost reports for effective decision making and pricing of business products. The identification of
real costs from the cost reports help in the production of more profitable items for the business.
The product margins can determined for effective pricing. The system processes the sales and
inventory transactions, facilitates data storage and access and report generation which helps in
effective management of business operations. The accurate and timely orders for inventory can
be placed with the help of POS system. In this by the new system supports the input of data,
processing of data and immediate and quick tracking of useful information due to which the
effective decisions for business can be made resulting in achieving competitive advantage.
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3) What are the advantages of having a centralized database?
The centralized system is the system which is placed or located at one location and can be
accessed from different places, different departments, etc. (Dontigney, 2018). The centralized
database is used by the organizations who work on a large scale and the management needs the
data to be stored at one location and can be accessed from the central server. The advantages of
the centralized database are:
 The centralized database includes fault-tolerant software with the help of which the data is
preserved from duplication and even if the hardware system fails then it can also continue to
perform.
 The centralized database when installed at one location then the cost of the server to be
installed individually reduces.
 The centralized database is more reliable since the centralized storage provides high-quality
redundancy.
 The business in today’s world maintains the information of the consumer which is sensitive
and protecting this information was earlier difficult but with the help of a centralized
database, it is convenient.
 If the data is stored individually on different computers then the chances of theft are huge but
through centralized database it is safe.
 The data can be managed and transformed by the knowledgeable experts and various
analyses can be performed.
 The data can be shared easily with the help of a centralized database.
 The resources used previously can be used again when the resources are in need of the
business with centralized business.
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4) How could this POS system facilitate decision-making?
The POS system facilitates decision making due to the following reasons:
 Since the system is more simple, fast and convenient. The implementation of the system will
make the organization to be centralized which not only take financial decisions but also helps
in taking decisions regarding the reporting, customer data and inventory. Hence, from the
above benefits, it can be derived that the POS system helps the business activities to be
performed effectively (Allen, 2014).
 The Point of Sale systems can track the information at the point of sale immediately. This
system can identify the best possible seller and the stock which is required to be diminished.
This work can be done manually but not effectively since the manual workers may not be
able to complete the process on time while the system will manage the information timely
and effectively.
 The POS system helps the organization to work on the basis of the customer preferences and
it will help the business to prepare the strategy to communicate to consumers in the way they
want.
 The POS system maintains the need for inventory and through which the customer demand
can be reflected and with the help of which the POS will be able to order if there are any
benefits in ordering the quantity.
 To manage the business in a proper way the information should be used effectively. The POS
system helps the business to identify any shortage in inventory and reminds the organization
before the inventory is sold (Voldman, 2014)
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5) Recommended telecommunication options for this POS system
For the installation of the new POS system by the Four Season Greenhouse and nursery, the
LAN system will be the most suitable and appropriate telecommunication system. LAN is the
Local Network Area which facilitates the networking and internet access within a limited
geographical area of business. The POS system is required by the business only for its internal
operations including recording, tracking and processing of sales and inventory transactions and
business data. Therefore the business is recommended to use LAN since the telecommunication
networking is required within a specified business area. Also the LAN should be the wireless
networking system so that the devices within the different departments can be connected so that
the sales and inventory transactions can be updated in all the devices automatically after
inputting the data. Also the wireless LAN will support wider internet access for all the devices.
For this purpose the wireless Ethernet Bridge can be used which facilitates wireless connection
of devices smoothly and efficiently (Bemardos, et.al, 2014).
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6) What types of risks does the POS system bring and how to protect the business against
these risks?
The new POS system will create the security and privacy issues for the business. This system
will generate the risk of leakage of private business information and affect the confidentiality and
integrity of the business information. In the new PIS system the data can be tracked and accessed
easily at any time by any employee and therefore the access of private information can be made
by any staff member. Apart from this, under the new POS system, the delegation of
responsibility s made to the employees as a result of which they have to submit their goals on
their own in the system. This creates the risk of inaccurate information input into the system and
manipulation of results which will also adversely affect the decision-making. This will
compromise the integrity of the business information and give rise to the risk of data leakage and
security and privacy issues for the business (Pearson & Benameur, 2010). These risks can be
prevented by the business by incorporating security and authentication controls within the
systems and devices. The use of passwords can be made in order to prevent the unauthorized
access and protect the integrity and confidentiality of the business data.
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Conclusion
From the analysis of the benefits of the use of technology within the business operations, it can
be concluded that the technology is a boon for every business. With the use of the new POS
system for the business, For Seasons Greenhouse nursery will be able to achieve the business
efficiency and competitive advantage. This will help in the sustainable growth of the business.
Apart from this, it can also be concluded that the IT system and technology also creates risks for
the business. The security and privacy issues arise due to the use of Information Technology in
business operations. However, these risks can also be prevented in order to reduce the adverse
effect of the risks on the business. It can be further concluded that the use of technology for
business reduce the workload and helps in making effective decisions.
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References
Allen, C., 2014. Making data-driven decisions with your POS. [Online] Available at:
https://www.retailcustomerexperience.com/blogs/making-data-driven-decisions-with-your-pos/
[Accessed: 11 January 2018]
Bernardos, C.J., De La Oliva, A., Serrano, P., Banchs, A., Contreras, L.M., Jin, H. and Zúñiga,
J.C., 2014. An architecture for software defined wireless networking. IEEE wireless
communications, 21(3), pp.52-61.
Dontigney, E., 2018. The Advantages of centralized database storage. [Online] Available at:
https://www.911software.com/factors-beyond-cost-that-impact-pos-decision-making/ [Accessed:
11 January 2018]
Kindström, D., 2010. Towards a service-based business model–Key aspects for future
competitive advantage. European Management Journal, 28(6), pp.479-490.
Kirchmer, M., 2012. Business process oriented implementation of standard software: how to
achieve competitive advantage efficiently and effectively. Springer Science & Business Media.
Pearson, S. and Benameur, A., 2010, November. Privacy, security and trust issues arising from
cloud computing. In Cloud Computing Technology and Science (CloudCom), 2010 IEEE Second
International Conference on (pp. 693-702). IEEE.
Subashini, S. and Kavitha, V., 2011. A survey on security issues in service delivery models of
cloud computing. Journal of network and computer applications, 34(1), pp.1-11.
Voldman, Z., 2014. Factors beyond cost that impact POS decision making. [Online] Available
at: https://www.911software.com/factors-beyond-cost-that-impact-pos-decision-making/
[Accessed: 11 January 2018]
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