Information Technology (IT) for Business Assignment

RUNNING HEAD: IT for Business
IT for Business

IT for Business 1
Executive Summary
This report focuses on the adoption of information technology in the business operations of Four
Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery which is located in Colorado. Such adoption in the form of
POS system has resulted in increased profitability and gaining of competitive advantage for the
organization. The decision making has become easier along easy management of the business
due to immediate tracking of the business data at the time of sales. This report also provides
recommendation of the telecommunication network that can be utilized for the POS system of
garden centre along with the sources that can assist in protecting the security of the data.

IT for Business 2
Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Advantages and Disadvantages of Point of Sale (POS) System......................................................3
Gaining of Competitive Advantages by Business through POS System.........................................4
Advantages of having centralized database.....................................................................................4
POS system facilitates decision making..........................................................................................5
Processing of business activities more effectively.......................................................................5
Tracking of Information manually...............................................................................................5
Answering of questions effectively..............................................................................................5
Use of information in the better management of business...........................................................6
Recommendation for Telecommunication options for POS system................................................6
Risks associated with POS system and their protection..................................................................7
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................8
Recommendations............................................................................................................................8
References........................................................................................................................................9

IT for Business 3
Introduction
The use of information technology has now become the requirement of every kind of business
and industry of every size. The positive effects of adopting technology can be realized by the
small businesses but they lack the expertise and resources required for the implementation of the
information technology strategies.
POS systems are being increasingly adopted by the businesses as there is no requirement of the
price tags and the processing of sale take place only by the scanning of the product code which is
linked with the selling prices (Griff, 2014). POS systems can be defined as a computerized
network in which the checkout terminals are linked with the main computer and are supported by
various features of the hardware including the barcode scanners and card payment terminals
(Hiiemaa, 2015). This report discusses the POS system adopted by Four Seasons Greenhouse
and Nursery in detail.
Advantages and Disadvantages of Point of Sale (POS) System
The new Point-of-sale (POS) system has the following advantages and disadvantages.
Advantages
Tracking of Business Data- Point- of- Sale system allows the owner to track business data
immediately from the transaction relating to sales which in turn eliminates the need to perform
the manual tracking of sales. The data is stored and processed by the system from the sale while
performing the function of compiling of sales history and updating of inventory (Solution Dots,
2016).
More useful than a Cash Register- The functions of a POS system provide much more usefulness
than a cash register. POS systems are capable of performing a variety of functions such as input,
tracking and distribution of data which provides useful information to the owner with respect to
the operations and management of business.
Supports Decision Making- The decisions relating to the number of units to be ordered are no
longer required to be made on the basis of speculation regarding present inventory units.