Data Silos in LTR and Internal Communications Analysis
Verified
Added on  2023/01/12
|10
|3048
|53
AI Summary
This assignment focuses on the case study of LTR, a housing association in Luton, and discusses the data silos used by different teams, internal communication issues, and the business case for an email replacement project. It also explores alternative communication technologies and their benefits.
Contribute Materials
Your contribution can guide someone’s learning journey. Share your
documents today.
OPERATIONS AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT
Secure Best Marks with AI Grader
Need help grading? Try our AI Grader for instant feedback on your assignments.
TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1 Data Silos in LTR – Data Sharing and Digital Collaboration.........................................................1 Internal Communications Analysis of LTR.....................................................................................3 Email Replacement Project – Project Management Business Case................................................4 Executive Summary.....................................................................................................................4 Reason..........................................................................................................................................4 Business Options.........................................................................................................................5 Expected Benefits........................................................................................................................5 Expected Dis-benefits..................................................................................................................5 Timescale.....................................................................................................................................6 Costs............................................................................................................................................6 Investment Appraisal...................................................................................................................6 Major Risks..................................................................................................................................6 CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6 REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8
INTRODUCTION Project and operation management are two most important part that are required to be focused on by the organizations. Operation management within an organization deals with day to day strategic business issues in a systematic order. Whereas project management deals with organizing, planning, controlling and motivating all the resources of business in order to achieve specific goals(Cooren and Seidl, 2019). This assignment will focus on a case study of LTR also known as Luton Town Residences is a Housing Association that operates in Luton. They focus on providing housing to local community with one focus i.e. to provide support and assistance to vulnerable individuals. They do not have a centralized system that can be used by all the members of the organization. Each team of the organization have their own segregated data and share required information though emails. This assignment will focus on Data Silos in LTR, internal communication analysis of Luton Town Residences Housing Association and business case of email replacement. Data Silos in LTR – Data Sharing and Digital Collaboration Data Silos can be defined as a fixed data repository that remains under the control of one department and is completely isolated from rest of the organization. It is a kind of segregated data which is stored in multiple enterprise application(Wilder-James, 2016). Data silos restricts information and collaboration among teams which can further lead to poor decision making and can impact profitability negatively and can also affect accuracy of data or information stored withintheorganization.DataSilosoftenincreasesoverallorganizationalcostofdata management and collaboration and many times often leads to internal issues or delay in passing important informationfurther. Implementation and usage of Data Silos increasescost of extracting data for other uses(Patel, 2019). In the given case study, there are various kinds of Data Silos that are used by LTR which is a housing association in Luton. LTR manages manage several distinct housing blocks that are divided into two types of housing: General Purpose Housing and Supported Housing. They do not have their own centralized system in which their can store their data, manage or extract it for future use. They have different functional teams that tracks or manages issues within their own, specific areas. Each of the team have their own separate system which is used by them to track or retain information within their respective functional area(Suominen and Hyvönen, 2017). From the given case study, three different data Silos have been identified that are used by different teams of LTR housing association. Both the 1
types of housing have their own separate Data silos that are used by their functional teams for management of facilities. However, customer services team simply uses Excel Sheets, word or text documents for storing information and resolving issues of individual residents. First data Silo identified is Share Point server or Share point Drive This Data Silo is used by Finance team for access and version control for key financial documents. This Share Point drive can only be accessed by finance team and other than finance team it can only be accessed by restricted number of non-authorised employees. This drive is managed centrally but cannot accessed by everyone. People who have restricted access to this drive can only access it. All kinds of finance excel sheet or word document of finance department are stored in this drive. These financial sheets can be shared with any member of finance team. Other then them access to this drive is restricted. Another data Silo identified is 360Facility which is a special cloud-based system. This system is specifically used by facilities maintenance team for management of all kinds of facilities within their functional area. No other member, other than Facilities maintenance team have access to this cloud-based system. All the information related to facilities management is directly stored and shared with other members of facilities management teams through this cloud-based system only. Last Data silo identified is company laptops that are used by Personal Coach of Supported Housing department. These personal coaches store all kinds of personal and sensitive information about their residents within a password protected word document that are stored within companies’ laptops. These laptops and sensitive information stored within it can only be accessed by personal coaches and other than them Supported Housing Team Leader can access these laptops or information stored within it. Back up of all the information stored within these laptops is taken on regular basis within a secure hard drive. This hard drive is securely sept in a locked room of main Luton Town Centre office. There are the three main types of data Silos that have been identified and used by functional teams of LTR housing association. These Data Silos helps functional teams of LTR to store and protect information. If any of these teams want to collaborate with each other or want to share any information with other teams then they cannot provide access of these Data Silos to other teams in order to share data or collaborate with other functional 2
Paraphrase This Document
Need a fresh take? Get an instant paraphrase of this document with our AI Paraphraser
teams Email is used within LTR. With the help of Emails customer service team send issues of residents related to respective functional team. Internal Communications Analysis of LTR In LTR all kinds of communications currently take place with the help of emails only. All the functional teams communicate with each other with the help of emails. If any information is required to be speeded organization wide then it is also shared with the help of emails only with the help of daily newsletters(Rai, 2016). These newsletters are shared with each employee through email. But because of this current communication channel most of the time important information is missed or ignored by employees. In order to reduce this issue managers, send daily reminder letters to their employees after the news letter has been distributed. Many times, other functional teams do not respond to emails of customer service team because of which residents have to wait for several days for their issue to be resolved(Reda, Piccinini and Carbonaro, 2018). So, it can be said that there are various kinds of issues within current internal communication of LTR which is less time consuming and communication through which can be done easily. It is extremely important for LTR to adopt new technology that can be used by them for effective communication. Here are different types of technologies that can be used as an alternative to Email. ï‚·ERP: A fully integrated Enterprise resource planning software is one of the most effective and useful tools that can be used to improve internal communication. Entire organizations should one system to store data that means every one would be working with exact set of information. If one employees of a team change any information or data within the system then that information would be made available to every other employee as well. ERP is one of the most effective solution that can be used as an alternative for Emails within LTR. LTR can implement ERP system within their organization which will help them to improve their internal communication. This software can also be used for analysis as well in which reports can be generated and shared with other teams of the organization customer service team can generate a report of resident issues and can share it with other teams so that they can work on resolving those issues(Nwata, Umoh and Amah, 2016). It will help the organization to enhance their communication among all the employees. ï‚·Enterprise social networking service such as Yammer can also be used by LTR as an alternative for emails. Yammeris a social networking site that providesa platform for 3
different organizational departments where they can exchange their ideas or information with each other in an easy and effective manner. With the help of this platform documents can be send or edited at any time by the employees. Within a group project, group conversations can also be done. It can be used to increase internal communicationof LTR. Important information can also be shared on this platform. Facebook for work: Workplace by Facebook is a connectivity platform that has been developed by Facebook for workplace communication(Bischoff and dos Santos, 2017). It includes features like news feeds, instant messaging, groups and many more. It can help LTR to bring improvement within their internal communication collaboration among teams. It also provides a feature of groups chats, live videos, news feeds, analytics and many more. Skype: Skype is another one of the alternatives that can be used by LTR for bringing improvement within internal communication and collaboration. Any kind of online meeting can also be done with the help of video chat feature of Skype(Jacobs, Yu and Chavez, 2016). Employees can even record their videos and can send to other departments. There are some of the most common alternatives that can be used by LTR instead of emailsforeffectiveinternalcommunicationandeffectivecollaborationamongdifferent functional teams. Out of all of these alternatives ERP system and Yammer can be used as best and effective alternative for emails within LTR. These alternatives can help LTR to address issues faced by their residents easily, get organizational important information easily and share information with different functional departments in an easy and effective manner. Out of all the alternatives Yammer is one of the most useful and effective alternatives that can be used by LTR. Email Replacement Project – Project Management Business Case Executive Summary Replacement of email project will have various kinds of benefits associated with it such as will help in resolving issues faced by residents much more earlier, important information can be shared with all the employees easily and will also help in increasing internal functional team collaboration. Reason The main reason for undertaking this project is to implement an effective internal communication and collaboration system that can be used by LTR. This new communication 4
system will help LTR to manage their communication in an effective manner. Implementation and usage of yammer will help LTR to achieve their designed corporate objectives and strategies. Business Options There are various options that can be used by LTR for bringing improvement within their communication. First is that other than emails LTR can use effective social networking platform for communication as social networking are most commonly use by employees. Usage of these networking sites will be quite cheap and organization will not require any kind implementation cost. Other than this they can implement a centralized ERP system within an organization. This system will help them to centrally store all the information within a single system. Any kind of report or information can also be shared with the help of this system. Other than replacing the email there is another option i.e. is to recruit a separate IT team for managing and maintaining data storage, communication within the organization. Expected Benefits This project will provide various kinds of benefits to the organization. These benefits will also help the organization to achieve their corporate objectives in an effective manner. Some of the benefits of this this project are: ï‚·It will help in increasing collaboration among all the functional team of LTR housing association. ï‚·It will also help- in increasing satisfaction of all the functional teams of housing association by at least 10 percent ï‚·Will help in resolving issues of residents in a more effective manner which will further help in increasing satisfaction of residents by at least 30 percent. ï‚·Will help in sharing information in a more secure and faster manner as well as will also help in increasing accuracy of information as same information will be stored and shared with others. Expected Dis-benefits This project will also have some disbenefits such as: ï‚·It can increase system hacking chances that can increase risk of data theft, data manipulation. ï‚·It will increase overall operational and system maintenance cost of the organization. 5
Secure Best Marks with AI Grader
Need help grading? Try our AI Grader for instant feedback on your assignments.
If in future LTR focuses on merger with other organization then it can affect overall productivity of employees at the time of merger. Timescale Timescale is extremely important to be focused on in order to complete the project on time. According to initial analysis it can be said that overall completion of the project will take approximately 3 to 4 months’ time period for system implementation. After implementation it will take approximately 2 months in order to test the integrity of the system with the organization and its effectiveness as well. Costs There is no doubt that implementation of new communication and alternative system or replacement of emails in LTR will have some cost associated with it. Cost associated with this project are explained below: Implementation of new system within the organization: £5000 Cost of providing training to the employees: £100 per employee Total cost associated with the implementation of new collaboration and communication system is £11,800. Investment Appraisal Internal appraisal majorly includes ways in which project will be funded, payback time period etc. overall project can be funded in two possible ways first if to find investors who will willingly invest within the organization and second is to take loan from the bank. In both the cases time period required to payback is 6 to 8 months. Major Risks There are various kinds of risk associated with this project such as: Currentlytheprojectlooksquitestraightforwardbuttherearestillsomeunknown implementations that would be required to be focused on. This is also a risk that the project will not meet or fulfil its requirements or objectives. It can also increase overall operational cost of the organizations. CONCLUSION From the above assignment it has been summarized that there are various kinds of issues or problems that can be faced by employees of an organization if they do not have an effective communication system. In order to minimize issues or problems faced by organization it is 6
important for the organization to implement effective communication and collaboration system. It has been analysed that there are various kinds of tools or technologies that can be used by organizations for enhancing their internal communication and inter department collaboration, sharing of information. Each technology has its pros and cons for the organization. It has also been analysed that if these technologies and not implemented or used in an appropriate manner then it can increase risk associated with the organization. In order to analyse those risk and implement an effective communication system within an organization it is important for the company to design a Project Management Business Case which will help them to analyse cost associatedwith the system, benefits, disadvantages,risk, timescale in which it will be implemented and many more. 7
REFERENCES Books and Journals Bischoff,B.M.anddosSantos,F.A.N.V.,2017,July.ErgonomicsandOrganizational Communication:MethodsforBusinessCommunicationAuditing.InInternational Conference on Applied Human Factors and Ergonomics(pp. 43-51). Springer, Cham. Cooren, F. and Seidl, D., 2019. Niklas Luhmann’s radical communication approach and its implications for research on organizational communication.Academy of Management Review, (ja). Jacobs, M.A., Yu, W. and Chavez, R., 2016. The effect of internal communication and employee satisfaction on supply chain integration.International Journal of Production Economics. 171.pp.60-70. Nwata, U.P., Umoh, G.I. and Amah, E., 2016. Internal Organizational Communication and Employees’ Performance in Selected Banks in Port Harcourt.International Journal of Novel Research in Humanity and Social Sciences. 3(3). pp.86-95. Patel, J., 2019. OVERCOMING DATA SILOS THROUGH BIG DATA INTEGRATION. International Journal of Education (IJE). 3(01). Rai, A.K., 2016. Risk regulation and innovation: the case of rights-encumbered biomedical data silos.Notre Dame L. Rev.. 92. p.1641. Reda, R., Piccinini, F. and Carbonaro, A., 2018, April. Towards consistent data representation in the IoT healthcare landscape. InProceedings of the 2018 International Conference on Digital Health(pp. 5-10). Suominen, O. and Hyvönen, N., 2017. From MARC silos to Linked Data silos?.o-bib. Das offene Bibliotheksjournal/Herausgeber VDB. 4(2). pp.1-13. Wilder-James, E., 2016. Breaking down data silos.Harvard Business Review. 8