Managing Research: The Impact of Information Technology on Business

This research proposal investigates the impact of Information Technology (IT) on business operations, specifically focusing on ABC Company's challenges in adapting to modern market demands. The study aims to analyze the functional issues within ABC Company's traditional business processes, identify IT approaches employed by competitors, and develop a technology-based solution to enhance efficiency and customer satisfaction. The literature review explores contemporary issues in businesses with traditional procedures, the impact of recent business trends, and competitors' e-commerce platforms. The methodology section outlines the research design, data collection methods, and ethical considerations. The proposal highlights the need for IT adoption to address inefficiencies, meet growing customer demands, and ensure sustainable business growth in a competitive market. The research seeks to provide a comprehensive understanding of IT's role in transforming business strategies and achieving global exposure for ABC Company.

Running head: MANAGING RESEARCH
Managing Research
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1MANAGING RESEARCH
Table of Content
1. Introduction and background.................................................................................................2
1.2 Management problem.......................................................................................................3
1.3 Research Questions:.........................................................................................................3
1.4 Research Objectives.........................................................................................................4
2.0 Literature Review-...............................................................................................................5
2.1 Contemporary issues in businesses with traditional procedures......................................5
2.2 Impact of recent business trends- aspects of IT...............................................................6
2.3 Competitors’ approaches towards Information technology –ecommerce platforms.......7
2.4 Gaps in the literature............................................................................................................8
3.0 Methodology........................................................................................................................9
3.1 Research Design:..............................................................................................................9
3.2 Data collection method:.................................................................................................10
3.3 Data Analysis:................................................................................................................11
3.4 Ethical Consideration and limitation..................................................................................11
3.5 Time Schedule and budget.................................................................................................12
Reference..................................................................................................................................14

2MANAGING RESEARCH
1. Introduction and background
This research proposal provides a detailed overview of the research on the impact of
Information Technology on business. The purpose of the research is to develop a technology-
based solution for ABC Company, which would help the business to meet the growing
demand and create a global exposure. It is certain that technology and innovation associated
with it has changed the way businesses were done before. This research proposal describes
the issues of the research and findings provided by the scholars in the previous studies with
respect to implementation of information technology in business. The review of literature has
been done by involving the findings of 15 different journals. The report also states the type of
techniques chosen for the research.
The rapid development of technology and adoption of new trends in business have
pushed the marketers to develop new business approach to remain sustainable in today’s
dynamic marker environment. Phelps and Watt (2014) also mentioned that almost 59% of
overall corporate businesses have adopted information technology to their business. (Vom et
al. 2014) particularly mentioned that especially, the small and medium size firms have mostly
shown the initiatives of incorporating information technology because e-commerce- an aspect
of IT falls into the business to consumer (B2C) category, which includes online retail or
online shopping. It is usually referred to online purchases from Bricks and Mortar retailers
and web online retailing. Morganti, Dablanc and Fortin (2014) in their experimental study
have provided the figure that almost 1.66 billion people around the world have made online
purchasing. However, there are many businesses that are yet to incorporate such trend and
they are still going with the traditional business procedures.
The major problem associated with traditional business procedures is that the business
is not able to meet the growing demands of business. In the case of ABC Company, the major

3MANAGING RESEARCH
issue is that inefficiency in dealing with the customer demands have marked the decline in
the profitability ration of the business. So, traditional business process of ABC Company led
to poor growth of profits, loss of potential customers because understanding convenience of
online purchasing such as delivery to door step, the customers flock to online shopping. In
this context, Taiminen and Karjaluoto (2015) mentioned that business that do not incorporate
Information Technology will lag behind in the competition. Therefore, it is necessary to
conduct a research to learn the importance of Information Technology in business and
approaches such as online purchasing, which can be derived from IT. The proposed research
will include a primary analysis by considering the primary data, which will be collected by
performing qualitative data collection method. Nevertheless, the study does not include a
comparative analysis between organizations in which one has adopted Information
Technology and other one is ABC Company running operation with traditional procedures.
1.2 Management problem
The enhancement and innovation in the technology has a strong impact on the
working structure and function of business. Due to limited adoption of technological trends,
currently the working structured of food stores is inefficient in meeting the increasing
demands of customers. The organization should take the initiative of transforming their
working tactics with the innovative project plan (Laudon and Laudon 2015). It explosion of
trends and technologies have accelerated the technique of adopting the information
technology to enhance the degree of customer satisfaction which leads to increase in
profitability. The top executives of the company should take part in making decision about
the required innovation in the working platform of the organization. The following are the
key research questions.
1.3 Research Questions:
 What are the functional issues in existing process of business in ABC Company?

4MANAGING RESEARCH
 What are the technological approaches adopted by the competitors?
 What technology-based solution can be developed to address the issues identified in
traditional business procedures?
1.4 Research Objectives
 To critically evaluate the existing functional issues of business of ABC Company
 To identify the Information Technology approaches adopted by the competitors
 To develop suitable technology-based business approach to address the issues
identified in traditional business procedures
The third objective can also be treated as the major aim of the proposed research which deals
with handling the business activities related to taking orders of customers, shipping and
delivery services, preparing the invoices of customers, providing log in credentials to
customers for security purpose and other related activities.

5MANAGING RESEARCH
2.0 Literature Review-
This section of the research provides a detailed analysis, which revolves around the
facts and findings related to adoption of information system such as online shopping,
customer’s attitudes online shopping and conventional business process. In addition to these,
other significant areas of information system relevant to today’s business context have been
discussed in the following. The review of literature has been performed by considering 15
different journal articles.
2.1 Contemporary issues in businesses with traditional procedures
It is an undeniable fact that technology has made people’s life easy since its inception.
Technology is everywhere; especially in business, a significant form of technology such
Information technology, has a great role. Technology provide a more easy business solution
such as fast transaction, track of data, creating customer invoice, managing customer relation,
identifying consumer behaviour and many other aspects. However, DesJardins and McCall,
(2014) mentioned that business that did not adopt technology will certainly lag behind the
state of competition. For example, a small business with extending goals will find it difficult
to position the brand and attract the customers because the business reach is limited to a
certain areas, whereas a small business with the adoption of technological trends can
approach customers in the shortest period because it can focus on the customers belonging to
remote areas (Shanthi and Desti 2015). In addition to this, in traditional process of business,
the quality of service may not be aligned with the desired quality because in traditional
process, it takes a lot of time for a business to understand customer requirements.
Moreover, if a business wants to expand in a new or global market, it has to follow
the market trends, as in traditional process, the goals of reaching a wide market may take a lot
of time. The changing trends of market may confuse the business and identification of

6MANAGING RESEARCH
dynamic needs could be challenging in traditional process, as, hence, marketers dot not have
any idea regarding the traits and characteristics of customers and competitors in the sector
(Chakraborty et al. 2016)The major issue that is usually found that working structure and the
functions of traditional business is inefficient in meeting customer needs because for
example, the employers and the organizational members are facing issues in managing the
demand of customers. The customers tend to ask for the delivery at the doorstep while the
business find it difficult to maintain smooth and assured delivery. The business finds it
difficult to deal with the customer demands because tracking customers’ demand record with
existing business process is challenging and time consuming and hence leading to decline in
the profitability (Moore 2017).
2.2 Impact of recent business trends- aspects of IT
Anesbury et al. (2016) conducted a study and found that particularly, the small
retailers are adopting Information Technology for their entrepreneurial venture. Frim this
particular article, it has been learn that three antecedents are positioned to influence IT
adoption in business such as employer’s perception of the relative advantage of using
information technology, social expectation of information technology as well as the owner of
innovativeness in dealing with the business. Information technology provides three
significant mode of business such as Business to Consumers (B2C), Business to Business
(B2B) and Business to Government (B2G) but between these three, business to consumers is
probably the popular trend of business (Ta, Esper and Hofer 2015).
The major e-commerce giant such as Walmart and Amazon.com are the greatest
example of business to consumers. Sohaib and Kang (2014) mentioned that adoption of
Business to Consumer ecommerce model has become a long lasting trend of business
because, due to advancement in technology, people now have access to technological devices
such a laptop, computer and mobile phone. According to Australian Bureau of Statistics, the

7MANAGING RESEARCH
percentage smartphone users in 2017, was around 82.1% and this growth is reflected in the
business (Tam and Clarke 2015). The marketers understand that business remains profitable
when the path to reach the customers are easy and time-effective. Online media or e-
commerce platforms provides the maximum reach, when it comes to approaching customers
from a remote area. This enable the firm to generate desired number of sales and profits. For
example, Woolworths online sales has hit AU$2.9 billion in 2016 (Cavallo 2017). On the
other side, Wal-Mart’s US online sales increased by 44% in 2017 (Yu and Deng 2017). In
this context, Schultz and Block (2015) commented that with the help of information
technology, the marketers receive customers’ background information such as their taste,
preference, age, income proof, location and this large set of information help marketers to
design their product and strategy. To be more specific and increase customer’s value to
business, the markets design individual deals and offers to attract the respective customers.
2.3 Competitors’ approaches towards Information technology –ecommerce platforms
It has been identified that revenue of the business are expected to grow because
Information budgetary waters is presently calm and the advantages of Information
Technology is gearing up to adopt new tech in the coming future. In this context, Goyal
(2014) commented that as economic trends tend to continue upward, organizational revenues
are expected to grow and moreover, almost 60% respondents tend to expect corporate earning
to enhance the business in the coming year. Retailers tend to base their business procedures
on the recent trends and adapt the trends when required to fit the new and innovative the way
of doing business.
A very significant thing that business do is, development of a website which means
when transitioning a traditional business to a new platform, the website becomes the face of
the organization in the mind of consumers. Advertising is another significant aspect of this e-
business as it helps in customer acquisition in e-business. Abebe (2014) pointed out that in

8MANAGING RESEARCH
this procedure, the only major difference here is that method and the author has also
suggested that it is necessary to investigate different marketing options to determine the
suitable option that fit the business effectively. For example, when it comes to adopting or
development of e-commerce strategy, IBM has developed the principle the best way of
learning is, by doing. The organization has moved onto Web, and the organizations expect to
save $240 million on the $11 billion in goods and services. Likewise, IBM also developed
another similar step to put customer support online and this might save another $750 million
(Roos 2014).
Particularly, when it comes to E-Service, Paroutis, Bennett and Heracleous (2014)
mentioned IB has almost 1300 consultants and its e-service business is expected to hit
$3billion in the year. The brands deals with the web design to hook older corporate data base.
2.4 Gaps in the literature
The existing studies have presented different facts providing that traditional businesses are
becoming obsolete now days due to slow growth, limited reach, poor quality of services and
many other reasons. However, the studies do not talk about how a business with traditional
procedures can shift or adopt a new mode of business or adopt the c-commerce trends. The
literature did mention about any particular channels or platform that help a new business to
grow. In addition to this, the literature also include ay discussion regarding other aspect of
information technology can help the business to meet the dynamic market needs.

9MANAGING RESEARCH
3.0 Methodology
As put forward by Mackey and Gass (2015), research method is a systematic plan for
performing a study. Sociologists tend to draw on different set of qualitative and quantitative
research techniques including experiments, survey research, participant observation and
secondary data.
3.1 Research Design:
It has been identified that different research designs could place different meaning on
research design and some scholars tend to consider research design as the choice between the
qualitative and quantitative research methods. Brinkmann (2014) argued that research design
is referred to the choice of a specific technique of data collection and analysis. However, in
the proposed research, the research design will be used as the general plan which would help
to answer the research questions. The most significant elements of research design may
include the research strategies and technique related to analysis and data collection. The
research design is categorized into three different categories such explanatory, exploratory
and descriptive research design. According to Flick 2(015), explanatory research is treated as
the initial research into a hypothetical or theoretical data and most of the time exploratory
research could lay the initial groundwork for the future research. On the other side,
descriptive research design is usually defined as the attempt to discover and explain while
delivering additional information about the topic. In this context, Billig and Waterman (2014)
also mentioned that descriptive research remains as act of exploring the thing in dark by
forming a more in-depth picture of the context. In the proposed study, the descriptive
research design will be applied
Justifying descriptive research design:

10MANAGING RESEARCH
Descriptive research design will be applied to the execution of the proposed study because
this research design will help to dig into the concept of Information Technology and help to
learn how implementation of information technology such online shopping can help business
to grow. There are several concepts and finding related are derived about the use of
information technology but hardly any research has discovered those facts and applied to
real-world context.
3.2 Data collection method:
As put forward by Palinkas et al. (2015), data collection remains as the technique of
collecting information from all relevant sources to discover responses to the research
problems, and evaluate the outcome of the research. Data collection methods are usually
divided into two different categories such as primary data collection and secondary data
collection.
Secondary Data Collection method: The secondary data is a type of data that is
already available and the content can be found in books, newspapers, journal, articles and
some online portals. There is a plenty of data available in these sources about the research
area in the business studies. In the proposed study, the secondary data will be collected from
books, journals, industry analysis report by registered sources, articles and annual and
sustainability reports of organizations.
Primary data collection method: Primary data collection method is categorized into
two different groups such as quantitative and qualitative data collection. Hence, quantitative
data collection is usually based in the mathematical calculations in different formats. The
methods of quantitative data collection and the analysis could include questionnaire with the
close-ended questions, regression and methods of correlation. On the other side, Qualitative
data collection technique usually do not involve numbers, mathematical calculations. Thuries

11MANAGING RESEARCH
and Gillet (2016) specified that qualitative data collection method may include interview,
questionnaire with open-ended questions, observation and focus groups.
Justifying secondary data collection method: In the proposed study, secondary data collection
process will be used to collect the secondary data because the proposed study does not
include any particular organization and the discussion and analysis has been done based on
the data found in the secondary source such as the industry report, peer reviewed journal
articles and relevant data sources. Implementation of Information Technology is a broad
context which involve several real-world business environment and practical examples of
several business adopting Information Technology.
3.3 Data Analysis:
There is a clear difference between the qualitative and quantitative data analysis. Especially
in qualitative data analysis techniques may include interview, focus group and other
experiments and hence, the analysis could involve the identification of some common
patterns within the research response (Robson 2016). Conversely, quantitative data analysis
usually include critical analysis as well as the interpretation of some figures and numbers,
which help o find the logic behind the main findings. However, in the proposed study,
qualitative data analysis techniques will be used because the common facts derived from the
collected data can be linked to aims and objectives because the data are collected from
different sources.
3.4 Ethical Consideration and limitation
The ethical issues could be a major concern for a research and the major ethical issue
that is usually found in the secondary research is that the scholars usually do not
acknowledge the work of other author and claim the work as their own. To avoid such issue
in the proposed study appropriate evidences in the discussion will be provided. In addition,