Analysis: Impact of Information Technology on Business Processes

This report examines the profound impact of Information Technology, specifically focusing on Point of Sale (POS) systems, on business management and processes. Using the case of Four Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery (FSGN), the report analyzes the advantages and disadvantages of POS systems, highlighting their role in inventory control, automated purchase orders, and improved customer service. It explores the competitive advantages gained through faster and more accurate operations, stock management, and employee tracking. Furthermore, the report discusses the positive outcomes of a centralized database, its impact on decision-making, and recommendations for telecommunication options like Local Area Networks (LANs). It also addresses the security, privacy, and confidentiality risks associated with POS systems and offers strategies for mitigation. This analysis provides valuable insights into the practical application of IT in business and the importance of strategic technology adoption. For students seeking to enhance their understanding, Desklib offers access to past papers and solved assignments related to this topic and many more.

IMPACT OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ON BUSINESS
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Executive Summary
This study sheds light on the application of Point of sale system and its advantages in business
management process. As in the case scenario, there is a description of small nursery that
switched to point of sale system. Previously it is following to track manual registration system.
For individual products they were applying manual controlling process. With application of POS
system this company has not only accessed the work process in an accurate way but also it is
helpful to make the work process faster. The new system of management allows the owner to
give responsibility on the staffs and establish the goal of the company. It is recommended to use
the local area net work for more developed web based service in this firm. With the help of
centralised database process the firm can take ethical decision making and more constructive
business management process.
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Table of contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................4
Findings and Analysis......................................................................................................................4
1) Advantages and disadvantages of the newly included POS system the company....................4
2) Competitive advantage gained by the business after the inclusion of POS..............................4
3) The positive outcomes of having a centralized Database............................................................5
4) Impact of POS in the process of decision making.....................................................................5
5) Recommendation of options of telecommunication in the POS business system.......................6
6) Risks faced by the company after including new POS system and the ways of controlling the
risks..................................................................................................................................................7
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................7
Reference list...................................................................................................................................9
Appendices:...................................................................................................................................10
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Introduction
The study talks about the Impact of Information Technology on business. Taking the example of
a SME named Four Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery (FSGN), in Colorado the study is analysed.
The advantages and disadvantages of the newly included POS systems in the company have been
discussed. The competitive advantage that the SME will gain after the inclusion of this POS
System has also been analysed. The advantages of having a single database which can access by
multiple people and its importance in making better decisions have been discussed. A
recommendation for telecommunication options that shall help in the proper management of the
POS systems has also been talked about. The various security, privacy and confidentiality risks
that the company faces and the ways to overcome those risks have also been talked about.
Findings and Analysis
1) Advantages and disadvantages of the newly included POS system the company
Advantages:
Point of sale system can be integrated in the process of inventory control for a particular business
house. It generates purchase order automatically and can help to make reorders for different
items. It can help to decrease the work amount with expenses related to the running of business.
Additionally, product selection report is easily accessible in this method as in a venture; there is
no need to give focus on the selling amount. As suggested by Benjamin (2015), it will also show
the most popular item based on the selling percentage in one day. Requirement of update is
automatic in point of sale system where software is updated within a particular time (Refer to
appendix 1).
Disadvantages:
Timely update is necessary unless company may face security risks. Continuous and reliable
internet connection in POS system is necessary. Absence of reliable internet connection is not
effective to conduct a smooth business in the work process of the selected firm. It requires to
access with a monthly or yearly subscription fee. Using of credit and debits cards in point of sale
system may expose the financial vulnerability (Cummins and Cummins, 2018). As it is a web
based system it is mandatory to create connectivity in internet and hardware terminals.
2) Competitive advantage gained by the business after the inclusion of POS
POS system is helpful to conduct works faster and accurate within a company. There is no need
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to memorise product price or manually input data as the traditional cash registration process. It is
helpful to serve customers rapidly with accurate accounting system customers do not need to
wait for long time. Stock management facility is another advantage that easily accessible with
the help of point of sale system. It is automatically done by modern point of sale system. It is
helpful to count stock, track their location and amount of stocks within a company. It helps a
venture to assume the demand and makes stocks ready to sell customers. Forecasting is a major
issue that influences a company in competitive ground. Employee tracking such as staff
behavior, sales figure and competition level are easier to conduct with this process.
3) The positive outcomes of having a centralized Database
After the inclusion of the POS system the organisation was provided the chance of operating
through a centralised database. As per the view of Agarwal (2017), a centralised database
provides the SMEs a chance of understanding the required changes that can bring about
development in the organisation. The centralised database holds all the required information
about the company. The annual sales and revenue earned and the assets of the company are
properly maintained through the centralized database. With the help of this database the
managers of the SMEs are able to access the entire sales history of the organisation and locate
the reasons for the loss.
In the case of FSGN, the proprietor and the executive authorities found that the business was
continuously facing negligible profit or loss. To avoid these POS systems was included in the
company in 2008. After the inclusion of the system it was seen that data was accurately handled
and could be easily tracked (Parento and Bhatt, 2016). This helped the company in taking the
required decisions from strategies which could bring about profit.
4) Impact of POS in the process of decision making
Influence of point-of-sale system on business process:
It is able to track proper information about entire work process in company. The effect of this
system is much helpful as POS can track ordering diminished stock to point out the best seller.
The main influence of this system is on time management section. Effectiveness of POS is
related with high efficiency, management and controlling on every section of a company.
Tracking:
This information can be tracked manually whereas, it is long term process and time consuming.
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Additionally, it increases the expense of company. Automatic process is quicker than the manual
information tracking system.
Types of questions could be answered effectively:
Questions related to selling rate in every day, most or least selling item, as well as different other
account related problems can be answered effectively.
Better management:
For better manage the business POS system can be used to provide unlimited support for
business enhancement. As a venture can access all necessary information it can easily track any
dispute in working process (Weber and Bailey, 2016). It increases selling as company manager
points to the least selling item and focus on its quality. Employee payroll can be controlled and it
is helpful to manage promotion after certain time.
5) Recommendation of options of telecommunication in the POS business system
Types of networks – FSGN is a Colorado based SME and they have only one office. As a result
usage of Local Area Network (LAN) is the best telecommunication option that they should
choose. This can be helpful for them as the company database is accessed only by the few people
at a small location. As long as the company is based on a single location, all the computers of the
organisation can be accessed through a Local area network. As per the view of Cunningham et
al. (2015), through the usage of LAN, all the computers of the company are connected through a
centralised database and all the people with the ids and passwords can access them. The database
should also be protected by a single security system so that the passwords are provided only to
the concerned people and all the employees of the company cannot access the private data.
Types of media:
In accordance to present times and the highly advanced technologies that science has provided
the world the cost required for the installation of wired technologies and wireless technologies
have become almost similar. However, wireless technologies are still little expensive in
comparison to wired technologies. As stated by Kotlarsky et al. (2015), wireless technologies,
although little costly come completely hassle free and needs much less attention. The wireless
technologies also require less space allocation compared to the wired technologies.
Wireless Technologies can be installed in FSGN with the help of devices like RFI, Cellular
Communication, Wi-Fi, Radar Communication or Bluetooth communication across the computer
systems. With the installation of all these systems and the connection provided through the LAN,
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the organisation can connect all their systems over a single database and the managers and
executives of the company can access all the required files and documents as per their
requirements. Wireless communication systems will also have easy maintenance compared to
wires as wires get torn and need replacement but wireless technologies are everlasting.
6) Risks faced by the company after including new POS system and the ways of
controlling the risks
Security:
After the inclusion of the single centralised database all the computers of the organisation are
connected. There is a chance of the private data being accessed by all the employees of the
organisation and there is a chance of the data getting spread (Kelley, 2016).
However, the IT experts in control of the database should provide passwords to the database and
they should be allowed access only by selected people of the organisation. The corporate
executives and the senior hierarchy of the organisation should be given access to the database.
Privacy:
The privacy of the data in the database should be maintained. The people in authority of the
database should regularly check it for availability of malwares and spywares. Lau et al. (2018)
opined that, the database should be made almost unhackable so that anybody from outside cannot
access it. The IT experts of the company should also make sure that the database is updated and
upgraded from time to time so that they can provide the organisation with better help regarding
decision making.
Confidentiality:
The confidentiality of the database should be maintained by all the employees of the
organisation. Just because it is a small business, hackers shall be more oriented to hack the
resources as the security systems of the large businesses are much more secure. The hacking of
the central database might enable the hacker retrieve the personal details of the employees and
access private data of the organisation including special gardening strategies and special
techniques of the nursery. This information is confidential as they are unique and vary from one
company to another.
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Conclusion
The study talks about the Impact of Information Technology in a SME named Four Seasons
Greenhouse and Nursery. The advantages and disadvantages of the newly incorporated POS
systems in the organisation have been talked about. Further, the Competitive Advantage that is
gained after the inclusion of POS and its positive outcomes has been talked about. The help that
is provided by the centralised database in ethical decision making has been discussed. A type of
networks that should be used for the telecommunication in the POS Business System and the
risks factors that is faced by the company is discussed. The ways in which the company should
control the risks have also been talked about.
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Reference list
Journals:
Agarwal, G., 2017. CA Technologies Inc. Controlling mobile payment transactions based on
risk scores for point-of-sale terminals determined from locations reported by mobile terminals.
32(5), pp.23-33.
Benjamin, M., 2015. Capital One Financial Corp, Systems and methods for providing a financial
discount or reward, 14(4), pp.925-970.
Cummins, M.J. and Cummins, I., 2018. Pomo Search Ltd,. System and method for point of sale
transaction logging. 10(5), pp.12-25.
Cunningham, C., Good, T., Kearney, S.P., Miraglia, M., Amundsen, T., Giordano, P., Wang,
Y.P. and Zhu, X., Metrologic Instruments Inc, 2015. Point of sale (POS) based checkout system
supporting a customer-transparent two-factor authentication process during product checkout
operations. 12(7), pp.10-12.
Kelley, A.L., NCR Corp, 2016. Secure crypto currency point-of-sale (pos) management, 10(7),
pp.56-98.
Kotlarsky, A., Au, K.M., Veksland, M. and Zhu, X., Metrologic Instruments Inc,
2015. Automatic digital video image capture and processing system supporting image-
processing based code symbol reading during a pass-through mode of system operation at a
retail point of sale (POS) station. 12(7), pp.89-100.
Lau, P., KOTECHA, L.R. and Sanjeev, K., Verizon Patent and Licensing Inc, 2018. Point-of-
sale location check for payment card purchases. 10(4), pp.151-160.
Parento, S.A. and Bhatt, S., Mastercard International Inc, 2016. Methods, systems, and computer
readable media for providing benefits to loyalty cardholders via loyalty card transactions. 89(7),
pp.58-62.
Weber, L. and Bailey, K., Visa International Service Association, 2016. Dynamic point of sale
system integrated with reader device. 12(7), pp.56-66.
Website
fourseasonsgreenhouse.com 2018. FOURSEASONSGREENHOUSE.COM. Available at:
https://fourseasonsgreenhouse.com/ [Accessed on: 25 July, 2018]
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Appendices:
Appendix 1: Percentage of retail POS terminals by product in US companies
(Source: https://financesonline.com/15-best-pos-software-systems-business/)
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