Analyzing the Role of Information Technology in Tesco's Operations

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of the role of Information Technology (IT) in the context of Tesco, an international supermarket company. It begins with a literature review exploring the impact of IT on Tesco's success, encompassing areas like customer relationship management, accounting, human resource management, and production. The report then delves into the ethical and social issues associated with Tesco, including concerns related to people, the environment, animals, and taxation. It differentiates between various networking technologies like LAN, MAN, and WAN, highlighting their advantages and disadvantages. The importance of the internet and intranet for Tesco is discussed, focusing on aspects such as internet marketing, customer relationships, internal communication, and resource sharing. The role of IT in management, including inventory and data management systems, is examined. Furthermore, it explores the different stages of the system development life cycle, analyzes the benefits and drawbacks of IT, and concludes with a summary of the key findings.

Introduction to Information
Technology

INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
Literature Review...................................................................................................................3
Role of Information technology in success or failure of TESCO......................................3
Ethical and social issues associated with TESCO.............................................................4
Differentiate between different types of networking technologies....................................5
Importance of internet and intranet in TESCO..................................................................6
Role of IT in management.................................................................................................8
Different stages of system development life cycle............................................................9
Analysis and Discussion.......................................................................................................10
Benefits of IT...................................................................................................................10
Drawbacks of IT..............................................................................................................11
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................11
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................12

INTRODUCTION
Information technology is defined as the usage of computers to retrieve, store, manipulate
or transmit data or information. It is mainly used to perform business operations, entertainment
or personal technologies. It is considered to be a part of communication and information
technology (information technology , 2020). Tesco is an international supermarket
company. It was founded in 1919 in UK. It generally deals with the products like eatables,
groceries, clothes, entertainment, electronics and many more items. Moreover, it provides the
services also like financial services and many more. It has several stores all over the world where
they sell the branded as well as normal product range for all types of customers with occasional
discounts and offers. The following discussions are made on the information technology, it’s
roles, benefits, drawbacks, SDLC, types of networking, importance, social and ethical issues
associated with it in context of Tesco.
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MAIN BODY
Literature Review
Role of Information technology in success or failure of TESCO
 Customer relationship management: Information technology assists the business in
maintaining the relationships with the new or existing customers. It’s information
systems helps the specialised employee in IT to operate such customer relationship
systems so that long term growth can be expected within the market and could target the
customers with a better relationship with them (Rajaraman, 2018 Lloyd, 2020). Accounting: Information technology controls the cash flow within an organization so
that unusual expenses cannot be made and serves as a financial operator also with
efficiency and accuracy. High skilled person is required to operate and manage such high
tech systems of finance so that effectiveness could be maintained in an organization in
cash flow. Human resource management: Information technology helps in providing better
workforce with right skills for right work at right place on a right time (Benckendorff,
Xiang and Sheldon, 2019). Human resource management systems are also needed a
person who can handle such staffing technologies from recruiting to training and
development of employees with their motivation and remuneration by providing friendly
working environment to them. Production and manufacturing: Information technology assists the firm to keep all the
track records of raw materials, their quantity, cost, total quality management and
manufacturing activities. This can be considered as a major part because if production
management cannot be proper in a firm then all other functions are being affected so IT
management must be appropriate in a firm. Transactional processing system: Information technology manages all the transactions
happening in a firm either between employees or customers. It is important to manage all
the transactions so that records can be maintained, this is helpful for the finance team
because cash flow in an organization depends on the transaction processing systems
which are mainly controlled by the IT staff.
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 Real time operations: Information technology handles all the stores of a firm which are
widely expanded across the world so undoubtedly all the operations are done at the time
also so this can be ease by real time operations systems as this manages the all the
operations in all the stores at a time without any duplicity with efficiency and is done by
the IT specialist (Lugmayr and Grueblbauer, 2017). Management information systems: Information technology is known for the
management in an organization. Management information system basically is for the
decision making of a firm, supports all the management activities of a business which
leads a firm to be more successful and today it is known as number one in a supermarket
industry.
Ethical and social issues associated with TESCO People: TESCO has achieved the best rating from consumers for supply chain
management according to the human rights. Products that are being supplied by the
company are mostly branded according to the income of the customer and about how
much they can spend for a particular product. Moreover, non-branded products are also
sold by the firm for middle class people so that they can also afford TESCO’s products
without minimizing the quality of the product they are offering at low prices but making
their cost less so that they earn good from those products also. TESCO’s customers are
not limited to only high class people or middle class, but they have large variety of
consumers who buy their products at various price range. That is why it has best supply
chain management. Environment: TESCO is rated a worst from consumers for it’s policies of usage of toxic
chemicals in electronic products. Because they harm the environment on a large scale and
as well as people also who are using such items. Plastics are also in use by TESCO in it’s
production process harming the environment hugely and generation of pollution also
which are strictly against the environmental ethics. This is not only destroying the
environment but also it is negatively affecting the brand image also because people don’t
consider to shop from those companies who are working against the ethics. Therefore, it
is important for the firm to look into this matter on a serious matter (Kaddoura, 2020).
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 Animals: TESCO is rated middle from worst in testing of animals. This is against ethics
that no company is allowed to test their products on animals. After knowing this. TESCO
continues to sell products after testing them on animals including toxic substances and
harmful materials that can negatively affect the life of animals which is against the law
also. It is important for TESCO to reduce these unethical activities mainly on animals
because it is not only affecting the law but also the human emotions that are more
possessive for animals. So for the maintenance of image and reputation of brand, firm
needs to focus on such issues (Avgerou and Walsham, 2017).
 Politics: TESCO is rated worst from consumer in terms of taxation policies. It is come to
know that the firm had used and still using the strategies to avoid taxes and their policies
associated with it. This has declined the government support to the firm because in some
cases government help private sector also when they are in need either in the form of
loans or budget support, but TESCO is not eligible for this support due to avoidance of
tax payment to the government. This can become problematic for the firm in future if
they need government support in any tough situation so it is necessary for the firm to
reduce such unethical actions for future preferences.
Differentiate between different types of networking technologies
Basis of difference LAN MAN WAN
Full form LAN has a full form
of Local Area
Network
MAN has a full form
of Metropolitan Area
Network
WAN has a full form
of Wide Area Network
Ownership It is considered as
private network
It is considered as
private or public
network (Theis and
Wong, 2017)
It is considered as
private or public
network and can be
owned by one
particular organization
also
Speed It has high
transmission speed
It has average
transmission speed
It has low transmission
speed
Propagation delay It has short It has moderate It has long propagation
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propagation delay propagation delay delay
Congestion It is containing less
amount of congestion
It is containing more
than LAN but less
than WAN amount of
congestion
It is containing most of
the amount of
congestion
Maintenance It is having easy
design and
maintenance
It is having difficult
design and
maintenance than
LAN
It is having the most
difficult design and
maintenance system
Faults It consist most of the
fault tolerance
networking
It consist less fault
tolerance networking
than LAN
It consist least fault
tolerance networking
as compared to LAN
and WAN
They all are having the following collective advantages:
 They all are highly flexible (Long, 2018)
 They enhances accessibility and communication of information
 They all permits resource sharing conveniently
 Sharing of files is easy through these networks
 They all consist improved storage capacity
They all are having the following collective disadvantages:
 They all are lacking robustness and independence
 Difficulties in securities are there in networks
 They all permits malware and viruses
 They requires an effective and efficient operator (Luftman, Lyytinen and Zvi, 2017)
 They all requires the setup which are exclusive in nature
Importance of internet and intranet in TESCO
Internet Internet marketing and selling: TESCO has acquired it’s brand image through
marketing using internet and online selling of it’s products. This helped most of the
companies in doing their marketing as remarkable because internet is a very powerful
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tool in promotion of a brand as it involves innovation and attractiveness in advertising of
a product or service (Aasheim, Li and Williams, 2019). Product survey and testing: TESCO’s knows that which customers are to be targeted by
doing online survey of a market and online testing of a product gains the proper attention
of a customers to look into the product and use it. It is important for a firm to make it
more creative with more research and development process with effective innovation. Building customer relationships: Internet helps in communicating with customers
directly or indirectly either instantly or in some time. It assists the firm to maintain long
term relationship with the customers which supports the company in brand and customer
loyalty. Accuracy in business process: Now a days every business is managing it’s operations
through internet systems so that they can gain accurate results of it’s marketing, sales and
revenue generations. TESCO is using internet for it’s effective management among
customers as well (Turel, Soror and Steelman, 2017).
Intranet Internal communication: Intranet is responsible for the internal communication of an
organization so that it can be more effective. Communication is very important process in
any firm because it leads to the easy management of a firm. TESCO is using intranet for
the same for it’s efficient formal or informal communication. Internal sharing of resources: Intranet has helped the firm in internal sharing of
resources very smoothly, connection of every system makes comfort for the employees to
transfer data or information more speedily and safely among internal staff of an
organization (Watrous-deVersterre, 2019). Confidentiality of information: It is the most major benefit of intranet that it helps in
maintaining the information or any communication private, secret or confidential within
the company. No resources can be shared out of the firm so no leakage of information
can be possible through intranet.
 Internal training: Training and development of employees are the most essential part for
the business so that skilled staff could make more productivity for the firm. Intranet is
one of the ways through which training can be done internally without passing the
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training heads out of the firm’s premises using various intranet technologies (Taylor,
2020).
Role of IT in management Inventory management systems: IT systems help TESCO to manage inventory’s records,
quality and quantity. Stock and raw materials are all managed by IT systems. This
benefits company in more accuracy in production and manufacturing of it’s products and
services so that it can be more profitable for an organization. Data management systems: Data is the most important asset for TESCO which is very
important to manage otherwise firm can even suffer a loss if it is not managed properly.
Data management system is provided by information technology which plays a major
role in managing a business (Noble, 2017). Management information systems: This system is mainly for the decision making and
financial system technology. These functions are the most important for a firm to grow
because decision making is a prior step to move ahead on any project and financial
decisions are the major once so this is supported by IT. Customer relationship management: IT provides the platform through which
relationship can be maintained with customers by using internet systems. Social media
marketing, search engine optimization and many more techniques helped the TESCO in
building it’s image with the customers for a long term (Bhushan, 2017). Strategic thinking facilitation: IT needs the skilled workforce to operate and if not then
it is important to train and develop the existing employees so that IT systems can be
controlled by a specialised persons. IT has a role in it’s managerial functions like
planning, organising, controlling, staffing and directing. Stores and saves information: When data is converted into information, it is required to
be stored safely without any duplicity and unnecessary leakage of it. This is done by the
information system, it mainly stores and saves important data of a firm in a more
protective and secure manner (Puaschunder, 2019). Reduces cost and estimates waste: IT manages all the operations of a firm so
undoubtedly it has a responsibility of cost and waste management so that firm could bear
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more revenues and less loss through that. Information technology is responsible in
reduction of unnecessary cost and wastage estimation of a firm (Shladover, 2018). Speedily communication: IT facilitates the communication process more effective and
efficient so that every employee in a firm feels comfortable in working in the firm’s
premises. This speeds up the communication with an accurate nature in flow of
communication from top level of management to the lower level or vice versa.
Different stages of system development life cycle Planning: It is the primary and initial step of development of system because planning is
important in every stage. System development planning is like deciding about the cost,
architecture, paper work, workforce and many more things which included in planning
(Van Grembergen and De Haes, 2017). Define requirements: It is the most important part in development of a system, defining
requirements is essential because without knowing the actual needs and requirements,
system cannot be developed. Therefore, analysing and deep understanding of system
requirements is important for the effective software development. Design and prototyping: This is a third step after planning and defining the requirements
of systems. This is also a part of paperwork, designing the architecture and prototyping of
systems, it helps the developer for better understanding the requirements at the time of
coding and development. Software development: Finally this stage is for the software development that means
coding and running of the system. This needs a person with high technical skill and
excellent knowledge in computers and information technology systems so that accuracy
can be maintained during coding. Testing: After completion of the coding and development of software, testing is
necessary from the client’s point of view or from the user’s view. They can be a single
consumer or a firm who uses these systems professionally. So it is important to test such
systems after development so that any occurrence of bug could be sorted out at the time
of testing only. Deployment: This is a stage where developer puts their software in front of the user
either through payment link or downloads. It can be in many forms like proper company
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developer, personal developer, professional developer and many who develops the
software various purposes to gain or earn some money through their skills of developing
the software. Maintenance: After selling of a product or a service by a firm, it is necessary to give
after selling service for maintaining long term relationships with the customers and for
loyalty by the customers. Same way, after developing a software and handling over it to
client for further usage of it, servicing and maintenance is necessary of software because
IT field is something which updates regularly so it needs to be maintained regularly with
all it’s advancements in a software. Without maintenance it is impossible to manage IT
software.
Analysis and Discussion
Benefits of IT High ROI: Using IT reverts the firm or any personal as high return of investment
because doing anything on the internet or using software like information system
enhances the operations more effective so this is a benefit of IT which leads to the high
return on investment. Productivity increment: In today’s world, IT in increasing day by day which results in
the increment of productivity either in any organization or for any personal experience.
Productivity either in the form of knowledge, profit, money, reputation or anything which
satisfy humans working for their business or individual growth (Hemrungrote, Jakkaew
and Assawaboonmee, 2017). Cloud computing: This is the most important and largely beneficial for any organization
and for the individual professional also because it helps in data backup, storage,
retrieving, editing, modifying and many more activities online with full protection of
large data. Cloud services are mainly for the prevention of information from data
breaches and leakage for the purpose of misusing it. Better management: IT supports the every firm either small or big, profit or non profit,
professional or personal. Management is needed everywhere which can be more effective
and efficient due the systems in IT for better operations of a firm.
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