Knowledge Management Report

This report delves into the application of Cloud-based ERP systems and Enterprise 2.0 tools in achieving business objectives, using Allstate Insurance as a case study. It examines the challenges encountered during implementation, such as training issues, security concerns, customization difficulties, and integration problems. The report then proposes solutions to these challenges, including improved employee training, enhanced security measures, collaborative customization processes, and effective integration strategies. Furthermore, it discusses the benefits and barriers associated with Enterprise 2.0, focusing on privacy concerns, time consumption, and communication challenges. Solutions are offered to mitigate these barriers, such as implementing robust security protocols, categorizing information for easier access, and conducting targeted training programs to optimize communication. The report concludes by emphasizing the importance of these technologies in enhancing knowledge management and improving overall business performance and stakeholder relationships.

Knowledge Management and
Information

Table of Contents
Part 2................................................................................................................................................1
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
1. Cloud Based ERP in meeting business goals.....................................................................1
2. Enterprise 2.0 tool in business ...........................................................................................5
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

Part 2
INTRODUCTION
The knowledge management can addressed factors which are critical for business and its
operations. The knowledge management involves creativity, innovation and brainstorming
methods which are useful to manage information. In relation to business knowledge means what
company's employees know about their processes, products, customers, mistakes and
achievements, whether this knowledge is explicit or tacit (Ruggles, 2009). This report contains
in-depth knowledge about cloud system ERP and Enterprise 2.0 tool to meet business goals.
Further it includes information about barriers which are faced after implementation of both
techniques. In further, this report also includes solutions of barriers by implementing cloud
system and enterprise 2.0 tools.
1. Cloud Based ERP in meeting business goals
Cloud based ERP (Enterprises resources planning) is a tool that enables the firm to utilize
cloud computing platforms to manage its information on remote server in an appropriate manner.
This method also gives flexibility to assess the information in organization easily.
Issues of organization
All State Insurance organization was facing the problems with human resources in nation.
Generally, HR staff, managers as well as employees were suffering with many issues like
increased cost of project and utilization of resources to manage the people due to extensive
customization of its products in the nation. So, all staff members were facing so many
complexities to handle their business activities of Allstate insurance in the country. These things
were creating issues for the firm to meet business goals in the nation. Then after, management of
organization took decision to execute Cloud based ERP system in company premises to
overcome with this problem. After evaluation of ERP suppliers, Enterprise contacted IBM to
implement this tool for reducing their issues in the nation (Winchell, 2014).
Key challenges in cloud based ERP
1

(Source: Cloud world series, 2015)
As per state report of cloud, cloud challenges are increased as comparison of previous years in
the nation. Security and lack resources issues are some challenges which is described above the
diagram (Cloud world series, 2015).
Generally, organization faces many issues like educating users, integration of application,
security, customization as well as service level agreement to implement cloud based ERP. For
example, All State Insurance companies faced some challenges to execute human capital
management cloud based ERP system. It is described as below:
Training issues
As per the point of views of Alshargi (2015), organization also faced issues while
educating users. This process was also very time consuming as to execute this tool; Users did not
have proper knowledge about managing this kind of software in Allstate Insurance. In addition to
this, corporation was facing employee’s resistance regarding their training of ERP software. This
process also affected the productivity of Allstate Insurance in nation. Along with that, it reduced
the efficiency of employees in corporation. This thing was generating issues to meet the business
objectives of organization in country (Alshargi, 2015).
Security issues
According to (), corporation also suffered with lack of sensitive information in company
due to lack of security during execution time of cloud based ERP systems. Generally, this system
is completely operated on centralized server. Hence, threat of stealing information also increased
2

during implementation of cloud based ERP system in company. In addition, these things were
affecting the management to take any type of competitive decisions in the insurance sector.
Customization challenges
On the other side, organization also faced customization problem of software to execute
the cloud based ERP systems. This process created complexities for the firm to access various
functionality applications to manage its operations of Allstate insurance organization in the
nation. IT experts of IBM also faced this kind problem in the firm. In addition, this process also
affected the efficiency of corporation. It affected its profit and client service of organization in
the country.
Integration Issues
According to Peng and Gala (2014), Allstate insurance enterprise also faced complexities
for the integration of all applications. Generally, cloud based ERP system contains multiple
functionality to manage the operations of firm. In addition, integration issues also creating
problems for employees to take data from remote servers in the firm. This thing also was
providing limited access to extract any kind of information from the cloud based ERP systems in
the Allstate insurance organization. IT managers of IBM spent a huge time to integrate all
software in the Allstate insurance company (Peng and Gala, 2014).
Alshargi (2015) states that Allstate insurance organization suffered with many challenges
regarding service level agreement. Generally, it is a mutual contract between organization and
ERP suppliers to provide future support for the future issues. Enterprise also faced problems like
maintenance charges and cost of cloud based ERP system to decide the terms and conditions of
service level agreement in the nation.
Solution of these challenges
Management of Allstate insurance arranged meeting with general employees to solve
their training and other issues. They also gave proper information about cloud based ERP
system. In addition to this, they also described the benefits of this software in corporation.
Organization also conducted one to one interaction to resolve other technological issues with IT
experts. After finishing resistance of employees, Allstate insurance firm organized training
session of this software with the help of IT managers in its premises. This process also helped
company to reduce the fear regarding this software. In this way, enterprise reduced its training
issues to overcome from this problem (Lenart, 2011).
3

Organization also used proper security measures to save its sensitive information from
hackers in the nation. In addition to this, corporation also followed many steps like installation of
firewall and security protocols to decrease these types of activities. Management of Allstate
insurance also hired some IT experts to take care of cloud based remote servers regarding safety
of data in the nation.
To overcome with customization and integration problems, management of organization
gave its information regarding its operations to suppliers of cloud based ERP system in the
nation. In addition, they divides their operations into many steps. This method also aids the
suppliers of ERP to customize and integrate its cloud based ERP systems in appropriate manner
in the nation. This process also effectively helped the Allstate insurance to reduce its
customization and integration of applications problems in the country (Alaviand and Tiwana
2004). It also contribute effective role for firm to provide better insurance service to its
customers in the state.
Management of Allstate insurance also conducted meeting with its suppliers of cloud
based ERP systems in the nation. Organization appointed own IT experts to make better service
level agreement for future service. This process also gave effective benefits for enterprise to take
appropriate future service regarding this cloud based ERP system in the country.
In the near future, organization can applies many efforts to improve its efficiency of
cloud based ERP system in the nation. Management of Allstate insurance can manage effective
relationship with IBM to take further report in the nation. Enterprise can also take latest updates
to increase speed of this tool. By managing effective relations with suppliers, corporation can get
various advantages regarding this software in the nation. In addition, Allstate insurance firm can
improve its efficiency and productivity by acquiring fast information from remote server.
Further, management of organization can mange human and other resources in a appropriate
manners to complete its business activities in the nation. These thing can also contribute
effective role for Allstate insurance to take fast decision which can provide effective profit in the
country. Cloud-Based ERP system can also provide effective mobility to staff members for
accessing data from any where in the nation or world (Peng and Gala, 2014). This process can
also help the employees of corporation to complete their task very fast.
4

2. Enterprise 2.0 tool in business
Enterprise 2.0 is a strategic tool of Web 2.0 technology which is uses in enterprises to
help employees, suppliers, customers and partners. It is corporate integration of collaborative
technologies and online social networking into business processes. Its purpose is to enhance and
flatten the company's communication level with its partners, suppliers, employees and customers.
This Enterprise 2.0 tool is to build a network to share the information easily to work together.
The tools and services of Enterprise 2.0 use many type of techniques and advanced software
features such as tagging, rating, sharing, RSS, networking, bookmarking and linking etc.
Benefits of Enterprise 2.0 in business have been stated below:
 It provides easier and faster access to information.
 This gives more accurate and better quality information.
 It shows instant notifications on new updates which are made for blog and wiki
subscription (Pettersen. L., 2012).
 With the help of this tool, information sharing and communication between users also
improve.
 It increases the productivity of business.
 This tool is simple to use and also a cost effective.
 This tool can spur innovations and efficiency by encouraging stakeholders and employees
to discuss problems and share the information with others (McAfee, 2009).
There are few barriers which are faced by employees to use Enterprise 2.0, these barriers are
described below:
 Privacy challenge- Many employees feels fear to share personal information in front of
everyone while using social network. Employees feels that they are being monitored and
also fears to leave digital footprint of personal information that company or other people
can misuse that information.
Survey had been conducted on workers who worked in Norway, UK and Denmark in
2011. the result shows that employees are more concern about their personal information and by
using E2.0 the risk of misuse is always present (Privacy challenges in Enterprise 2.0, 2012).
 Time consuming- It consumes more time because if each employee share an information
and after that another employee wants to gain that information then it will take more time
to collect the exact information. For this purpose employee have to go through all
5

available information. A survey of 1,00 middle managers was conducted by Accenture in
2007. According to that survey managers agrees that they spend two or more hours to
search a particular information. The results also describes that more than 50% of total
shared information has no value related to information. And 59% middle managers said
that they can not find that information because they miss it which might be valuable for
them. Only few manager were satisfy and believes that it is a good an d their company fut
a great effort by governing the distribution of information (Matuszak, 2007).
 Communication challenge- The E2.0 provides good tools and services to make
communication and relation better with company's partner and stakeholders. The middle
level managers face the challenge that many employees of company spend their more
time on social network rather than work hard to accomplish their tasks. Managers also
feels that many employees not only share the business information but they use this tool
to make their regular communication. The communications between employees gather
the extra data at social networks and it also not useful for every employee. Employees
also feels that other information are not useful for them and they can not use or adopt that
information. This situation gives the adverse affect on both productivity and performance
of business because each employees at least spend their some time at social networks,
rather than this time can be used in effective manner to achieve the goal of business.
The company find out the solution of above mentioned barriers which are faced by the
employees of business (Jurisica, Mylopoulos and Yu, 2004). These barriers were affecting the
performance and productivity of business, the solution of these barriers have been stated below:
 Security- the company can implement security software to secure the private data of
employees. For this purpose company can hire IT expert on this to set the privacy. With
the help of this employees personal data will not be used by other employees and the risk
of misuse will also reduce. It expert can set the securities like hide the personal
information, set the password system and authentication. Company can also encryption
facility to secure the personal information. With this each employees can access their
own personal information.
 Time saving- This technique consumes more time of employees in searching the exact
information. Company can categorize the information in different segments. Segments
such as inventory related, marketing related, finance related, Discussion related, event
6

related and many more. With the help[ of this segmentation of information, the time of
employees will be save. They will also not the important information and they do not
need to see all information which are not related to their field. This technique will save
their which they were spending on surfing the information (Tanriverdi, 2005). This time
will be used to improve their work and they will be more focus on their goals and
objectives.
 Communication- The managers face this problem that many employees waste their time
in chatting and sharing the information which are not valuable and beneficial to anyone.
To solve this problem company can conduct the several training programs and sessions.
In training programs company can give the awareness about the valuable usage of this
technique. They can aware the employees to not share the information which have no
value. Company can organize special training session to employees that in what ways
they can use this technique and how this technique will help them to improve their
communication (Murray, 2006). The communication can be categorized in different
groups. Company can make the different groups for their customers, suppliers, employees
and partners. Each group will contain the knowledge which are important for them. The
information of suppliers and their operations are not important for customers.
With the help of these above mentioned solution, company can improve their performance and
productivity by implementing the Enterprise 2.0 tool. This enterprise 2.0 tool gives both benefits
and barriers to employees of company.
The company is implementing or adopting the Enterprise 2.0 tool to develop their
knowledge management system in more effective way (Bughin, 2008). To develop the
knowledge management, Enterprise 2.0 tool should provide:
 It should manage the accuracy, reliability, security, timeless and confidentiality of
information and knowledge.
 It should make the data and information available to suppliers, employees and customers
when it is needed.
 Manage and collect the accurate knowledge about organization (Sabherwal, 2005).
 By ensuring that software and hardware are reliable, safe, secure and friendly to use by
employees.
 Able to give required information at the time of emergency.
7

 Take the backup of all important information and knowledge.
Conclusion
From this report, it can be concluded that solutions of cloud-based ERP system is
providing appropriate reliability to manage operations of all state's organization in the nation.
This software is also helping the firm to increase its market share in the insurance sector. This
report also evaluated that with the help of Enterprise 2.0 technique the knowledge management
system can run effectively and smoothly in business. This report gives the light on new and
current trends in the knowledge management system which proposes to use cloud computing
system and Enterprise 2.0 technique in business. These techniques will helps to improve
performance and productivity of business and also improve relations with company's
stakeholders.
8

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Alavi, M. and Tiwana, A., 2004. Knowledge management: The information technology
dimension. The Blackwell handbook of organizational learning and knowledge management.
pp.104-121.
Bughin, J., 2008. The rise of enterprise 2.0. Journal of Direct, Data and Digital Marketing
Practice. 9(3). pp.251-259.
Jurisica, I., Mylopoulos, J. and Yu, E., 2004. Ontologies for knowledge management: an
information systems perspective. Knowledge and Information systems. 6(4). pp.380-401.
Lenart, A., 2011. ERP in the Cloud–Benefits and Challenges. In Research in systems analysis
and design: Models and methods . Springer Berlin Heidelberg. pp. 39-50.
McAfee, A., 2009. Enterprise 2.0: New collaborative tools for your organization's toughest
challenges. Harvard Business Press.
Mijač, M., Picek, R. and Stapić, Z., 2013, July. Cloud ERP system customization challenges. In
Central European Conference on Information and Intelligent Systems.
Mohamed, M., Stankosky, M. and Murray, A., 2006. Knowledge management and information
technology: can they work in perfect harmony?. Journal of knowledge management. 10(3).
pp.103-116.
Nurmi, D. and et.al., 2009, May. The eucalyptus open-source cloud-computing system. In
Cluster Computing and the Grid, 2009. CCGRID'09. 9th IEEE/ACM International Symposium.
pp. 124-131.
Ruggles, R., 2009. Knowledge management tools. Routledge.
Sabherwal, R. and Sabherwal, S., 2005. Knowledge Management Using Information
Technology: Determinants of Short‐Term Impact on Firm Value*. Decision Sciences. 36(4).
pp.531-567.
Tanriverdi, H., 2005. Information technology relatedness, knowledge management capability,
and performance of multibusiness firms. MIS quarterly. pp.311-334.
Online and PDF
9

Alshargi, M., 2015. Cloud-Based ERP Implementation issues. [Pdf]. Available
Through:<http://nngt.org/digital-library/upload/conference6/Mishari%20AlShargi%208.pdf>.
[Accessed on 21th December 2015].
Cloud world series, 2015. [Online]. Available
Through:<https://cloudworldseries.wordpress.com/>. [Accessed on 21th December 2015].
Matuszak, G., 2007. Enterprise 2.0: Benefits and Challenges of Adoption. [PDF]. Available
through:<https://www.kpmg.com/Ca/en/IssuesAndInsights/ArticlesPublications/Documents/
Enterprise20PartII.pdf>. [Accessed on 21st December].
Peng, G.C. and Gala, C.J., 2014. Cloud ERP. [Pdf]. Available
Through:<http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/79123/3/WRRO_79123.pdf>. [Accessed on 21th
December 2015].
Pettersen. L., 2012. Privacy challenges in Enterprise 2.0. [ONLINE]. Available through:
<http://spir.aoir.org/index.php/spir/article/view/14>. [Accessed on 21st December].
Winchell, B., 2014. Business Challenges. [Pdf]. Available
Through:<https://www.successfactors.com/content/dam/successfactors/en_us/resources/case-
studies/allstate-cs.pdf>. [Accessed on 21th December 2015].
10