MGT603 Assessment 2: Systems Thinking Analysis for Westpac Group

This report presents a systems thinking analysis of Westpac Banking Group, focusing on the operational challenges and cyber risks faced by the organization. The assignment utilizes the Rich Picture technique to visually represent the complex system, followed by a CATWOE analysis to understand the perspectives of various stakeholders, including consumers, actors, and owners, and to identify key transformations and environmental constraints. The analysis highlights the vulnerability of customer and employee data to cyber threats. The report recommends organizational policy changes and the implementation of a TDE master encryption key to mitigate these risks. The report emphasizes the importance of regular security checks and cyber-hygiene practices. The recommendations aim to enhance data security and regulatory compliance. The report concludes with a list of references.

Running head: SYSTEMS THINKING BASED ON WESTPAC BANKING GROUP
Systems Thinking based on Westpac Banking group
Name of Student
Name of University
Author note

1SYSTEMS THINKING BASED ON WESTPAC BANKING GROUP
Table of Contents
1. Rich Picture.................................................................................................................................2
2. Root Picture report using CATWOE...........................................................................................3
3. Recommendation of Optimal Solutions.......................................................................................6
4. References....................................................................................................................................8

2SYSTEMS THINKING BASED ON WESTPAC BANKING GROUP
1. Rich Picture
There are diverse categories of operational issues which are faced in commercial
organizations such as the banking sector organizations (Rexha, Sadiku & Krasniqi, 2018). The
previous assignment has focussed on the operational issues which were faced in Westpac
Banking Group, and it was identified that cyber risk is the biggest operation risk faced by this
organization as most of the assets and the intellectual properties of the business are in the
database, and any compromise of data may expose both the customer information and the
information about the employees working in this organization. The overview of the complex
system shall be described in the ensuing rich picture diagram.
Figure 1: Rich picture of the problem
(Source: Created by author)

3SYSTEMS THINKING BASED ON WESTPAC BANKING GROUP
2. Root Picture report using CATWOE
The operational issues can be understood and resolved in the first place using CATWOE
analysis (Aithal, 2017). Multiple perceptions of a problem can be identified using this analysis
technique, the acronyms of this analysis in relation to this case study is evaluated in the
following se3ction of this assignment.
Consumers (C): All the stakeholders of the beneficiaries of the scenario are represented
using this acronym (Stoyanovich et al., 2018). Challenges faced by the consumers, and their
reaction based on this proposal, and the achievements after the plan is successfully enacted is
stated based on this acronym of the analysis.
The employees of the banking organization and the consumers of the bank are on the
receiving end of cyber risks which comes from the social engineers. Essential customer data and
employee data can get exposed due to cyber risks. It is being proposed that the data encryption
technique of the Oracle database can be very much useful to reduce the chances of cyber risks in
this organization.
Actors (A): All the stakeholders who will be carrying out this transformation process
shall be identified based on this acronym (Maennel, Mäses & Maennel, 2018). The impact of
working on the proposal from the perspective of these stakeholders is also a part of this acronym.
The reaction of these stakeholders is also very much significant for the success of this
transformational scenario.
The stakeholders who will be carrying out these transformations in Westpac Banking
Group are the IT manager of this organization, Facility Manager who will be managing all the
resources required in the transformation, database experts who understand the changes required

4SYSTEMS THINKING BASED ON WESTPAC BANKING GROUP
in the business, software testers who will be testing the accuracy of the data transfer speed once
the transformations are over, customer service department of Oracle Corporation who will be
addressing the challenges faced by the IT experts of this banking organization while enacting the
new database. All these stakeholders can be hugely benefited from this transformation as they
can understand the significance of using TDE master encryption key to protect the customer data
and the employee data from the cyber risks. Network security knowledge of each of these
stakeholders can be improved after all the transformations take place.
Transformation (T): The process of transforming inputs into outputs can be understood
from this acronym of the CATWOE analysis (Wardhana & Hariwibowo, 2020). The
identification of the inputs of this scenario and the outputs of the scenario can be understood
from this prime business activity. All the steps between the inputs and the outputs can be
understood from this activity as well.
The prime inputs of this scenario are the different sets of essential data which were stored
in the organizational databases such as the employee data and the customer data. Each of these
diverse categories of data are vulnerable to cyber risks coming from social engineers. To
maintain the integrity of the inputs, a new Oracle database has to be incorporated in this
organization, as the TDE master encryption key can help to encrypt all the data which will be
stored in the database and it can also notify if there is any unusual activity in the organizational
network. Thus, maintaining the integrity of the data is the output of the scenario.
Weltanschauung (W): The bigger picture of this scenario can be understood from this
acronym of the CATWOE analysis (Aithal, 2017). The real problems which is being addressed

5SYSTEMS THINKING BASED ON WESTPAC BANKING GROUP
can be analysed using this acronym, at the same time, this acronym is also very much useful to
understand the wider impact of the solution which is being proposed to address the problem.
Cyber risk can have both business loss as well as reputation loss for Westpac Banking
Group, to minimise the risk coming from cyber risk, Oracle Database has to be enacted in this
business as it can encrypt all the data which are being stored in the servers. Most of the other
banking organizations who are also facing the same issue can be hugely benefitted if they
incorporate this database. The SQL server database of Oracle can be very much useful to encrypt
and decrypt any type of sensitive data within a fraction of a second. Hence, the business process
of the bank shall not be affected due to this transformation.
Owner (O): The real owner of the situation can be identified in this acronym of
CATWOE analysis (Rexha, Sadiku & Krasniqi, 2018). The stakeholder role who could
investigate a change shall be identified and the reasons behind their engagement during the
change shall also be explained in this acronym.
The decision makers of Westpac Banking Group, and the server team of this organization
are the stakeholders who can instigate change in this business. They can help to make all the
major decisions which is required to be taken while the changes is being made. Their prime goals
to protect the sensitive data from cyber risks.
Environment (E): This acronym highlights the constraints imposed in the environment
where changes is going to take place (Maurya et al. 2019). The ethical laws, financial
constraints, availability of resources required to bring about the changes are identified based on
this acronym, and the solution of these constraints are also discussed based on this acronym.

6SYSTEMS THINKING BASED ON WESTPAC BANKING GROUP
Issues of database privacy have to be followed by the personnel’s who will be playing a
key role in the project. There is a Code of Ethics which are faced by most of the database experts
all around the world; it has to be followed in this scenario as well. The role of the facility
manager will be very much significant to identify and categories the role of each personnel who
will be making the proposed changes.
3. Recommendation of Optimal Solutions
The two recommendations to overcome the problems faced in Westpac Banking Group
are as followings:
Organizational policy change: As described by Hawari (2018), the security of all the
devices which are connected to the organizational database must be checked on a regular basis as
there are numerous data entry points which can be compromised by the social engineers during a
cyber-attack. On the other hand, according to Brauner et al., (2018), a cyber-hygiene
environment must be created in the business environment where all the stakeholders of the
business must be understanding the impact of a cyber-attack. The researchers stated that
password hygiene must be maintained by all the stakeholders of the business which can
decryption process much more complicated from the perspective of the social engineers (Laws et
al., 2018). Thus, it can be understood that some of the organizational policies must also be a
check on regular intervals to deal with the risk coming from social engineers.
TDE master encryption key: The regulatory compliance issues faced in Westpac
Banking Group due to cyber risks can be resolved using TDE master encryption key
(Docs.oracle.com, 2020). All the data security concerns of a business can be minimized using
this key. Transparency of the data encryption process of the key is very much on the higher side

7SYSTEMS THINKING BASED ON WESTPAC BANKING GROUP
(Oracle.com, 2020). The encryption keys are stored separately in keystore, which is usually out
of reach for the social engineers.

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4. References
Aithal, P. S. (2017). ABCD Analysis as Research Methodology in Company Case Studies.
International Journal of Management, Technology, and Social Sciences (IJMTS), 2(2),
40-54.
Brauner, P., Ziefle, M., Schroeder, U., Leonhardt, T., Bergner, N., & Ziegler, B. (2018, May).
Gender influences on school students' mental models of computer science: a quantitative
rich picture analysis with sixth graders. In Proceedings of the 4th Conference on Gender
& IT (pp. 113-122).
Hawari, N. N. (2018). Integration of Soft Systems Methodology and System Dynamics
Modelling for Supply and Demand Analysis of the Rising Cost in Higher Education. Int.
J Sup. Chain. Mgt Vol, 7(4), 234.
Laws, G., Nowatkowski, M., Heslen, J., & Vericella, S. (2018, June). Guidelines for Cyber
Hygiene in Online Education. In ANNUAL (p. 93).
Maennel, K., Mäses, S., & Maennel, O. (2018, November). Cyber Hygiene: The Big Picture. In
Nordic Conference on Secure IT Systems (pp. 291-305). Springer, Cham.
Maurya, A. K., Singh, A., Dubey, U., Pandey, S., & Tripathi, U. N. (2019). Protection of Data
Stored in Transparent Database System using Encryption. Journal of Computer and
Mathematical Sciences, 10(1), 190-196.

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Rexha, B., Sadiku, H., & Krasniqi, B. (2018). Using Record Level Encryption for Securing
Information in Classified Information Systems. Natural and Engineering Sciences, 3(2),
207-224.
Securing Stored Data Using Transparent Data Encryption. Docs.oracle.com. (2020). Retrieved
10 April 2020, from
https://docs.oracle.com/cd/E11882_01/network.112/e40393/asotrans.htm#ASOAG600.
Stoyanovich, J., Howe, B., Jagadish, H. V., & Miklau, G. (2018). Panel: a debate on data and
algorithmic ethics. Proceedings of the VLDB Endowment, 11(12), 2165-2167.
Transparent Data Encryption Frequently Asked Questions. Oracle.com. (2020). Retrieved 10
April 2020, from https://www.oracle.com/database/technologies/faq-tde.html.
Wardhana, D. Y., & Hariwibowo, I. N. (2020). Sustainability Analysis of Family Based Culinary
Industry in Indonesia. Review of Integrative Business and Economics Research, 9, 465-
479.