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Question 1:a. Explain the impact of MIS in the area of police information system? Answer: MIS is an Information system which helps in providing the management of an organization with information which is used by management for decision making. A management information system (MIS) is a subset of the overall internal controls of a business covering the application of people, documents, technologies, and procedures by management accountants to solving business problems such as costing a product, service or a business-wide strategy. Management information systems are distinct from regular information systems in that they are used to analyze other information systems applied in operational activities in the organization. Academically, the term is commonly used to refer to the group of information management methods tied to the automation or support of human decision making, e.g. Decision Support Systems, Expert systems, and Executive information systems. An 'MIS' is a planned system of the collecting, processing, storing and disseminating data in the form of information needed to carry out the functions of management. According to Philip Kotler "A marketing information system consists of people, equipment, and procedures to gather, sort, analyze, evaluate, and distribute needed, timely, and accurate information to marketing decision makers." The terms MIS and information system are often confused. Information systems include systems that are not intended for decision making. The area of study called MIS is sometimes referred to, in a restrictive sense, as information technology management. That area of study should not be confused with computer science. IT service management is a practitionerfocused discipline. MIS has also some differences with Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) as ERP incorporates elements that are not necessarily focused on decision support.

Joshi Tarunkumar Bhupenrakumar : MBA SEM 2 MB0031- SET 1

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MIS has a major impact on the functions of any organization. The organization derives benefits from the systems in the following form: a) Speedy access to information, b) Interpretation of data, c) Quick decisions, d) Speedy actions, e) increased productivity and thereby increase in the profit f) Reduced transaction cost. MIS characteristics In any organization managers will have varieties of tasks to manage. MIS is mainly designed to take care of the needs of the managers in the organization. Organizations will have different departments like marketing, production, sales, inventory, maintenance etc. Each of these departments function individually and also in relationship with other departments. Information is available in abundance. MIS aids in integrating the information generated by various departments of the organization. MIS helps in identifying a proper mechanism of storage of data. The data is maintained in such a way that the unnecessary duplication of data is avoided. MIS also helps in establishing mechanism to eliminate redundancies in data. MIS as a system can be broken down into sub systems. Each such sub system may be programmed. This results in easy access of data, accuracy of data and information. It helps in maintaining the consistency of data. Function of MIS The main function of MIS is to help the managers and the executives in the organization in decision-making. Large quantities of data like customers information, competitors information, personnel records, sales data, accounting data etc is collected

Joshi Tarunkumar Bhupenrakumar : MBA SEM 2 MB0031- SET 1

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from internal sources like the Company records and external sources like annual reports and publications. The collected data is organized in the form of a database. The data from the database is processed and analyzed by using different tools and techniques. The results of the analysis are properly presented to the managers to help them in decision-making. Question 1. b. What are the functions and disadvantages of MIS? Answer: Advantages and Disadvantages, which we feel, is appropriate in the case. 1) To begin with, in the above Case presentation, the initial paragraph is on the typical work scenario faced by a Manager in most of the service sector organization. The amount of pressure he is in during his daily routines work. Here he seems to be senior most and most computer literate among others in the office. Hence his boss comes to him and hands over a letter to him, which mentions about Collaboration over Internet. The manager is supposed to go through the contents and brief everyone by Thursday. The matter is related to E-Collaboration and E Business. Further there are information on how to get more information on E-Collabration. There are references of various Internet sites given to gather more inputs on E-Enterprise, E Business and E Collaboration. E business systems lay foundation of other Enterprise applications, namely E commerce, Ecommunication and E collaboration. To understand and discuss about the above terms we need to know that MIS has been evolving in different forms under different levels of management. Some of the developments are recent and some are still in the development stage. The research continues. With the emergence of Internet, business organization has undergone structural, cultural, and qualitatitive change and a new organization structure has emerged which is known as E business enterprise. In this Enterprise business operations are

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performed through E Communication and E Collaboration initiatives. Therefore, E business enterprise has a global market, reach, source and global competition. E business enterprise is more process driven, technology enabled and uses its own information and knowledge to perform. It has no geographic boundaries as it can extend its operations where Internet works. About E Collaboration Every business has a number of work scenarios where group of people work together to complete the tasks and to achieve a common objective. The groups could be teams or virtual teams with different member strength. They come together to perform a task to achieve some results. The process is called collaboration. The collaboration now is possible with e-technologies, which put these teams in network with Internet support for communication, access to different databases and servers. These capabilities help to create collaborative work systems and allow members to work together cooperatively on projects and assignments. The biggest advantage of E-collaboration is that it taps the collective wisdom, knowledge and experience of the members. The collaboration team or group could be within the organisation and between the organisations as well. Since, E-collaboration works on an Internet platform and uses web technology, work group / team need not be at one physical location. They can be at different locations and form a virtual team to work on project or assignment. E-collaboration uses E-communication capabilities to perform collaborative tasks, or project assignment. Its effectiveness is increased by software 'GroupWare' that enables the members of the group to share information, invoke an application and work together to create documents and share them and so on. GroupWare is collaboration software. E-collaboration helps work effectively on applications like calendaring and scheduling tasks, event, project management, workflow applications, work group applications, document creation and sharing, and knowledge management.

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E-collaboration system components are Internet, Intranet, Extranet and LAN, WAN networks for communication through GroupWare tools, browsers. Application packages are software suit, which help process customer requirements. It is supported by databases present on various servers like mail server, material database, knowledge server, document server and so on. 2) MIS for E-business is different compared to conventional MIS design of an organisation. The role of MIS in E-business organization is to deal with changes in global market and enterprises. MIS produces more knowledge-based products. Knowledge management system is formally recognized as a part of MIS. It is effectively used for strategic planning for survival and growth, increase in profit and productivity and so on. To achieve the said benefits of E-business organisation, it is necessary to redesign the organisation to realize the benefits of digital firm. The organisation structure should be lean and flat. 2) Get rid of rigid established infrastructure such as branch office or zonal office. 3) Allow people to work from anywhere. 4) Automate processes after reengineering the process to cut down process cycle time. Make use of groupware technology on Internet platform for faster response processing. 3) Advantages and Challenges: Internet and networking technology has thrown challenge to enlarge the scope of organisation where customers and vendors become part of the organisation. This technology offers a solution to communicate, co ordinate and collaborate with customers, vendors and business partners. E-business enterprise is open twenty-four hours, and being independent, managers, vendors; customers transact business any time from anywhere. It has no geographic boundaries as it can extend its operations where Internet works. All this is possible due to Internet and web moving traditional paper

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driven organisation to information driven Internet enabled E-business enterprise. MIS in E-organisation deviates from traditional report formats to automated intelligent knowledge driven system. It enforces manager to act quickly to response displayed on the screen. Most of the decisions of middle and operational management are delegated to IT-enabled information and knowledge driven systems. They are supported by the rule-based transaction processing system, decision support systems, expert systems, artificial intelligence (AI) systems, and data warehouse and mining systems. MIS in E-organisation deviates from the conventional model of 'Capture Compute Process Analyse Report Think and Act' to 'Point Click Respond Act. Challenges: One challenge is to convert domestic process design to work for international process, where integration of multinational information systems using different communication standards, country specific accounting practices, and laws of security are to be adhered strictly. This is just not a technical change in business operations but a cultural change in the mindset of managers and workers to look beyond the conventional organisation. It means changing the organization behaviour to take competitive advantage of the E-business technology. The last but not the least important is the challenge to organise and implement information architecture and information technology platforms, considering multiple locations and multiple information needs arising due to global operations of the business into a comprehensive MIS.

Joshi Tarunkumar Bhupenrakumar : MBA SEM 2 MB0031- SET 1

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Question 2 a. Write a scenario which shows the applications of OLAP systems? Answer: A decision support system is a way to model data and make quality decisions based upon it. Making the right decision in business is usually based on the quality of your data and your ability to sift through and analyze the data to find trends in which you can create solutions and strategies for. DSS or decision support systems are usually computer applications along with a human component that can sift through large amounts of data and pick between the many choices. While many people think of decision support systems as a specialized part of a business, most companies have actually integrated this system into their day to day operating activities. For instance, many companies constantly download and analyze sales data, budget sheets and forecasts and they update their strategy once they analyze and evaluate the current results. Decision support systems have a definite structure in businesses, but in reality, the data and decisions that are based on it are fluid and constantly changing. Types of DSS Data-Driven DSS Data-Driven DSS take the massive amounts of data available through the company's TPS and MIS systems and cull from it useful information which executives can use to make more informed decisions. They don't have to have a theory or model but can "free-flow" the data. The first generic type of Decision Support System is a Data- Driven DSS. These systems include file drawer and management reporting systems, data warehousing and analysis systems, Executive Information Systems (EIS) and Spatial Decision Support Systems. Business Intelligence Systems are also examples of DataDriven DSS. Data-Driven DSS emphasize access to and manipulation of large databases of structured data and especially a time-series of internal company data and sometimes external data. Simple file systems accessed

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by query and retrieval tools provide the most elementary level of functionality. Data warehouse systems that allow the manipulation of data by computerized tools tailored to a specific task and setting or by more general tools and operators provide additional functionality. Data-Driven DSS with Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) provide the highest level of functionality and decision support that is linked to analysis of large collections of historical data. Model-Driven DSS A second category, Model-Driven DSS, includes systems that use accounting and financial models, representational models, and optimization models. Model-Driven DSS emphasize access to and manipulation of a model. Simple statistical and analytical tools provide the most elementary level of functionality. Some OLAP systems that allow complex analysis of data may be classified as hybrid DSS systems providing modeling, data retrieval and data summarization functionality. Model-Driven DSS use data and parameters provided by decision makers to aid them in analyzing a situation, but they are not usually data intensive. Very large databases are usually not needed for Model-Driven DSS. Model-Driven DSS were isolated from the main Information Systems of the organization and were primarily used for the typical "what-if" analysis. That is, "What if we increase production of our products and decrease the shipment time?" These systems rely heavily on models to help executives understand the impact of their decisions on the organization, its suppliers, and its customers. Knowledge-Driven DSS The terminology for this third generic type of DSS is still evolving. Currently, the best term seems to be Knowledge-Driven DSS. Adding the modifier driven to the word knowledge maintains a parallelism in the framework and focuses on the dominant knowledge base component. Knowledge-Driven DSS can suggest or recommend actions to managers.

Joshi Tarunkumar Bhupenrakumar : MBA SEM 2 MB0031- SET 1

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These DSS are personal computer systems with specialized problem-solving expertise. The "expertise" consists of knowledge about a particular domain, understanding of problems within that domain, and "skill" at solving some of these problems. A related concept is Data Mining. It refers to a class of analytical applications that search for hidden patterns in a database. Data mining is the process of sifting through large amounts of data to produce data content relationships. Document-Driven DSS A new type of DSS, a Document-Driven DSS or Knowledge Management System, is evolving to help managers retrieve and manage unstructured documents and Web pages. A Document-Driven DSS integrates a variety of storage and processing technologies to provide complete document retrieval and analysis. The Web provides access to large document databases including databases of hypertext documents, images, sounds and video. Examples of documents that would be accessed by a Document-Based DSS are policies and procedures, product specifications, catalogs, and corporate historical documents, including minutes of meetings, corporate records, and important correspondence. A search engine is a powerful decision aiding tool associated with a Document-Driven DSS. Communications-Driven and Group DSS Group Decision Support Systems (GDSS) came first, but now a broader category of Communications-Driven DSS or groupware can be identified. This fifth generic type of Decision Support System includes communication, collaboration and decision support technologies that do not fit within those DSS types identified. Therefore, we need to identify these systems as a specific category of DSS. A Group DSS is a hybrid Decision Support System that emphasizes both the use of communications and decision models. A Group Decision Support System is an interactive computer-based system intended to facilitate the solution of problems by decision-makers working together as a group. Groupware supports electronic communication,

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scheduling, document sharing, and other group productivity and decision support enhancing activities We have a number of technologies and capabilities in this category in the framework Group DSS, two-way interactive video, White Boards, Bulletin Boards, and Email. Question : 2 b. How does information technology influence the organisationss goals. Answer.: IT influences Organizations goals There is always a mention about what IT contributes to corporate strategy. It was recognized that corporation achieved a significant competitive advantage by adopting suitable IT concepts in building up their strategy. It quickly became incumbent on its competitors to neutralize that advantage, and hence to avoid 'competitive disadvantage' (Vitale 1986, Warner 1987, Brousseau 1990). Thebnotion of 'competitive necessity' was created to complement that of 'competitive advantage'. Comparison was drawn between 'sustainable' and 'contestable' competitive advantage (Clemons 1986, Feeny & Ives 1989, Ciborra 1992). Though many kinds of advantages which can possibly be derived from innovative use of IT, it is possible to quickly neutralize it by others. A distinction needs to be made between the sustainability of the original advantage, and of any derived advantage. An enhancement to the Porter framework of competitive strategy was the notion of 'alliance' (Barrett & Konsynski 1982, Gummesson 1987, EDP Analyzer 1987, Johnston & Vitale 1988, Rockart & Short 1989, Wiseman 1989, Konsynski & McFarlan 1990, Ford 1990, Bowersox 1990). This referred to chains or clusters of organizations which collaborate in order to gain competitive advantage over other, similar organizations, or to neutralize the advantage of one or more competitor organizations.

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The innovation in IT and its strategic importance to enterprise is compatible with the company's existing characteristics and advantages (Beath & Ives 1986, Clemons & Row 1987, Ives & Vitale 1988, Hopper 1990). One particularly important facet of this is the notion of 'strategic alignment' of IT policies and initiatives with the directions indicated by the corporation's senior executives (Henderson & Venkatraman 1989, Earl 1989, Broadbent & Weill 1991). An outline of factors that influence organization's strategic goals is summarized in the following diagram.

Scott Morton's Five Forces Influencing the Organizations Objectives Organizations are facing the re-conceptualization of the role of information technology in business.

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Q.3 a. Explain the role of systems analyst in SDLC. Explain with a scenario.

Answer: Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) India Outsourcing > Software Development Life Cycle Summary: As in any other engineering discipline, software engineering also has some structured models for software development. This document will provide you with a generic overview about different software development methodologies adopted by contemporary software firms. Read on to know more about the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) in detail. Curtain Raiser Like any other set of engineering products, software products are also oriented towards the customer. It is either market driven or it drives the market. Customer Satisfaction was the buzzword of the 80's. Customer Delight is today's buzzword and Customer Ecstasy is the buzzword of the new millennium. Products that are not customer or user friendly have no place in the market although they are engineered using the best technology. The interface of the product is as crucial as the internal technology of the product. Market Research A market study is made to identify a potential customer's need. This process is also known as market research. Here, the already existing need and the possible and potential needs that are available in a segment of the society are studied carefully. The market study is done based on a lot of assumptions. Assumptions are the crucial factors in the development or inception of a product's development. Unrealistic assumptions can cause a nosedive in the entire venture. Though assumptions are abstract, there should be a move to develop tangible assumptions to come up with a successful product.

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Research and Development Once the Market Research is carried out, the customer's need is given to the Research & Development division (R&D) to conceptualize a costeffective system that could potentially solve the customer's needs in a manner that is better than the one adopted by the competitors at present. Once the conceptual system is developed and tested in a hypothetical environment, the development team takes control of it. The development team adopts one of the software development methodologies that is given below, develops the proposed system, and gives it to the customer. The Sales & Marketing division starts selling the software to the available customers and simultaneously works to develop a niche segment that could potentially buy the software. In addition, the division also passes the feedback from the customers to the developers and the R&D division to make possible value additions to the product. While developing a software, the company outsources the non-core activities to other companies who specialize in those activities. This accelerates the software development process largely. Some companies work on tie-ups to bring out a highly matured product in a short period. Popular Software Development Models The following are some basic popular models that are adopted by many software development firms A. System Development Life Cycle (SDLC) Model B. Prototyping Model C. Rapid Application Development Model D. Component Assembly Model A. System Development Life Cycle (SDLC) Model This is also known as Classic Life Cycle Model (or) Linear Sequential Model (or) Waterfall Method. This model has the following activities.

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1. System/Information Engineering and Modeling As software is always of a large system (or business), work begins by establishing the requirements for all system elements and then allocating some subset of these requirements to software. This system view is essential when the software must interface with other elements such as hardware, people and other resources. System is the basic and very critical requirement for the existence of software in any entity. So if the system is not in place, the system should be engineered and put in place. In some cases, to extract the maximum output, the system should be re-engineered and spruced up. Once the ideal system is engineered or tuned, the development team studies the software requirement for the system. 2. Software Requirement Analysis This process is also known as feasibility study. In this phase, the development team visits the customer and studies their system. They investigate the need for possible software automation in the given system. By the end of the feasibility study, the team furnishes a document that holds the different specific recommendations for the candidate system. It also includes the personnel assignments, costs, project schedule, target dates etc.... The requirement gathering process is intensified and focussed specially on software. To understand the nature of the program(s) to be built, the system engineer or "Analyst" must understand the information domain for the software, as well as required function, behavior, performance and interfacing. The essential purpose of this phase is to find the need and to define the problem that needs to be solved . 3. System Analysis and Design In this phase, the software development process, the software's overall structure and its nuances are defined. In terms of the client/server technology, the number of tiers needed for the package architecture, the database design, the data structure design etc... are all defined in this phase. A software development model is thus created. Analysis and Design

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are very crucial in the whole development cycle. Any glitch in the design phase could be very expensive to solve in the later stage of the software development. Much care is taken during this phase. The logical system of the product is developed in this phase. 4. Code Generation The design must be translated into a machine-readable form. The code generation step performs this task. If the design is performed in a detailed manner, code generation can be accomplished without much complication. Programming tools like compilers, interpreters, debuggers etc... are used to generate the code. Different high level programming languages like C, C++, Pascal, Java are used for coding. With respect to the type of application, the right programming language is chosen. B. Prototyping Model This is a cyclic version of the linear model. In this model, once the requirement analysis is done and the design for a prototype is made, the development process gets started. Once the prototype is created, it is given to the customer for evaluation. The customer tests the package and gives his/her feed back to the developer who refines the product according to the customer's exact expectation. After a finite number of iterations, the final software package is given to the customer. In this methodology, the software is evolved as a result of periodic shuttling of information between the customer and developer. This is the most popular development model in the contemporary IT industry. Most of the successful software products have been developed using this model - as it is very difficult (even for a whiz kid!) to comprehend all the requirements of a customer in one shot. There are many variations of this model skewed with respect to the project management styles of the companies. New versions of a software product evolve as a result of prototyping. C. Rapid Application Development (RAD) Model

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The RAD models a linear sequential software development process that emphasizes an extremely short development cycle. The RAD model is a "high speed" adaptation of the linear sequential model in which rapid development is achieved by using a component-based construction approach. Used primarily for information systems applications, the RAD approach encompasses the following phases: 1. Business modeling The information flow among business functions is modeled in a way that answers the following questions: What information drives the business process? What information is generated? Who generates it? Where does the information go? Who processes it? 2. Data modeling The information flow defined as part of the business modeling phase is refined into a set of data objects that are needed to support the business. The characteristic (called attributes) of each object is identified and the relationships between these objects are defined. 3. Process modeling The data objects defined in the data-modeling phase are transformed to achieve the information flow necessary to implement a business function. Processing the descriptions are created for adding, modifying, deleting, or retrieving a data object. 4. Application generation The RAD model assumes the use of the RAD tools like VB, VC++, Delphi etc... rather than creating software using conventional third generation programming languages. The RAD model works to reuse existing program

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components (when possible) or create reusable components (when necessary). In all cases, automated tools are used to facilitate construction of the software. 5. Testing and turnover Since the RAD process emphasizes reuse, many of the program components have already been tested. This minimizes the testing and development time. D. Component Assembly Model Object technologies provide the technical framework for a componentbased process model for software engineering. The object oriented paradigm emphasizes the creation of classes that encapsulate both data and the algorithm that are used to manipulate the data. If properly designed and implemented, object oriented classes are reusable across different applications and computer based system architectures. Component Assembly Model leads to software reusability. The integration/assembly of the already existing software components accelerates the development process. Nowadays many component libraries are available on the Internet. If the right components are chosen, the integration aspect is made much simpler.

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Question 3. B. Draw a data flow diagram for an hospital management system? Answer: Diagrams for an hospital management system are as under

Figure 1

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Figure 2

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Figure 3

Figure 4

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Question .4 What is the features contributing to success and failures of MIS models? Answer .: Budgeting Models Controlling the business performance through the budget system is an accepted management practice. In this approach, various budgets are prepared, viz., the Sales Budget, the Production Budget, the Capacity Budget, the Manpower Budget, the Expense Budget, and the Inventory Budget, etc. Using these budgets the profits are estimated. Budgets are also used for planning and control. The system is used to find out whether the performance is under the budget or over the budget. This gives the manager a self evaluation tool for assessing the current status and also provides some insight into the operations of the Company. The use of Spread Sheet, Lotus123, Visicalc, Framework and many others are a standard tool for these applications, where the planning, budgeting and analysis are required. All these systems are based on the worksheet which has columns and rows with labels on each. The package helps in arriving at the row totals and the column totals. It not only provides the totals but also summaries at the subheads. It has also a facility that if one row or column changes, it computes the changes in the rest of the worksheet, where it is affected. Breakeven Analysis Model This model is simple but very useful for determining the volume of business activity at which there is no loss or profit. The model is used to decide the alternatives based on the cost, volume and price. BEP= FC___= 100000 = 1000

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REV-VC 200-100 Where FC = Fixed cost REV = Revenue per unit BEP = Break Even Point TC = total Cost VC = Variable Cost N = No. of Units demanded Suppose FC = 1, 00,000, VC/Unit = 100 and Rev = 200 then BEP is calculated as above. This model can be built for the company, for the product groups or for any activity, where you can identify the fixed cost, the variable cost and the revenue at each activity level in terms of the units demanded. The advantage of this model is that it tells you as to what the breakeven point for the given level of costs and revenue is. If there are possibilities of altering the costs, it would tell its impact on the breakeven point, i.e., if the price is reduced, the revenue will come down and the breakeven point will further go up. The costs are generally not linear over the entire range of activity. The cost would go up after a breakeven model can be built for the multiple activities and for the nonlinear costs. The computerized model helps in assessing the various parameters of business and its sensitivity towards the profit/loss. The model is very popular when the costs are known and are controllable. It is very handy tool for a quick decision on the price, cost considerations, etc. and can be used very effectively for commercial negotiations.

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Question .5 What is the limitations of ERP systems? How do ERP packages help in overcoming theses limitations? Answer .: Limitations of ERP Success depends on the skill and experience of the workforce, including training about how to make the system work correctly. Many companies cut costs by cutting training budgets. Privately owned small enterprises are often undercapitalized, meaning their ERP system is often operated by personnel with inadequate education in ERP in general, such as APICS foundations, and in the particular ERP vendor package being used. Personnel turnover Companies can employ new managers lacking education in the company's ERP system, proposing changes in business practices that are out of synchronization with the best utilization of the company's selected ERP. Customization of the ERP software is limited. Some customization may involve changing of the ERP software structure which is usually not allowed. Reengineering of business processes to fit the "industry standard" prescribed by the ERP system may lead to a loss of competitive advantage. ERP systems can be very expensive to install often ranging from 30,000 US Dollars to 500,000,000 US Dollars for multinational companies. ERP vendors can charge sums of money for annual license renewal that is unrelated to the size of the company using the ERP or its profitability. Technical support personnel often give replies to callers that are inappropriate for the caller's corporate structure. Computer security concerns arise, for example when telling a nonprogrammer how to change

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a database on the fly, at a company that requires an audit trail of changes so as to meet some regulatory standards. ERPs are often seen as too rigid and too difficult to adapt to the specific workflow and business process of some companiesthis is cited as one of the main causes of their failure. Systems can be difficult to use. Systems are too restrictive and do not allow much flexibility in implementation and usage. The system can suffer from the "weakest link" probleman inefficiency in one department or at one of the partners may affect other participants. Many of the integrated links need high accuracy in other applications to work effectively. A company can achieve minimum standards, then over time "dirty data" will reduce the reliability of some applications. Once a system is established, switching costs are very high for any one of the partners (reducing flexibility and strategic control at the corporate level). The blurring of company boundaries can cause accountability, lines of responsibility, and employee morale. problems in

Resistance in sharing sensitive internal information between departments can reduce the effectiveness of the software. Some large organizations may have multiple departments with separate, independent resources, missions, chains of command, etc, and consolidation into a single enterprise may yield limited benefits. There are frequent compatibility problems with the various legacy systems of the partners.

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The system may be over engineered relative to the actual needs of the customer. ERP Integration Integration is an extremely important part to ERP's. ERP's main goal is to integrate data and processes from all areas of an organization and unify it for easy access and work flow. ERP's usually accomplish integration by creating one single database that employs multiple software modules providing different areas of an organization with various business functions. Although the ideal configuration would be one ERP system for an entire organization, many larger organizations usually create and ERP system and then build upon the system and external interface for other stand alone systems which might be more powerful and perform better in fulfilling an organizations needs. Usually this type of configuration can be time consuming and does require lots of labor hours.

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Question 6. Explain the relationship between artificial intelligence and neural networks with the help of a scenario? Answer: Two factors are necessary for a method to be useful in a variety of country settings. An analysis technique to understand information available is required that is robust and not constrained. And, data of a comparable format and scope of measurement is needed to enable parallel analysis across countries. Artificial intelligence neural networks and Consumer Confidence Surveys fit these criteria. This work provides an example of the power of this combination. NEURAL PATTERNS Marketers constantly face the dilemma of how best to implement a winning strategy from one market to another. Thinking globally and acting locally are no longer ideals for international marketers -- rather, thinking globally and acting locally are required for growth and profit. Differences in consumer perception, spending power, need states, and purchase habits complicate discerning the commonalties which are present. By example we will provide an approach to understanding the link between perceptions and spending that can be implemented in any market. Two factors are necessary for a method to be useful in a variety of country settings. An analysis technique to understand information available is required that is robust and not constrained. And, data of a similar format and scope of measurement will be needed to enable parallel analysis across countries. Artificial intelligence neural network models continue to provide a new dimension in data analysis for marketers. Because neural nets require no assumptions about a data sets structure, distribution, independence or relationship, they are able to discover patterns present in information that traditional statistical methods

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Joshi Tarunkumar Bhupenrakumar : MBA SEM 2 MB0031- SET 1

Roll No. 520843328

cannot address. Neural networks use human-like trial and error learning methods to detect patterns existing within a data set. Additionally, neural nets have the ability to ignore data that is not significant and emphasize that data that is most influential. A neural network acquires its intelligence by training with a set of variables or features represented by a variety of encoding methods. This knowledge is then applied as a prediction of the patterns existing in this new data presented to the network. Work by Bechtel et al. (1993) provides compelling evidence that consumer confidence tracking data is a reliable reflection of the macro psychology attitude-behavior link at the aggregate level of national economic conditions. Additionally we see confirmation of a strong socio tropic component of consumer confidence that exists across a number of EEC states. Much has use has been made of the components of consumer confidence. The Consumer Confidence Survey of The Conference Board, Inc., New York, is classified as a leading economic indicator by the U. S. Department of Commerce. This survey is generally referred to as the worlds first and best known psychological indicator. According to Bechtel, adaptations of this index are reported in monthly surveys in each of the twelve nations of the European Economic Community. Tracking this index and its various components proves beneficial at a macro analytic level. When attempting to use consumer confidence in industry specific forecasting, the results are less satisfying. Building on this knowledge, we develop neural networks capable of learning the patterns of change over time in consumer confidence by country. These patterns are related with sales from a number of major retail categories, e.g. department stores, automobiles, grocery, food away from home, etc. Trained neural net models now generalize this learning and permit forecasts of consumer category sales in future time as well as in new geographic markets. An example of a model using neural network

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Joshi Tarunkumar Bhupenrakumar : MBA SEM 2 MB0031- SET 1

Roll No. 520843328

pattern analysis to forecast department store monthly sales is now presented. MODEL STRUCTURE Guided by Bechtel we are able to construct a parsimonious model. This model is accurate and is of a general structure which may be used in a large number of individual countries. Of course the model may be refined for each country with specific data available in the CCI study. For this example we use neural pattern analysis to forecast the next month department store sales (SIC code 531) using current month confidence measures. Neural networks such as the one we use here are comprised of a series of layers of neuron processing nodes (Grey- Tedesco, 1991). One layer each for input and output. Also a layer of neurons known as the hidden is constructed between the input and output layers. All neurons in each layer are connected to each neuron in the next layer input to hidden -- hidden to output. These connections are represented by weight values which are modified by the network during the course of training the network. Initially these weights are random numbers; as the neural net examines each new data record these weights change in order for the network output to more closely match the output of the current data example. It is the value of these connection weights that depict the knowledge gained by the model. The input vector for the neural network contained a seasonality factor and the monthly Consumer Confidence Survey for the following: With the exception of the last two items, there are three categories for each of the above confidence measures. Therefore, the network input layer contains 26 individual neurons. It is common with neural networks to have an output vector with more than a single variable to predict. In this model only one month is estimated. Other models using this same confidence survey input are designed to estimate up to three months into the future simultaneously. After pre-processing and design, the neural pattern model appears as follows:

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Joshi Tarunkumar Bhupenrakumar : MBA SEM 2 MB0031- SET 1

Roll No. 520843328

FULLY CONNECTED NEURAL PATTERN MODEL METHOD AND RESULTS Monthly data for the period January, 1984 through December, 1994 in the United States is used in this model. Observations are presented to the neural network two at a time. And, the network is permitted to process for 11,000+ iterations through the data. Training is accomplished with approximately 90% of data, while the remaining 10% is withheld for testing the accuracy of the networks forecasting ability. Using the test data, the model reports a reliability factor of 76% when projecting department store sales two months after the current months confidence data, and 89% reliability when forecasting one month into the future. We use the term reliability to mean the percent chance of Business Conditions Evaluation Business Conditions Expectation Personal Conditions Expectations Buying Plans Personal Department Store Sales All data and weights flow this direction Connection Weights the model being correct when forecasting sales for a new month. In other words, this neural pattern model will be correct almost nine out of ten times where it projects sales for the next one month. Two meaningful uses of any neural pattern model are: 1) forecasting and 2) the analysis of the relative importance of the independent or casual variables. The following table displays the forecast for the last three months of 1994 using this model. all sales in $MM While the accuracy of this model does vary somewhat (2% to 6%), its application as a planning tool is a breakthrough is a search for commonality in quantifying the trends of consumer confidence. Neural patterns are now available as method for marketers to realize the heretofore untapped information available in a variety of consumer behavior data. This powerful technology is a bridge for the passage of global marketing strategies. As more data is made available from sources

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Joshi Tarunkumar Bhupenrakumar : MBA SEM 2 MB0031- SET 1

Roll No. 520843328

through the varied interactive offerings, the ability to glean knowledge from this information grows in value. Artificial intelligence neural networks continue to offer the greatest opportunity to realize the expectations facing marketers.

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Joshi Tarunkumar Bhupenrakumar : MBA SEM 2 MB0031- SET 1

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