The answers provided below are in reference to the two case studies; focus on organization and focus on technology
The problem faced by Peru Credit Bank is that of having trouble in ensuring that as it attracts new customers, it was able to maintain the already existing customers with it. In addition the Bank data house was insufficient to handle the swelling number of customers. This problem affected the performance because it made customer segmentation a task that was very laborious for the Bank, in addition to the analysis of the customer data taking too long. In order to provide a solution to the first problem, the Bank made a choice to focus on customer service. This was enhanced through adding the services related with electronic Banking; which could enable the customers to go through most of their transactions in the ATM by themselves, in addition to increasing the tellers in banking halls. The people’s services are recognized in the Bank, although it would be cheaper to maintain ATM. A customer interaction with a Bank employee represents an opportunity sell additional banking services to the customer. Therefore, the people dimension is perceived in the dimension of marketing. The ATM machine represents technology, through which the Banking efficiency is improved. The organizations solution is seen in the management decision of transferring the data warehouse.
The alternatives available for the management are updating the same database management for the warehouse used by BCP and migration choice to a data warehouse. The alternative chosen was the best because there was a change in the Bank analysis and segmentation of the customers. Through the data warehouse information, BCP would be able to create its customers profile, through which the customers segments would be easily indentified and marketed. In addition, through the alternatives chosen, it would be possible for the Bank to immediately see the effects of the marketing campaigns as it monitors the older campaigns results
Second case study
The problems faced by China Telecom included; the company requirement of compliance with the regulations of international reporting for the companies that were traded publicly and the need to ensure that all the business functions were integrated and a real time management was enabled. These problems would affect the company’s efficiency in organization; affect the internal operation control in addition to promotion of improved collaboration between the different parts. The company chose to solve the problem through investing in the software of enterprise resource planning. Other alternative that the company could have taken could have been that of choosing to write its own software through which it could have been able to ensure that different functions of business and units of organization were linked.
The solution chosen from the peoples, technological and organizational perspective were; mySAP ERP based on its functioning that was powerful and capable integration. MySAP ERP supports markets, procurement, control, finance and management of the human capital. For data integration promotion the company also made a decision of adopting two SAP Netweaver components which were; SAP Enterprise Portal and SAP Business Intelligence. HewLett- Packard was chosen by China Telecom after consideration of some vendors. The hardware, due to its scalability would run the ERP software.
The solution made was the best because it would allow the use of HP and SAP solution by over 30,000 employees at over 20 subsidiaries of China Telecom. In addition, the data integration has stepped up the information flow among the management functions of accounting, procurement and engineering together with encouragement of department’s collaboration.
References
Chapter 5, Foundations of business Intelligence: Databases and Information Management. p.167
Chapter 8, Achieving Operational Excellence and Customer Intimacy: Enterprise Applications. p.267
