The Eckero Group and the Problem of Effective Information Dissemination - Case Study Example

THE ECKERO GROUP AND THE PROBLEM OF EFFECTIVE INFORMATION DISSEMINATION Executive Summary Efficient dissemination of information and the employment of effective communication are the methods through which entrepreneurial firms and commercial organisations manage and direct their endeavors and achieve their short- and long-term objectives. The Eckero Group, a respected name in the shipping and tourism industry, in its pursuit of further improving its service to its clientele and harness more its influence in the industry, exerts effort and puts into practice initiatives that takes advantage of the latest technologies now prevailing in the information age, namely, the intranet. A simple intranet access management infrastructure that assimilates applications and platforms can generate vital and significant benefits for organisations trying to improve or enhance the use and management of their communication channels and digital identities. As a classic example, the use of a standard set of security protocols and the elimination of redundant identity stores can simplify infrastructure, reduce management efforts, enable single sign on (SSO), and make security auditing easier. Introduction Effective communication and efficient information dissemination are the approaches through which business firms and organisations synchronise their pursuits and accomplish their short- and long-term objectives. Perceptibly, technologies for managing and distributing information have changed over time, but its purpose and meaning required for human organisation have remained considerably coherent and dependable. The initiative to seek for ways to authenticate electronic requests and submissions is merely an attempt to meet the same needs that seals, signature comparison, and notary publics met in the paper world. As it is, the need to secure information on networks is exactly the same need that led to sealing wax and armed guards in previous eras using paper media. However, security requirements are not the only reasons that motivate and drive organisations to manage their information. If the information does not facilitate some further use that provides value, then there is no need to secure it. Basically, organisational information carries with it content that leads to action which either means a gain or a loss of resources. Customarily, an organisation strengthens its capacity to organise and direct these resources by dividing among numerous individuals the work necessary to achieve its objective. For the organisation to be effective, activities and its progress must synchronised and highly coordinated. As it is, a vital justification for the distribution and allotment of information within organisations is the conformity and management of these objectives and divergent tasks. Consistency of information is a crucial necessity for successful coordination. It is not a positive development if the existence and location of vital information stays unknown to those who need it, likewise, it is not very helpful and efficient if a team tries to reach and consensus when every member is operating from a different information base that may be conflicting or irreconcilable with the others on the team. It is a fact that data more often than not gets stale that keeping it current is an imperative necessity. At present, most organisational structures and processes have been made sophisticated to solve the problems intrinsic with paper-based information. Information currency and integrity are much simpler problems when the content does not change often, activities being coordinated are not that big or complicated and the information is centrally collected and distributed. However, these are not common characteristics of most businesses today. The distributed environments more commonly found at present need to be able to synchronise information in a distinct and novel way which requires a different set of management structures and processes than most organisations have inherited. Intranet Among the most recent catchphrases in the computer and networking sphere is the intranet. An intranet is an internally focused application of internet technology used to circulate information within a company (Riggins and Rhee, 1998). Driven by promises of wide ranging benefits, from cost savings through fundamental business process improvement, companies are aggressively embracing intranet technology. Following its introduction in 1994, the number of companies implementing corporate intranets has grown dramatically. More than three-quarters of all Web servers being installed are for intranet purposes, and the market for intranet applications, platforms and related technology is substantially outstripping that for the public internet and all other IT areas (Gerstner, 2002). Basically, an intranet is a system linking a series of allied computers and devices using internet protocols such Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) and Hypertext Transport Protocol (HTTP), and technology (e.g., the Web, newsgroups, e-mail). With this technological structure, the network nodes are restricted within the enterprise that operates it and are protected from the external world by one or more firewalls. Intranets can be implemented exclusively as internal distributed networks over LANs and WANs or with an opening to the outside world through some Internet access, from behind a firewall. The former implementation is less concerned with security issues, although it can be subject to internal attacks. The latter implementation is definitely exposed to security breaches from the outside and requires special handling of the problem (Stallings, 1995). Company Overview Ecker Linjen is a marketing brand name for Rederiaktiebolaget Ecker. Introduced in the 1960s, the name became renowned in the public eye. The firm's well managed ferries create a familiar atmosphere between the passengers and the firm's staff. Many of its passengers are frequent visitors to land and the familiar atmosphere onboard has fortified the company's respectable profile. Basically, the whole organisation likes to concern itself with warmth, friendliness and safety. Together with its subsidiaries, the Ecker Group has about 600 employees, except during the summer season when they have to increase to 800. Ecker Linjen is also a tourist agency, cooperating with all the hotels, lodges, cottages and other service providers as well as with sports and cultural organisations on land. The incoming departments in Grisslehamn and Ecker cover the whole range of tourist products on land in their sales - from simple accommodation to various packages for individuals and groups, activity holidays, and conferences. Ecker Group has five subsidiaries; landsresor/Ecker Linjen Incoming Dept; landsresor Ab; Williams Buss; and Ecker Line (Eckerolinjen.com, 2006). The Problem A major dilemma of the business is that communication between various units does not flow efficiently. When the parent company sends out information, it's either for all units or only for just specific divisions. The management's quandary is when information is given to all units, there is too much unnecessary facts flowing to divisions that do not need the information at all or it can be that vital facts that really need to be conveyed may be lost. Eckerlinjen is currently on the process of developing an enhanced "intranet" system to facilitate the efficient flow of information. The one that already exists is not accessible to all units. Since the company employs a large workforce, the management wants to have an information system that will enable employees to access particular company information in a timely manner without added complexity. It has to be a system that is flexible and user-friendly, not a tool that is too complicated nobody will bother to use it. However, much as management wants to pursue such plan, there is no formal model or template available where streams of information are relayed in appropriate channels to and from the units, within the units and between the units. With the ship's traffic, there are demands from governments to document everything that has something to do with security and for this purpose an ISM system is being utilised. Nonetheless, this structure is extremely bureaucratic and might not be able to facilitate the other current of information. Technically, there are great possibilities of developing an advanced intranet. The bigger challenge now is to stay within reasonable costs and make the system really user-friendly. In addition, there is also the need to resolve the question of how the ships can use the intranet system since they cannot be connected to the internet when they are out in the sea. PROPOSAL IN RESPONSE TO THE PROBLEM Constructing an efficient and a cost-effective Intranet system means thinking about how documents can be used to complete and accomplish tasks, how tasks can be well-organised into processes and how these processes can be structured into standard procedures. Basically, intranet is not specifically a tool; rather, it is a working support whose utilisation, when carrying duties and providing/securing information, can considerably transform a firm's working procedures and decisions and actions. But more importantly, the introduction of intranet necessitates a cultural change within the organisation adopting the system. Proposed Design First thing that must be borne in mind is that the intranet must be a star-network system where all the different computer terminals from various departments are all connected to a central server. Within the same office, computers must be connected to network hubs (routers) and connected to the Internet to the main server which could be hosted elsewhere. If from a ship and when communication is required onboard, the intranet will have to be connected through the satellite system on the ships. The intranet will be designed in a manner that is easy to use and provide an effective and secured form of communication within the organisation. To achieve this objective, an identification system is required in order to access the intranet, with the use of usernames and passwords. The network manager can design a system will allow access of different information to different users. For such a system, software requirements need to be considered. A Windows NT Server operating system will be good for such a need or an intranet login using a network managing software like Novell Client. Recommended Technology The technology program that will prove to bring excellent results for the group should be Microsoft Windows Sharepoint Services. Due to its high level of refining/processing, to use "grundlsning" would make the implementation project significantly smaller. The "grundlsning" that Microsoft has follows the product development cycle of the Ecker Group in which several additional components can also be installed on top of the platform. Below are a suggested structures and possible models/templates of how the company's intranet configuration should look like (Illustrations 1, 2, &3).. Key Players The following roles in intranet management should be: the author, who is responsible for constructing and bringing up to date a specific portion of intranet content; content manager, who should organize, manage and direct the content produced by the various authors, and responsible for ascertaining reliability, prevent overlapping of content, and for recommending changes and new content to the authors; webmaster, who represents the interface between the content side and the technical side of intranet management. Main responsibility is to keep the web applications running and formally consistent (e.g., no broken links). Likewise, the webmaster perform several administrative tasks related to the web applications themselves (e.g., conversion of documents to adequate formats such as hypertext markup language (HTML); technical administrator who is responsible for running and maintaining the underlying hardware and software components and main tasks include surveillance, logging, configuration, hardware and software installation, and user management. This role can be divided into the three sub-roles -- network administrator, for network hardware and software; server administrator, for server hardware and software, including server operating systems; and client administrator, for client hardware and software, such as web browsers; supporter who's duty is for running a help desk, which supports end users as well as authors and content managers. Problems that cannot be solved by the supporter are forwarded to competent specialists; and finally, the trainer who is responsible for training end users, authors, and content managers. Illustration 1 Anticipated Content For the structure to work and serve its users efficiently, it needs to have an emailing system for quick messaging and memo; schedules of the forms of transportations should be made available; other useful information can also be shared among the staff, like maintenance log and other historical information (database) of the organisation; Access to these must be confined to relevant parties only; shared access to documents; controlled access (Intranet should be password protected) and should have different levels of access, for instance, top management might have exclusive access while the majority of staff is excluded from viewing confidential accounting and HR information; events calendar, scheduler, a centralised scheduling system guarantees that everyone stays on the same page. This must allow meetings and events to be scheduled from a company, department and team level; message boards that will allow staff to express their opinions and work out solutions. A forum like this promotes the sharing of ideas that may not occur in face-to-face discussions. It also fosters communication between departments and peer groups that might not otherwise communicate candidly. Having these discussions on the intranet, rather than on outside service, keeps discussions focused and positive; address book which contains a complete list of clients', vendors' and employees' contact. This will make the search easier, faster and less expensive to update. In addition, batch email functionality can be implemented so that mass emails can be sent based on search criteria; capability to send messages to wireless devices, such as PDAs or cell phones; and finally, a search engine, the fastest way to find the information one is looking for. The search function must be easily accessible and ideally available from every page on the intranet. Conclusion Intranets provide us the power to manage in different and highly innovative ways. Taking advantage of novel approaches and positive opportunities necessitate a shift in our outlook of managing things to managing knowledge and information flows. This transformed standpoint requires us to look at the entire organisation as a knowledge base, not just the information in applications and databases. The workplace now becomes a complicated but extremely interesting sharing of sensory information and localised activities that change the knowledge base as they come about. As the organisational metaphor shifts from machine to organism, control will be seen in terms of conflicting and divergent tensions rather than engineered solutions. People become the key element, not as multi-talented and flexible machines, but as a vital arsenal of distinct knowledge to be shared and blended. This paves the way to an exciting possibility -- a shift in perspective from the Industrial Revolution as the golden age of individualism and exploitation of community labour to the Information Revolution as the golden age of community development and nurturing of individual knowledge. An intranet within an organisation, especially for an organisation like Eckero, will be an excellent tool to manage intelligence and will provide tremendous power and a competitive advantage. Key success factors would include -- a tight management of the project decentralisation; a strong project manager; a good definition of needs; serious focus on users; and persistence. * Illustration 2 - Information distribution process * Illustration3 - Maintenance process References / Readings Riggins, F. J. and Rhee, H. S. (1998). Toward a unified view of electronic commerce. Association for Computing Machinery, Communications of the ACM, 41, 88-95. Gerstner, J. (2002). Intranets mean business. Communication World 19, 14-17. Stallings, W. (1995). Network and internetwork security--Principles and practice. IEEE Press Benett, G. (1996). Introducing intranets: A decision gaker's Guide to launching an intranet. Indianapolis, IN: Que Corp. Bruno, L. (1996). Groupware vs. webware. Data Commun. 25, 3, 123-130. Davenport, T. and Short, J. The new industrial engineering: Information technology and business process redesign. Sloan Mgmt. Rev. 31, 4, 59-75. Grover, V., Fiedler, K., and Teng, J. Exploring the success of information technology-enabled business process reengineering. IEEE Trans. on Eng. Manage. 41, 3, 276-284. Rai, A. and Bajwa, D. (1997). An empirical investigation into factors relating to the adoption of executive information systems: An analysis of EIS for collaboration and decision support. Dec. Sci. 28, 4, 939-974. Streeter, L., Kraunt, R., Lucas, H., and Caby, L. How open data networks influence business performance and market structure. Commun. ACM 39, 7, 62-73. Thornton Management (Asia) Ltd. (1996). Guide to Hong Kong Companies. Hong Kong: Edinburgh Financial Publishing (Asia) * Diagrams taken from Roland E. Schmid, Thomas M. Kaiser, Volker Bach, and Hubert sterle. A Process-Oriented Framework for Efficient Intranet Management. Paper submitted to the University of St. Gallen Switzerland Read More