Current Challenges Facing IT and Recommendations - Essay Example

Task: Current challenges facing IT & recommendations Information technology emerged as the world’s most achievement as far as technology and science are concerned. With technology, various activities, including businesses, have been simplified to the lowest level possible. IT has indeed become a remarkable concept in almost all aspects of human life. However, IT also has some shortcomings, which have been portrayed by failure and problems in certain organizations. Information system failure in a hospital is a symbol of IT failure. Failure of a business organization may as well arise due to problems caused by IT failures. These organizations can be used as cases to learn more concerning Information Technology (IT). Failure always comes because of challenges affecting a particular organization. One of the companies in the US that has been facing challenges is Otisline, a company that specialized in the distribution and provision of elevators. The essay will look into details, the overview of Otisline, challenges facing it, as well as, the recommendations required to make Otisline better. Case overview Otisline Company improved the performance of different business organizations. The company, other than the supply and provision of elevators, also provided regional, district and NAO management with the required amount of quality information. When a problem arose, the management was the first to know from the customer complaints. Different managements responded differently to the clients’ callbacks. This depended on the number of callback, for instance, district managers handled three or more callbacks in a month. The company made corrections using these callbacks. Otisline had many impacts on NAO’s business including customer service, information service, dispatching, and controlling of mechanics. Otisline had several impacts in NAO in different sectors such as information service, which involved the use of sms database with an IBM 3083 computer (Stoddad & Harvard University 198). This was meant to make response to the clients as fast as possible. An example of a place where the Otisline was applied was in the customer service whereby it recognized buildings in four distinct ways: telephone number, building identification number, building address as well as the building name, state and city. The Otisline service center was also organized in a way that it easily promoted dispatcher efficiency. Otisline software was applied in other areas such as marketing services, and control and dispatching of service mechanics. The following describes the factors that brought about the problem in Oisline. The factors explain succinctly the challenges that the IT controlled company is undergoing. The factors are unsatisfactory consumer services, lack of enough human resource, obsolescence, IT complexities, poor marketing and public relations, poor data storage and retrieval methods, and poor budgeting. Challenges Facing IT Customer service: IT is affected by bad reputation when taking customer need satisfaction. As evidenced by the Otisline, there is a high chance of doing the work incorrectly according to the customer’s requirements (Stoddad & Harvard University 218). This is what leads to several callbacks. This is the same in the corporate field. The customer normally wants and expects to be told what they want. The automated recommendation tone always seems arrogant. This may always lead to infusion of negative mentalities and attitudes towards the IT. This challenge can be corrected or recommended by listening to customer needs and making them the number one priority; not allowing them to be controlled by the IT system or software like that of Otisline, in this case. It leads to lose of human resource. There is always a normal trend of worker lay off when a new program or software that can replace the employees and do the work efficiently is discovered. The same has affected Otis Corporation whereby six workers were laid off after the realization of the company’s IT expert that the Otisline program could easily do the job, which the people did. Human resource can never be compared with any form of technology. First, it led to low client to corporation contact since there was no personal relationship between the two parties. It is obvious that people will view any person who communicates to them via an automated program as a non-serious individual; the same applies to business enterprises, Otisline for example. The company should develop or come up with creative ways on how to minimize stress, match corporate needs to the employees’ targets and dreams (Stoddad & Harvard University 273). In addition to the above, there are always complexities when handling IT related materials and tools in organizations whose management is mostly controlled by IT. The existing IT trend is irrefutable making the IT becoming more complex than before. This complexity in the IT world implies that an individual cannot develop a complete program or software alone; he or she has to have a company of IT professionals. This evident in the Otisline corporation where every individual tries to give out his or her input to the existing Otisline software. These include Bob Smith and John Miller. This brings about the one of the issues on the mass deployment of people due to increasing technological advancement. Another challenge facing the IT today is obsolescence. Most of the PC parts and materials are prone to becoming obsolete in five or three years time. Another problem posed by obsolescence is that software development is and will always be present several years to come. Picking the wrong Operating system will undoubtedly make a person suffers the same problems as the owners of 1980s computers. In order to deal with any issue related to obsolescence, the company should increase or improve the productive life system, equipment, and software, as well. If I were brought as a consultant, I would advise the company to comprehend the limit at which their usage of IT should end. I would also advise them to avoid firing off several employees and substituting them with IT; IT cannot make decisions in case issues arise. It will stop functioning, but it would take a group of individuals of different fields such as engineering and computer science (Stoddad & Harvard University 232). In conclusion, IT has done a lot in boosting the initial economy of the Otisline Company. However, lack of carefulness and analysis on the use of IT in various departments in an organization can make a company make progressive loses. Work Cited Stoddad, Donna & Harvard University. Graduate school of business administration. OTISLINE (A) .Boston, Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Pub, 1990. Print. Read More