Information Systems for Hill Top Hotel - Case Study Example

Information Systems Proposal for Hill Top Hotel Name Course Name and Code Instructor’s Name Date Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Business needs of Independent Hotel 3 Proposed information system structure 4 People resources 5 Hardware resources 5 Software resources 5 Data resources 6 Network resources 6 How the IS supports each business process 6 Proposed decision support system 9 Security challenges 11 Ethical challenges 11 Legal challenges 12 Privacy challenges 12 E-commerce 12 Backup and security for the systems 13 Different architectures of the company 13 Blueprint of enterprise architecture 14 Works Cited 15 Appendices 16 Hardware components 16 Budget for project 16 Software 16 Sample policies 17 Sample web page 21 Business needs of Independent Hotel Hill Top Hotel (hypothetical) is an independent hotel in Sydney Australia. It is mainly weeknight business clientele with an increasing level of conference business. The hotel use standalone personal computers (PCs) for billing (Bider 44). Reservations are all handled manually in the hotel and there is no central reservation system for the hotel. Hotel general manager report to the hotel managing director (MD) and provide his reports by manually extracting data from the various systems and creating management reports using a word processing application (Gallaugher 81). The hotel MD has, therefore, a limited knowledge of the operations of the hotel and a serious deficiency of management information for all levels for the whole group. The firm also faces intense competition from chain hotels and other independent hotels found in Sydney Australia. Proposed information system structure The proposed information system for the Hill Top Hotel is the customer relationship management (CRM) system. CRM has three parts of application architecture (Hall 31). They include operational, analytical and cooperation. The operational part helps in automation of enterprise marketing, sales force automation and a customer service and support. CRM provides information about the business environment, keeps track of customer preferences, buying habits and demographics in addition to sales staff performance. It also automates some service requests, complaints, product returns and information requests (Bider 61). The system also allows customers to perform their own service via a variety of communication channels such as email, fax and web. The CRM has an application which allows automation of marketing. Internet personalization tools on this application allow firms to track behavior on a web-site and allow tailoring of the contact experience or generation of cross selling opportunities based on this behavior. People resources These include computer operators, system analysts, programmers and managers. When acquiring personnel for the information system consideration ought to be made for both present system needs and the future system growth. The effectiveness of the information system is dependent on people resources. An information systems manager requires both technical skills and managerial skills. Hardware resources This refers to all physical components of a computer system. They include central processing unit, storage units, input/output devices and communication devices. Communication can take place either via wireless networks or fiber optic cables. Software resources This provides an interface between the information system and the users. They include applications and system software. The system software includes the operating system, special purpose programs and utility programs. Applications accomplish a specific purpose. The software and hardware become complicated when a firm decides to implement an advanced information system. Data resources This is a centrally controlled collection of organized data. This decreases redundancy and duplication of data. Organized and structured data allows sharing and improves its availability to those who need it. It improves efficiency of storage by eliminating redundant files and improves efficiency of processing by provision of required data in a single file instead of separate files. Network resources This include internet service provider and the resources needed to be connected to the internet such as fiber optic or wireless networks. How the IS supports each business process CRM will enable Hill Top Hotel to develop better communication channels. The system will allow the company to be able to deliver instant company wide access to customer histories. Thus it will reduce time required to attend to a customer who needs to make a reservation by calling a reservation department of the firm. CRM enables firms to realize that customer relationships exist at different levels including customer service and web presence (Bider 73). This allows the firm to start understanding the need for sharing data that is available throughout the organization. As consequence, the CRM system will enable the employees of Hill Top Hotel to make informed decisions and follow up on the different levels. Furthermore, if Hill Top Hotel implement CRM the firm will be able to offer better customer service. This is because all data related to interaction with the customer are centralized. Thus by implementing CRM the customer service department of Hill Top Hotel will have all the information it needs at their disposal. Thus all decisions made will be based on real time data and not via guess work. It will also allow customer service representatives to use push technology in leading the customer towards the information they need. With such system the customer is able to do most of this on their own since the CRM system is able to anticipate the need of the customer. This will greatly enhance the customer experience. Implementation of CRM system at Hill Top Hotel will also increase customer satisfaction. This is because the system makes the customer to feel more as part of the team rather than a subject for sales and marketing since the system anticipate the need of the customer. Moreover, such firms are able to create detailed profiles such as customer preferences which enable it to meet the needs of its customers. Thus the system will ensure that guest service provided are based on the available detailed profiles such as customer preferences which will enable it to meet the needs of its customers. Complemented with products which exceed the expectations of customers; CRM system is able to increase customer satisfaction. As a consequence customers will be delighted and this will greatly increase customer loyalty to the firm. The firm is also able to identify new selling opportunities once it implements a CRM. Thus, CRM enables firms to manage their sales leads, accounts, orders, and case management which increases their revenue and customer satisfaction and reduces costs resulting from less administrative tracking time and greater turn around time. For the case of Hill Top Hotels, cost of tracking cost of guest services will be reduced once this system is implemented. CRM systems will also enhance the ability of Hill Top Hotels to retain its customers. This is because the CRM system will help Hill Top Hotels to enchant its customers which will in turn increase customer loyalty who will keep on coming back to buy from the firm again and again hence resulting in increased customer retention. The delighted customers will be turned from doubting clients to loyal advocates of the business resulting in more repeat business. CRM will also enhance development of innovative products and services. This is because the system is a more personal approach which leads to development and design of innovative and improved products and services. Such innovations will results in increased revenue for the Hill Top Hotels. Furthermore, CRM will enhance cross selling of Hill Top Hotel. By implementing an effective CRM, the selling of other products which are directly or indirectly related to the main product offered by Hill Top Hotels will be increased. Thus the system will enable the business to highlight and suggest enhancements and substitutes of the main products which are desired by their customers. This will increase product lines for the Hill Top Hotels and enhance its profitability. The CRM will also enable Hill Top Hotel to increase its sells (Bider 131). This is because the firm will be able to identify and anticipate the needs and desires of the customers in a better manner than businesses without the system. This will result in increased sales since it will have an efficient CRM which bring innovative and beneficial products into the market. The chart below shows how the CRM will affect different process of the Hill Top Hotel. Proposed decision support system The CRM is usually associated with Decision Support system, the Web an dthe workflow. When these tools are used independently, the offer reduced services and even can result in generation of faults and functioning problems. However, when interconnected, they become a very powerful tool for command and control. Thus DSS and the CRM need to act at all levels of the company to bring value to the strategic problems and information management. Whereas CRM helps in decisions concerning the improvement of the future company’s activity based on customer’s behavior; Data warehouse help in the analysis and reporting based on historical data. On the other hand, DSS helps in making decisions pertaining forecast for goods, purchasing and selling. The decision support model proposed for the CRM system is the revenue management model. This model is expected to provide the Hill Top Hotel managers with an intelligent decision support tool for maximizing revenue. The system will rely on accurate room demand forecast model and a dynamic room pricing and allocation model. The proposed model will combine expert domain knowledge about revenue management with statistical models to provide an effective and flexible decision support system for revenue management. The system will be able to scan the historical booking, occupancy patterns and reservations as provided by CRM system and will fit in quantitative forecasting model. The fitted model will arrive at some predictions and the predictions will be used as inputs to an optimization module in order to make rate and allocation decisions. The human judgment will then be used to adjust and refine forecasting results and revenue management decision. The system is illustrated in the diagram below. Security challenges One of the challenges that Hill Top Hotel will face while using the CRM is having a system with suitable and acceptable security measures and features. The security of customer data and other sensitive data is paramount for the successful utilization of the CRM. It has been argued that increased security of CRM system comes at expense of reduced usability and hence need for a balance between security and usability of the system. User error has been cited as the main causes of security breaches. To enhance security of the CRM to be implemented at Hill Top Hotel, technical writers will be involved in building the content of the CRM. This will allow development of a system that will allow easy usability and provide the security required. Since the data will be hosted by a third party, the firm will have to source for reputable company that does not compromise the customers’ data. The firm will source for a firm which allows it to store its data in an encrypted form to avoid it being tempered with. Ethical challenges The ethical issue that could arise in the adoption of CRM is trust between the Hotel and the client. This is because CRM requires the client to entrust his/her data to the business in question. It is trust that makes more customers to be skeptical of the safety of their data. In order to win the trust of clients, business owners ought to address all issues such as security, vulnerability, and performance issues facing the technology among others. The reputation of the firm and policies adopted by them can help them win the trust of clients. Thus Hill Top hotel will put in place policies to guard against intrusion of customers private data. Legal challenges Legal issues that may arise are related to data security. To address this, the firm which will be engaged in provision of hosting services will be required to provide a formalized service level agreement that allow automation of the enforcement process. Privacy challenges The privacy of the customers data may raise privacy concerns. To reduce this concerns all sensitive data from customers will be stored in encrypted form and privacy policy will be adopted at the firm to address such privacy issues. E-commerce The Hill Top Hotel will require an integrated e-commerce model which includes both business to business (B2B) model and Business to customer (B2C) model. The (B2B) model will enable the Hotel to transact business with other business. The B2B model will allow the Hill Top hotel to source for raw material from its suppliers for the hotel business and aid in ordering and purchasing of the material in addition to other administrative tasks. By implementing the B2B model, the Hill Top will access wide variety of suppliers in various parts of the world from which it can choose from. Thus, the B2B model will allow the store to connect with wholesalers, suppliers and manufacturers globally. This will allow the firm to source for quality products at a competitive pricing. Thus the firm will be able to offer its customers quality products at competitive prices that will enable it increase its sales. Thus, the B2B model will enable the Hill Top Hotel to maintain efficiency in the procurement process and the supply chain prices for its business. The Hill Top will need to integrate B2C model in its B2B model e-commerce for the purpose of dealing with its hotel customers. This will allow customers to book and pay online. The ecommerce will help in collection, storage, modification and retrieval of transactions of the Hotel. The success of Hill Top Hotel e-commerce will be measured using Google Analytics. The analytic will be integrated into the store’s online pages to aid in generation of a wide range of essential reports (Ulrich and Newcomb 42). The reports will help in provision of essential information required for measuring the success of Hill Top Hotel online site. The Google Analytics will provide various metrics such as conversion rates, bounce rates, pages per visit, time on site, goal funnels and adwords campaigns that will help the firm determine the success of its e-commerce initiative. Google analytics will help in generating detailed statistics about the visitors to the firm’s website. Backup and security for the systems The Hill Top Hotel will need to ask itself questions about the availability of the data in case something goes wrong with the service provider (Gallaugher 71). This implies that Hill Top Hotel will have to source their data hosting vendors who can assure them of the continuity of their ventures in case something goes amiss. Hill Top Hotel will have to consider the disaster management policies put in place by service providers to attend to emergencies such as unexpected attack on the infrastructure and how to recover the lost data and whether the firm has some backups. Different architectures of the company The Hill Top Hotel business architecture is illustrated in the diagram below. What do they do? Who does it? Which information? Where is it done? Short term paid lodging with facilities such as: Accommodation rooms En suite bathrooms Air conditioning Telephone Television Safe Restaurants Swimming pool Conference facilities Fitness center Other luxury facilities Managing director General manager Middle managers Administrative staff Line level supervisors Waiters Customer care Reservation Order processing Invoicing Booking Customer preferences Revenue management Marketing and sales information And other customer related information Information system Blueprint of enterprise architecture What do they do? Who does it? Which information Where is it done? Information architecture Technology architecture Data security Data technology Applications technology Systems management Integration Collaboration Integration technology applications Platforms Networks Works Cited Bider, Ilia. Enterprise, Business-Process and Information Systems Modeling: 11th International Workshop, BPMDS 2010, and 15th International Conference, EMMSAD 2010, Held at CAiSE 2010, Hammamet, Tunisia, June 7-8, 2010, Proceedings. New York: Springer, 2010. Gallaugher, John. Information Systems: A Manager's Guide to Harnessing Technology. London: Flat World Knowledge, L.L.C., 2010. Hall, James. Accounting Information Systems, 7th Ed. London: Cengage Learning, 2010. Ulrich William, and Newcomb Philip. Information Systems Transformation: Architecture-Driven Modernization Case Studies. London: Morgan Kaufmann, 2010. Appendices Hardware components Computers Servers Wire cables Printers Scanners Budget for project Item Cost per item($) No. of items Total costs ($) Software 20,000 1 40,000 Hardware 50,000 1 50,000 Internet service provider 10,000 1 10,000 Webhosting 12,000 1 12,000 Training 1,000 1 1,000 Human resources 4,000 4 16,000 Server 10,000 1 10,000 Total 139,000 Software CRM software Security software DSS software Web applications software Sample policies Privacy policy This privacy policy sets out how Hill Top Hotel uses and protects any information that you give Hill Top Hotel when you use this website. Hill Top Hotel is committed to ensuring that your privacy is protected. Should we ask you to provide certain information by which you can be identified when using this website, then you can be assured that it will only be used in accordance with this privacy statement. Hill Top Hotel may change this policy from time to time by updating this page. You should check this page from time to time to ensure that you are happy with any changes. This policy is effective from [date]. What we collect We may collect the following information: name and job title contact information including email address demographic information such as postcode, preferences and interests other information relevant to customer surveys and/or offers What we do with the information we gather We require this information to understand your needs and provide you with a better service, and in particular for the following reasons: Internal record keeping. We may use the information to improve our products and services. We may periodically send promotional emails about new products, special offers or other information which we think you may find interesting using the email address which you have provided. From time to time, we may also use your information to contact you for market research purposes. We may contact you by email, phone, fax or mail. We may use the information to customise the website according to your interests. Security We are committed to ensuring that your information is secure. In order to prevent unauthorised access or disclosure, we have put in place suitable physical, electronic and managerial procedures to safeguard and secure the information we collect online. How we use cookies A cookie is a small file which asks permission to be placed on your computer's hard drive. Once you agree, the file is added and the cookie helps analyse web traffic or lets you know when you visit a particular site. Cookies allow web applications to respond to you as an individual. The web application can tailor its operations to your needs, likes and dislikes by gathering and remembering information about your preferences. We use traffic log cookies to identify which pages are being used. This helps us analyse data about webpage traffic and improve our website in order to tailor it to customer needs. We only use this information for statistical analysis purposes and then the data is removed from the system. Overall, cookies help us provide you with a better website by enabling us to monitor which pages you find useful and which you do not. A cookie in no way gives us access to your computer or any information about you, other than the data you choose to share with us. You can choose to accept or decline cookies. Most web browsers automatically accept cookies, but you can usually modify your browser setting to decline cookies if you prefer. This may prevent you from taking full advantage of the website. Links to other websites Our website may contain links to other websites of interest. However, once you have used these links to leave our site, you should note that we do not have any control over that other website. Therefore, we cannot be responsible for the protection and privacy of any information which you provide whilst visiting such sites and such sites are not governed by this privacy statement. You should exercise caution and look at the privacy statement applicable to the website in question. Controlling your personal information You may choose to restrict the collection or use of your personal information in the following ways: whenever you are asked to fill in a form on the website, look for the box that you can click to indicate that you do not want the information to be used by anybody for direct marketing purposes if you have previously agreed to us using your personal information for direct marketing purposes, you may change your mind at any time by writing to or emailing us at hilltop@hilltop.org We will not sell, distribute or lease your personal information to third parties unless we have your permission or are required by law to do so. We may use your personal information to send you promotional information about third parties which we think you may find interesting if you tell us that you wish this to happen. You may request details of personal information which we hold about you under the Data Protection Act 1998. A small fee will be payable. If you would like a copy of the information held on you please write to Hill Top Hotel, P.O BOX 114242525, Sydney, Australia. If you believe that any information we are holding on you is incorrect or incomplete, please write to or email us as soon as possible at the above address. We will promptly correct any information found to be incorrect. Sample web page Read More