Magnum Enterprises and Technological Challenges - Case Study Example

Information Technology of Table of Contents Table of Contents 2 Introduction 3 Part The role of the IT manager in organizations 3 Part 2: Handling the E-business challenge at Magnum Enterprises 5 1. Factors related to E-business set up: 5 2. Technological challenges faced in the E-business set up of Magnum Enterprises  6 3. Key management challenges faced by IT manager of Magnum Enterprises 7 Conclusion 7 References 8 Introduction Information technology is one of the most emerging factors from the organizations perspective. Organizational managers are using IT in terms of developing strategies for the growth and sustainability of the organization. It has been observed that managers are using IT systems to employ development strategies, resource handling and maintenance. Moreover, firms are using various computer systems, software and networks for analyzing various statistics of operational policies. The current study is divided into two parts in order to make an in-depth analysis on the IT management system of Magnum Enterprises. In the first part, role of IT management in the enterprise will be outlined. On the other hand, different challenges that are involved in the e-business process and IT based management of Magnum are outlined in the second part (Durbin & Tomlinson, 2014). Part 1: The role of the IT manager in organizations It has been observed that the firms are using information technologies in order to develop business operations and performance. IT management role and responsibility are gaining importance in organizational set ups (Turban & Volonino, 2012). Similarly, Magnum Enterprises can use the IT management in order to increase their performance in different business segment. The CEO of the organization, Rachel Heigl developed an IT management group, which is comprised of six junior employees. The main role of management is supervising those and incorporating different software, hardware and rules among the operational process. Mainly, interpersonal, informational and decisional skills are the major role of IT managers in the organization (CasconPereira & Hallier, 2011). Interpersonal role The IT manager of Magnum Enterprises needs to disseminate various information and ideas among the subordinates. Mainly three different roles are representing interpersonal roles of the managers (Turban & Volonino, 2012). Figurehead: Being the figurehead, the managers of Magnum Enterprises needs to outline shared and legal requirements of the IT policies. Authority must inspire the IIT management group of seven members in terms of using online infrastructure (Farrington, 2011). Leading employees: Performance and tasks of the subordinates and group members needs to be communicated along with the guidelines of working. Magnum Enterprises managers will be outlining roles and responsibility of different employees (Krueger, 2004). Liaison: As Magnum Enterprises is developing the IT system for the first time, so, management needs to develop proper communication and interaction facility among the employees. Such trait will increase feasibility of employing the IT systems in operational system (CasconPereira & Hallier, 2011). Informational role Monitor: The manager of Magnum Enterprises need to explore the operational efficiency of firm and each individual employee. Such assessment will outline the changes and complexity faced by employees for the new IT based operational process. Therefore, swift action strategies can be developed by the management to increase the workplace efficiency and employees engagements in the operational setup (Krueger, 2004). Disseminator: IT managers are required to circulate different information among employees. In case of Magnum Enterprises, the manager is responsible to communicate roles, responsibilities and performance targets of their employees. This role will create a benchmark and guideline for the employees and they are also guided in terms of using various technological factors (Durbin & Tomlinson, 2014). Spokesperson: The IT manager has to act as the representative of their employees. Implementation of IT system will be creating certain complexity among the existing employees. Sometime, it has been observed that lack of knowledge, ambiguity and fear of uncertainty reduces the efficiency of employees. Thus, the managers are required to report all the difficulties faced by employees to their higher authority like CEO or owners in terms of finding solution (Farrington, 2011). Decisional role Entrepreneurial role: Magnum Enterprises IT manager is responsible to control change in the operational policy. They are supposed to make suitable transition of conventional operational system into IT based operations (Durbin & Tomlinson, 2014). They have to solve the problems in integrating new software and hardware in the operational set up. IT managers have to obtain innovative ideas from the members of the IT management team and implementing those in developing the performance of the overall organization (Farrington, 2011). Disturbance Handler: The IT manager of Magnum Enterprises is also responsible for handling disputes in the organization. Conflicts can arise due to the unfamiliar conditions in the work. Technologically weak employees will create biasness among the operational policy (Krueger, 2004). Resource Allocator: IT management has to allocate the organizational resources in more synchronized manner so that the efficiency of the employees and Magnum Enterprises will increase. Negotiator: The manager have to negotiate various employee related factors like the salary of employees, job timing, required skill set and termination (Durbin & Tomlinson, 2014). Part 2: Handling the E-business challenge at Magnum Enterprises 1. Factors related to E-business set up: E-business facilities of Magnum Enterprises is in the average phase and in order to increase its efficiency, different diplomats from the departments like process, marketing, finance, and authorized departments are selected (Laudon & Traver, 2002). Such members will be giving the viewpoints on the various factors involved in their roles and responsibility as per E-business. The IT manager must be able to cope up certain features in the E-commerce portal of Magnum Enterprises (Rich, 2008). The portal must be having one search box facility, which enables the users to search any particular product’s features and price with more ease (Price, 2014). On the other hand, featured and related product options or segments are offering the customers with a set of offers on the product and range of similar products (Laudon & Traver, 2002). Customers can be able to access more alternative products of Magnum Enterprises and they will not shift to any other company products. Moreover, E-business facility must be having the product zooming facility, categories and good navigation options that are allowing the customers in accessing various products and service of the firm from the large set of option (Price, 2014). E-commerce of Magnum Enterprises must offer safe and easy payment gateway which safeguards the important information of customers like the credit card number, passwords and many other personal data which can be used by the hackers. Moreover, the portal will be having one segment for the customer login and registration. The E-business portal would also include lucrative graphics and provide information regarding purchase orders (Puri, Khurana & Seth, 2010). 2. Technological challenges faced in the E-business set up of Magnum Enterprises  Magnum Enterprises IT manager will be facing different technical challenges. Such challenges are faced in terms of re-engineering e-business portal of Magnum. Firstly, the IT manager will be facing the challenge of security concerns. Personal and private data of the customers and the users are required to be safeguarded. Such challenge will be affecting customer loyalty and satisfaction (Price, 2014). In addition, it has been observed that Magnum Enterprise’s online portals are inefficient in outlining proper logout process. The IT manager has also observed that the hidden charges involvement, required registration in terms of buying, floating customers, extra shipping charges are involved and they are unable to record out of stock products (Puri, Khurana & Seth, 2010). The portal was unable to provide the information of various store location or checking availability products in market. In addition, the portals designed very poorly as the organization have developed the system very recently. Such portal does not use multi language option thus language blockade is observed along with geographical restriction (Patala, Jalkala & Soukka, 2014). 3. Key management challenges faced by IT manager of Magnum Enterprises E-commerce systems are new domain for the organization which requires effective employee engagement. Employees have to be trained to increase the potentiality of running and handling software portals (Puri, Khurana & Seth, 2010). However, it involves certain risk of uncertainty among employees. It has been observed that IT managers are facing problem in developing such electronic or virtual control on the employees. They have to train the employees with different technological support. There is a huge difference between normal management conditions and virtual controlling (Lingard & Holmes, 2001). E-commerce environment reduces the opportunity of considerate customer expectations and perception. In such business policy, customers are dealt virtually, thus, it is tough to check that whether the customers are satisfied or not (Price, 2014). On the other hand, the management will be facing certain amount of complexity in managing IT system according to the organizational compatibility. Inexperience of the managers will be leading the organizations to meet failure in near future (Patala, Jalkala & Soukka, 2014). Conclusion In the current study, role of IT manager in Magnum Enterprises are outlined in the first place. It has been observed that the IT manager must be posing interpersonal, informational and decisional skills. Magnum Enterprises will get the aid of effective management role and organizational performance will increase. In the second part, various challenges are faced by Magnum Enterprises while implementing E-commerce portals. Then the factors of the E-business models are outlined in terms of managing various technological challenges and management challenges faced by Magnum Enterprises IT management. The study helps in outlining the roles and responsibility of IT managers of Magnum Enterprises, so that they can perform better and increase adaptability of the E-commerce portal. The CEO Rachel Heigl, can take effective decisions with the help of abovementioned analysis. References CasconPereira, R. & Hallier, J. (2011). Getting that Certain Feeling: The Role of Emotions in the Meaning, Construction and Enactment of Doctor Managers Identities. British Journal of Management, 57-69. 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Finding fault in organisations - reconceptualising the role of senior managers in corporate manslaughter. Legal Studies, 18(5), 157-159 Puri, S., Khurana, A. & Seth, N. (2010). TDCP: a scale to measure technological dimensions of crisis preparedness. International Journal of Business Continuity And Risk Management, 1(3), 283. Rich, J. (2008). Design and launch an online e-commerce business in a week. Irvine, Calif.: Entrepreneur Press. Turban, E., & Volonino, L. (2012). Information technology for management. Hoboken, NJ: J. Wiley & Sons. Read More