Enterprise System Management and Enterprise Resource Planning for Shell Company - Case Study Example

Name : xxxxxxxxxxx Institution : xxxxxxxxxxx Course : xxxxxxxxxxx Title : Information Technology Tutor : xxxxxxxxxxx @2010 Information Technology Introduction At shell, IT is an essential element to the success of the company as it has a role in everything that is done at Shell. The IT teams within the company offer strategic solutions to Shell business in all its business outlets irrespective of if they are developing custom applications or delivering effective technology services. Within Shell Company, the IT strategies are involved in implementation of international projects all over the world, for instance SAP, offering of consultancy within IT strategy, business performance enhancement, application development, the management of supply chain in addition to strategy support. Moreover, the IT has enabled Shell Company to take part in pre-sale activities, for instance in development of proposals and performance of business analysis and also making sure there is sound technical development and implementation of the chief IT applications (Friedmann 2004). With technology, Shell Company has been able to scan the eternal business environment easily in order to gather information that has been useful in decision making regarding the allocation of the resources in a manner that has been reaching the societal standards and has enabled the employees, administrators as well as the clients to make maximum use of the available resources. With technology, easy and fast communication of information has been enabled and also it is has been possible to share and make decisions fast. With the internet use, Shell company has been able to benchmark form other organizations strategies that have been useful in enabling the company to reach its objectives (Panepinto 1999). Remaining competitive is what made Shell company to rethinking about its strategies and discovered that in order to remain competitive the company had to develop and apply a strategy that was based on technology in addition to multidisciplinary dynamics. The company hence targeted at improving internal communications, integration of information systems and simplifying technological procedures. These are what stimulated improvements within overall performance of the company through integration of information systems to internal stricture change (Jenner, 1992). Information technology has also been a key element in the turn around at Shell Company. The layers of redundant middle management have been done away with and this has increased efficiency and has improved client service radically. This has been achieved because of the technology which was executed in the company’s revised and centralized practices (Pugmire 2005). All the client customer service functions were consolidated into one national client’s service where the clients could be given up to the small information regarding their shipments and Shell’s plans. The success of Shell in implementing such technology together with other accompanying changes, including formal and informal enabled Shell to make a remarkable turnaround (Main 1998). With the emerging technology Shell’s employees have been able to work independently. This is as a result of each and every employee being able to have access to information. Moreover, this has made it possible for the company’s employees to be able to work anywhere to perform their duties. The IT within Shell has provided an opportunity for the workers to be able to access information they require at any place, anytime or anywhere. Consequently, the employees have got enormous independence and hence this has left the company with a lot of supervisory implications which means the employees have to be managed accordingly. The tasks within the company have turned out to be more goal oriented and thus the measures of the job performance are no longer dependent on face to face interactions but have remained tied to the ability accomplish and complete the assigned tasks (Fleck 2000). IT systems have changed even the more traditional managerial relationships. The installation of computer networks have enabled the Shell employees to communicate fast, share the ideas and also transfer information with no regard to physical sites or to a logical extent even with no regard to the temporal dimension. Thus, the managers within Shell Company have been able to monitor the activities of very many employees as well as the subordinates without the need of having them being required to report directly to the managers or the employees. This also has been useful since it can be used as a “span control” and hence as a measure of the number people or teams that a manager is able to effectively manage. Such spans have enabled occurrence of “spans of communication” which is the number of individuals that an executive can manage through using an efficient information system. Such an executive has enabled the managers and administrators within Shell to be able to supervise many empowered people and groups (Hulser 2004). Still, the advance in technology as well as interdependency between people has come up with some empowerment. This mans that the employees become trained regarding the technology and hence they have been able to comprehend the direction Shell organization has been taking and their role in it. The culture within Shell kept on changing with every technology innovation and hence the company’s employees have been given more authority as well as self-direction. More importantly, the company’s employees are always aware of what is required of them and they do not have to wait for the managers to give out the instructions, information and orders. Consequently, this has increased productivity by the employees since they always perform their tasks on time without having to wait for their administrators and also they have adapted to performing their duties even in the absence of their seniors (Rosenbrock 2000). The People Factor Improving technology entailed some skills, education as well as the training and this saw the staff members becoming trained and educated on the required technological skills. The users have been continuously been trained on some degree of skills and training to efficiently make use of the technology based services that have been installed. Since the planning of the technology entails the use of time as well as the destabilization of the budget, this has seen a quite large amount of finances going into the technology advancements (Sahlman 1997). With each technology, the company’s staff has been forced to adopt new and suitable technical skills needed to efficiently utilize implemented technologies. Strong but flexible training programs have offered a solid base for tackling this requirement. These trainings have been either formal, for instance classes or also informal, for example the employees have attended several conferences or at times have worked on a self study module. As a result, after the employees have acquired these skills, this has resulted into the company’s employees being able to handle the assigned work portions efficiently and this has directly contributed to the increased of the company (Beckwith 1997). Still, the ability of the company to share information between one company and another as well as the simplicity in transferring the designs has resulted into an increase in outsourcing as the company has been attempting to reduce its workforce and this in some instances has led into the company being left with inadequate employees the company has at times found itself shorthanded (Beckwith 1997). The improved technology has had a big impact on the company’s relationship with its suppliers as well as with its clients. The capacity of employees within Shell to gain information from others up or down a procedure or distribution channel has led to having control over that procedure or entity less than an issue. This has been especially factual within Shell Company since it was initially using a vertical integration strategy but has realized that vertical integration has turned to be less essential since Shell has adopted utilization of information systems imaginatively (Kupfer 2008). Moreover, the tasks that the employees within Shell have been performing have been radically affected by the augmented mechanization as well as the application of technology as a component of the production procedure. The tasks that were previously being carried out by the human operators directly have with time become automated and this has changed the human’s roles into one supervisory control. As a result, the expectations of an average employee in such an environment has changed since there is no longer carrying out of repetitive tasks but the employees have been left with the choice of being able to acknowledge a problem and be able to react to problem situations (Alexander, 1999). IT strategy Guiding values This IT planning procedure is guided by collective values and principles which comprise of: Centralized coordination and local control Organizational collaboration Universal standards as a goal Fiscal responsibility and efficiency Steadfast services Openness with governance and policy organizations Some restricted centrally availed services The vision is that the strategy is customer focused The IT plan will envision an environment wherein A full range of information services are provided on demand, autonomous of time and place. Communications, media as well as information services are joined, incorporated and delivered on congregated networks and systems to enhance functionality for the end user and cost effectiveness for the organization. IT and services are delivered with the end user as the main focus. End user objectives should be fulfilled. The services of the IT strategy should be simple to use as E-Bay as comprehensive as Google, each item of information open and searchable. The staff as well as the clients will enjoy the best possible business experience on the business as well as on-line (Kuhn 2007). Objectives connected with Shell priorities A mechanism that will enable the Shell company staff members to develop and train will anticipate changes with the Shell Company and there should be larger emphasis on the identification of international business which will contribute toward the Shell accomplishing of other goals which will increase the productivity of the company. Also the strategy will involve and will enable raised support for business opportunities more so in regard to usage of High performance Compute facility and also there will be commitment to decreasing the environmental impact of IT within Shell Company and finally the strategy will put the main focus in delivering services to the new business operation structures (Goff 1994). Technological objectives The IT strategy should have an infrastructure that will be in a position to fulfill the IT requirements of the company for a period of five years and above. The strategy should also involve applications and services having clear linkages with the Shell Company’s business and it should also lead into reduced use of the number of different technologies being used currently. The strategy should also aim at reducing the number of core systems as well as the applications that provide similar purposes and it should enable the administration of the company as well as the employees to be in a position to deliver services in a manner that fulfills the requirements of the user and not the CiCS or the Shell Company (Nelson, 2005). Furthermore, it should lead into an efficient system for making sure that each and every new and emerging technology is assessed and finally the strategy information technology strategy should that there is a robust system to make sure there is effectual monitoring and also the reviewing of the technical infrastructure as well as the services. However, the main goal of this IT strategy is to raise the focus on availing innovative services to the company’s clients in order to establish a consistent and resilient technical infrastructure which is cost-effective and also sustainable as this will maintain the environmental costs at the minimum level. A reliable information system should be committed to choosing software and hardware which conforms to open standards. This means that the most preferred solutions are the ones that enable the company to link together different systems and technologies in a non-propriety manner and which will enable Shell Company to replace elements comparatively easily. The open-source substitutes to commercial systems should also be considered as an ingredient of any tendering procedure (Oblinger & Sean, 2004). An IT strategy that is able to make services available over the web should be installed and the services that are offered over the web should have similar interfaces and similar appliance requirements. The casual users who do not need the full functionality of any particular system the underlying complexity ought to be hidden in the portal (MUSE). As a result, MUSE will turn out to be the key point of delivery for most company’s services. The present desktop applications’ reach should be extended, for instance the applications on the managed desktop through integrating them in the portal. This system will make sure that the users of the company will be in a position to select how, when and where they access services like change module for customers or product’s requisitioning. The usage of portal standard like “appelets” will enable the users to create their own set of frequently utilized purposes which are able to be delivered to their pda as well as the convectional portal on a desktop or laptop computer and will enable the company to respond more easily and quickly to any technological change. Both the new and existing IT services should be integrated making use of Service Oriented Architecture where possible and web services techniques in order to reduce duplication and overlapping as well. Collaboration between the administration, employees, clients and the external partners is very significant ways and it is an important part in the company’s undertakings and the IT services will offer a rising support for this manner of working. In such a way, Shell Company will be able to take advantage of the opportunities that will come by with the latest generation of web technologies for the purpose of enabling and facilitating collaboration. With the rising amounts of data as well as the increasing variety within storage locations and technologies, metadata storage and search facilities which will boost the employees’ understanding and the usage og this resource and this will turn out to be progressively vital (Pugmire 2005) Initially, Shell Company had difficulties with handling its workforce management (WFM) procedures. Through different technology improvements which have led to the utilization of the best of breed solutions to automate details like, the company has been in a position to automate all its data entry from its clients as well as from the company and also this has enable retrieving of the data in real time. The IT solutions that have been installed have been simple to use and more engaging for all Shell’s employees and this has allowed speedy deployment as well as adoption. For instance, installation of Workforce management (WFM) in its information systems has come with the best WFM best operations which have the company to: To do away with manual data entry as well as validation regarding time keeping data and this has reduced error rates and has also led to great improvements in terms of productivity. The installation of WFM has also led to accommodation of exclusive and changing needs without the necessity of the custom code which has led to reduction of the training requirements, reduction of support expenses and also the reduction of implementation headaches. Still, installation of WFM has enabled automatic validation of the data entry at all the times and this has prevented problems taking place before they occur, and this includes early as well late punches and disqualified clocking. It has also enabled improved as well as enabled better decision making in regard to the scheduling, managing of the absences, and payroll accurateness in addition to controlling of the expenses. Furthermore, this has resulted into employee self-service and this has decreased manager’s administrative burdens while also enhancing the collection of the data and accuracy and has also enabled instant delivery of information as well as measurable bottom line returns. Telephony There should be build on the installation of the IP based switches which will offer new and improved functionality, for instance converged voice, voice mail, e-mail and many others. Search Installation of search will enable utilization of collaborative systems like the newly bought clear space product as this will increase the capacity of Shell to find expertise in the Shell Company community. This will also increase Shell’s capacity to extract knowledge from data through utilizing facilities offered by the present technologies like Cogno reporting tools (Patricia 1993). Portal The portal will make more application and information available to both the Shell’s clients as well as to the company’s personnel. Portal ought to be up-graded in order to take advantage of portlet standards. The department of Information Technology should also increase incorporation of portal with application by using the channels and also the portal should be made or may be the channels in portal should be made visible and usable on their appliances where suitable. Moreover, the desktop applications at present should be moved on the managed service to the portal and also the present portal technology should be reviewed (Vitiello 2000). SAP There should be continuation of integration work and the data should be availed for usage by the non-SAP users and also the SAP should be given the necessary upgrades. Moreover, new developments should be assessed in order to establish if SAP ought to be used and a lot of research as well as work should be done to improve the user interface where practicable and cost effective. CIS In regard to CIS, the department of Information Technology should shift from Forms of applications to Java and also forms 6 applications should be converted from 6 to forms 10 applications. There should also be installations of support simple developments within PHP in order to reduce time to deployment and also a second review of CIS systems should be conducted. Reporting and information management There should be an increased usage of the Cognos toolset in order to deliver a larger level of amalgamation in reporting and also at departmental level. There should be installation of enabled reporting on all data by using a sole interface. Still, in regard to management of the information and reporting resources should be diverted in order to enhance the level of support for the management of information even if this may lead to reduced resource elsewhere. VLE More resilient service should be built in order to reflect increasing in strategic significance and also this should lead to rise in capacity in addition to space (Gerstein 1992). Collaboration In regard to collaboration, the most recent clearspace product should be deployed as this is widely as possible for the entire company and also the next generation mail as well as calendaring product should be deployed. The document management system pilots should be evaluated and a review of the mail services for the clients as well as the workers should be conducted in order to be able to compare the value of money for the services offered by commercial suppliers. Centralization of HPC installations should be encouraged allover the Company and there should be increased support from CICS from all available resources. Desktops In regard to the desktops, the provision of the applications over the web should be shifted to all the appliances that are operating modern browser and the PCs should be replaced within open access areas with thin customer appliances and the utilization of thin client services should be encouraged elsewhere. Bibliography Alexander, C., 1999, A Pattern Language, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Fleck, J. et al., 2000, "Dynamics of Information Technology Implementation. A reassessment of paradigms and trajectories of development" Futures, Vol 22, July/August 1990, pp. 618-638. Friedmann, A L., 2004, "The Information Technology Field: Using Fields and paradigms for analyzing technological change" Human Relations, Vol 47, April, 1994, pp. 367-393. Gerstein, M. 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