Week 10

Reflection

This week in our lecture the topic we focused on was sustainability which a guest lecturer came in to talk us through the presentation. We filled in a quiz about sustainability which had questions such as 'How many kilometres are driven each year to deliver goods to stores, service stations & homes in the UK?' and 'London has committed to reduce its carbon emissions by what percentage by 2025?' When the answers were revealed I was shocked at the answers. I learnt that by 2025 London has committed to reduce its carbon emissions by 60% which I thought was a high percentage as study shows that the City of London were responsible for emitting 15.5 tonnes of carbon dioxide a year. (Carbon Brief, 2013)

We then went into the UN Sustainable Development Goals which are made up of 17 important factors that make a sustainable environment. Some examples of these may be health and well-being, no poverty, clean water and sanitation and responsible consumption and production. These factors concern the needs of both more and less economically developed countries. Paris Conference was the first to commit to the Sustainable Development Goals in December 2015. The lecturer then went on to explain how air, water and food are the main key systems that help to sustain the human race. Without these factors there would be no sustainability at all.

Lastly we discussed how sustainability is important for businesses and how it could prompt a risk towards a business. From my own research I found out that businesses are making strategic decisions around the type and extent of their corporate sustainability policies. Enforcing environmental sustainability within business practices can have a number of significant benefits. Sustainable businesses are often the most innovative as they are constantly reviewing processes to find new solutions and ways that they can use alternative ways to produce products or services. Businesses that have a mission of environmental sustainability can build a reputation with consumers who are eco-friendly which means they have a platform for a specific type of customer while also offering a product and service for people who may not care about the environment.

Going greener actually makes some business more money due to less expenses on production, materials and tax. Companies such as Tesla, Nike and Unilever make over one billion dollars from being a greener company. This also gives them a competitive advantage over similar businesses within their industry.

There are many ways for businesses to help the sustainability around the world. For example: Tom's, the shoe manufacturer has a project running which gives a pair of shoes or eyewear to children in less developed countries or every shoe bought. They are also helping to provide water for these children in less developed countries.


References
Carbon Brief (2013) City of London tops UK carbon footprint list. Available from: https://www.carbonbrief.org/city-of-london-tops-uk-carbon-footprint-list

Teamwork

This week within my team it was the last week before the coursework had to be handed in. We worked on the presentation to try get it finished to the highest of standards. We had to make sure each slide was okay to present, so checking its presentation, if the audience can read it, if it looks professional and that it has all of the information we need on it. We filmed our presentation today and it ran very smoothly and the team was happy with the final product. 

I am very happy with my teammates efforts throughout this project as they were always on time for meetings, always helping each other and communication was constant throughout the whole 10 weeks. There was a few times when members of the team couldn't make it to meetings but it was fine due to the communication of the team. Overall, I am very pleased with our final product and our efforts as a team.

Week 9

Reflection

This week we were off for easter break, therefore I looked back at all lecture and seminar notes from the past 9 weeks. I also made sure to read the requirements for the reflective writing piece for coursework 2. I am excited to do the reflective writing skills as I feel I have the knowledge and skills to write a good reflection about the past 10 weeks. 

Teamwork

This week as we were off for easter break, we kept in contact through social media and decided to meet up to discuss the problems within Japan Tobacco International as we didn't feel that we could get everything we were saying across within a text. We came up with more solutions with the problems our business was facing by going to the library and doing a lot of research with similar companies. One of the problems our company had was that the market was becoming smaller, more restricted and more competitive, especially within the tobacco industry. We decided as a team that companies need to find new and more effective ways to penetrate the market whether that is keeping up with trends such as 'vaping' and electronic cigarettes. Also, they could fix this by using IS such as creating databases for their existing and loyal customers which helps keep the customers up to date with anything new happening that involves the business, any discounted products, any new launches or even about loyalty privileges . This could expand the companies market and give them a competitive advantage as none of the competitors offer this service.

Another very serious problem the company faced was annual tax increases on their products. As smoking is frowned upon and people are addicted, the government do not care about raising the tax on tobacco products which could possibly damage the net profit as people may stop buying them or move to a cheaper brand of tobacco. We came up with the solution of the company calculating an estimate of the tax increase and then maybe cutting the costs of production or to their overall budget. This could possibly make up for the loss of profit and also help them focus on where their money will go when drawing up the budget for the following year. There are many tool that help make these predictions and that help to cut the costs of the business where necessary.

Week 8

Reflection

This week our lecture focused on business models in the digital world. This focuses a lot on how a business runs online through modern day technology and how it stays up to date as technology is constantly advancing. We all know what a organisation is, a formal social structure that processes resources from environment to produce outputs, and we also know that organisations follow a lot of models, processes and routines. Well organisations still follow routines, processes and models when working with information systems, they may just differ from those not to do with IT. Information systems has a lot of impact on the business as information is found quicker and done so a lot more efficiently. According to management theorist Henry Mintzberg, an organisation's structure comes from the interplay of the organisation's strategy, the environmental forces it experiences, and the organisational structure itself. He then identified five main successful organisational structures, which are:

• The entrepreneurial organisation

• The machine bureaucracy

• Divisionalised bureaucracy

• Professional bureaucracy

• Adhocracy (Innovative)

These 5 successful organisational structures are only successful if they are used for the right organisation measured on the characteristics of the organisation, what shapes them and by understanding the different organisational types. 

I also learned about the three different levels of the organisation and how IS is used within that role. Such as operation level. This would be a member of the organisation that interacts with customers, deals with day to day business processes and transactions. IS is used within this level to optimise processes, understand any causes of underperforming and the processing of business events and transactions. The next level is managerial which focuses on effectively utilising and deploying resources while also monitoring operational-level activities. IS helps as it can be used to produce performance analytics, forecasts and reports which can help further support decision making within the organisation. The last level is executive level. This would be roles such as the president, CEO, vice presidents, board of directors, etc. Their job is to support the organisation and to help with planning and decision making. IS is helpful on this level as the information stored on the IS is very helpful when decision making and planning for the future of the company. 

I learnt the five types of organisational strategies such as OLCL, FLC, BD, FD and BCP. All of these strategies are competitive strategies to help the business compete within its own industry. Using IS will give a company a competitive advantage  due to automating, informating and strategising. Porter’s Value Chain model is used widely around the world as a tool for companies to gain a competitive advantage. 

Some businesses use Freeconomics Business Models which offers a free service or product to customers but the company still makes a profit from that. For example: Google is free to use for everyone on the internet, however when you click a sponsored link Google gets paid for that as companies pay Google to have their link added to the search. Just because something is offered for free, that doesn't necessarily mean that you can not profit from it. 

Teamwork

This week within our team we started to discuss and take notes of what type of slides we want for our presentation, what will be on them and who is talking about what problem. We chose a format and a presentation theme that we thought was relevant as it looked professional. We also chose an order of who is speaking as we want it to be constantly flowing. I am very impressed with our team as we get work done on time and to a high standard.

Week 7

Reflection

This weeks lecture was about preparing and delivering a presentation. This is very helpful as we have a presentation due for the end of the year as part of our coursework. In this lecture we got shown the standard slide style of a presentation such as what the presentation should start and end with, what it should outline and how it should look. I learnt what I should and shouldn't do as regards to the theme of the presentation as it is important that the audience can read the slides and that is also looks professional. Another thing I learnt that I felt would be very helpful when doing my presentation is that planning the presentation, as an alternative of just doing it as you go along, is a lot more helpful as it gives you more time to think about the information you want to add to the slide as it is very minimal. Another helpful subject was on graphs and tables as I have never added these into a presentation it was helpful to know that it is important to always title graphs, it is good to use graphs to show data rather than words, etc. I learnt a lot of small things that are usually forgotten about such as using spell checks, grammar checks, use templates for consistency, etc.


We then moved on to talk about actually presenting the slides on the presentation and what helps make you do a better job and look more professional. These included things you should do and things you should do such as memorising the slides instead of winging it. It is important that you know what is going to come next as if you run out of things to say for a slide you can then move to the next slide without pausing as this is how you lose an audience and it looks very unprofessional. Another thing we got told not to do was read from the text as it does not sound natural and also the audience can read it so speaking from your knowledge will help further explain the slide.
I was told that a good conclusion is very effective as it is the last thing the audience sees before you stop speaking so this could be the final deciding factor if the presentation was good or not. This conclusion should summarise the main points within the presentation, suggest sources for further research and ask if the audience has any questions as this will get the audience involved and more curious to ask questions about the subject of the presentation.

Teamwork

Within our seminar teams this week we focused on going into more depth with the solutions to our companies problems. We have found that t has become very hard to come up with solutions as we are dealing with such a large international company that the problems the business have are on such a large scale. These problems are mostly related to legislations set by the government as the tobacco industry is frowned upon in a lot countries throughout the globe. Within the past few years there are a lot more laws coming into legislation to o with tobacco as they are trying to stop advertising for it as it is a health hazard and is causing a lot more health problems which the government do not want. This also means that it is hard for tobacco companies such as Japan tobacco international to recruit employees due to the bad image it has in todays society. 

Week 6

Reflection

In this weeks lecture we focused on cloud computing and relational databases. I learnt that organisations rent resources from an external provider on an as-needed basis, this is charged per month measured by the number of users, features used, data storage, bandwidth consumed, etc.The “Cloud” is a metaphor for the Internet which enables convenient, on-demand network access to shared computing resources such as documents, photos, E-mails, etc. These can be rapidly supplied and shared with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. A large example of this is Google as each account can hold e-documents- e-mails, photos, etc. I learnt that although cloud computing has many advantages, there are also some downfalls. Some of these advantages are measured service and resource pooling. Examples of the downfalls are viability of the cloud, security and privacy and how easy it is to move data or applications to other providers.

I learnt what a relational database was, how it is identified and why organisations use it. I learnt that a relational database needs to have a primary key so information can be uniquely identified within each record of the database. I also learnt that there were three different types of relationships that columns can have, these are; One-to-one, One-to-many and Many-to-many. A database management system is software that lets you create databases and change the information within them. I was then shown how to create a database with queries, forms and reports. If I was asked to create a database with queries, forms and reports I would feel confident in doing so.

Teamwork

This week within our teams we went to the JTI offices in Weybridge for another interview to gain more knowledge of the problems so we can then find a solution. After this we allocated certain problems that Japanese Tobacco International faces on a day to day basis and decided that each member of the team will focus on a certain problem so they can brainstorm solutions to the problem then give feedback in next weeks seminar. However, we will still focus on all the problems as we felt that some people may have a more suitable solution. We had four main solutions  that we gave to each member of the team, these were a range of different issues ranging from government regulations to technology development. Next week we will give feedback of the solutions we have came up with and brainstorm to find which is the best solution that all of the group agrees upon.

Week 5

Reflection

This week in our lecture we learnt about Information Systems Crimes, Security & Controls. I learnt that organisations dependent on Information Systems, become more vulnerable to security disasters due to Internal and External threats. I have learnt that certain precautions need to be taken if a company wants to keep Information Systems safe. I was surprised to find that the most common computer crime was information modification and unauthorized people accessing private information. I learnt a lot on computer viruses, the different types of viruses, what they do and how to prevent them. I learnt about cyber threats and how it is important to not take part in any cyber threats as it is against the law. We did not just learn about issues with computer systems and cyber threats, I also learnt about computer ethics, dealing with issues and standards of conduct pertaining to the use of information systems. A very important thing I learned about was how to reduce risks using Technological Safeguards, such as using passwords, photo ID cards, smart cards, keys to unlock the computer, etc. We learnt the difference between firewalls and encryption. Firewalls being a system designed to detect intrusion and prevent unauthorized access and Encryption being the process of encoding messages before sending on to network or airwaves. In the seminar we did more independent work on excel.

Teamwork

This week within our teams we came up with some more questions that will help get more information to help us come up with valid solutions to the business' problems that they face. We also discussed the different types of roles that we will assign the following week as not all of the group members were in during this seminar. One of the major problems that we chose to focus on was the problem Japanese Tobacco International had with vapes being so popular instead of people smoking tobacco products.

Week 4

Reflection

This weeks lecture was about enhancing business intelligence using information systems. Within this lecture I learnt ISs are used to gather and analyse information from internal and external sources to help make good business decisions that will help the business in the long run. I learnt what "Big Data" is and how it effects a business through volume, variety, velocity, veracity and value. We also looked at the different types of data that management has to require, soft data which is non-analytical information such as up to date news stories and hard data which is facts and numbers usually produced by organisational databases or other systems. Business intelligence helps when reacting to various threats and opportunities organisations may face such as fierce competition and to help organisations continuously analyse and monitor business processes to get the results to help make adjustments within the business.

We also learnt about databases and the Database Management System, or DBMS for short, this is a program that allows organisations to easily create, store, retrieve, organise and analyse information the business has retrieved. After that we learnt about the advantages of the database approach, how effective it is to a business and the types of documents that would be drawn up.

We learnt about a few other systems such as:

• Decision support systems (DSS), which is a system used to support decision making for recurring problems. This is measured through a what-if analysis which usually a employee at managerial level would complete.

• Expert systems, which is a system that manipulates knowledge rather than information. This system asks a series of questions where the answers are then matched with predefined rules. 

• Intelligent agents. This system comes in many different types such as user agents, buyer agents, monitoring and sensing agents, data-mining agents, web crawlers and destructive agents. 

The last thing I learnt in the lecture was GIS which is an acronym for geographic information systems. This is a system for creating, managing, analysing and storing geographically referenced information where a user can add information stored in different layers. an example of this could be google earth.

Teamwork

This week within our groups we asked our company a few questions to the business to get more of an insight on the company and some minor issues they would go through on a day to day basis. We collected a lot of information which we then read over in the seminar and analysed the answers to produce any solutions to these problems. This was just to help us see who was best at what job so we can then start to assign roles for the more serious solutions the business faces.