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The screen I spend the most time with these days is a black LCD monitor attached to a PC in an indie bookshop on Long Island. I spend whole days looking at point-of-sale software called Anthology which also keeps track of the store’s inventory. Often, it’s accurate. Occasionally, it says we have three copies of The Bell Jar that have simply disappeared from the face of the Earth. No one stole them. They were raptured, like socks that never make it out of the dryer.
If you’ve never worked a retail job, let me tell you what it’s like: you come in with a little spring in your step, caffeinated, and ready to greet your coworkers and update them on how terrible your last shift without them was. Though the memory of the previous shift’s slog might give you a little anxiety, and though a hangover can make your fuse a little short, you’re in a better mood at the start of the day than at the end. Tedious tasks like ordering and unboxing books (sci-fi movies did not prepare me for how much cardboard there would be in the future) seem manageable in the morning. Customers seem kind. The items you’re selling feel necessary to human happiness. Whatever is going on in your life is put on pause to manage store operations, and time flies. Then, by 3 PM, whether you had time for lunch or not, you wish you had done anything else with your day — or, better yet — your life.
While the back-straining work of moving inventory around the store or walking the floor helping customers all day without a second to sit down might make you physically tired, the real work of retail is mental and forces employees to become part-machine. Retail workers have to ask the same three questions (“Rewards?” “Bag?” “Receipt?”) and reply to the same three questions (“Have it?” “Bathroom?” “Manager?!?!?”) for 8-10 of their most worthwhile waking hours.
In bookstores, there is the added expectation that while you’re participating in this mind-numbing routine, you’re at least able to pretend to like and engage with literature. I'm not arguing that people working at Old Navy aren’t eloquent or as over-educated for their job as I am. If they aren’t teenagers, most retail employees I’ve encountered have, by virtue of talking to coworkers and customers all day, the same high emotional intelligence as the smartest people I know who chain smoke outside bars. Still, my guess is that it’s rare for a customer to see a clothing store employee folding clothes, and think “I wonder what their opinion is of the latest Ann Patchett book” or “I wonder if they read Knausgård and run a book club when they’re not helping me find jeans in my size.” People see booksellers doing the same tedious tasks as any other retail employee and assume they not only possess unlimited knowledge about the state of publishing but also have unlimited hours to read while in the store. Customers hold booksellers to an impossible intellectual standard. When they fail to live up to said standard, they’re subjected to conversations like this:
“You haven’t read the latest Kingsolver?” a customer will ask, “Why not? What about this one? Or that one? It’s so good though! I thought you would have read all of these!”
What’s a shame is that they think they’re being kind when they half-recommend, half-admonish bookstore employees. Worse are the people who are flat-out rude. Case in point, a man came into the store at hour six of my shift, and without any preamble, treating me like I was a human Google search bar, said the name of an author, then started spelling the name. When I asked for a second to look up what I assumed he was asking for, he rolled his eyes and began spelling slowly and loudly: “PAUL. P…A…U…”
Sadly, I’m too old to be treated that way and without thinking I raised my hand and said sternly “Don’t do that.” Now some oblivious retired banker is walking around Long Island asking himself why indie booksellers are so mean. My Midwestern niceness has disappeared, my helpful attitude is now nonexistent. I have been worn down by the people I’m paid to be kind to.
Read the rest here.
#lit#lol#humor#funny#essay#essays#bookselling#barnes and noble#reading#writing#customers#american fiction#books#literature#better book titles#dan wilbur
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Hana Retail offers a comprehensive POS system for book stores, designed to streamline operations and boost sales. With features like inventory management, customer tracking, and marketing tools, their POS system can help book stores run more efficiently and effectively.
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Dan Fridd on the latest in Bookselling Technology
I saw Dan Fridd in action promoting Edelweiss "the book industry's platform to market, sell, discover, and order new titles" at the RISE Bookselling Conference in Prague a few weeks ago and knew I had to have him on the show.
Dan is Client "Success" Manager for Edelweiss. We talk about the company, his career in bookselling IT, and how "Above the Treeline" provides booksellers with the big picture; about book sales, inventory management, pie charts, Barbara Kingsolver's The Lacuna, the John Sandoe Bookshop in London, Ann Arbor, Michigan, book conversations opening up your world, marina management software, yachts, coding, data splicing, browsing publisher sales catalogues, analytics, creating your own catalogues, the Book Bugs and Dragon Tales bookshop, Norwich, Mitch Kaplan, and gigs in the Cayman Islands.
Check out this episode!
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CirclePos is the whole point of sale, stock management, and online sales solution for booksellers. It is an ideal platform for bricks and mortar stores that want to be online but don't want the hassle of managing a website and the shop floor. With Circle, all sales (in-store or online) are administered through a single cloud-based system that is accessible from anywhere, like your online email account. It knits together your existing business systems for email, accounting and eftpos; and functions on any device.
#Bookshop Management Systems#cloud based stock management system#inventory management software for bookshops#stock management system#document management systems#Management system
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Rise In Online Shipment Amidst Hefty Rains.
A book is a PDF data that is sold as a service to a specific problem. The problem is that it additionally supplies Chinese counterfeiters simpler access to product details, making it less complicated to create phony merchandise, send it to the FBA gratification facilities, and undercut legitimate vendors. Having testimonials for your items includes credibility as well as helps prospective clients really feel a lot more informed concerning their purchasing decision. You detail your products on Amazon's site. Sales of Amazon Echo and Echo Dot were nine times higher this holiday compared to they were during the exact same period in 2015. Crucial with offering on Amazon.com is to comply with all the rules meticulously. Ideally, in the day time you would certainly be able to manage your store's admin activities like payment and also item order information, and so on Due to the fact that it indicates that you will make more as well as sell more, this is great for sellers. Twenty different companions presently share the duties of shipping Amazon's 600 million bundles a year, with FedEx, USPS, and also UPS moving one of the most. Now that an increasing number of people are going online, more and more are purchasing off the Internet. Due to the fact that it could expose exactly what techniques they utilize to get the clients buy their products or solutions, this could be of much aid. They not just connect on an individual degree, they also indirectly promote lots of companies when they look into locations, posts images of the products they get and also chat regarding their preferred buying destinations. If they believe you are damaging them by using the exact same items to Costco, distributors and suppliers could occasionally become tough. You could list a limitless variety of items absolutely free yet just what they call a reference fee is billed on each sale. You can get this outstanding eCommerce advancement system in free of cost. Ecommerce companies frequently do not objectively place themselves in the shoes of their internet site site visitors, as well as regarding exactly how your products or services exist to the visitor is a vital location that is typically ignored. In some cases individuals don't know exactly what they are seeking when they go to an ecommerce website. You can't market anything that is a duplicate, a free marketing variation, an international item not accredited up for sale in the UK or anything that is hazardous (unlikely to relate to publications). With the help of custom-made strategies for ecommerce web design, you could incorporate such things, tabs, or photos that can appeal to the clients and force them to purchase your products. This program allows sellers to deliver all their DVDs (or other inventory) to Amazon wholesale. There are lots of after Xmas sales and offers going on that you are sure to locate a great price on a nice digital video camera. If you use this solution as a seller, you won't have to bother with the promotion of the product. Leading Net, IP as well as software program legal representative Chip Cooper has automated the procedure of preparing lawful agreements on-line consisting of internet site lawful conformity papers with his MyLegalFirewall website records composing solution. There's no doubt concerning it, Amazon is a force to be considered, however if brands typically aren't notified, prepared to take care of the need, and keeping very close attention their marketing technique, things could draw out of control. However it additionally requires time, space, as well as organization if you have lots of products. Options available in the online market place, ecommerce web-stores are completing mostly on client service consequently building a relationship with the clients. You could be able to locate some obscure 'warm topics' by asking in bookshops and also collections about what publications are coming to be prominent, and then trying to second-guess the need on Amazon. The risks of ecommerce could include the items themselves in addition to the electronic transaction. You could eliminate shipping costs by utilizing Fulfillment by Amazon, FBA which requires sending your products to Amazon that will after that take care of the product packaging as well as shipping to consumers. There are a lot of companies with sufficient money to import these products straight by the thousands and also undersell any individual that buys through a representative or wholesaler. One mild negative aspect of using this method is that every seller intends to offer these publications.
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Inventory Clerks
Kingston Bookshop is seeking Inventory Clerks We are Hiring! Do you have: Training in Inventory Management? At least 3 years’ experience in the retail industry? At least 5 CXC subjects with passes in Mathematics and English Language? Proficiency in the use of Microsoft Excel and Inventory Management Software? Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted
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What is a POS system? A Deep Insight
We often hear the word POS in our surroundings, but we end up thinking about what a POS system is? However, in an understandable term, the word POS is an abbreviation of Point of Sale system, software, or technology that provides you line-busting capabilities to improve your business operation, improve customer experience, and provide many benefits of inventory management.
The POS system is defined as a Point of Sale that enables a business person to manage their business in a fast, easiest, most reliable, and secure way. In the fast-paced world having POS, technology brings ease for managing the business efficiently. If you want to know about POS for business guidance or POS for your restaurant guidance, then this article might be helpful to you.
Importance of POS system
Operating a business is never an easy task as it requires several administrative, management, and marketing skills that collectively contribute to business growth. However, you can get all these skills in one place with POS software, an all-in-one system that ensures that all your business operations are working in unison.
The POS software allows you to simplify your billing, handle sales monitoring promotions or returns, manage inventory, engage employees and customers, and much more. No matter wherever you are, an efficient point of sale system software provides you instant reports every time. It is a perfect tool for small businesses and medium enterprises. You don’t have to view prices through tags because fast POS technology allows you to scan the expenses and calculate the costs in seconds.
Best POS software
There are different POS software available for various businesses; for instance, if you want a POS system for your retail store or any other departmental store, then Howmuch POS would be the best choice for you because it is compatible with every kind of store. It perfectly fits with Grocery Stores, Pharmacies, bakeries, bookshops, medical stores, milk shops, Toyshop, Electronic Stores, and Superstore business operations. It also functions smoothly for the Tyre and spare parts shop, furnishing market, electronic and hardware stores, warehouses, furniture shop, gifts, jewelry, and flower shops. No matter how big or small your business is, Howmuch POS will keep the hassle away from it.
Similarly, if you are searching for an ideal revolutionary POS system for your restaurant, a foodnerd cloud-based restaurant POS system would be an excellent choice. It is cost-efficient, simple, and user-friendly that will expand your restaurant business by leaps and bounds. With Point of sale software, you can manage your small business with just one platform and within a minimal time and budget.
Features of POS system
The POS system is featured with exceptional qualities that prove to be an ideal POS for small businesses.
An effective POS system comes with the advanced offline and online mode that allows you to run uninterrupted operations without an internet connection.
The POS system keeps track of your transaction and allows you to sell products by holding the line moving quickly.
The best POS system is compatible with every type of transaction; for instance, Howmuch POS or Foodnerd POS provides customers multiple payment options such as stripe, Jazz Cash, easy paisa Paypal, and cash on delivery.
POS system provides you the benefits of real-time inventory management and gives you short reports on different subjects such as accounting, sales, inventory, etc.
An effective POS integrates the records of your store or restaurant’s sales and purchases.
Multiple management is also one of the exceptional features the POS system provides. No matter how many restaurants or stores you own, you can manage various restaurants or stores with POS.
The best POS system always has in-built CRM capabilities that maintain customer loyalty.
Types of POS system
There are different types of Point of Sale software, such as Cloud-Based POS systems, On-premise POS systems, Mobile POS systems, and Self-service Kiosk POS systems. Details are given below:
Cloud-based POS system
A cloud-based POS system is an online or web-based system compatible with Android, Mac, or Windows devices. A cloud-based POS system can be easily used anywhere, anytime. It provides benefits of modern software technology. For instance, if you want to operate your multiple restaurants in one place, then foodnerd POS allows you to manage all of your restaurant operations.
On-premise POS system
The On-premise POS system is a non-cloud-based or traditional POS system software that runs within an internal network and utilizes local servers in information storage. The one disadvantage associated with an on-premise POS system is that it can only be accessed on the infrastructure where it is deployed or installed.
Mobile POS system
The Mobile POS system is like an in-hand POS system that can be considered a cloud-based POS system category. This POS system runs efficiently on any mobile device, and you can operate it anywhere, any time. Mobile POS systems come with the benefits of mobility and low cost.
Self-service Kiosk POS system
The self-service Kiosk POS system is mainly installed in restaurants or cafes where customers can place orders and pay for their products themselves. This type of Point of sale system allows businesses to make their service more efficient without human resources.
Benefits of inventory management
Inventory management is considered critical and decisive to the success of any business; that is why it is significant for the business owners or operators to keep track of their stock level, and they never run out of stock. Still, with modern technology managing an inventory is not a difficult task because the point of sale software provides you numerous benefits to oversee inventory. It helps retailers to improve their efficiency in inventory management and save time and cost. POS inventory management software always ensures that you have enough stock to meet your customer demands. For instance, with howmuch POS system, you’ll be in fewer headaches when setting up your inventory because it will save all the messy problems for you.
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10 Nov 2020: Should you own your delivery? Robots in the aisles.
Hello, this is the Co-op Digital newsletter - it looks at what's happening in the internet/digital world and how it's relevant to the Co-op, to retail businesses, and most importantly to people, communities and society. Thank you for reading - send ideas and feedback to @rod on Twitter. Please tell a friend about it!
[Image: Centerlineautomotive/Amazon]
US election
South Ayrshire Golf club owner loses 2020 presidential election is one of the better headlines about the election. Joe Biden will be the next president in the US. And Kamala Harris will be vice president - itself a historic achievement. You’d expect less chaos, more stability and better decision-making. You’d hope that division can now give way to healing, though that may be a long road. The effect on the technology sector will probably be increased regulation and tax, though the former was surely coming regardless of the winner.
Previously, 2016: “the internet and social media played a part in “post-truth” politics”, which with 2020’s hindsight was a very coy way to put it.
Should you own your delivery?
Thanks to the virus, delivery has gone from being another sales channel to the way retailers survive.
To own or not to own delivery? Grocers reassess the Instacart dilemma. Outsourcing to delivery experts is a good way to get going quickly. But the retailer loses both control of the shopping experience and visibility/ownership of the shopping behaviour data. Over time these gaps may become significant. But given that most grocery delivery services are currently offered at break-even or below cost, there may not be much retailer appeal in chunky investment to build out delivery services. Yet.
Retail news
Small shops are better at surviving the virus than big ones - independent shops doing better than chain stores, says data. (Or maybe the data shows that closing a store is a viable strategy for chains but not independents…)
M&S slumps to first loss in public firm's history. Clothing and home sales fell due to the impact of lockdowns.
“We are refocusing on our core food business, putting food back at the heart of Sainsbury's” - Sainsbury’s is closing a lot of standalone Argos stores and opening some inside the supermarkets. This newsletter thinks supermarkets could experiment more with unusual store formats like Argos.
Nestlé purchased Freshly, a meal delivery co in the US.
Lockdown: Andrex maker has '100 million toilet rolls standing by’ - no-one will be caught short.
The next economic crisis: empty retail space?
Robots in the aisles
Walmart drops inventory-scanning robots from its stores - the robots trundled the aisles, looking for gaps on the shelves. “This was one idea we tried in roughly 500 stores just as we are trying other ideas in additional stores”. The human staff were better at the job apparently.
But it doesn’t look like a simple case of customers being freaked out by autonomous robots though, because Walmart is keeping its floor cleaning robots. So it may be that shelf-scanning is a task that’s too complex for 2020’s robots.
Neighbourhoods in the car park
Here’s a company that manages 4,500 car parks in the US. They do all the parking management stuff you’d expect, but they’re also trying to make the car parks work harder to provide other services: (“dark”) neighbourhood kitchens, “last block” delivery services. Leveraging space. You could imagine a trade here: do one delivery, get 30 minutes free parking.
Department of Amazon
'This is revolutionary’: new online bookshop unites indies to rival Amazon - Bookshop.org just launched in the UK in partnership with more than 130 shops. (Hive is another anti-Amazon selling books.)
How Jeff Bezos is spending his $10 billion Earth Fund - slowly.
Lost in translation: Amazon bungles its launch in Sweden - the launch of Amazon’s Swedish website has been blighted by cultural gaffes and glaring mistranslations.
Various things
Tesla released its quarterly safety stats for its AutoPilot feature: “one accident for every 4.59 million miles driven in which drivers had Autopilot engaged”. The report hints that AutoPilot is as safe as human driving, but it isn’t necessarily a fair comparison because AutoPilot driving is generally on motorways.
Tech is never neutral but it’s often indifferent to the uses it is put to: Activists are building facial recognition tools to identify police officers using off-the-shelf image recognition software (registration required for that link).
What is the internet doing to Boomers’ brains? - some sweeping generalisations here but interesting on the spread of misinformation and the erosion of trust.
Apple will require apps to add privacy ‘nutrition labels’ in December.
PayPal allows Bitcoin and crypto spending - very gradually, cryptocurrencies have been seeing more use. Many problems exist though: blockchainy approaches are often energy-inefficient, still.
How does Google’s monopoly hurt you? Try these searches. - “right under our noses, the Internet’s most-used website has been getting worse”.
Co-op Digital news and events
Free of charge events at Federation house (and elsewhere):
Andy’s Man Club – Gentleman's Peer to Peer Mental Health Meet Up – Mondays 7pm
Mindfulness & Selfcare for Children – Workshop – 11 Nov – 3.30pm
Introducing the Declaration for Responsible and Intelligent Data Practice – Workshop – 12 Nov – 4pm. In a world awash with data, the ability to make the right decisions regarding the use of data becomes increasingly more complex and difficult. Our capacity to create, collect and analyse data from disparate sources, using advances such as machine learning and artificial intelligence, creates challenges that are not only technical, but legal and ethical too. To learn more and get involved Sign up here.
Tech Ethics – Meet Up – 12 Nov – 6pm
Managing Difficult Conversations – Webinar – 17 Nov – 13.30pm
This is the North – Convention – 24/25 Nov – All Day
Paid for event: Tech for Good – Webinar – 18 Nov - 10am
More detail on Federation House’s events.
Thank you for reading
Thank you friends, readers and contributors. Please continue to send ideas, questions, corrections, improvements, etc to @rod on Twitter. If you have enjoyed reading, please tell a friend! If you want to find out more about Co-op Digital, follow us @CoopDigital on Twitter and read the Co-op Digital Blog. Previous newsletters.
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Make Your Business More Easier By Stock Management Software.
FUMAS is a simple, user friendly stock/inventory integrated with accounts system. A business owner will be able to manage his/her business with the aid of this system getting reports on Daily sales, Stock level as at a particular date, sales per sales man/woman, Profit and loss, balance sheet. FUMAS keeps track of stock in real time. The software is ideal for Supermarkets, Wholesalers, Retailers, Restaurant, Bookshops, Chemist, Spare part, Hardware, Cosmetic shops.
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Point Of Sale For Book Stores MCC 5942
If you’re passionate аbоut mаking уоur indереndеnt bookstore thrivе, you should аlѕо bе раѕѕiоnаtе роint оf ѕаlе (POS) ѕуѕtеmѕ. Luсkilу, уоu dоn’t have tо bе a POS еxреrt whеn you hаvе Mеrсhаnt Strоnghоld on уоur ѕidе. We work with the tор POS providers оf bookstore POS ѕуѕtеmѕ tо hеlр mеrсhаntѕ likе you access the integrated POS features аnd payment рrосеѕѕing tools that саn really make a difference to your bоttоm line.
Intеgrаtеd POS ѕуѕtеmѕ
A POS ѕуѕtеm fоr bооkѕtоrеѕ with integrated payment processing саn rеаllу hеlр сlоѕе the gap bеtwееn big bоx сhаinѕ аnd independently owned bookstores likе yours. Yоu dоn’t hаvе to hаvе соrроrаtе headquarters hаnding dоwn fаnсу mаrkеting plans аnd customer lоуаltу solutions to аttrасt аnd kеер customers. Yоu dоn’t nееd аn entire IT ѕtаff tо imрlеmеnt an e-commerce solution аnd uѕе buуing power tо gеt cutting еdgе technology programs likе thе big-box chains dо. When уоu hаvе a POS ѕуѕtеm, designed ѕресifiсаllу fоr independent bооkѕtоrеѕ, ѕuрроrtеd by a local POS provider, аnd vаluе added payment solutions, you саn dо еvеrуthing your соmреtitоrѕ do and mоrе.
Cuѕtоmеr Lоуаltу
Cuѕtоmеrѕ frеԛuеnt buѕinеѕѕеѕ thаt dеlivеr a роѕitivе сuѕtоmеr experience. Whеn a сuѕtоmеr соmеѕ intо your ��hор аnd you саn inѕtаntlу find thе book thеу’rе looking fоr, ring them up аnd accept thе рауmеnt form оf their сhоiсе in оnе ԛuiсk trаnѕасtiоn, уоu’rе delivering a gооd customer experience thаt invitеѕ them bасk tо your buѕinеѕѕ. If уоu саn оffеr targeted рrоmоtiоnѕ bаѕеd оn сuѕtоmеr dаtа, dеlivеrеd directly to thеir mоbilе рhоnе, уоu’rе dеlivеring a gооd customer experience. If your customers саn brоwѕе уоur invеntоrу оnlinе аnd mаkе a purchase frоm thеir hоmе, you’re dеlivеring a good сuѕtоmеr experience.
WHAT MОRЕ WITH A POS
Mаnаgе аnd ѕеаrсh inventory with еаѕе
Aссерt mоѕt payment tуреѕ аnd саrd brаndѕ
Run customer loyalty рrоgrаmѕ аnd rеwаrd rереаt customers
Offer e-commerce ѕhоррing
Cоllесt аnd аggrеgаtе dаtа fоr tаrgеtеd mаrkеting саmраignѕ
AFFORDABLE, ЕАЅУ TО USE РОINT-ОF-ЅАLЕ ЅОFTWАRЕ FОR BООKЅTОRЕЅ
Frоm indереndеnt bookshops tо lаrgе chain bооkѕtоrеѕ, wе’vе fоund thаt bооk retailers can bе some оf thе biggеѕt bеnеfiсiаriеѕ оf using POS software. Thеѕе tуреѕ of ѕtоrеѕ have gigаntiс invеntоriеѕ thаt are hаrd to keep track of. Also, thеу only hаvе an fеw checkout areas, so there iѕn’t muсh еԛuiрmеnt to worry аbоut.
Thеѕе ѕуѕtеmѕ can bе uѕеd tо maximize juѕt аbоut any tуре оf buѕinеѕѕ, but bооkѕtоrеѕ might make use оf thеm the bеѕt. One оf key thingѕ that POS software fоr bookstores саn оffеr iѕ аiding ѕtоrе owners with inventory management. POS ѕуѕtеmѕ for bookshops аrе еxtrеmеlу easy tо figurе оut, undеrѕtаnd, аnd imрlеmеnt in any business.
Obviоuѕlу, such a ѕуѕtеm inсludеѕ everything nееdеd tо gets a сuѕtоmеr thrоugh the сhесkоut service, inсluding rеgiѕtеrѕ, computers, and рауmеnt processing hardware. Thе POS system аlѕо hаѕ оthеr uѕеѕ thоugh ѕuсh as bооkѕtоrе POS inventory mаnаgеmеnt, аnd kеерing trасk оf trаnѕасtiоn rесоrdѕ.Mаnу саn bеnеfit frоm bооkѕtоrе POS software in diffеrеnt ways.
Fоr inѕtаnсе. thоuѕаndѕ of bооkѕ саn bе trасkеd аnd kерt trасk of thrоugh the vеrifоnе VX520 POS bookstore POS invеntоrу features. Alѕо, detailed rесеiрtѕ can bе printed uр fоr еасh transaction, аnd сrеdit саrdѕ саn be accepted and processed аѕ fоrmѕ оf рауmеnt. These ѕаlеѕ ѕуѕtеmѕ аrе vеrѕаtilе for all buѕinеѕѕеѕ, which еxрlаinѕ why thеу аrе so widely uѕеd.
Anу bookstore соuld аnd ѕhоuld uѕе a bооkѕtоrе POS ѕуѕtеm to kеер trасk of invеntоriеѕ, tаkе care оf trаnѕасtiоnѕ, аnd mоrе. Thеrе аrе vеrу fеw downsides whеn it соmеѕ tо such ѕуѕtеmѕ. Thе riѕkѕ аrе fеw whilе thе rewards are mаnу.
Nоtе; Bооk ѕhорѕ аrе еxресtеd tо do mоѕt оf thеir buѕinеѕѕ viа tеrminаl if thеу nееd a Merchant account, merchant services, payment gateway, Humboldt, NMI, credit card payment solutions, credit card processing solutions, electronic payment solutions, international payment solutions, (соntасt Merchant Stronghоld to knоw mоrе about this)
Frее POS ѕоftwаrе for Bооk ѕhорѕ
BETTER POS FOR YOUR Bооk Stоrе
Verifone VX520 POS hаѕ all these capabilities аnd much mоrе, whiсh mаkеѕ it аn idеаl point оf sale ѕоlutiоn fоr уоur stores.
With Verifone VX520 POS, items саn ԛuiсklу be рut intо invеntоrу. Dеtаilѕ ѕuсh аѕ thе рriсе thаt wаѕ раid (cost), dаtе received, mаrk-uр, mаrgin, ԛuаntitу, аnd dеѕсriрtiоn are аll rесоrdеd for each item. Whеn prospective buуеrѕ hаvе ԛuеѕtiоnѕ, аnу infоrmаtiоn that wаѕ еntеrеd оn the itеm саn be easily ассеѕѕ just by scanning the рrоduсt. Cоmрlеtе rероrtѕ саn be ассеѕѕеd to review inventory lеvеlѕ, inventory vаluе, ѕаlеѕ hiѕtоrу, or virtuаllу аnу аѕресt of invеntоrу аnd sales information thаt has bееn соnduсtеd оn thе store роint of ѕаlе ѕуѕtеm.
In a multi-store еnvirоnmеnt, еасh ѕtоrе lосаtiоn can hаvе “live-time” ассеѕѕ tо invеntоrу infоrmаtiоn frоm ѕtоrе to store. Buyers thаt are lооking fоr a specific item can be rеdirесtеd, whеn thаt item iѕ рrеѕеnt аt one of your оthеr ѕtоrеѕ.
All оf the fеаturеѕ above are inсоrроrаtеd with mоrе bу Merchant strong hоldѕ which includes;
Frее shipping tо аll сliеntѕ.
Nо setup fее
Wirеlеѕѕ
Wе Support EMV, IP оr Diаl
nо Mоnthlу Fее
48 Hоurѕ аррrоvаl аnd lots mоrе
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INFS 5093 | SYSTEMS PLANNING ASSIGNMENT
INFS 5093 | SYSTEMS PLANNING ASSIGNMENT | INFORMATION SYSTEMS
COMPUTER ASSIGNMENT HELP
Introduction
This assignment consists of
A case study, which requires you to apply your learning from the systems planningmodule.
An ethical analysis which requires you to apply one of thereadings provided on the course website.
A conceptual development and reflection section which requires you to consider how systems planningtasks impact on a systems development project.
The feedback sheet lists the assessment criteria. Look for it on the assignment’s webpage. Take note of which sections carry the most marks.
Note that this assignment’s word count is 2602without your answers, so
Don’t worry if the final word count seems high.
Also, there are some diagrams in this assignment so don’t worry if your final word count seems low.
I suggest that you draw thediagrams by hand, photograph the drawings and insert the photographs in this file. If you prefer, you can use Word’s drawing tools (or some other drawing or modelling software) but you may find working with pen and paper is faster, easier to amend, less cumbersome and more reliable with respect to layout.
Instructions
When referring to the exemplars on the course website, read the old assignment specifications carefully because the assignments differ every study period.
Recall: in the previous study period, students spent an average of 24hours on this assignment.
Pace yourself accordingly.
For best results
Do not attempt to complete the whole assignment in one session.
Work slowly and carefully.
In addition to the instructions on the course website
Do not overlook the ‘Why?’ questions.
Read the case study carefully.
Keep track of the hours you spend.
You are encouraged to make assumptions where necessary. Scope for assumptions has been deliberately included in this assignment because it is often necessary to make assumptions openly when dealing with a client who is under-informed with respect to technology. Please label your assumptions clearly. Here’s an example from a previous study period,
Assumption: As the passengers of Titanic II may be from any nation, I have assumed a currency converter is required for the ticket-purchasing function.
Case study: Socrates & Co
You work at IT Foundry as a Systems Analyst.
Socrates & Co is a bookshop specialising in new, second hand and rare books. It is located on a busy shopping street, close to several university campuses and has been in business for a long time. Today, it’s managed by its owner, Joanna Diakou, but it was started in 1938 by Joanna’s father, Stefanos, who was a well-known local intellectual. When he established Socrates & Co, Stefanos gave a lot of consideration to the store’s interior design and location. It came to be well known as a place where people are welcome to escape the noise, rest their feet, and sit and read without being disturbed. There are comfortable armchairs between the shelves and people can have snacks if they are careful. Over time, Stefanos came to know many of his customers by name and Socrates & Co built a reputation and a loyal customer base almost entirely from word-of-mouth recommendations. Stefanos retired in 1974 and turned the business over to Joanna, who at the time was recently graduated with an honours degree in the humanities. She has maintained her father’s practices and has come to know her regular customers by name and people know they can come to Socrates & Co and find a warm welcome, insightful and witty conversation, or quiet solitude.
Although she draws a salary from Socrates & Co, Joanna doesn’t consider the time she spends there to be ‘work’ – instead it is simply her lifestyle. She goes to Socrates & Co every day except Sundays. Four other people work there: Kavya Amal works on Mondays and Thursdays; Adam Matchoss works on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Sundays; Rajavel Sulake and Priyam Farrukh (store manager) both work on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Kavya, Adam, Rajavel and Priyam are postgraduate coursework students whose schedules change every semester. Priyam has worked at Socrates & Co for five years and is paid a higher wage because she manages the store on Sundays. All of the staff love the relaxed atmosphere and they deeply appreciate Joanna’s attitude because, as long the customers have what they need, Joanna doesn’t mind if the staff work on their assignments while they are at the store. The store’s opening hours are the same every day: 11am to 7pm.
However, Joanna has recently been unwell and has come to realise that perhaps Socrates & Co could afford her an additional afternoon off if she didn’t have to spend so much time on keeping track of inventory, sales, special orders, rosters and all the other little administrative tasks. Also, Kavya and Adam are students in an IT department and they both think Socrates & Co really ought to expand into ecommerce, with an app and a website. Joanna is not entirely sure what this would entail, but she trusts Kavya and Adam and she decides to investigate further.
One of Joanna’s regular customers is Andrew Frawley. He is one of your workmates at IT Foundry. When Andrew came into the store, Joanna asked him for advice. He immediately advised Joanna to work with you; you have more experience in ecommerce and publishing than Andrew. She agrees to a meeting, which Andrew arranges between yourself and Joanna.
You talk to Joanna about Socrates & Co and you realise its significance extends to the wider community: even people who never buy a book can enjoy reading in the peaceful atmosphere. You learn that Socrates & Co has long-standing relationships with thirty-four publishers and you know that seventeen of the publishers (the larger ones) offer B2B ordering, returns and invoicing. You talk about various business processes. For example, you discuss how Joanna sources rare books and you discuss the Socrates & Co text-book sales service (on a 5% commission) for uni students. You talk about the process for replenishing the second hand stock and the process for when a customer makes a special order. You are sure there are other business processes Joanna has not mentioned; payroll comes immediately to mind and you begin to identify other overlooked business processes. Joanna also tells you about a project she has had in mind for some time: she wants to start a small café in one corner of the store, for which she has obtained a licence.
You can see potential for supporting Socrates & Co business processes and for supporting Joanna’s plans for a small café, both without disrupting the Socrates & Co reputation. However, as you are a seasoned professional, you don’t rush in. Instead you suggest that Socrates & Co funds a preliminary investigation of a potential future IS project. Joanna agrees to the cost, your manager approves, and when one of your existing projects closes, you begin the Socrates & Co preliminary investigation.
Understanding the business
Recall: you can make assumptions in this assignment (as noted above). Also, you can use the course forum if you have any questions.
Develop a business profile for Socrates & Co. Focus on business activities, how the business is organised, resources, customers, suppliers and future directions.
Given below is the business profile for Socrates & Co.
Business Profile: Socrates & Co.
Overview
Socrates and Co. is a legacy bookshop set up in 1938, engaged in retail sales of text books, rare books and new books in fiction and non fiction categories. The company’s mission is to expand its operations into the e-commerce space and provide services through a mobile app and a website.
Activities
The company is engaged in following activities:
· Retail sales of books (text books, fiction books, second hand and rare books)
· Sourcing/procurement of books from its network of publishers (currently has 34 with some of them offering returns)
Some of the internal functions of the company are:
· Payroll management (manage payouts to its existing staff, salaries etc.)
· Inventory management (manage stocks of books and handle new purchases)
Business Organisation From its current scale of operations, Socrates & Co. can be categorized as a small scale business. The business is organised as:
· The company is headed by Joanna, the owner of the book store who manages the overall functions.
· There are 4 staff members who work part time—Kavya Amal, Adam Matchoss, Rajavel Sulake and Priyam Farrukh.
· The company has engaged an external IT solutioning firm called IT Foundry to do a preliminery investigation for the implementation of an Information System.
Resources The company’s key resources are:
· Human Resources
o 4 part time workers taking care of the retail sales, inventory management and administration work.
· Financial Resources:
o Cash Deposits of 0.5 million AUD
o Antiques having estimated net worth of 2 million AUD
o Bills receivables of 50,000 AUD
· Other Resources:
o Antique furniture
o Victorian era building (of monument value and tourist attraction)
o Rare collection of victorian era books (original copies)
Customers · Strong existing customers base, which stems from the popularity of the original establisher Stephanos, a renowned intellectual of 1930’s.
· Customers include tourists and walk-ins who come to visit the building to enjoy the ambience and architecture.
· Also includes university students who come for text books (the building being in close vicinity to universities).
Suppliers The company has a strong supplier base comprising of 34 publishers with whom it has long-standing relationship. Amongst the 34 suppliers:
· 2 are special vendors dealing in rare books
· 17 are B2B publishers who offer easy returns of unpurchased books
· 15 are text book publishers
Future Direction · The company plans to foray into e-commerce and online sales by establishing a website and a mobile app.
o The online presence will create wider presence and expand the scale of operations for the company.
o It also wants active presence on the social media and increase the word-of-mouth customer base by way of online reviews and polls.
· The company wants a mobile app which will perform similar functions as the website.
· In addition to the above, the business also wants to set up a “reading café” to generate revenues from walk-in tourists who only wish to explore the architecture and ambience of the building.
Create an organisation chart for Socrates & Co.
The current organisation structure for the business is as follows:
List four of Socrates & Co’s main business processes.
The company currently handles all its processes manually and does not have an automated system to capture inventory, sales, orders or the administrative activities.
The key business processes and sub processes are:
Process Sub process Sales
· Invoice processing
· Maintaining cash registers
· Customer checkout
Supplier management
· Prepare purchase orders
· Handle returns and publisher invoices
Inventory management · Replenish stocks
· Update records
Finance · Payments to suppliers
· Payments to internal staff (payroll processing)
Given below is a functional decomposition diagram (Systems Analysis and design, ninth edition, Ch. 4. Requirements Modelling, Pg. 150) summarizing the key business processes.
Draw models for two of the business processes listed above, including events, processes and results (an example is available on p11 of the text book).
The business process models have been described below for:
Sales
Supplier Management
Do Socrates & Co’s current business processes support its future objectives? Why or why not?
No the current business processes alone are not sufficient to support the future objectives of the company. We need additional processes to support the future business objectives:
We need a transaction processing system(Transaction Processing, Chapter 1, p.15, Systems Analysis and Design, Tenth Edition, Rosenblatt), so that the sales data, order details, and customer details are all entered automatically into the system:
Hardware such as bar code readers will be needed.
Point of sales solution will be required wherein the sales manager can enter details at the time of sales.
Staff will have to be trained on the new system of retail sales
We need a dedicated staff to manage online sales. The person will be responsible for:
Taking note of everyday orders.
Ensure the orders are dispatched correctly.
Ensure the database is updated and running smoothly.
Look at customer grievances posted online or failed orders.
You now have outlines of the Socrates & Co business processes but you need another meeting with Joanna to double check some details and to discuss project constraints. At the meeting, you sketch diagrams on the whiteboard outlining four of the main business processes. Then you ask Joanna if the processes share data, and if not, could they share data in the future.
Joanna says, “Well, no, they don’t share data … wait, what do you mean exactly? Because I know what sales are made when I check the day’s transactions and when I know the sales, it helps me figure out if I need to order more stock. There are other things that overlap too, like the rosters and the payroll.”
You explain that’s exactly what you mean and you ask her to describe more ‘overlaps’ in the Socrates & Co business processes.
“Well, the cash sales determine the next morning’s bank deposits, but the POS transactions just happen automatically. Also, you know how the sales tell me what to order? Well, I also use a bit of knowhow, like when Michael Sandel’s latest book came out, I knew it was going to sell quickly so I ordered quite a few. Actually, I can say the same for several other authors, like Sam Harris. He sells quite well these days. Hmm … come to think of it, if the new system knows how quickly an author sells, then it could keep those authors in a special list, couldn’t it?”
You agree that’s one of the functions a system could provide. But you point out that it wouldn’t be able to figure out whether to stock new authors because they wouldn’t have a sales history.
Joanna says, “Oh, that’s ok, the publishers know the store so well, I can usually rely on their recommendations. Then I just order a few copies of what they recommend, unless I think the author wouldn’t work at all. It’s especially easy if the publisher takes returns of unsold stock.”
You say, “Like Fractal Publishing? They do that for one of my other clients.”
You recall that Fractal Publishing is one of the B2B publishers and that they are going to upgrade the security of their B2B system next year; as are Continuum, MUP, OUP and Stanford Law Books.
“Yes, we’ve had an account with Fractal for ages! Do you know Jane Berne? She’s my account manager.”
“No, but let’s stay on track. If you email me a list of publishers that take returns and a description of the important ‘overlaps’ we can look at some other things. About the app… do you want it to offer the same transactions as the website? Or do you have something else in mind?”
“I’m not sure. What do you recommend?”
“To keep costs down, let’s keep the transactions the same for now and if you need to review that decision in future, you can do so. But, transactions aside, the website can have other features if you want it to. It doesn’t have to be only sales.”
“Really? That’d be great. We can advertise our different Writers’ Week events. I need to talk it over with Kavya and Adam, they’re bound to have some suggestions. Oh! Can the customers review the books they have read?”
“Sure. But let’s be a little cautious with respect to budget and schedule. So perhaps we ought to …”
The discussion carried on for another fifteen minutes before you shook hands and estimated that you would finish the preliminary investigation within a week.
Preliminary investigation
Conduct a SWOT analysis for the future information systems project.
Described below are the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of this solution.
Strengths:
Good number of existing customers will help push online sales: The existing customer base and word-of-mouth recommendations will bring users to the online portal. The target customer base will expand across all customer categories:
The books will be available to everyone browsing the Internet, thus giving every bibliophilic an option of reading the book information as per their own convenience, irrespective of the location.
The project will enhance the customer experience, as there will be no time constraints for making the purchase, making it available 24/7.
Online marketing: Word of mouth recommendations for a particular book will transform into e-recommendations thus making it available for a larger audience and helping them in their decisions when they are looking up for the similar content.
The company can promote the website on social media to get reviews and word-of-mouth recommendations.
The company can post information on special events such as “writer’s week” on either social media or on its website.
Online users can browse through categories such as “Publisher Recommendation”, “New Arrivals” and “In stock now” to get the best books.
Sales data to make informed business decisions/deeper insight into customer preferences: Managing sales will be easier as the process will be automated and handled completely by the Information Systems:
The transaction-processing database will be able to provide details like which publications are generating maximum sales. It will also be able to tell, in which months the sales are the highest.
The online sales system will give important insight into the customer behaviour:
Which books are being searched the most?
Which books from “Publisher Recommendations” are selling most?
Which age group are majority of customers from?
Which region are the majority of order being placed?
No adverse impact on walk in customers: The bookshop’s heritage architecture will be promoted on the website, therebyattracting tourists and walk-ins, which can generate additionalsales. The website and social media presence will generate awareness about the bookstore and its services.
Weaknesses:
Need for Training: Lack of hands-on experience in using an information system might pose challenges. The staff will need training to operate the new system.
Need for full-time staff: The new business model mayrequire fulltime staff or dedicated roles for staff members to manage activities properly.
Need to “professionally manage” publishers and suppliers: Currently the business is being run on personal relationships and reliance on publishers who have long-standing relationships with the company. Many decisions are taken “instinctively” with respect to sales and reordering of the books. This approach may not be very helpful in future when sales expand and more publishers will be required to fulfil sales orders. A more professional system will be needed to manage the supplier relationships.
Opportunities:
Tying up with universities, pushing textbook sales from university websites: We can tie up with universities to boost textbooks sales through Socrates website (universities can direct students and online users to Socrates website for textbook purchases, and get 5% commission).
Launching Offers and Schemes: Various online marketing strategies can be applied—for example, “limited time period offers” can push the online sales.
Web Advertising: Advertisements can be posted on the website or the mobile application for the upcoming events suchas“writers meet” etc.
E-Books can be made available through the portal.
Café and additional services: Additional business idea like having a Café inside the bookshop will be an attraction for the customers who wants to enjoy their reads with a cup of coffee.This feature can be promoted online to increase walk-in customers and show them the enhanced experience.
Online reviews: The future system will allow the customers to post reviews of the books online. People can also reviews their bookstore experience and give comments.
Threats:
Coping with the change: As the orders increase, the need to expand supplier base will also emerge. This would mean additional resources, expanded network of suppliers, and further investment in terms of time and resources. Not being prepared for this up scaling can lead to failure, loss of reputation and customer trust.
Customers who are not tech-savvy: Customers in the older age group (60-80 years) might find walking into the bookshop much easier than using the modern technology and hence they might refuse to make use of the application or website.
Negative Impact on Walk-in Sales: If the website fails to generate the desired publicity about the bookstore, then it might lose some of the existing walk in customers,who wouldprobably just make the purchases online.
Dependency on technology: A smart phone/tab/laptopis a mandatory requirement to access the website or the mobile application,as well a good Internet connection is needed to utilize the web services. Customers without this facility might not benefit by the project.
In one sentence, state the opportunity.
By establishing a transaction processing system,an online portal, and mobile app, Socrates & Co. can expand sales, supplier network, and walk-in customer base, besides generating word-of-mouth publicity through active online presence.
Outline the future project’s scope with Must Do, Should Do, Could Do and Won’t Do lists.
Must Do:
Set up a database for:
Books available in the store
Books under special orders
Rare books
Prioritize the platform (Android/iOS/Blackberry) on which the mobile application will be made available first.
Design and develop the website:
Provide information regarding all the books available within the bookstore
Provide categories such as “publisher recommendations” and “best sellers”
Ensure that the publishers agree to the format of Drop-Ship(provide goods by direct delivery from the manufacturer to the customer).
Ensurethat the online sales system is launched without disrupting any of the current business processes.
Set up theonline payment system via credit/debit/pay pal.
Document and process the legal formalities for setting up the website or mobile application.
Should Do:
Plan the transformation in phases—create a project plan while ensuring that the current business is not adversely impacted.
Suggest a better inventory management system including storage of the inventory.
Plan training for the resources to access and manage the new system.
Suggest a book renting service for online users.
Provide the option to pre-order the books online or by placing a request at the store.
Could Do:
Provide “Cash on delivery”services for the customers placing online orders.
Provide the rare books for a limited period on rent (by placing request online).
Provide customer service via e-mail (since a call up service would require additional resources) to ensure a positive customer experience and grievance redressing mechanism.
Provide facility of international shipping of orders.
Provide option to rate the books online by using a “five-star”rating format—one star being the lowest and five indicating the highest ratings.
Publish “frequently asked questions” on the website.
Make arrangements for a transaction processing system for the Café which may be opened later on in the bookshop (the owner has already acquired the license and in future, may require an integration into the existing system)
Won’t do:
Providing E-Books for the mobile application or website users
Posting detailed book reviews(since this will require an additional resource to scan through and finalize the content before publishing it online)
Identify two approaches to fact finding you would use in this case and explain why you favour these approaches.
The two fact-finding techniques that we would use are:
Conduct series of interviews
Observe Operations
Interview: Who, What, Where, When, How, and Why
Since a new inventory system is being developed, we will need more information regarding the sales history besides other elements from the past history of the bookshop, as proper sales information is not being maintained currently. Also, the first download of information given by Joanna regarding the business might have missed supporting details which will be captured during interviews and help us in documentation of the facts and figures. The details can be captured by conducting series of interviews with the owner of the bookshop as well as the employees working as part time.
What How Where Who When Why
What processes are being followed?
How is a procedure performed?
Where are the operations being performed?
Who performs each of the procedures within the system?
When is a procedure performed?
Why are the processes important to the business?
Observing the ongoing operations
Socrates and Co. does not maintain a record of its day-to-day activities thus observing ongoing operations will help in providing an accurate picture of the sales process and the workflow.By close observation, we will be able to understand the roles and responsibilities accurately, which will later help us in allocating the tasks and roles in the new information system.
For projects such as this one, estimates for cost, benefit and schedule are required prior to decision-making. Write a list of the tasks you would undertake in order to estimate the cost of the future project.
We will evaluate the Economic Feasibility of the project, which means:
Calculating the benefits of the proposed project
Dollars saved per fiscal year or per month
Intangible benefits to the business
Calculating the Total Cost of Ownership
Cost of resources (including IT staff and users)
Cost of required hardware (bard code readers, PCs, laptops, servers)
Cost of required software (in-house development or vendor purchase)
Training cost (time required to train each employee)
Cost of licensing and legal approvals
Consulting fees by IT Foundry
Cost of postponing or not developing the project
We will also perform a Schedule Feasibility Analysis to understand:
The timeframe within which the project can be implemented
Acceptable time overruns (tolerance to extending the timelines)
Socrates & Co can budget $25,000 for the proposed project. Is this enough information to make a decision on the project’s economic feasibility? Explain.
This information is not enough to make a decision on the project’s economic feasibility. To get a clear picture of the economic feasibility, we need clear calculation of:
Cost in terms of resources (effort required by IT staff to develop and implement the system)
Cost of required hardware (bard code readers, PCs, laptops, servers)
Cost of required software (in-house development or vendor purchase)
Training cost (time required to train each employee)
Cost of licensing and legal approvals
Consulting fees by IT Foundry
Cost of postponing or not developing the project
A project is considered economically viable if the benefits exceed the incurred costs. We will have to deep dive into the intangible and tangible benefits to ascertain the exact worth of the project.
Ethical analysis
Consider the Socrates & Co case study.
Suggest one amendment to Socrates & Co that won’t incur heavy costs, but will
Deliver long-term benefits to the wider community.
Foster growth in any related or relevant industries.
Explain how your amendment will achieve these two outcomes.
One amendment to Socrates & Co that would deliver long-term benefits to the wider community and foster growth in a related or relevant industry would be:
Allow renting of text books to students
Allow renting of rare books to senior citizens and aged customers.
The above two amendments will not cost any additional money, but will generate goodwill and thus better word-of-mouth publicity for the company. Goodwill is an intangible asset to a company, which provides long-term benefits by way of generating positive customer outlook.
In future, as the company forays into online sales, many aged customers might feel “left out” due to lack of technical knowledge. In the online forum on the course website, a fellow student has said “people of old age still prefer person-to-person contact and they need personal attention. They wait on long holds just to talk to a person and get their query answered. This could either be due to difficulty in using the system or they don’t rely and don’t trust the automated system with certain things like making payments.”
Old people may not be able to make the purchases and for them, coming to the store and renting out old books would be a boon. Also, students from weaker sections of the society will find it extremely beneficial, to be allowed to rent some of the books. All these services will generate positive customer impact and a sense of social responsibility by the company.
Joanna is very happy with the project plan you produced and has almost decided to move on to systems analysis with you and IT Foundry. In her enthusiasm, she shows your project plan to Kavya and Adam, who are delighted to view a professional project plan and very keen on the project, especially as some of the ideas they had for the website have been included in the planning.
A week later, Kavya and Joanna are working together and during a quiet moment, Kavya suggests that Joanna can save money by giving the project plan to Kavya and her friends so they can do the project as part of their masters program. That way, Joanna would get the technology for free and Kavya and her friends can work on a real-world project. Kavya says the finished product will be just as good as what IT Foundry can produce.
In responding to the questions below, consider Grodzinsky, Miller and Wolf (2012). This reading can be located on the course website.
With respect to ‘the rules’ what is the main ethical issue?
With reference to ‘The rules’ the main ethical issue is that Joanna might be influenced by Kavya’s idea and breach Rule 2 (Rule 2: The shared responsibility of computing artifacts is not a zero-sum game, Grodzinsky, Miller and Wolf, 2012, Pg. 16) by withdrawing the project from IT socrates and providing it to Kavya and her friends. The company IT Foundry (Creator) trusts Joanna (User) and will honour the relevant licensing agreements and will not use the information provided by them in an unpredictable way. Also, if Joanna is willing to give the project to the graduates, she should seek IT Foundry’s permission and then proceed with the projects with Kavya and her friends. In this case, Joanna is ignoring her moral responsibilities and knowingly committing an action that is unethical and a breach of trust.
With respect to the trust model what is the main ethical issue?
As per the model of trust(Grodzinsky et al., 2011, Pg. – 17),Joanna might breach the principle number 2 – Trust is a decision by a to delegate to b some aspect of importance to a in achieving a goal in order to reduce cost for the development of the project, which is a main ethical issue. Thus, when Joanna and IT Foundry were almost planning to move on with the IT Foundry for the analysis of the project, out of enthusiasm, she shares the plan with Kavya and Adam. Kavya suggests that there can be some savings done on the cost by giving the project plan created by IT Foundry to her friends who are pursuing master’s and can use that as a part of their project work. Also, Kavya and her friends are eager to work on the project since it will be a real time application.
What implications arise from the two ethical issues identified in questions 13 and 14?
There are chances that Joanna may change plans of engaging IT Foundry with the project since she will benefit with Kavya and her friends implementing the plan as a part of their Master’s program for no cost.
Also, Joanna might lose trust of the IT Foundry which might also hamper the relationship which was built by her and her father with few of the publications that she deals with like Fractal Publications, Continuum, MUP, OUP and Stanford Law Books etc. (Assuming that IT Foundry will be handling their future security upgrade of their B2B system)
From Joanna’s point of view, what options are there? Identify four options.
From Joanna’s point of view, the options she has are as follows:
She has to be completely honest with IT Foundry and propose that she would like her employee Kavya and her friends to do the project as part of their major project as it will save her a lot of money
Or else she can continue entering a contract with the IT Foundry and not share the work with Kavya’s friends.
Also, Joanna has an option to stick with IT Foundry as the provider of the new information system and get Kavya and her friends to collaborate with IT Foundry to work on the project together.
Finally, the last option is get only the initial proposal from IT Foundry and then wait for a period of time and with further consultation then finally decide to proceed with the project at a later date.
From a Joanna’s point of view, which option is best, and why?
From the options above, the best option from Joanna’s point of view is option 3, where she can get IT Foundry and Kavya and her friends to collaborate on the project and work on it as a team.
Implementing this will benefit Joanna since she is a trusting person as well as the IT graduates since they will get hands on experience by working on a real world project with professionals.
Also, IT Foundry has invested time and effort to come up with a likeable project plan which includes ideas from Joanna and her team thus if both the entities work together they will avoid breaching any principles or rules and can end the project without any disputes.
Hence, the moral thing to do is to keep IT Foundry informed of the decisions taken as it wouldn’t be ethical to steal the work they did for Joanna and give it exclusively to her employees to do as a project for their university.
Option 1 and 2 gets eliminated since it is not ethically correct to use IT Foundry’s work elsewhere. Also, option 4 is time consuming since Joanna, might have to wait for indefinite period and can be ruled out.
Conceptual development and risk identification
Consider the Socrates & Co case study and the systems planning you have completed. You may have completed the planning tasks with a lot of care. If so, your planning is more likely to be effective in supporting future project activities.
Consider a situation in which the planning tasks were conducted in a carelessmanner.
With respect to the systems planning tasks you completed above, identify risks for each of the following stakeholders. Your answer should have eight unique risks (two per stakeholder).
Socrates & Co.
Socrates and Co. may withdraw due to budget issues and might not choose to continue with the future information systems, which will lead to the project closure prematurely.
Since Socrates and Co. has to work simultaneously on running the existing business while planning for the future information systems, there might be lack of commitment and cooperation which might cause gap in the requirements gathered.
The wider community.
Since Socrates and Co. did not have any online presence, it will be difficult to market the website or mobile app to a wider community
Since new to the market, people not familiar to the bookshop will take time to trust the brand.
The IT profession.
IT Professionals (Kavya and her friends) are inexperienced and lack the skill and knowledge since they are still pursuing their degree hence working in a professional environment with IT Foundry willimpact the project schedule since they might require training to complete the task.
The students collaborating with the IT team to work on the project might withdraw mid-way from the project creatinga resource shortfall.
Your own future work tasks (assuming the project goes ahead).
The assumptions while planning the project might be inaccurate and some of the information might be misleading.
Might have overlooked some information, which will be important at a later stage of the project thus incurring more costs to the customer.
Select two of the risks from question 18. With reference to these two risks, what are your conclusions about the importance of attention to detail with respect to system planning?
Note: future assignments will ask you to reflect on the answer you give.
Tworisks from the above question are:
Socrates and Co. may withdraw due to budget issues and might not choose to continue with the future information systems, which will lead to the project closure prematurely.
The assumptions while planning the project might be inaccurate and some of the information might be misleading.
Conclusion:
The risks mentioned above highlight the need for attention to detail while calculating the budget and defining the scope of the project. We need a detailed analysis on economic feasibility to mention what all costs are going to be incurred. The owner of Socrates and Co. is looking at accommodating additional services like opening a caféwithin the current budget. If we don’t look into the details of what it would entail, it will create of shortage of funds, and risk the project before the scheduled end date, thus forcing the owner to withdraw the project prematurely.
Not for assessment
How many hours did you invest in this assignment?This information will be provided to future students in this course.
We have invested the following effort in compiling the answers:
Group members: 5
Effort spent per member: 6 hours
Total Effort: 6 hours x 5 = 30 hours
Thank you for the time and effort you have invested. I look forward to reading your submissio
Assumptions
Assumption with regard to Roles Allocation: Joanna is the Managing Director of the firm, while the key functions are being managed by the part time workers in the following allocation:
Kavya Amal, Sales Manager
Adam Matchoss, Supply Chain Manager
Rajavel Sulake, Inventory Manager
Priyam Farrukh, Finance Manager
Assumption with regard to current business process: There is no Point of Sales system currently in place in the business. Transactions are processed manually with no electronic system being used.
Assumptions with regard to assets and resources of the company: The company has the following assets and resources at the time of the initial investigation and project planning phase:
Cash Deposits worth 0.5 million AUD
Antiques having estimated net worth of 2 million AUD
Bills receivables of 50,000 AUD
Rare collection of victorian era books (original copies)
Asssumptions with regard to suppliers and publishers:The company has a network of 34 suppliers which are categorized as:
2 are special vendors dealing in rare books
17 are B2B publishers who offer easy returns of unpurchased books
15 are text book publishers
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INFS 5093 | SYSTEMS PLANNING ASSIGNMENT
INFS 5093 | SYSTEMS PLANNING ASSIGNMENT | INFORMATION SYSTEMS
COMPUTER ASSIGNMENT HELP
Introduction
This assignment consists of
A case study, which requires you to apply your learning from the systems planningmodule.
An ethical analysis which requires you to apply one of thereadings provided on the course website.
A conceptual development and reflection section which requires you to consider how systems planningtasks impact on a systems development project.
The feedback sheet lists the assessment criteria. Look for it on the assignment’s webpage. Take note of which sections carry the most marks.
Note that this assignment’s word count is 2602without your answers, so
Don’t worry if the final word count seems high.
Also, there are some diagrams in this assignment so don’t worry if your final word count seems low.
I suggest that you draw thediagrams by hand, photograph the drawings and insert the photographs in this file. If you prefer, you can use Word’s drawing tools (or some other drawing or modelling software) but you may find working with pen and paper is faster, easier to amend, less cumbersome and more reliable with respect to layout.
Instructions
When referring to the exemplars on the course website, read the old assignment specifications carefully because the assignments differ every study period.
Recall: in the previous study period, students spent an average of 24hours on this assignment.
Pace yourself accordingly.
For best results
Do not attempt to complete the whole assignment in one session.
Work slowly and carefully.
In addition to the instructions on the course website
Do not overlook the ‘Why?’ questions.
Read the case study carefully.
Keep track of the hours you spend.
You are encouraged to make assumptions where necessary. Scope for assumptions has been deliberately included in this assignment because it is often necessary to make assumptions openly when dealing with a client who is under-informed with respect to technology. Please label your assumptions clearly. Here’s an example from a previous study period,
Assumption: As the passengers of Titanic II may be from any nation, I have assumed a currency converter is required for the ticket-purchasing function.
Case study: Socrates & Co
You work at IT Foundry as a Systems Analyst.
Socrates & Co is a bookshop specialising in new, second hand and rare books. It is located on a busy shopping street, close to several university campuses and has been in business for a long time. Today, it’s managed by its owner, Joanna Diakou, but it was started in 1938 by Joanna’s father, Stefanos, who was a well-known local intellectual. When he established Socrates & Co, Stefanos gave a lot of consideration to the store’s interior design and location. It came to be well known as a place where people are welcome to escape the noise, rest their feet, and sit and read without being disturbed. There are comfortable armchairs between the shelves and people can have snacks if they are careful. Over time, Stefanos came to know many of his customers by name and Socrates & Co built a reputation and a loyal customer base almost entirely from word-of-mouth recommendations. Stefanos retired in 1974 and turned the business over to Joanna, who at the time was recently graduated with an honours degree in the humanities. She has maintained her father’s practices and has come to know her regular customers by name and people know they can come to Socrates & Co and find a warm welcome, insightful and witty conversation, or quiet solitude.
Although she draws a salary from Socrates & Co, Joanna doesn’t consider the time she spends there to be ‘work’ – instead it is simply her lifestyle. She goes to Socrates & Co every day except Sundays. Four other people work there: Kavya Amal works on Mondays and Thursdays; Adam Matchoss works on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Sundays; Rajavel Sulake and Priyam Farrukh (store manager) both work on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Kavya, Adam, Rajavel and Priyam are postgraduate coursework students whose schedules change every semester. Priyam has worked at Socrates & Co for five years and is paid a higher wage because she manages the store on Sundays. All of the staff love the relaxed atmosphere and they deeply appreciate Joanna’s attitude because, as long the customers have what they need, Joanna doesn’t mind if the staff work on their assignments while they are at the store. The store’s opening hours are the same every day: 11am to 7pm.
However, Joanna has recently been unwell and has come to realise that perhaps Socrates & Co could afford her an additional afternoon off if she didn’t have to spend so much time on keeping track of inventory, sales, special orders, rosters and all the other little administrative tasks. Also, Kavya and Adam are students in an IT department and they both think Socrates & Co really ought to expand into ecommerce, with an app and a website. Joanna is not entirely sure what this would entail, but she trusts Kavya and Adam and she decides to investigate further.
One of Joanna’s regular customers is Andrew Frawley. He is one of your workmates at IT Foundry. When Andrew came into the store, Joanna asked him for advice. He immediately advised Joanna to work with you; you have more experience in ecommerce and publishing than Andrew. She agrees to a meeting, which Andrew arranges between yourself and Joanna.
You talk to Joanna about Socrates & Co and you realise its significance extends to the wider community: even people who never buy a book can enjoy reading in the peaceful atmosphere. You learn that Socrates & Co has long-standing relationships with thirty-four publishers and you know that seventeen of the publishers (the larger ones) offer B2B ordering, returns and invoicing. You talk about various business processes. For example, you discuss how Joanna sources rare books and you discuss the Socrates & Co text-book sales service (on a 5% commission) for uni students. You talk about the process for replenishing the second hand stock and the process for when a customer makes a special order. You are sure there are other business processes Joanna has not mentioned; payroll comes immediately to mind and you begin to identify other overlooked business processes. Joanna also tells you about a project she has had in mind for some time: she wants to start a small café in one corner of the store, for which she has obtained a licence.
You can see potential for supporting Socrates & Co business processes and for supporting Joanna’s plans for a small café, both without disrupting the Socrates & Co reputation. However, as you are a seasoned professional, you don’t rush in. Instead you suggest that Socrates & Co funds a preliminary investigation of a potential future IS project. Joanna agrees to the cost, your manager approves, and when one of your existing projects closes, you begin the Socrates & Co preliminary investigation.
Understanding the business
Recall: you can make assumptions in this assignment (as noted above). Also, you can use the course forum if you have any questions.
Develop a business profile for Socrates & Co. Focus on business activities, how the business is organised, resources, customers, suppliers and future directions.
Given below is the business profile for Socrates & Co.
Business Profile: Socrates & Co.
Overview
Socrates and Co. is a legacy bookshop set up in 1938, engaged in retail sales of text books, rare books and new books in fiction and non fiction categories. The company’s mission is to expand its operations into the e-commerce space and provide services through a mobile app and a website.
Activities
The company is engaged in following activities:
· Retail sales of books (text books, fiction books, second hand and rare books)
· Sourcing/procurement of books from its network of publishers (currently has 34 with some of them offering returns)
Some of the internal functions of the company are:
· Payroll management (manage payouts to its existing staff, salaries etc.)
· Inventory management (manage stocks of books and handle new purchases)
Business Organisation From its current scale of operations, Socrates & Co. can be categorized as a small scale business. The business is organised as:
· The company is headed by Joanna, the owner of the book store who manages the overall functions.
· There are 4 staff members who work part time—Kavya Amal, Adam Matchoss, Rajavel Sulake and Priyam Farrukh.
· The company has engaged an external IT solutioning firm called IT Foundry to do a preliminery investigation for the implementation of an Information System.
Resources The company’s key resources are:
· Human Resources
o 4 part time workers taking care of the retail sales, inventory management and administration work.
· Financial Resources:
o Cash Deposits of 0.5 million AUD
o Antiques having estimated net worth of 2 million AUD
o Bills receivables of 50,000 AUD
· Other Resources:
o Antique furniture
o Victorian era building (of monument value and tourist attraction)
o Rare collection of victorian era books (original copies)
Customers · Strong existing customers base, which stems from the popularity of the original establisher Stephanos, a renowned intellectual of 1930’s.
· Customers include tourists and walk-ins who come to visit the building to enjoy the ambience and architecture.
· Also includes university students who come for text books (the building being in close vicinity to universities).
Suppliers The company has a strong supplier base comprising of 34 publishers with whom it has long-standing relationship. Amongst the 34 suppliers:
· 2 are special vendors dealing in rare books
· 17 are B2B publishers who offer easy returns of unpurchased books
· 15 are text book publishers
Future Direction · The company plans to foray into e-commerce and online sales by establishing a website and a mobile app.
o The online presence will create wider presence and expand the scale of operations for the company.
o It also wants active presence on the social media and increase the word-of-mouth customer base by way of online reviews and polls.
· The company wants a mobile app which will perform similar functions as the website.
· In addition to the above, the business also wants to set up a “reading café” to generate revenues from walk-in tourists who only wish to explore the architecture and ambience of the building.
Create an organisation chart for Socrates & Co.
The current organisation structure for the business is as follows:
List four of Socrates & Co’s main business processes.
The company currently handles all its processes manually and does not have an automated system to capture inventory, sales, orders or the administrative activities.
The key business processes and sub processes are:
Process Sub process Sales
· Invoice processing
· Maintaining cash registers
· Customer checkout
Supplier management
· Prepare purchase orders
· Handle returns and publisher invoices
Inventory management · Replenish stocks
· Update records
Finance · Payments to suppliers
· Payments to internal staff (payroll processing)
Given below is a functional decomposition diagram (Systems Analysis and design, ninth edition, Ch. 4. Requirements Modelling, Pg. 150) summarizing the key business processes.
Draw models for two of the business processes listed above, including events, processes and results (an example is available on p11 of the text book).
The business process models have been described below for:
Sales
Supplier Management
Do Socrates & Co’s current business processes support its future objectives? Why or why not?
No the current business processes alone are not sufficient to support the future objectives of the company. We need additional processes to support the future business objectives:
We need a transaction processing system(Transaction Processing, Chapter 1, p.15, Systems Analysis and Design, Tenth Edition, Rosenblatt), so that the sales data, order details, and customer details are all entered automatically into the system:
Hardware such as bar code readers will be needed.
Point of sales solution will be required wherein the sales manager can enter details at the time of sales.
Staff will have to be trained on the new system of retail sales
We need a dedicated staff to manage online sales. The person will be responsible for:
Taking note of everyday orders.
Ensure the orders are dispatched correctly.
Ensure the database is updated and running smoothly.
Look at customer grievances posted online or failed orders.
You now have outlines of the Socrates & Co business processes but you need another meeting with Joanna to double check some details and to discuss project constraints. At the meeting, you sketch diagrams on the whiteboard outlining four of the main business processes. Then you ask Joanna if the processes share data, and if not, could they share data in the future.
Joanna says, “Well, no, they don’t share data … wait, what do you mean exactly? Because I know what sales are made when I check the day’s transactions and when I know the sales, it helps me figure out if I need to order more stock. There are other things that overlap too, like the rosters and the payroll.”
You explain that’s exactly what you mean and you ask her to describe more ‘overlaps’ in the Socrates & Co business processes.
“Well, the cash sales determine the next morning’s bank deposits, but the POS transactions just happen automatically. Also, you know how the sales tell me what to order? Well, I also use a bit of knowhow, like when Michael Sandel’s latest book came out, I knew it was going to sell quickly so I ordered quite a few. Actually, I can say the same for several other authors, like Sam Harris. He sells quite well these days. Hmm … come to think of it, if the new system knows how quickly an author sells, then it could keep those authors in a special list, couldn’t it?”
You agree that’s one of the functions a system could provide. But you point out that it wouldn’t be able to figure out whether to stock new authors because they wouldn’t have a sales history.
Joanna says, “Oh, that’s ok, the publishers know the store so well, I can usually rely on their recommendations. Then I just order a few copies of what they recommend, unless I think the author wouldn’t work at all. It’s especially easy if the publisher takes returns of unsold stock.”
You say, “Like Fractal Publishing? They do that for one of my other clients.”
You recall that Fractal Publishing is one of the B2B publishers and that they are going to upgrade the security of their B2B system next year; as are Continuum, MUP, OUP and Stanford Law Books.
“Yes, we’ve had an account with Fractal for ages! Do you know Jane Berne? She’s my account manager.”
“No, but let’s stay on track. If you email me a list of publishers that take returns and a description of the important ‘overlaps’ we can look at some other things. About the app… do you want it to offer the same transactions as the website? Or do you have something else in mind?”
“I’m not sure. What do you recommend?”
“To keep costs down, let’s keep the transactions the same for now and if you need to review that decision in future, you can do so. But, transactions aside, the website can have other features if you want it to. It doesn’t have to be only sales.”
“Really? That’d be great. We can advertise our different Writers’ Week events. I need to talk it over with Kavya and Adam, they’re bound to have some suggestions. Oh! Can the customers review the books they have read?”
“Sure. But let’s be a little cautious with respect to budget and schedule. So perhaps we ought to …”
The discussion carried on for another fifteen minutes before you shook hands and estimated that you would finish the preliminary investigation within a week.
Preliminary investigation
Conduct a SWOT analysis for the future information systems project.
Described below are the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of this solution.
Strengths:
Good number of existing customers will help push online sales: The existing customer base and word-of-mouth recommendations will bring users to the online portal. The target customer base will expand across all customer categories:
The books will be available to everyone browsing the Internet, thus giving every bibliophilic an option of reading the book information as per their own convenience, irrespective of the location.
The project will enhance the customer experience, as there will be no time constraints for making the purchase, making it available 24/7.
Online marketing: Word of mouth recommendations for a particular book will transform into e-recommendations thus making it available for a larger audience and helping them in their decisions when they are looking up for the similar content.
The company can promote the website on social media to get reviews and word-of-mouth recommendations.
The company can post information on special events such as “writer’s week” on either social media or on its website.
Online users can browse through categories such as “Publisher Recommendation”, “New Arrivals” and “In stock now” to get the best books.
Sales data to make informed business decisions/deeper insight into customer preferences: Managing sales will be easier as the process will be automated and handled completely by the Information Systems:
The transaction-processing database will be able to provide details like which publications are generating maximum sales. It will also be able to tell, in which months the sales are the highest.
The online sales system will give important insight into the customer behaviour:
Which books are being searched the most?
Which books from “Publisher Recommendations” are selling most?
Which age group are majority of customers from?
Which region are the majority of order being placed?
No adverse impact on walk in customers: The bookshop’s heritage architecture will be promoted on the website, therebyattracting tourists and walk-ins, which can generate additionalsales. The website and social media presence will generate awareness about the bookstore and its services.
Weaknesses:
Need for Training: Lack of hands-on experience in using an information system might pose challenges. The staff will need training to operate the new system.
Need for full-time staff: The new business model mayrequire fulltime staff or dedicated roles for staff members to manage activities properly.
Need to “professionally manage” publishers and suppliers: Currently the business is being run on personal relationships and reliance on publishers who have long-standing relationships with the company. Many decisions are taken “instinctively” with respect to sales and reordering of the books. This approach may not be very helpful in future when sales expand and more publishers will be required to fulfil sales orders. A more professional system will be needed to manage the supplier relationships.
Opportunities:
Tying up with universities, pushing textbook sales from university websites: We can tie up with universities to boost textbooks sales through Socrates website (universities can direct students and online users to Socrates website for textbook purchases, and get 5% commission).
Launching Offers and Schemes: Various online marketing strategies can be applied—for example, “limited time period offers” can push the online sales.
Web Advertising: Advertisements can be posted on the website or the mobile application for the upcoming events suchas“writers meet” etc.
E-Books can be made available through the portal.
Café and additional services: Additional business idea like having a Café inside the bookshop will be an attraction for the customers who wants to enjoy their reads with a cup of coffee.This feature can be promoted online to increase walk-in customers and show them the enhanced experience.
Online reviews: The future system will allow the customers to post reviews of the books online. People can also reviews their bookstore experience and give comments.
Threats:
Coping with the change: As the orders increase, the need to expand supplier base will also emerge. This would mean additional resources, expanded network of suppliers, and further investment in terms of time and resources. Not being prepared for this up scaling can lead to failure, loss of reputation and customer trust.
Customers who are not tech-savvy: Customers in the older age group (60-80 years) might find walking into the bookshop much easier than using the modern technology and hence they might refuse to make use of the application or website.
Negative Impact on Walk-in Sales: If the website fails to generate the desired publicity about the bookstore, then it might lose some of the existing walk in customers,who wouldprobably just make the purchases online.
Dependency on technology: A smart phone/tab/laptopis a mandatory requirement to access the website or the mobile application,as well a good Internet connection is needed to utilize the web services. Customers without this facility might not benefit by the project.
In one sentence, state the opportunity.
By establishing a transaction processing system,an online portal, and mobile app, Socrates & Co. can expand sales, supplier network, and walk-in customer base, besides generating word-of-mouth publicity through active online presence.
Outline the future project’s scope with Must Do, Should Do, Could Do and Won’t Do lists.
Must Do:
Set up a database for:
Books available in the store
Books under special orders
Rare books
Prioritize the platform (Android/iOS/Blackberry) on which the mobile application will be made available first.
Design and develop the website:
Provide information regarding all the books available within the bookstore
Provide categories such as “publisher recommendations” and “best sellers”
Ensure that the publishers agree to the format of Drop-Ship(provide goods by direct delivery from the manufacturer to the customer).
Ensurethat the online sales system is launched without disrupting any of the current business processes.
Set up theonline payment system via credit/debit/pay pal.
Document and process the legal formalities for setting up the website or mobile application.
Should Do:
Plan the transformation in phases—create a project plan while ensuring that the current business is not adversely impacted.
Suggest a better inventory management system including storage of the inventory.
Plan training for the resources to access and manage the new system.
Suggest a book renting service for online users.
Provide the option to pre-order the books online or by placing a request at the store.
Could Do:
Provide “Cash on delivery”services for the customers placing online orders.
Provide the rare books for a limited period on rent (by placing request online).
Provide customer service via e-mail (since a call up service would require additional resources) to ensure a positive customer experience and grievance redressing mechanism.
Provide facility of international shipping of orders.
Provide option to rate the books online by using a “five-star”rating format—one star being the lowest and five indicating the highest ratings.
Publish “frequently asked questions” on the website.
Make arrangements for a transaction processing system for the Café which may be opened later on in the bookshop (the owner has already acquired the license and in future, may require an integration into the existing system)
Won’t do:
Providing E-Books for the mobile application or website users
Posting detailed book reviews(since this will require an additional resource to scan through and finalize the content before publishing it online)
Identify two approaches to fact finding you would use in this case and explain why you favour these approaches.
The two fact-finding techniques that we would use are:
Conduct series of interviews
Observe Operations
Interview: Who, What, Where, When, How, and Why
Since a new inventory system is being developed, we will need more information regarding the sales history besides other elements from the past history of the bookshop, as proper sales information is not being maintained currently. Also, the first download of information given by Joanna regarding the business might have missed supporting details which will be captured during interviews and help us in documentation of the facts and figures. The details can be captured by conducting series of interviews with the owner of the bookshop as well as the employees working as part time.
What How Where Who When Why
What processes are being followed?
How is a procedure performed?
Where are the operations being performed?
Who performs each of the procedures within the system?
When is a procedure performed?
Why are the processes important to the business?
Observing the ongoing operations
Socrates and Co. does not maintain a record of its day-to-day activities thus observing ongoing operations will help in providing an accurate picture of the sales process and the workflow.By close observation, we will be able to understand the roles and responsibilities accurately, which will later help us in allocating the tasks and roles in the new information system.
For projects such as this one, estimates for cost, benefit and schedule are required prior to decision-making. Write a list of the tasks you would undertake in order to estimate the cost of the future project.
We will evaluate the Economic Feasibility of the project, which means:
Calculating the benefits of the proposed project
Dollars saved per fiscal year or per month
Intangible benefits to the business
Calculating the Total Cost of Ownership
Cost of resources (including IT staff and users)
Cost of required hardware (bard code readers, PCs, laptops, servers)
Cost of required software (in-house development or vendor purchase)
Training cost (time required to train each employee)
Cost of licensing and legal approvals
Consulting fees by IT Foundry
Cost of postponing or not developing the project
We will also perform a Schedule Feasibility Analysis to understand:
The timeframe within which the project can be implemented
Acceptable time overruns (tolerance to extending the timelines)
Socrates & Co can budget $25,000 for the proposed project. Is this enough information to make a decision on the project’s economic feasibility? Explain.
This information is not enough to make a decision on the project’s economic feasibility. To get a clear picture of the economic feasibility, we need clear calculation of:
Cost in terms of resources (effort required by IT staff to develop and implement the system)
Cost of required hardware (bard code readers, PCs, laptops, servers)
Cost of required software (in-house development or vendor purchase)
Training cost (time required to train each employee)
Cost of licensing and legal approvals
Consulting fees by IT Foundry
Cost of postponing or not developing the project
A project is considered economically viable if the benefits exceed the incurred costs. We will have to deep dive into the intangible and tangible benefits to ascertain the exact worth of the project.
Ethical analysis
Consider the Socrates & Co case study.
Suggest one amendment to Socrates & Co that won’t incur heavy costs, but will
Deliver long-term benefits to the wider community.
Foster growth in any related or relevant industries.
Explain how your amendment will achieve these two outcomes.
One amendment to Socrates & Co that would deliver long-term benefits to the wider community and foster growth in a related or relevant industry would be:
Allow renting of text books to students
Allow renting of rare books to senior citizens and aged customers.
The above two amendments will not cost any additional money, but will generate goodwill and thus better word-of-mouth publicity for the company. Goodwill is an intangible asset to a company, which provides long-term benefits by way of generating positive customer outlook.
In future, as the company forays into online sales, many aged customers might feel “left out” due to lack of technical knowledge. In the online forum on the course website, a fellow student has said “people of old age still prefer person-to-person contact and they need personal attention. They wait on long holds just to talk to a person and get their query answered. This could either be due to difficulty in using the system or they don’t rely and don’t trust the automated system with certain things like making payments.”
Old people may not be able to make the purchases and for them, coming to the store and renting out old books would be a boon. Also, students from weaker sections of the society will find it extremely beneficial, to be allowed to rent some of the books. All these services will generate positive customer impact and a sense of social responsibility by the company.
Joanna is very happy with the project plan you produced and has almost decided to move on to systems analysis with you and IT Foundry. In her enthusiasm, she shows your project plan to Kavya and Adam, who are delighted to view a professional project plan and very keen on the project, especially as some of the ideas they had for the website have been included in the planning.
A week later, Kavya and Joanna are working together and during a quiet moment, Kavya suggests that Joanna can save money by giving the project plan to Kavya and her friends so they can do the project as part of their masters program. That way, Joanna would get the technology for free and Kavya and her friends can work on a real-world project. Kavya says the finished product will be just as good as what IT Foundry can produce.
In responding to the questions below, consider Grodzinsky, Miller and Wolf (2012). This reading can be located on the course website.
With respect to ‘the rules’ what is the main ethical issue?
With reference to ‘The rules’ the main ethical issue is that Joanna might be influenced by Kavya’s idea and breach Rule 2 (Rule 2: The shared responsibility of computing artifacts is not a zero-sum game, Grodzinsky, Miller and Wolf, 2012, Pg. 16) by withdrawing the project from IT socrates and providing it to Kavya and her friends. The company IT Foundry (Creator) trusts Joanna (User) and will honour the relevant licensing agreements and will not use the information provided by them in an unpredictable way. Also, if Joanna is willing to give the project to the graduates, she should seek IT Foundry’s permission and then proceed with the projects with Kavya and her friends. In this case, Joanna is ignoring her moral responsibilities and knowingly committing an action that is unethical and a breach of trust.
With respect to the trust model what is the main ethical issue?
As per the model of trust(Grodzinsky et al., 2011, Pg. – 17),Joanna might breach the principle number 2 – Trust is a decision by a to delegate to b some aspect of importance to a in achieving a goal in order to reduce cost for the development of the project, which is a main ethical issue. Thus, when Joanna and IT Foundry were almost planning to move on with the IT Foundry for the analysis of the project, out of enthusiasm, she shares the plan with Kavya and Adam. Kavya suggests that there can be some savings done on the cost by giving the project plan created by IT Foundry to her friends who are pursuing master’s and can use that as a part of their project work. Also, Kavya and her friends are eager to work on the project since it will be a real time application.
What implications arise from the two ethical issues identified in questions 13 and 14?
There are chances that Joanna may change plans of engaging IT Foundry with the project since she will benefit with Kavya and her friends implementing the plan as a part of their Master’s program for no cost.
Also, Joanna might lose trust of the IT Foundry which might also hamper the relationship which was built by her and her father with few of the publications that she deals with like Fractal Publications, Continuum, MUP, OUP and Stanford Law Books etc. (Assuming that IT Foundry will be handling their future security upgrade of their B2B system)
From Joanna’s point of view, what options are there? Identify four options.
From Joanna’s point of view, the options she has are as follows:
She has to be completely honest with IT Foundry and propose that she would like her employee Kavya and her friends to do the project as part of their major project as it will save her a lot of money
Or else she can continue entering a contract with the IT Foundry and not share the work with Kavya’s friends.
Also, Joanna has an option to stick with IT Foundry as the provider of the new information system and get Kavya and her friends to collaborate with IT Foundry to work on the project together.
Finally, the last option is get only the initial proposal from IT Foundry and then wait for a period of time and with further consultation then finally decide to proceed with the project at a later date.
From a Joanna’s point of view, which option is best, and why?
From the options above, the best option from Joanna’s point of view is option 3, where she can get IT Foundry and Kavya and her friends to collaborate on the project and work on it as a team.
Implementing this will benefit Joanna since she is a trusting person as well as the IT graduates since they will get hands on experience by working on a real world project with professionals.
Also, IT Foundry has invested time and effort to come up with a likeable project plan which includes ideas from Joanna and her team thus if both the entities work together they will avoid breaching any principles or rules and can end the project without any disputes.
Hence, the moral thing to do is to keep IT Foundry informed of the decisions taken as it wouldn’t be ethical to steal the work they did for Joanna and give it exclusively to her employees to do as a project for their university.
Option 1 and 2 gets eliminated since it is not ethically correct to use IT Foundry’s work elsewhere. Also, option 4 is time consuming since Joanna, might have to wait for indefinite period and can be ruled out.
Conceptual development and risk identification
Consider the Socrates & Co case study and the systems planning you have completed. You may have completed the planning tasks with a lot of care. If so, your planning is more likely to be effective in supporting future project activities.
Consider a situation in which the planning tasks were conducted in a carelessmanner.
With respect to the systems planning tasks you completed above, identify risks for each of the following stakeholders. Your answer should have eight unique risks (two per stakeholder).
Socrates & Co.
Socrates and Co. may withdraw due to budget issues and might not choose to continue with the future information systems, which will lead to the project closure prematurely.
Since Socrates and Co. has to work simultaneously on running the existing business while planning for the future information systems, there might be lack of commitment and cooperation which might cause gap in the requirements gathered.
The wider community.
Since Socrates and Co. did not have any online presence, it will be difficult to market the website or mobile app to a wider community
Since new to the market, people not familiar to the bookshop will take time to trust the brand.
The IT profession.
IT Professionals (Kavya and her friends) are inexperienced and lack the skill and knowledge since they are still pursuing their degree hence working in a professional environment with IT Foundry willimpact the project schedule since they might require training to complete the task.
The students collaborating with the IT team to work on the project might withdraw mid-way from the project creatinga resource shortfall.
Your own future work tasks (assuming the project goes ahead).
The assumptions while planning the project might be inaccurate and some of the information might be misleading.
Might have overlooked some information, which will be important at a later stage of the project thus incurring more costs to the customer.
Select two of the risks from question 18. With reference to these two risks, what are your conclusions about the importance of attention to detail with respect to system planning?
Note: future assignments will ask you to reflect on the answer you give.
Tworisks from the above question are:
Socrates and Co. may withdraw due to budget issues and might not choose to continue with the future information systems, which will lead to the project closure prematurely.
The assumptions while planning the project might be inaccurate and some of the information might be misleading.
Conclusion:
The risks mentioned above highlight the need for attention to detail while calculating the budget and defining the scope of the project. We need a detailed analysis on economic feasibility to mention what all costs are going to be incurred. The owner of Socrates and Co. is looking at accommodating additional services like opening a caféwithin the current budget. If we don’t look into the details of what it would entail, it will create of shortage of funds, and risk the project before the scheduled end date, thus forcing the owner to withdraw the project prematurely.
Not for assessment
How many hours did you invest in this assignment?This information will be provided to future students in this course.
We have invested the following effort in compiling the answers:
Group members: 5
Effort spent per member: 6 hours
Total Effort: 6 hours x 5 = 30 hours
Thank you for the time and effort you have invested. I look forward to reading your submissio
Assumptions
Assumption with regard to Roles Allocation: Joanna is the Managing Director of the firm, while the key functions are being managed by the part time workers in the following allocation:
Kavya Amal, Sales Manager
Adam Matchoss, Supply Chain Manager
Rajavel Sulake, Inventory Manager
Priyam Farrukh, Finance Manager
Assumption with regard to current business process: There is no Point of Sales system currently in place in the business. Transactions are processed manually with no electronic system being used.
Assumptions with regard to assets and resources of the company: The company has the following assets and resources at the time of the initial investigation and project planning phase:
Cash Deposits worth 0.5 million AUD
Antiques having estimated net worth of 2 million AUD
Bills receivables of 50,000 AUD
Rare collection of victorian era books (original copies)
Asssumptions with regard to suppliers and publishers:The company has a network of 34 suppliers which are categorized as:
2 are special vendors dealing in rare books
17 are B2B publishers who offer easy returns of unpurchased books
15 are text book publishers
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INFS 5093 | SYSTEMS PLANNING ASSIGNMENT
INFS 5093 | SYSTEMS PLANNING ASSIGNMENT | INFORMATION SYSTEMS
COMPUTER ASSIGNMENT HELP
Introduction
This assignment consists of
A case study, which requires you to apply your learning from the systems planningmodule.
An ethical analysis which requires you to apply one of thereadings provided on the course website.
A conceptual development and reflection section which requires you to consider how systems planningtasks impact on a systems development project.
The feedback sheet lists the assessment criteria. Look for it on the assignment’s webpage. Take note of which sections carry the most marks.
Note that this assignment’s word count is 2602without your answers, so
Don’t worry if the final word count seems high.
Also, there are some diagrams in this assignment so don’t worry if your final word count seems low.
I suggest that you draw thediagrams by hand, photograph the drawings and insert the photographs in this file. If you prefer, you can use Word’s drawing tools (or some other drawing or modelling software) but you may find working with pen and paper is faster, easier to amend, less cumbersome and more reliable with respect to layout.
Instructions
When referring to the exemplars on the course website, read the old assignment specifications carefully because the assignments differ every study period.
Recall: in the previous study period, students spent an average of 24hours on this assignment.
Pace yourself accordingly.
For best results
Do not attempt to complete the whole assignment in one session.
Work slowly and carefully.
In addition to the instructions on the course website
Do not overlook the ‘Why?’ questions.
Read the case study carefully.
Keep track of the hours you spend.
You are encouraged to make assumptions where necessary. Scope for assumptions has been deliberately included in this assignment because it is often necessary to make assumptions openly when dealing with a client who is under-informed with respect to technology. Please label your assumptions clearly. Here’s an example from a previous study period,
Assumption: As the passengers of Titanic II may be from any nation, I have assumed a currency converter is required for the ticket-purchasing function.
Case study: Socrates & Co
You work at IT Foundry as a Systems Analyst.
Socrates & Co is a bookshop specialising in new, second hand and rare books. It is located on a busy shopping street, close to several university campuses and has been in business for a long time. Today, it’s managed by its owner, Joanna Diakou, but it was started in 1938 by Joanna’s father, Stefanos, who was a well-known local intellectual. When he established Socrates & Co, Stefanos gave a lot of consideration to the store’s interior design and location. It came to be well known as a place where people are welcome to escape the noise, rest their feet, and sit and read without being disturbed. There are comfortable armchairs between the shelves and people can have snacks if they are careful. Over time, Stefanos came to know many of his customers by name and Socrates & Co built a reputation and a loyal customer base almost entirely from word-of-mouth recommendations. Stefanos retired in 1974 and turned the business over to Joanna, who at the time was recently graduated with an honours degree in the humanities. She has maintained her father’s practices and has come to know her regular customers by name and people know they can come to Socrates & Co and find a warm welcome, insightful and witty conversation, or quiet solitude.
Although she draws a salary from Socrates & Co, Joanna doesn’t consider the time she spends there to be ‘work’ – instead it is simply her lifestyle. She goes to Socrates & Co every day except Sundays. Four other people work there: Kavya Amal works on Mondays and Thursdays; Adam Matchoss works on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Sundays; Rajavel Sulake and Priyam Farrukh (store manager) both work on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Kavya, Adam, Rajavel and Priyam are postgraduate coursework students whose schedules change every semester. Priyam has worked at Socrates & Co for five years and is paid a higher wage because she manages the store on Sundays. All of the staff love the relaxed atmosphere and they deeply appreciate Joanna’s attitude because, as long the customers have what they need, Joanna doesn’t mind if the staff work on their assignments while they are at the store. The store’s opening hours are the same every day: 11am to 7pm.
However, Joanna has recently been unwell and has come to realise that perhaps Socrates & Co could afford her an additional afternoon off if she didn’t have to spend so much time on keeping track of inventory, sales, special orders, rosters and all the other little administrative tasks. Also, Kavya and Adam are students in an IT department and they both think Socrates & Co really ought to expand into ecommerce, with an app and a website. Joanna is not entirely sure what this would entail, but she trusts Kavya and Adam and she decides to investigate further.
One of Joanna’s regular customers is Andrew Frawley. He is one of your workmates at IT Foundry. When Andrew came into the store, Joanna asked him for advice. He immediately advised Joanna to work with you; you have more experience in ecommerce and publishing than Andrew. She agrees to a meeting, which Andrew arranges between yourself and Joanna.
You talk to Joanna about Socrates & Co and you realise its significance extends to the wider community: even people who never buy a book can enjoy reading in the peaceful atmosphere. You learn that Socrates & Co has long-standing relationships with thirty-four publishers and you know that seventeen of the publishers (the larger ones) offer B2B ordering, returns and invoicing. You talk about various business processes. For example, you discuss how Joanna sources rare books and you discuss the Socrates & Co text-book sales service (on a 5% commission) for uni students. You talk about the process for replenishing the second hand stock and the process for when a customer makes a special order. You are sure there are other business processes Joanna has not mentioned; payroll comes immediately to mind and you begin to identify other overlooked business processes. Joanna also tells you about a project she has had in mind for some time: she wants to start a small café in one corner of the store, for which she has obtained a licence.
You can see potential for supporting Socrates & Co business processes and for supporting Joanna’s plans for a small café, both without disrupting the Socrates & Co reputation. However, as you are a seasoned professional, you don’t rush in. Instead you suggest that Socrates & Co funds a preliminary investigation of a potential future IS project. Joanna agrees to the cost, your manager approves, and when one of your existing projects closes, you begin the Socrates & Co preliminary investigation.
Understanding the business
Recall: you can make assumptions in this assignment (as noted above). Also, you can use the course forum if you have any questions.
Develop a business profile for Socrates & Co. Focus on business activities, how the business is organised, resources, customers, suppliers and future directions.
Given below is the business profile for Socrates & Co.
Business Profile: Socrates & Co.
Overview
Socrates and Co. is a legacy bookshop set up in 1938, engaged in retail sales of text books, rare books and new books in fiction and non fiction categories. The company’s mission is to expand its operations into the e-commerce space and provide services through a mobile app and a website.
Activities
The company is engaged in following activities:
· Retail sales of books (text books, fiction books, second hand and rare books)
· Sourcing/procurement of books from its network of publishers (currently has 34 with some of them offering returns)
Some of the internal functions of the company are:
· Payroll management (manage payouts to its existing staff, salaries etc.)
· Inventory management (manage stocks of books and handle new purchases)
Business Organisation From its current scale of operations, Socrates & Co. can be categorized as a small scale business. The business is organised as:
· The company is headed by Joanna, the owner of the book store who manages the overall functions.
· There are 4 staff members who work part time—Kavya Amal, Adam Matchoss, Rajavel Sulake and Priyam Farrukh.
· The company has engaged an external IT solutioning firm called IT Foundry to do a preliminery investigation for the implementation of an Information System.
Resources The company’s key resources are:
· Human Resources
o 4 part time workers taking care of the retail sales, inventory management and administration work.
· Financial Resources:
o Cash Deposits of 0.5 million AUD
o Antiques having estimated net worth of 2 million AUD
o Bills receivables of 50,000 AUD
· Other Resources:
o Antique furniture
o Victorian era building (of monument value and tourist attraction)
o Rare collection of victorian era books (original copies)
Customers · Strong existing customers base, which stems from the popularity of the original establisher Stephanos, a renowned intellectual of 1930’s.
· Customers include tourists and walk-ins who come to visit the building to enjoy the ambience and architecture.
· Also includes university students who come for text books (the building being in close vicinity to universities).
Suppliers The company has a strong supplier base comprising of 34 publishers with whom it has long-standing relationship. Amongst the 34 suppliers:
· 2 are special vendors dealing in rare books
· 17 are B2B publishers who offer easy returns of unpurchased books
· 15 are text book publishers
Future Direction · The company plans to foray into e-commerce and online sales by establishing a website and a mobile app.
o The online presence will create wider presence and expand the scale of operations for the company.
o It also wants active presence on the social media and increase the word-of-mouth customer base by way of online reviews and polls.
· The company wants a mobile app which will perform similar functions as the website.
· In addition to the above, the business also wants to set up a “reading café” to generate revenues from walk-in tourists who only wish to explore the architecture and ambience of the building.
Create an organisation chart for Socrates & Co.
The current organisation structure for the business is as follows:
List four of Socrates & Co’s main business processes.
The company currently handles all its processes manually and does not have an automated system to capture inventory, sales, orders or the administrative activities.
The key business processes and sub processes are:
Process Sub process Sales
· Invoice processing
· Maintaining cash registers
· Customer checkout
Supplier management
· Prepare purchase orders
· Handle returns and publisher invoices
Inventory management · Replenish stocks
· Update records
Finance · Payments to suppliers
· Payments to internal staff (payroll processing)
Given below is a functional decomposition diagram (Systems Analysis and design, ninth edition, Ch. 4. Requirements Modelling, Pg. 150) summarizing the key business processes.
Draw models for two of the business processes listed above, including events, processes and results (an example is available on p11 of the text book).
The business process models have been described below for:
Sales
Supplier Management
Do Socrates & Co’s current business processes support its future objectives? Why or why not?
No the current business processes alone are not sufficient to support the future objectives of the company. We need additional processes to support the future business objectives:
We need a transaction processing system(Transaction Processing, Chapter 1, p.15, Systems Analysis and Design, Tenth Edition, Rosenblatt), so that the sales data, order details, and customer details are all entered automatically into the system:
Hardware such as bar code readers will be needed.
Point of sales solution will be required wherein the sales manager can enter details at the time of sales.
Staff will have to be trained on the new system of retail sales
We need a dedicated staff to manage online sales. The person will be responsible for:
Taking note of everyday orders.
Ensure the orders are dispatched correctly.
Ensure the database is updated and running smoothly.
Look at customer grievances posted online or failed orders.
You now have outlines of the Socrates & Co business processes but you need another meeting with Joanna to double check some details and to discuss project constraints. At the meeting, you sketch diagrams on the whiteboard outlining four of the main business processes. Then you ask Joanna if the processes share data, and if not, could they share data in the future.
Joanna says, “Well, no, they don’t share data … wait, what do you mean exactly? Because I know what sales are made when I check the day’s transactions and when I know the sales, it helps me figure out if I need to order more stock. There are other things that overlap too, like the rosters and the payroll.”
You explain that’s exactly what you mean and you ask her to describe more ‘overlaps’ in the Socrates & Co business processes.
“Well, the cash sales determine the next morning’s bank deposits, but the POS transactions just happen automatically. Also, you know how the sales tell me what to order? Well, I also use a bit of knowhow, like when Michael Sandel’s latest book came out, I knew it was going to sell quickly so I ordered quite a few. Actually, I can say the same for several other authors, like Sam Harris. He sells quite well these days. Hmm … come to think of it, if the new system knows how quickly an author sells, then it could keep those authors in a special list, couldn’t it?”
You agree that’s one of the functions a system could provide. But you point out that it wouldn’t be able to figure out whether to stock new authors because they wouldn’t have a sales history.
Joanna says, “Oh, that’s ok, the publishers know the store so well, I can usually rely on their recommendations. Then I just order a few copies of what they recommend, unless I think the author wouldn’t work at all. It’s especially easy if the publisher takes returns of unsold stock.”
You say, “Like Fractal Publishing? They do that for one of my other clients.”
You recall that Fractal Publishing is one of the B2B publishers and that they are going to upgrade the security of their B2B system next year; as are Continuum, MUP, OUP and Stanford Law Books.
“Yes, we’ve had an account with Fractal for ages! Do you know Jane Berne? She’s my account manager.”
“No, but let’s stay on track. If you email me a list of publishers that take returns and a description of the important ‘overlaps’ we can look at some other things. About the app… do you want it to offer the same transactions as the website? Or do you have something else in mind?”
“I’m not sure. What do you recommend?”
“To keep costs down, let’s keep the transactions the same for now and if you need to review that decision in future, you can do so. But, transactions aside, the website can have other features if you want it to. It doesn’t have to be only sales.”
“Really? That’d be great. We can advertise our different Writers’ Week events. I need to talk it over with Kavya and Adam, they’re bound to have some suggestions. Oh! Can the customers review the books they have read?”
“Sure. But let’s be a little cautious with respect to budget and schedule. So perhaps we ought to …”
The discussion carried on for another fifteen minutes before you shook hands and estimated that you would finish the preliminary investigation within a week.
Preliminary investigation
Conduct a SWOT analysis for the future information systems project.
Described below are the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of this solution.
Strengths:
Good number of existing customers will help push online sales: The existing customer base and word-of-mouth recommendations will bring users to the online portal. The target customer base will expand across all customer categories:
The books will be available to everyone browsing the Internet, thus giving every bibliophilic an option of reading the book information as per their own convenience, irrespective of the location.
The project will enhance the customer experience, as there will be no time constraints for making the purchase, making it available 24/7.
Online marketing: Word of mouth recommendations for a particular book will transform into e-recommendations thus making it available for a larger audience and helping them in their decisions when they are looking up for the similar content.
The company can promote the website on social media to get reviews and word-of-mouth recommendations.
The company can post information on special events such as “writer’s week” on either social media or on its website.
Online users can browse through categories such as “Publisher Recommendation”, “New Arrivals” and “In stock now” to get the best books.
Sales data to make informed business decisions/deeper insight into customer preferences: Managing sales will be easier as the process will be automated and handled completely by the Information Systems:
The transaction-processing database will be able to provide details like which publications are generating maximum sales. It will also be able to tell, in which months the sales are the highest.
The online sales system will give important insight into the customer behaviour:
Which books are being searched the most?
Which books from “Publisher Recommendations” are selling most?
Which age group are majority of customers from?
Which region are the majority of order being placed?
No adverse impact on walk in customers: The bookshop’s heritage architecture will be promoted on the website, therebyattracting tourists and walk-ins, which can generate additionalsales. The website and social media presence will generate awareness about the bookstore and its services.
Weaknesses:
Need for Training: Lack of hands-on experience in using an information system might pose challenges. The staff will need training to operate the new system.
Need for full-time staff: The new business model mayrequire fulltime staff or dedicated roles for staff members to manage activities properly.
Need to “professionally manage” publishers and suppliers: Currently the business is being run on personal relationships and reliance on publishers who have long-standing relationships with the company. Many decisions are taken “instinctively” with respect to sales and reordering of the books. This approach may not be very helpful in future when sales expand and more publishers will be required to fulfil sales orders. A more professional system will be needed to manage the supplier relationships.
Opportunities:
Tying up with universities, pushing textbook sales from university websites: We can tie up with universities to boost textbooks sales through Socrates website (universities can direct students and online users to Socrates website for textbook purchases, and get 5% commission).
Launching Offers and Schemes: Various online marketing strategies can be applied—for example, “limited time period offers” can push the online sales.
Web Advertising: Advertisements can be posted on the website or the mobile application for the upcoming events suchas“writers meet” etc.
E-Books can be made available through the portal.
Café and additional services: Additional business idea like having a Café inside the bookshop will be an attraction for the customers who wants to enjoy their reads with a cup of coffee.This feature can be promoted online to increase walk-in customers and show them the enhanced experience.
Online reviews: The future system will allow the customers to post reviews of the books online. People can also reviews their bookstore experience and give comments.
Threats:
Coping with the change: As the orders increase, the need to expand supplier base will also emerge. This would mean additional resources, expanded network of suppliers, and further investment in terms of time and resources. Not being prepared for this up scaling can lead to failure, loss of reputation and customer trust.
Customers who are not tech-savvy: Customers in the older age group (60-80 years) might find walking into the bookshop much easier than using the modern technology and hence they might refuse to make use of the application or website.
Negative Impact on Walk-in Sales: If the website fails to generate the desired publicity about the bookstore, then it might lose some of the existing walk in customers,who wouldprobably just make the purchases online.
Dependency on technology: A smart phone/tab/laptopis a mandatory requirement to access the website or the mobile application,as well a good Internet connection is needed to utilize the web services. Customers without this facility might not benefit by the project.
In one sentence, state the opportunity.
By establishing a transaction processing system,an online portal, and mobile app, Socrates & Co. can expand sales, supplier network, and walk-in customer base, besides generating word-of-mouth publicity through active online presence.
Outline the future project’s scope with Must Do, Should Do, Could Do and Won’t Do lists.
Must Do:
Set up a database for:
Books available in the store
Books under special orders
Rare books
Prioritize the platform (Android/iOS/Blackberry) on which the mobile application will be made available first.
Design and develop the website:
Provide information regarding all the books available within the bookstore
Provide categories such as “publisher recommendations” and “best sellers”
Ensure that the publishers agree to the format of Drop-Ship(provide goods by direct delivery from the manufacturer to the customer).
Ensurethat the online sales system is launched without disrupting any of the current business processes.
Set up theonline payment system via credit/debit/pay pal.
Document and process the legal formalities for setting up the website or mobile application.
Should Do:
Plan the transformation in phases—create a project plan while ensuring that the current business is not adversely impacted.
Suggest a better inventory management system including storage of the inventory.
Plan training for the resources to access and manage the new system.
Suggest a book renting service for online users.
Provide the option to pre-order the books online or by placing a request at the store.
Could Do:
Provide “Cash on delivery”services for the customers placing online orders.
Provide the rare books for a limited period on rent (by placing request online).
Provide customer service via e-mail (since a call up service would require additional resources) to ensure a positive customer experience and grievance redressing mechanism.
Provide facility of international shipping of orders.
Provide option to rate the books online by using a “five-star”rating format—one star being the lowest and five indicating the highest ratings.
Publish “frequently asked questions” on the website.
Make arrangements for a transaction processing system for the Café which may be opened later on in the bookshop (the owner has already acquired the license and in future, may require an integration into the existing system)
Won’t do:
Providing E-Books for the mobile application or website users
Posting detailed book reviews(since this will require an additional resource to scan through and finalize the content before publishing it online)
Identify two approaches to fact finding you would use in this case and explain why you favour these approaches.
The two fact-finding techniques that we would use are:
Conduct series of interviews
Observe Operations
Interview: Who, What, Where, When, How, and Why
Since a new inventory system is being developed, we will need more information regarding the sales history besides other elements from the past history of the bookshop, as proper sales information is not being maintained currently. Also, the first download of information given by Joanna regarding the business might have missed supporting details which will be captured during interviews and help us in documentation of the facts and figures. The details can be captured by conducting series of interviews with the owner of the bookshop as well as the employees working as part time.
What How Where Who When Why
What processes are being followed?
How is a procedure performed?
Where are the operations being performed?
Who performs each of the procedures within the system?
When is a procedure performed?
Why are the processes important to the business?
Observing the ongoing operations
Socrates and Co. does not maintain a record of its day-to-day activities thus observing ongoing operations will help in providing an accurate picture of the sales process and the workflow.By close observation, we will be able to understand the roles and responsibilities accurately, which will later help us in allocating the tasks and roles in the new information system.
For projects such as this one, estimates for cost, benefit and schedule are required prior to decision-making. Write a list of the tasks you would undertake in order to estimate the cost of the future project.
We will evaluate the Economic Feasibility of the project, which means:
Calculating the benefits of the proposed project
Dollars saved per fiscal year or per month
Intangible benefits to the business
Calculating the Total Cost of Ownership
Cost of resources (including IT staff and users)
Cost of required hardware (bard code readers, PCs, laptops, servers)
Cost of required software (in-house development or vendor purchase)
Training cost (time required to train each employee)
Cost of licensing and legal approvals
Consulting fees by IT Foundry
Cost of postponing or not developing the project
We will also perform a Schedule Feasibility Analysis to understand:
The timeframe within which the project can be implemented
Acceptable time overruns (tolerance to extending the timelines)
Socrates & Co can budget $25,000 for the proposed project. Is this enough information to make a decision on the project’s economic feasibility? Explain.
This information is not enough to make a decision on the project’s economic feasibility. To get a clear picture of the economic feasibility, we need clear calculation of:
Cost in terms of resources (effort required by IT staff to develop and implement the system)
Cost of required hardware (bard code readers, PCs, laptops, servers)
Cost of required software (in-house development or vendor purchase)
Training cost (time required to train each employee)
Cost of licensing and legal approvals
Consulting fees by IT Foundry
Cost of postponing or not developing the project
A project is considered economically viable if the benefits exceed the incurred costs. We will have to deep dive into the intangible and tangible benefits to ascertain the exact worth of the project.
Ethical analysis
Consider the Socrates & Co case study.
Suggest one amendment to Socrates & Co that won’t incur heavy costs, but will
Deliver long-term benefits to the wider community.
Foster growth in any related or relevant industries.
Explain how your amendment will achieve these two outcomes.
One amendment to Socrates & Co that would deliver long-term benefits to the wider community and foster growth in a related or relevant industry would be:
Allow renting of text books to students
Allow renting of rare books to senior citizens and aged customers.
The above two amendments will not cost any additional money, but will generate goodwill and thus better word-of-mouth publicity for the company. Goodwill is an intangible asset to a company, which provides long-term benefits by way of generating positive customer outlook.
In future, as the company forays into online sales, many aged customers might feel “left out” due to lack of technical knowledge. In the online forum on the course website, a fellow student has said “people of old age still prefer person-to-person contact and they need personal attention. They wait on long holds just to talk to a person and get their query answered. This could either be due to difficulty in using the system or they don’t rely and don’t trust the automated system with certain things like making payments.”
Old people may not be able to make the purchases and for them, coming to the store and renting out old books would be a boon. Also, students from weaker sections of the society will find it extremely beneficial, to be allowed to rent some of the books. All these services will generate positive customer impact and a sense of social responsibility by the company.
Joanna is very happy with the project plan you produced and has almost decided to move on to systems analysis with you and IT Foundry. In her enthusiasm, she shows your project plan to Kavya and Adam, who are delighted to view a professional project plan and very keen on the project, especially as some of the ideas they had for the website have been included in the planning.
A week later, Kavya and Joanna are working together and during a quiet moment, Kavya suggests that Joanna can save money by giving the project plan to Kavya and her friends so they can do the project as part of their masters program. That way, Joanna would get the technology for free and Kavya and her friends can work on a real-world project. Kavya says the finished product will be just as good as what IT Foundry can produce.
In responding to the questions below, consider Grodzinsky, Miller and Wolf (2012). This reading can be located on the course website.
With respect to ‘the rules’ what is the main ethical issue?
With reference to ‘The rules’ the main ethical issue is that Joanna might be influenced by Kavya’s idea and breach Rule 2 (Rule 2: The shared responsibility of computing artifacts is not a zero-sum game, Grodzinsky, Miller and Wolf, 2012, Pg. 16) by withdrawing the project from IT socrates and providing it to Kavya and her friends. The company IT Foundry (Creator) trusts Joanna (User) and will honour the relevant licensing agreements and will not use the information provided by them in an unpredictable way. Also, if Joanna is willing to give the project to the graduates, she should seek IT Foundry’s permission and then proceed with the projects with Kavya and her friends. In this case, Joanna is ignoring her moral responsibilities and knowingly committing an action that is unethical and a breach of trust.
With respect to the trust model what is the main ethical issue?
As per the model of trust(Grodzinsky et al., 2011, Pg. – 17),Joanna might breach the principle number 2 – Trust is a decision by a to delegate to b some aspect of importance to a in achieving a goal in order to reduce cost for the development of the project, which is a main ethical issue. Thus, when Joanna and IT Foundry were almost planning to move on with the IT Foundry for the analysis of the project, out of enthusiasm, she shares the plan with Kavya and Adam. Kavya suggests that there can be some savings done on the cost by giving the project plan created by IT Foundry to her friends who are pursuing master’s and can use that as a part of their project work. Also, Kavya and her friends are eager to work on the project since it will be a real time application.
What implications arise from the two ethical issues identified in questions 13 and 14?
There are chances that Joanna may change plans of engaging IT Foundry with the project since she will benefit with Kavya and her friends implementing the plan as a part of their Master’s program for no cost.
Also, Joanna might lose trust of the IT Foundry which might also hamper the relationship which was built by her and her father with few of the publications that she deals with like Fractal Publications, Continuum, MUP, OUP and Stanford Law Books etc. (Assuming that IT Foundry will be handling their future security upgrade of their B2B system)
From Joanna’s point of view, what options are there? Identify four options.
From Joanna’s point of view, the options she has are as follows:
She has to be completely honest with IT Foundry and propose that she would like her employee Kavya and her friends to do the project as part of their major project as it will save her a lot of money
Or else she can continue entering a contract with the IT Foundry and not share the work with Kavya’s friends.
Also, Joanna has an option to stick with IT Foundry as the provider of the new information system and get Kavya and her friends to collaborate with IT Foundry to work on the project together.
Finally, the last option is get only the initial proposal from IT Foundry and then wait for a period of time and with further consultation then finally decide to proceed with the project at a later date.
From a Joanna’s point of view, which option is best, and why?
From the options above, the best option from Joanna’s point of view is option 3, where she can get IT Foundry and Kavya and her friends to collaborate on the project and work on it as a team.
Implementing this will benefit Joanna since she is a trusting person as well as the IT graduates since they will get hands on experience by working on a real world project with professionals.
Also, IT Foundry has invested time and effort to come up with a likeable project plan which includes ideas from Joanna and her team thus if both the entities work together they will avoid breaching any principles or rules and can end the project without any disputes.
Hence, the moral thing to do is to keep IT Foundry informed of the decisions taken as it wouldn’t be ethical to steal the work they did for Joanna and give it exclusively to her employees to do as a project for their university.
Option 1 and 2 gets eliminated since it is not ethically correct to use IT Foundry’s work elsewhere. Also, option 4 is time consuming since Joanna, might have to wait for indefinite period and can be ruled out.
Conceptual development and risk identification
Consider the Socrates & Co case study and the systems planning you have completed. You may have completed the planning tasks with a lot of care. If so, your planning is more likely to be effective in supporting future project activities.
Consider a situation in which the planning tasks were conducted in a carelessmanner.
With respect to the systems planning tasks you completed above, identify risks for each of the following stakeholders. Your answer should have eight unique risks (two per stakeholder).
Socrates & Co.
Socrates and Co. may withdraw due to budget issues and might not choose to continue with the future information systems, which will lead to the project closure prematurely.
Since Socrates and Co. has to work simultaneously on running the existing business while planning for the future information systems, there might be lack of commitment and cooperation which might cause gap in the requirements gathered.
The wider community.
Since Socrates and Co. did not have any online presence, it will be difficult to market the website or mobile app to a wider community
Since new to the market, people not familiar to the bookshop will take time to trust the brand.
The IT profession.
IT Professionals (Kavya and her friends) are inexperienced and lack the skill and knowledge since they are still pursuing their degree hence working in a professional environment with IT Foundry willimpact the project schedule since they might require training to complete the task.
The students collaborating with the IT team to work on the project might withdraw mid-way from the project creatinga resource shortfall.
Your own future work tasks (assuming the project goes ahead).
The assumptions while planning the project might be inaccurate and some of the information might be misleading.
Might have overlooked some information, which will be important at a later stage of the project thus incurring more costs to the customer.
Select two of the risks from question 18. With reference to these two risks, what are your conclusions about the importance of attention to detail with respect to system planning?
Note: future assignments will ask you to reflect on the answer you give.
Tworisks from the above question are:
Socrates and Co. may withdraw due to budget issues and might not choose to continue with the future information systems, which will lead to the project closure prematurely.
The assumptions while planning the project might be inaccurate and some of the information might be misleading.
Conclusion:
The risks mentioned above highlight the need for attention to detail while calculating the budget and defining the scope of the project. We need a detailed analysis on economic feasibility to mention what all costs are going to be incurred. The owner of Socrates and Co. is looking at accommodating additional services like opening a caféwithin the current budget. If we don’t look into the details of what it would entail, it will create of shortage of funds, and risk the project before the scheduled end date, thus forcing the owner to withdraw the project prematurely.
Not for assessment
How many hours did you invest in this assignment?This information will be provided to future students in this course.
We have invested the following effort in compiling the answers:
Group members: 5
Effort spent per member: 6 hours
Total Effort: 6 hours x 5 = 30 hours
Thank you for the time and effort you have invested. I look forward to reading your submissio
Assumptions
Assumption with regard to Roles Allocation: Joanna is the Managing Director of the firm, while the key functions are being managed by the part time workers in the following allocation:
Kavya Amal, Sales Manager
Adam Matchoss, Supply Chain Manager
Rajavel Sulake, Inventory Manager
Priyam Farrukh, Finance Manager
Assumption with regard to current business process: There is no Point of Sales system currently in place in the business. Transactions are processed manually with no electronic system being used.
Assumptions with regard to assets and resources of the company: The company has the following assets and resources at the time of the initial investigation and project planning phase:
Cash Deposits worth 0.5 million AUD
Antiques having estimated net worth of 2 million AUD
Bills receivables of 50,000 AUD
Rare collection of victorian era books (original copies)
Asssumptions with regard to suppliers and publishers:The company has a network of 34 suppliers which are categorized as:
2 are special vendors dealing in rare books
17 are B2B publishers who offer easy returns of unpurchased books
15 are text book publishers
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What is a POS system? A Deep Insight
We often hear the word POS in our surroundings, but we end up thinking about what a POS system is? However, in an understandable term, the word POS is an abbreviation of Point of Sale system, software, or technology that provides you line-busting capabilities to improve your business operation, improve customer experience, and provide many benefits of inventory management. The POS system is defined as a Point of Sale that enables a business person to manage their business in a fast, easiest, most reliable, and secure way. In the fast-paced world having POS, technology brings ease for managing the business efficiently. If you want to know about POS for business guidance or POS for your restaurant guidance, then this article might be helpful to you.
Importance of POS system
Operating a business is never an easy task as it requires several administrative, management, and marketing skills that collectively contribute to business growth. However, you can get all these skills in one place with POS software, an all-in-one system that ensures that all your business operations are working in unison. The POS software allows you to simplify your billing, handle sales monitoring promotions or returns, manage inventory, engage employees and customers, and much more. No matter wherever you are, an efficient point of sale system software provides you instant reports every time. It is a perfect tool for small businesses and medium enterprises. You don’t have to view prices through tags because fast POS technology allows you to scan the expenses and calculate the costs in seconds.
Best POS software
There are different POS software available for various businesses; for instance, if you want a POS system for your retail store or any other departmental store, then Howmuch POS would be the best choice for you because it is compatible with every kind of store. It perfectly fits with Grocery Stores, Pharmacies, bakeries, bookshops, medical stores, milk shops, Toyshop, Electronic Stores, and Superstore business operations. It also functions smoothly for the Tyre and spare parts shop, furnishing market, electronic and hardware stores, warehouses, furniture shop, gifts, jewelry, and flower shops. No matter how big or small your business is, Howmuch POS will keep the hassle away from it. Similarly, if you are searching for an ideal revolutionary POS system for your restaurant, a foodnerd cloud-based restaurant POS system would be an excellent choice. It is cost-efficient, simple, and user-friendly that will expand your restaurant business by leaps and bounds. With Point of sale software, you can manage your small business with just one platform and within a minimal time and budget.
Features of POS system
The POS system is featured with exceptional qualities that prove to be an ideal POS for small businesses.
An effective POS system comes with the advanced offline and online mode that allows you to run uninterrupted operations without an internet connection.
The POS system keeps track of your transaction and allows you to sell products by holding the line moving quickly.
The best POS system is compatible with every type of transaction; for instance, Howmuch POS or Foodnerd POS provides customers multiple payment options such as stripe, Jazz Cash, easy paisa Paypal, and cash on delivery.
POS system provides you the benefits of real-time inventory management and gives you short reports on different subjects such as accounting, sales, inventory, etc.
An effective POS integrates the records of your store or restaurant’s sales and purchases.
Multiple management is also one of the exceptional features the POS system provides. No matter how many restaurants or stores you own, you can manage various restaurants or stores with POS.
The best POS system always has in-built CRM capabilities that maintain customer loyalty.
Types of POS system
There are different types of Point of Sale software, such as Cloud-Based POS systems, On-premise POS systems, Mobile POS systems, and Self-service Kiosk POS systems. Details are given below:
Cloud-based POS system
A cloud-based POS system is an online or web-based system compatible with Android, Mac, or Windows devices. A cloud-based POS system can be easily used anywhere, anytime. It provides benefits of modern software technology. For instance, if you want to operate your multiple restaurants in one place, then foodnerd POS allows you to manage all of your restaurant operations.
On-premise POS system
The On-premise POS system is a non-cloud-based or traditional POS system software that runs within an internal network and utilizes local servers in information storage. The one disadvantage associated with an on-premise POS system is that it can only be accessed on the infrastructure where it is deployed or installed.
Mobile POS system
The Mobile POS system is like an in-hand POS system that can be considered a cloud-based POS system category. This POS system runs efficiently on any mobile device, and you can operate it anywhere, any time. Mobile POS systems come with the benefits of mobility and low cost.
Self-service Kiosk POS system
The self-service Kiosk POS system is mainly installed in restaurants or cafes where customers can place orders and pay for their products themselves. This type of Point of sale system allows businesses to make their service more efficient without human resources.
Benefits of inventory management
Inventory management is considered critical and decisive to the success of any business; that is why it is significant for the business owners or operators to keep track of their stock level, and they never run out of stock. Still, with modern technology managing an inventory is not a difficult task because the point of sale software provides you numerous benefits to oversee inventory. It helps retailers to improve their efficiency in inventory management and save time and cost. POS inventory management software always ensures that you have enough stock to meet your customer demands. For instance, with howmuch POS system, you’ll be in fewer headaches when setting up your inventory because it will save all the messy problems for you.
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INFS 5093 | SYSTEMS PLANNING ASSIGNMENT
INFS 5093 | SYSTEMS PLANNING ASSIGNMENT | INFORMATION SYSTEMS
COMPUTER ASSIGNMENT HELP
Introduction
This assignment consists of
A case study, which requires you to apply your learning from the systems planningmodule.
An ethical analysis which requires you to apply one of thereadings provided on the course website.
A conceptual development and reflection section which requires you to consider how systems planningtasks impact on a systems development project.
The feedback sheet lists the assessment criteria. Look for it on the assignment’s webpage. Take note of which sections carry the most marks.
Note that this assignment’s word count is 2602without your answers, so
Don’t worry if the final word count seems high.
Also, there are some diagrams in this assignment so don’t worry if your final word count seems low.
I suggest that you draw thediagrams by hand, photograph the drawings and insert the photographs in this file. If you prefer, you can use Word’s drawing tools (or some other drawing or modelling software) but you may find working with pen and paper is faster, easier to amend, less cumbersome and more reliable with respect to layout.
Instructions
When referring to the exemplars on the course website, read the old assignment specifications carefully because the assignments differ every study period.
Recall: in the previous study period, students spent an average of 24hours on this assignment.
Pace yourself accordingly.
For best results
Do not attempt to complete the whole assignment in one session.
Work slowly and carefully.
In addition to the instructions on the course website
Do not overlook the ‘Why?’ questions.
Read the case study carefully.
Keep track of the hours you spend.
You are encouraged to make assumptions where necessary. Scope for assumptions has been deliberately included in this assignment because it is often necessary to make assumptions openly when dealing with a client who is under-informed with respect to technology. Please label your assumptions clearly. Here’s an example from a previous study period,
Assumption: As the passengers of Titanic II may be from any nation, I have assumed a currency converter is required for the ticket-purchasing function.
Case study: Socrates & Co
You work at IT Foundry as a Systems Analyst.
Socrates & Co is a bookshop specialising in new, second hand and rare books. It is located on a busy shopping street, close to several university campuses and has been in business for a long time. Today, it’s managed by its owner, Joanna Diakou, but it was started in 1938 by Joanna’s father, Stefanos, who was a well-known local intellectual. When he established Socrates & Co, Stefanos gave a lot of consideration to the store’s interior design and location. It came to be well known as a place where people are welcome to escape the noise, rest their feet, and sit and read without being disturbed. There are comfortable armchairs between the shelves and people can have snacks if they are careful. Over time, Stefanos came to know many of his customers by name and Socrates & Co built a reputation and a loyal customer base almost entirely from word-of-mouth recommendations. Stefanos retired in 1974 and turned the business over to Joanna, who at the time was recently graduated with an honours degree in the humanities. She has maintained her father’s practices and has come to know her regular customers by name and people know they can come to Socrates & Co and find a warm welcome, insightful and witty conversation, or quiet solitude.
Although she draws a salary from Socrates & Co, Joanna doesn’t consider the time she spends there to be ‘work’ – instead it is simply her lifestyle. She goes to Socrates & Co every day except Sundays. Four other people work there: Kavya Amal works on Mondays and Thursdays; Adam Matchoss works on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Sundays; Rajavel Sulake and Priyam Farrukh (store manager) both work on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Kavya, Adam, Rajavel and Priyam are postgraduate coursework students whose schedules change every semester. Priyam has worked at Socrates & Co for five years and is paid a higher wage because she manages the store on Sundays. All of the staff love the relaxed atmosphere and they deeply appreciate Joanna’s attitude because, as long the customers have what they need, Joanna doesn’t mind if the staff work on their assignments while they are at the store. The store’s opening hours are the same every day: 11am to 7pm.
However, Joanna has recently been unwell and has come to realise that perhaps Socrates & Co could afford her an additional afternoon off if she didn’t have to spend so much time on keeping track of inventory, sales, special orders, rosters and all the other little administrative tasks. Also, Kavya and Adam are students in an IT department and they both think Socrates & Co really ought to expand into ecommerce, with an app and a website. Joanna is not entirely sure what this would entail, but she trusts Kavya and Adam and she decides to investigate further.
One of Joanna’s regular customers is Andrew Frawley. He is one of your workmates at IT Foundry. When Andrew came into the store, Joanna asked him for advice. He immediately advised Joanna to work with you; you have more experience in ecommerce and publishing than Andrew. She agrees to a meeting, which Andrew arranges between yourself and Joanna.
You talk to Joanna about Socrates & Co and you realise its significance extends to the wider community: even people who never buy a book can enjoy reading in the peaceful atmosphere. You learn that Socrates & Co has long-standing relationships with thirty-four publishers and you know that seventeen of the publishers (the larger ones) offer B2B ordering, returns and invoicing. You talk about various business processes. For example, you discuss how Joanna sources rare books and you discuss the Socrates & Co text-book sales service (on a 5% commission) for uni students. You talk about the process for replenishing the second hand stock and the process for when a customer makes a special order. You are sure there are other business processes Joanna has not mentioned; payroll comes immediately to mind and you begin to identify other overlooked business processes. Joanna also tells you about a project she has had in mind for some time: she wants to start a small café in one corner of the store, for which she has obtained a licence.
You can see potential for supporting Socrates & Co business processes and for supporting Joanna’s plans for a small café, both without disrupting the Socrates & Co reputation. However, as you are a seasoned professional, you don’t rush in. Instead you suggest that Socrates & Co funds a preliminary investigation of a potential future IS project. Joanna agrees to the cost, your manager approves, and when one of your existing projects closes, you begin the Socrates & Co preliminary investigation.
Understanding the business
Recall: you can make assumptions in this assignment (as noted above). Also, you can use the course forum if you have any questions.
Develop a business profile for Socrates & Co. Focus on business activities, how the business is organised, resources, customers, suppliers and future directions.
Given below is the business profile for Socrates & Co.
Business Profile: Socrates & Co.
Overview
Socrates and Co. is a legacy bookshop set up in 1938, engaged in retail sales of text books, rare books and new books in fiction and non fiction categories. The company’s mission is to expand its operations into the e-commerce space and provide services through a mobile app and a website.
Activities
The company is engaged in following activities:
· Retail sales of books (text books, fiction books, second hand and rare books)
· Sourcing/procurement of books from its network of publishers (currently has 34 with some of them offering returns)
Some of the internal functions of the company are:
· Payroll management (manage payouts to its existing staff, salaries etc.)
· Inventory management (manage stocks of books and handle new purchases)
Business Organisation From its current scale of operations, Socrates & Co. can be categorized as a small scale business. The business is organised as:
· The company is headed by Joanna, the owner of the book store who manages the overall functions.
· There are 4 staff members who work part time—Kavya Amal, Adam Matchoss, Rajavel Sulake and Priyam Farrukh.
· The company has engaged an external IT solutioning firm called IT Foundry to do a preliminery investigation for the implementation of an Information System.
Resources The company’s key resources are:
· Human Resources
o 4 part time workers taking care of the retail sales, inventory management and administration work.
· Financial Resources:
o Cash Deposits of 0.5 million AUD
o Antiques having estimated net worth of 2 million AUD
o Bills receivables of 50,000 AUD
· Other Resources:
o Antique furniture
o Victorian era building (of monument value and tourist attraction)
o Rare collection of victorian era books (original copies)
Customers · Strong existing customers base, which stems from the popularity of the original establisher Stephanos, a renowned intellectual of 1930’s.
· Customers include tourists and walk-ins who come to visit the building to enjoy the ambience and architecture.
· �� Also includes university students who come for text books (the building being in close vicinity to universities).
Suppliers The company has a strong supplier base comprising of 34 publishers with whom it has long-standing relationship. Amongst the 34 suppliers:
· 2 are special vendors dealing in rare books
· 17 are B2B publishers who offer easy returns of unpurchased books
· 15 are text book publishers
Future Direction · The company plans to foray into e-commerce and online sales by establishing a website and a mobile app.
o The online presence will create wider presence and expand the scale of operations for the company.
o It also wants active presence on the social media and increase the word-of-mouth customer base by way of online reviews and polls.
· The company wants a mobile app which will perform similar functions as the website.
· In addition to the above, the business also wants to set up a “reading café” to generate revenues from walk-in tourists who only wish to explore the architecture and ambience of the building.
Create an organisation chart for Socrates & Co.
The current organisation structure for the business is as follows:
List four of Socrates & Co’s main business processes.
The company currently handles all its processes manually and does not have an automated system to capture inventory, sales, orders or the administrative activities.
The key business processes and sub processes are:
Process Sub process Sales
· Invoice processing
· Maintaining cash registers
· Customer checkout
Supplier management
· Prepare purchase orders
· Handle returns and publisher invoices
Inventory management · Replenish stocks
· Update records
Finance · Payments to suppliers
· Payments to internal staff (payroll processing)
Given below is a functional decomposition diagram (Systems Analysis and design, ninth edition, Ch. 4. Requirements Modelling, Pg. 150) summarizing the key business processes.
Draw models for two of the business processes listed above, including events, processes and results (an example is available on p11 of the text book).
The business process models have been described below for:
Sales
Supplier Management
Do Socrates & Co’s current business processes support its future objectives? Why or why not?
No the current business processes alone are not sufficient to support the future objectives of the company. We need additional processes to support the future business objectives:
We need a transaction processing system(Transaction Processing, Chapter 1, p.15, Systems Analysis and Design, Tenth Edition, Rosenblatt), so that the sales data, order details, and customer details are all entered automatically into the system:
Hardware such as bar code readers will be needed.
Point of sales solution will be required wherein the sales manager can enter details at the time of sales.
Staff will have to be trained on the new system of retail sales
We need a dedicated staff to manage online sales. The person will be responsible for:
Taking note of everyday orders.
Ensure the orders are dispatched correctly.
Ensure the database is updated and running smoothly.
Look at customer grievances posted online or failed orders.
You now have outlines of the Socrates & Co business processes but you need another meeting with Joanna to double check some details and to discuss project constraints. At the meeting, you sketch diagrams on the whiteboard outlining four of the main business processes. Then you ask Joanna if the processes share data, and if not, could they share data in the future.
Joanna says, “Well, no, they don’t share data … wait, what do you mean exactly? Because I know what sales are made when I check the day’s transactions and when I know the sales, it helps me figure out if I need to order more stock. There are other things that overlap too, like the rosters and the payroll.”
You explain that’s exactly what you mean and you ask her to describe more ‘overlaps’ in the Socrates & Co business processes.
“Well, the cash sales determine the next morning’s bank deposits, but the POS transactions just happen automatically. Also, you know how the sales tell me what to order? Well, I also use a bit of knowhow, like when Michael Sandel’s latest book came out, I knew it was going to sell quickly so I ordered quite a few. Actually, I can say the same for several other authors, like Sam Harris. He sells quite well these days. Hmm … come to think of it, if the new system knows how quickly an author sells, then it could keep those authors in a special list, couldn’t it?”
You agree that’s one of the functions a system could provide. But you point out that it wouldn’t be able to figure out whether to stock new authors because they wouldn’t have a sales history.
Joanna says, “Oh, that’s ok, the publishers know the store so well, I can usually rely on their recommendations. Then I just order a few copies of what they recommend, unless I think the author wouldn’t work at all. It’s especially easy if the publisher takes returns of unsold stock.”
You say, “Like Fractal Publishing? They do that for one of my other clients.”
You recall that Fractal Publishing is one of the B2B publishers and that they are going to upgrade the security of their B2B system next year; as are Continuum, MUP, OUP and Stanford Law Books.
“Yes, we’ve had an account with Fractal for ages! Do you know Jane Berne? She’s my account manager.”
“No, but let’s stay on track. If you email me a list of publishers that take returns and a description of the important ‘overlaps’ we can look at some other things. About the app… do you want it to offer the same transactions as the website? Or do you have something else in mind?”
“I’m not sure. What do you recommend?”
“To keep costs down, let’s keep the transactions the same for now and if you need to review that decision in future, you can do so. But, transactions aside, the website can have other features if you want it to. It doesn’t have to be only sales.”
“Really? That’d be great. We can advertise our different Writers’ Week events. I need to talk it over with Kavya and Adam, they’re bound to have some suggestions. Oh! Can the customers review the books they have read?”
“Sure. But let’s be a little cautious with respect to budget and schedule. So perhaps we ought to …”
The discussion carried on for another fifteen minutes before you shook hands and estimated that you would finish the preliminary investigation within a week.
Preliminary investigation
Conduct a SWOT analysis for the future information systems project.
Described below are the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of this solution.
Strengths:
Good number of existing customers will help push online sales: The existing customer base and word-of-mouth recommendations will bring users to the online portal. The target customer base will expand across all customer categories:
The books will be available to everyone browsing the Internet, thus giving every bibliophilic an option of reading the book information as per their own convenience, irrespective of the location.
The project will enhance the customer experience, as there will be no time constraints for making the purchase, making it available 24/7.
Online marketing: Word of mouth recommendations for a particular book will transform into e-recommendations thus making it available for a larger audience and helping them in their decisions when they are looking up for the similar content.
The company can promote the website on social media to get reviews and word-of-mouth recommendations.
The company can post information on special events such as “writer’s week” on either social media or on its website.
Online users can browse through categories such as “Publisher Recommendation”, “New Arrivals” and “In stock now” to get the best books.
Sales data to make informed business decisions/deeper insight into customer preferences: Managing sales will be easier as the process will be automated and handled completely by the Information Systems:
The transaction-processing database will be able to provide details like which publications are generating maximum sales. It will also be able to tell, in which months the sales are the highest.
The online sales system will give important insight into the customer behaviour:
Which books are being searched the most?
Which books from “Publisher Recommendations” are selling most?
Which age group are majority of customers from?
Which region are the majority of order being placed?
No adverse impact on walk in customers: The bookshop’s heritage architecture will be promoted on the website, therebyattracting tourists and walk-ins, which can generate additionalsales. The website and social media presence will generate awareness about the bookstore and its services.
Weaknesses:
Need for Training: Lack of hands-on experience in using an information system might pose challenges. The staff will need training to operate the new system.
Need for full-time staff: The new business model mayrequire fulltime staff or dedicated roles for staff members to manage activities properly.
Need to “professionally manage” publishers and suppliers: Currently the business is being run on personal relationships and reliance on publishers who have long-standing relationships with the company. Many decisions are taken “instinctively” with respect to sales and reordering of the books. This approach may not be very helpful in future when sales expand and more publishers will be required to fulfil sales orders. A more professional system will be needed to manage the supplier relationships.
Opportunities:
Tying up with universities, pushing textbook sales from university websites: We can tie up with universities to boost textbooks sales through Socrates website (universities can direct students and online users to Socrates website for textbook purchases, and get 5% commission).
Launching Offers and Schemes: Various online marketing strategies can be applied—for example, “limited time period offers” can push the online sales.
Web Advertising: Advertisements can be posted on the website or the mobile application for the upcoming events suchas“writers meet” etc.
E-Books can be made available through the portal.
Café and additional services: Additional business idea like having a Café inside the bookshop will be an attraction for the customers who wants to enjoy their reads with a cup of coffee.This feature can be promoted online to increase walk-in customers and show them the enhanced experience.
Online reviews: The future system will allow the customers to post reviews of the books online. People can also reviews their bookstore experience and give comments.
Threats:
Coping with the change: As the orders increase, the need to expand supplier base will also emerge. This would mean additional resources, expanded network of suppliers, and further investment in terms of time and resources. Not being prepared for this up scaling can lead to failure, loss of reputation and customer trust.
Customers who are not tech-savvy: Customers in the older age group (60-80 years) might find walking into the bookshop much easier than using the modern technology and hence they might refuse to make use of the application or website.
Negative Impact on Walk-in Sales: If the website fails to generate the desired publicity about the bookstore, then it might lose some of the existing walk in customers,who wouldprobably just make the purchases online.
Dependency on technology: A smart phone/tab/laptopis a mandatory requirement to access the website or the mobile application,as well a good Internet connection is needed to utilize the web services. Customers without this facility might not benefit by the project.
In one sentence, state the opportunity.
By establishing a transaction processing system,an online portal, and mobile app, Socrates & Co. can expand sales, supplier network, and walk-in customer base, besides generating word-of-mouth publicity through active online presence.
Outline the future project’s scope with Must Do, Should Do, Could Do and Won’t Do lists.
Must Do:
Set up a database for:
Books available in the store
Books under special orders
Rare books
Prioritize the platform (Android/iOS/Blackberry) on which the mobile application will be made available first.
Design and develop the website:
Provide information regarding all the books available within the bookstore
Provide categories such as “publisher recommendations” and “best sellers”
Ensure that the publishers agree to the format of Drop-Ship(provide goods by direct delivery from the manufacturer to the customer).
Ensurethat the online sales system is launched without disrupting any of the current business processes.
Set up theonline payment system via credit/debit/pay pal.
Document and process the legal formalities for setting up the website or mobile application.
Should Do:
Plan the transformation in phases—create a project plan while ensuring that the current business is not adversely impacted.
Suggest a better inventory management system including storage of the inventory.
Plan training for the resources to access and manage the new system.
Suggest a book renting service for online users.
Provide the option to pre-order the books online or by placing a request at the store.
Could Do:
Provide “Cash on delivery”services for the customers placing online orders.
Provide the rare books for a limited period on rent (by placing request online).
Provide customer service via e-mail (since a call up service would require additional resources) to ensure a positive customer experience and grievance redressing mechanism.
Provide facility of international shipping of orders.
Provide option to rate the books online by using a “five-star”rating format—one star being the lowest and five indicating the highest ratings.
Publish “frequently asked questions” on the website.
Make arrangements for a transaction processing system for the Café which may be opened later on in the bookshop (the owner has already acquired the license and in future, may require an integration into the existing system)
Won’t do:
Providing E-Books for the mobile application or website users
Posting detailed book reviews(since this will require an additional resource to scan through and finalize the content before publishing it online)
Identify two approaches to fact finding you would use in this case and explain why you favour these approaches.
The two fact-finding techniques that we would use are:
Conduct series of interviews
Observe Operations
Interview: Who, What, Where, When, How, and Why
Since a new inventory system is being developed, we will need more information regarding the sales history besides other elements from the past history of the bookshop, as proper sales information is not being maintained currently. Also, the first download of information given by Joanna regarding the business might have missed supporting details which will be captured during interviews and help us in documentation of the facts and figures. The details can be captured by conducting series of interviews with the owner of the bookshop as well as the employees working as part time.
What How Where Who When Why
What processes are being followed?
How is a procedure performed?
Where are the operations being performed?
Who performs each of the procedures within the system?
When is a procedure performed?
Why are the processes important to the business?
Observing the ongoing operations
Socrates and Co. does not maintain a record of its day-to-day activities thus observing ongoing operations will help in providing an accurate picture of the sales process and the workflow.By close observation, we will be able to understand the roles and responsibilities accurately, which will later help us in allocating the tasks and roles in the new information system.
For projects such as this one, estimates for cost, benefit and schedule are required prior to decision-making. Write a list of the tasks you would undertake in order to estimate the cost of the future project.
We will evaluate the Economic Feasibility of the project, which means:
Calculating the benefits of the proposed project
Dollars saved per fiscal year or per month
Intangible benefits to the business
Calculating the Total Cost of Ownership
Cost of resources (including IT staff and users)
Cost of required hardware (bard code readers, PCs, laptops, servers)
Cost of required software (in-house development or vendor purchase)
Training cost (time required to train each employee)
Cost of licensing and legal approvals
Consulting fees by IT Foundry
Cost of postponing or not developing the project
We will also perform a Schedule Feasibility Analysis to understand:
The timeframe within which the project can be implemented
Acceptable time overruns (tolerance to extending the timelines)
Socrates & Co can budget $25,000 for the proposed project. Is this enough information to make a decision on the project’s economic feasibility? Explain.
This information is not enough to make a decision on the project’s economic feasibility. To get a clear picture of the economic feasibility, we need clear calculation of:
Cost in terms of resources (effort required by IT staff to develop and implement the system)
Cost of required hardware (bard code readers, PCs, laptops, servers)
Cost of required software (in-house development or vendor purchase)
Training cost (time required to train each employee)
Cost of licensing and legal approvals
Consulting fees by IT Foundry
Cost of postponing or not developing the project
A project is considered economically viable if the benefits exceed the incurred costs. We will have to deep dive into the intangible and tangible benefits to ascertain the exact worth of the project.
Ethical analysis
Consider the Socrates & Co case study.
Suggest one amendment to Socrates & Co that won’t incur heavy costs, but will
Deliver long-term benefits to the wider community.
Foster growth in any related or relevant industries.
Explain how your amendment will achieve these two outcomes.
One amendment to Socrates & Co that would deliver long-term benefits to the wider community and foster growth in a related or relevant industry would be:
Allow renting of text books to students
Allow renting of rare books to senior citizens and aged customers.
The above two amendments will not cost any additional money, but will generate goodwill and thus better word-of-mouth publicity for the company. Goodwill is an intangible asset to a company, which provides long-term benefits by way of generating positive customer outlook.
In future, as the company forays into online sales, many aged customers might feel “left out” due to lack of technical knowledge. In the online forum on the course website, a fellow student has said “people of old age still prefer person-to-person contact and they need personal attention. They wait on long holds just to talk to a person and get their query answered. This could either be due to difficulty in using the system or they don’t rely and don’t trust the automated system with certain things like making payments.”
Old people may not be able to make the purchases and for them, coming to the store and renting out old books would be a boon. Also, students from weaker sections of the society will find it extremely beneficial, to be allowed to rent some of the books. All these services will generate positive customer impact and a sense of social responsibility by the company.
Joanna is very happy with the project plan you produced and has almost decided to move on to systems analysis with you and IT Foundry. In her enthusiasm, she shows your project plan to Kavya and Adam, who are delighted to view a professional project plan and very keen on the project, especially as some of the ideas they had for the website have been included in the planning.
A week later, Kavya and Joanna are working together and during a quiet moment, Kavya suggests that Joanna can save money by giving the project plan to Kavya and her friends so they can do the project as part of their masters program. That way, Joanna would get the technology for free and Kavya and her friends can work on a real-world project. Kavya says the finished product will be just as good as what IT Foundry can produce.
In responding to the questions below, consider Grodzinsky, Miller and Wolf (2012). This reading can be located on the course website.
With respect to ‘the rules’ what is the main ethical issue?
With reference to ‘The rules’ the main ethical issue is that Joanna might be influenced by Kavya’s idea and breach Rule 2 (Rule 2: The shared responsibility of computing artifacts is not a zero-sum game, Grodzinsky, Miller and Wolf, 2012, Pg. 16) by withdrawing the project from IT socrates and providing it to Kavya and her friends. The company IT Foundry (Creator) trusts Joanna (User) and will honour the relevant licensing agreements and will not use the information provided by them in an unpredictable way. Also, if Joanna is willing to give the project to the graduates, she should seek IT Foundry’s permission and then proceed with the projects with Kavya and her friends. In this case, Joanna is ignoring her moral responsibilities and knowingly committing an action that is unethical and a breach of trust.
With respect to the trust model what is the main ethical issue?
As per the model of trust(Grodzinsky et al., 2011, Pg. – 17),Joanna might breach the principle number 2 – Trust is a decision by a to delegate to b some aspect of importance to a in achieving a goal in order to reduce cost for the development of the project, which is a main ethical issue. Thus, when Joanna and IT Foundry were almost planning to move on with the IT Foundry for the analysis of the project, out of enthusiasm, she shares the plan with Kavya and Adam. Kavya suggests that there can be some savings done on the cost by giving the project plan created by IT Foundry to her friends who are pursuing master’s and can use that as a part of their project work. Also, Kavya and her friends are eager to work on the project since it will be a real time application.
What implications arise from the two ethical issues identified in questions 13 and 14?
There are chances that Joanna may change plans of engaging IT Foundry with the project since she will benefit with Kavya and her friends implementing the plan as a part of their Master’s program for no cost.
Also, Joanna might lose trust of the IT Foundry which might also hamper the relationship which was built by her and her father with few of the publications that she deals with like Fractal Publications, Continuum, MUP, OUP and Stanford Law Books etc. (Assuming that IT Foundry will be handling their future security upgrade of their B2B system)
From Joanna’s point of view, what options are there? Identify four options.
From Joanna’s point of view, the options she has are as follows:
She has to be completely honest with IT Foundry and propose that she would like her employee Kavya and her friends to do the project as part of their major project as it will save her a lot of money
Or else she can continue entering a contract with the IT Foundry and not share the work with Kavya’s friends.
Also, Joanna has an option to stick with IT Foundry as the provider of the new information system and get Kavya and her friends to collaborate with IT Foundry to work on the project together.
Finally, the last option is get only the initial proposal from IT Foundry and then wait for a period of time and with further consultation then finally decide to proceed with the project at a later date.
From a Joanna’s point of view, which option is best, and why?
From the options above, the best option from Joanna’s point of view is option 3, where she can get IT Foundry and Kavya and her friends to collaborate on the project and work on it as a team.
Implementing this will benefit Joanna since she is a trusting person as well as the IT graduates since they will get hands on experience by working on a real world project with professionals.
Also, IT Foundry has invested time and effort to come up with a likeable project plan which includes ideas from Joanna and her team thus if both the entities work together they will avoid breaching any principles or rules and can end the project without any disputes.
Hence, the moral thing to do is to keep IT Foundry informed of the decisions taken as it wouldn’t be ethical to steal the work they did for Joanna and give it exclusively to her employees to do as a project for their university.
Option 1 and 2 gets eliminated since it is not ethically correct to use IT Foundry’s work elsewhere. Also, option 4 is time consuming since Joanna, might have to wait for indefinite period and can be ruled out.
Conceptual development and risk identification
Consider the Socrates & Co case study and the systems planning you have completed. You may have completed the planning tasks with a lot of care. If so, your planning is more likely to be effective in supporting future project activities.
Consider a situation in which the planning tasks were conducted in a carelessmanner.
With respect to the systems planning tasks you completed above, identify risks for each of the following stakeholders. Your answer should have eight unique risks (two per stakeholder).
Socrates & Co.
Socrates and Co. may withdraw due to budget issues and might not choose to continue with the future information systems, which will lead to the project closure prematurely.
Since Socrates and Co. has to work simultaneously on running the existing business while planning for the future information systems, there might be lack of commitment and cooperation which might cause gap in the requirements gathered.
The wider community.
Since Socrates and Co. did not have any online presence, it will be difficult to market the website or mobile app to a wider community
Since new to the market, people not familiar to the bookshop will take time to trust the brand.
The IT profession.
IT Professionals (Kavya and her friends) are inexperienced and lack the skill and knowledge since they are still pursuing their degree hence working in a professional environment with IT Foundry willimpact the project schedule since they might require training to complete the task.
The students collaborating with the IT team to work on the project might withdraw mid-way from the project creatinga resource shortfall.
Your own future work tasks (assuming the project goes ahead).
The assumptions while planning the project might be inaccurate and some of the information might be misleading.
Might have overlooked some information, which will be important at a later stage of the project thus incurring more costs to the customer.
Select two of the risks from question 18. With reference to these two risks, what are your conclusions about the importance of attention to detail with respect to system planning?
Note: future assignments will ask you to reflect on the answer you give.
Tworisks from the above question are:
Socrates and Co. may withdraw due to budget issues and might not choose to continue with the future information systems, which will lead to the project closure prematurely.
The assumptions while planning the project might be inaccurate and some of the information might be misleading.
Conclusion:
The risks mentioned above highlight the need for attention to detail while calculating the budget and defining the scope of the project. We need a detailed analysis on economic feasibility to mention what all costs are going to be incurred. The owner of Socrates and Co. is looking at accommodating additional services like opening a caféwithin the current budget. If we don’t look into the details of what it would entail, it will create of shortage of funds, and risk the project before the scheduled end date, thus forcing the owner to withdraw the project prematurely.
Not for assessment
How many hours did you invest in this assignment?This information will be provided to future students in this course.
We have invested the following effort in compiling the answers:
Group members: 5
Effort spent per member: 6 hours
Total Effort: 6 hours x 5 = 30 hours
Thank you for the time and effort you have invested. I look forward to reading your submissio
Assumptions
Assumption with regard to Roles Allocation: Joanna is the Managing Director of the firm, while the key functions are being managed by the part time workers in the following allocation:
Kavya Amal, Sales Manager
Adam Matchoss, Supply Chain Manager
Rajavel Sulake, Inventory Manager
Priyam Farrukh, Finance Manager
Assumption with regard to current business process: There is no Point of Sales system currently in place in the business. Transactions are processed manually with no electronic system being used.
Assumptions with regard to assets and resources of the company: The company has the following assets and resources at the time of the initial investigation and project planning phase:
Cash Deposits worth 0.5 million AUD
Antiques having estimated net worth of 2 million AUD
Bills receivables of 50,000 AUD
Rare collection of victorian era books (original copies)
Asssumptions with regard to suppliers and publishers:The company has a network of 34 suppliers which are categorized as:
2 are special vendors dealing in rare books
17 are B2B publishers who offer easy returns of unpurchased books
15 are text book publishers
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