Knowledge Management and Information Systems Assignment Sample
1. Introduction
The main objective of this study is to develop the detailed understating about the knowledge management and the information system which is used in the organizations to make their functions more efficient and smooth. In this way, Tesco of UK is selected for accomplishing this study and as per the case scenario,
Tesco is looking to upgrade its information infrastructure. Similarly, it is also considering the range of the Knowledge Management Information Systems (KMIS) to be integrated with any other appropriate system. In this case, this report includes the organization’s detail information with objectives, structure, overview and the business model (Wood et al., 2017).
Additionally, environmental analysis is also done in relation to the company along with the suggested information systems and their benefits to the company which are appropriate for the company. Apart from this, three management implementation challenges are also described which may be faced by the company while implementing the suggested information system.
2. Background of the Company
Corporate Objectives
While concerning about selected business such as Tesco, it is demonstrated that company was developed with the very simple mission that is to be the best seller for the customers in whole the world and help them for enjoying the better quality of their life and quite easier path of living the life.
This is the key mission of Tesco and it has not been changed yet (Mollah, 2014). Along with the above mission, there are some important objectives of Tesco and these are followed within the organization properly. Moreover, these corporate objectives of Tesco are given below:
- To offer the outstanding and the unsurprising individual services to the customers
- To develop the critical understanding in regards of the customers to know them better
- To be more competitive on the fundamentals
- To provide variety of product to the customers
- To provide the comfortable environment in which customers can find satisfaction while purchasing products
- To understand the customer’s demand and fulfill their requirements by offering quality products
- To retain the experienced and talented human resources within the organization to enhance the customer satisfaction
Hence, above objectives are very crucial and effective for the company to be fulfilled and that is the reason, these are the important corporate objectives for Tesco and to accomplish these objectives,
Tesco needs to adopt knowledge management and the information system (Strazzari and Tholens, 2014). These systems provide the efficiency to the company in its internal operations at the significant level.
Business Overview
Tesco is known as British multinational general merchandize and the grocery retailer and it is located in England, United Kingdom. Company operates its business mainly in retail industry of UK since 1919.
Company serves its customers in UK through offering them retail products as per their demand. Similarly, company has number of goals to be accomplished and it can be done through focusing on the business and its operations significantly (Johnson et al., 2018). Tesco has around 6800 shops in all over the world.
Tesco’s key persons are John Allan (Chairman), Dave Lewis (CEO) and Ken Murphy (CEO). However, company has been operating good business as its revenue £63.911 billion with its 450,000 employees as of 2019. As per the operations of company, it invests huge amount in it IT infrastructure to enhance its operational efficiency and improve the customer services (Malik, 2015).
Corporate Structure
Tesco is identified as a large size company and its organizational structure is hierarchical as the company adopts Hierarchical management system which makes sure the efficiency as well as smoothness of the organizational functioning. Under this management system, all the business operations are divided into the long chain of commands.
Similarly, the member’s power is placed at the apex level (Ibrahim et al., 2017). The key reason of adopting hierarchical structure in Tesco is it number of benefits in which defining the roles is most important as through this system, all the member’s roles are defined without any confusion. This structure includes three levels such as top level, middle level and the lower level.
Business Model
Business model is described as the plan which is applied by Tesco with the aim of leading successful business operations within the organization. Its business plan includes some important elements such as products, finance of the company, source of the revenue and the customer target market etc (Farahani et al., 2014). However, company also defines its business model very straightforwardly as “they buy, move and sell products and services to their customers and use customers to get insight in order to do a bit better each time”. In this way, company’s online business model is given below to understand the whole business:
3. Environmental analysis of the company including internal and external analysis
Macro-Environmental Analysis
For analyzing the macro environment, it is essential to adopt some important and critical tools such as PESTEL analysis and the Porter’s Five Forces analysis tools which are effective for the organizations to understand the external environment and the forces. These forces are important to analyze because they impact the business in both the manner such as negative and positive (Xinyun, 2018). In this way, these macro environmental analysis tools are below given:
PESTEL Analysis
| Political Forces | Tesco is multinational grocery retail in UK and operates its business in various countries so it has to deal with different political environment. However, UK is Tesco’s home country and here, the political environment is quite stable for company. But Brexit has raised several uncertainties (Awadari and Kanwal, 2019). Due to the Brexit, Tesco has been facing the issue of lack of skilled workforce and the lack of resources. Similarly, Tesco has been dealing with some more issues such as market policies and the legislations. |
| Due to the pandemic situation, the purchasing power of the customers is likely to go down so it can be mentioned that economy of UK has been suffering. Similarly, the increasing ware rate also has the major impact over Tesco because it increases the cost of Tesco million of pounds in UK. Apart from this, some other factors like cost, prices and profit. In this way, Tesco needs to focus on interest rate and the borrowing cost in UK because it hampers the company’s profitability (Malik, 2015). At the end, diversification as well as international market presences can be beneficial for Tesco to enhance its growth. | Economical Forces |
| Social-Cultural Forces | The shopping trends have been changing over the time. Now, people do not have much time to waste and they want fast delivery of products. So, it is one of the major challenges for Tesco to deal with the changing demands of the customers. Similarly, due to the obesity, customers are getting more health conscious so company needs to focus on its products quality and the customer’s health. |
| Due to the technological advancement, Tesco has been facing the problem of poor customer experiences. However, Tesco has the opportunity to adopt technological advancement to enhance customer’s experiences and their loyalty. For example, company has introduced RFID technology which is automatically counts stock and completing the sales it removes it (Mollah, 2014). This system is also beneficial for the store suppliers. Apart from this, Tesco has also developed its mobile payment system named as PayQwid and around 524 stores are adopting this app. | Technological Forces |
| Environmental Forces | Due to the global warming and increasing environmental issues, Tesco has the immense pressure from the UK government agencies. So, company adopts number of CSR practices to decrease the pressure and make the environment pollution free. Tesco also has the commitment to adopt the renewable sources. |
| Along with above, Tesco also has the pressure of UK’s legal environment as there are several laws changes which have the impact over Tesco’s operation and it have to follow these laws significantly (Awadari and Kanwal, 2019). | Legal Forces |
Porter’s Five Forces Analysis
This tool helps the company to identify the efficient sources of the competitive advantages. In this way, these five forces are mentioned below:
| Threat of substitute products and services
The threats of substitutes within the grocery market are very low especially for the food products as well as medium for the non-food products (Mollah, 2014). The sources of substitute products are the small convenience store organic shops etc. Tesco also provides high quality products with low prices. |
Threat of entry of new competitors
Threats of new entrants are also very low because this industry needs huge investment to be competitive and develop the brand name. Similarly, Tesco is the brand and it has captured huge market share in UK but the new entrants have to focus on something innovative. |
| Intensity of competitive rivalry
The competitive rivalry is very high in food and grocery retail industry. Tesco faces high level of competition from its direct competitors such as Sainsbury, Asda, Morrisons and Waitrose etc. This intense competition is based on products, prices and the promotions. |
Bargaining power of buyers
Similarly, the bargaining power of buyers is very high due to the low switching costs from one brand to another. Moreover, the online presence of retail stores also enhances the bargaining power of the customers as they compare the products very easily (Malik, 2015). |
| Bargaining power of suppliers
The bargaining power of suppliers is low due to the incline for the major food as well as grocery retailers and continuously losing contracts of them with the large supermarkets. |
|
Micro- Environmental Analysis
After conducting the macro environmental analysis, it is crucial to know about the company’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats so that appropriate actions can be taken to improve the organizational efficiency and its operations (Farahani et al., 2014). In this situation, SWOT analysis is one of the bet tool and for Tesco, it is given below:
| Strengths
· Increasing Market Share · Insurance · Online Presence of Tesco Stores · Brand Value of Tesco · Market Leadership in UK |
Weaknesses
· Reliance upon the UK Market · Debt Reduction · Acquisition · Lack of Finance · Failure in USA and Japan |
| Opportunities
· International Expansion · Market Growth · Technological Advancement · Focus on Information System |
Threats
· Financial Downturn · Inflation · Decrease in Disposable Income
|
Thus, above defined SWOT analysis clearly reflects the strengths and opportunities for the company and through them, its weaknesses and threats can be overcome at the significant level. Moreover, company has sufficient strengths to deal with its market competitors in UK market.
4. Suggest the most appropriate management information system
Recommend Information system for providing the support to major business functions and strategies
After analyzing the macro and micro environment of Tesco, it is identified that company needs to focus on its information system so that enough support can be provided to the business functions and its strategies to get the success and growth in future. In this way, the main aim of information system is to support the management, its decision making and the operations.
An information system is identified as the information and the communication technology which is adopted by the organizations (Girard and Girard, 2015). There are different types of information system but Tesco can be suggested information system as per the suitability of organizational operations and functions.
In addition, the transaction processing system (TPS) can be suggested to Tesco as this system helps in data collection, processing, storage as well as outputting the functionalities towards the main functions of the business (Putra and Febriani, 2018). Transaction processing system gathers the data from the customer as the inputs and then it develops the significant outputs on the basis of the gathered information.
In this way, Tesco’s online ordering and payment system can be included. At the same time, Management Information System (MIS) can also be recommended to Tesco as this system is adopted by tactical managers while monitoring the current performance status of the organization (Becerra-Fernandez and Sabherwal, 2014).
In this MIS, the generated outputs from transaction processing system is used as the input and analyzed it with the routine algorithms such as compare, aggregate as well as brief the outcomes for the produced reports which are used by tactical managers to measure, control as well as predict the performance for the future perspective.
At the same time, Tesco can also be recommended Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Systems which is used by the business owner to coordinate the sales as well as marketing efforts. With this system, the customer’s practices are accumulated and tracked along with the customer inquiries, purchasing trends, and the product defects (Hwang et al., 2018).
CRM system is also used as the important component of the organizational collaboration strategies. Thus, above recommended three information system are quite effective for Tesco as per their business functions as these system are capable to enhance these organizational efficient at the extended level.
Characteristics of information system to facilitate knowledge capture & sharing, customer relations or supply chain management aspects
Above suggested information systems have the number of characteristics through which an organization can get the huge market success and high level of growth because in present, information is more significance than other things in order to enhance the sales and attract the huge amount of customers towards the brands (Cerchione and Esposito, 2017).
In concern f Tesco, company is suggested, Transaction Processing System (TPS), Management Information System (MIS) and the Customer Relationship Management (CRMS) etc. to enhance its operational efficiency and increase its growth significantly. In this manner, some of the important characteristics of Information systems are described below:
One of the important characteristics of Information system is the real time data. Through the important information systems within the organization, companies are capable to keep its data up to data. Same can be done by Tesco in concern of its customers and its inventories within the business.
Similarly, the real time data is required for all the elements related to the organization which range from the marketing communication by the finance (Al-Ammary, 2014). In addition, communication is another characteristic of the information system which is very crucial for the businesses as these information systems help the businesses to have the better communication as compared to earlier.
Moreover, the communication also important for the businesses as it facilitates the knowledge capturing & sharing and enhancing the relationships with the customers. At the same time, it is also determined that information system leads to the effective communication among the team members by having correct information at each time.
Along with the above characteristics, the suggested information systems are also effective to reduce the possible risk of errors while conducting the organizational operations. With these information systems, the collected data cannot be replicated and in this situation, the chances of human errors are also very low. Through this, more accurate information can be available for the users in the organization (Omotayo, 2015). Apart from this,
information systems are also effective to provide the greater productivity which is required by all the business in their operations and functions to be successful and growing. These information systems are capable to reduce the time taken by the practices in absence of information system.
Thus, above mentioned characteristics of information system are effective for Tesco to facilitate the knowledge capture & sharing and the customer relationship management or the supply chain management aspects related to organization.
Develop the performance objectives for the company
After adopting the above suggested information systems, Tesco will be capable to enhance its efficiency and productivity because these systems will help it to perform its functions more efficiently. Similarly, these information system are also beneficial for the business to provide them required information easily without wasting much time to collect its (Barão, 2017).
In addition, it is important for Tesco to develop the new performance objectives with the adoption of information system as per the requirement of the business operations. These performance objectives of Tesco are given below:
- To enhance the sales from the customers by serving them with their required products or services by 20% within 6 months
- To increase the employee productivity through increasing the employee engagement and their motivation within 3 months
- To improve the brand image and awareness among the potential customers through fulfilling their demand and adopting appropriate marketing tools
Above developed new performance objectives are based on SMART objective system and these will be beneficial for Tesco in the future to enhance its performance and its brand image among the potential customers of it (Soto-Acosta et al., 2018). Moreover, while accomplishing these objectives, Tesco will also focus on the suggested information systems which will help it to enhance its efficiency and work productivity at the significant level.
5. Identify the three challenges while applying the suggested information systems
In concern of the information system, it is mentioned that Tesco has been suggested to adopt three information systems which will help in its functions and organizational practices in future. But it is also crucial to know that these systems lead to some important challenges within the business while adopting them and implement them in the organizational operations (Dalkir, 2017).
These challenges can be the result of failure of the system, fulfillment of the organizational requirements and inefficiency of the organizational functions. In addition, there are number of challenges in which three challenges are given below related to the information system:
Lack of Strategy: Number of MIS issues is related to the lack of solid strategy. In this way, the leaders of the information system know the number of tools which are available to collect the data in relation to the networks but using that collected information is one of the major challenges for them always.
Earlier, the technology department was treated as the separate operation which provides the tech support as well as keeps the organizational equipment running (Donate and de Pablo, 2015). But in present, information system leaders work with other business leaders and make sure that the technology is supporting the organizational overall mission to move forward. In case of absence of proper strategy, it is very critical to implement the information system.
Meeting Organizational Needs: One more challenges of information system is meeting the organizational needs because information system plays an important role including the professional who relying on the technology in concern of each aspect of the organizational operations. For instance, the sales and the marketing departments depend on the customer relationship software for tracking the client interactions like the accounting requires its own software for billing, financial tracking and the invoicing.
Attracting and Retaining Top Talent: the technological advancement has outpaced the many people to enter in the field. For the companies, developers, database administrator and the programmer are required for most of the operations. However, number of businesses has been shifting to the cloud software but the shortage of skilled workforces creates the problem in front of businesses (Hwang et al., 2018).
This problem takes place while adopting the information system within the organization. It leads the major issues because without skilled workforce, companies are unable to go further with its IT operations. In this case, number of businesses has to face failure while competing within the competitive environment.
Thus, above defined challenges are very critical for Tesco while adopting the information system within the organization. In this situation, company will needs to deal with these challenges very efficiently to resolve them significantly.
Conclusion
At the end of the study, it can be mentioned that Tesco is one of the world’s leading company which has the number of strengths which help the company to adopt the information system within the organization to overcome its weaknesses at the significant level.
At the same time, it is also mentioned that there are number of opportunities which should be focused by Tesco to get the significant growth within the target market of UK. In this case, Tesco is suggested to adopt some important information system such as Transaction Process System (TPS), Management Information System (IMS) and the Customer Relationship Management System (CRMS) etc. to enhance the organizational efficiency.
References
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