1. Why shall I care about MIS ?

I. MIS does matter

- Companies spend 1/3 of their expenditure in the information system and technologies
- Investment in hardware, software, information services…
INVESTMENT
- Resources are rare, so when company spend a lot of money it shows that it is important
- They spend a lot of investment in order to get positive resources

VALUE
CHAIN
- IS are part of every single aspect of the value chain of the firm

- We can see that at each level (Operational, managerial,

executive) of the organization, you’ll need IS
UTILIZATION

- Each department need to share information, and IS enable

them to do it more efficiently

What happens when Information Technology fails : If the IS doesn’t work, the firm will bankrupt
RISK OF • Needs : Investment in the IS must match the customers need
FAILURE • Accuracy : If the IS is not performant, all the data recovered will be inaccurate (and implementation = failure)
• Adaptation : You must adapt your firm and activity to the ERP system and not the contrary

II. The MIS big picture : Linking the dots

There are 4 different categories of IS :

- Valid for all the hardware/network/software that the firm acquire in order to be able to have the basic of
INFRASTRUCTURE Information System (it is the basic first need of the organization)
- It is extremely important, because without it there isn’t IS (without network, server , emails à Impossible)

- Refers to all the systems that are used in order to process the transactional business of an organization in a
TRANSACTIONAL regular daily basis
- ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning system) is linked to transactional, because they enable the occurrence of daily transactions)

- Linked to the different IS that enable you to have better insight and understanding of the data that emanate
INFORMATIONAL
from the transactional system (=business analytics or business intelligence)

STRATEGIC - IS that enable the firm to acquire competitive advantage

 2. Introducing Infor mation System
I. Introduction
- From the 1950s, organizations from Ford to Uber have been using daily basis information systems to reach their
PRINCIPLE
business goals, achieve competitive advantage and manage their daily operations.
- Organizations use information systems to reach many goals : Such as procuring their raw material, developing their
GOALS
R&D operations, optimizing their logistics, organizing their distribution, providing satisfaction to their customers…
- IS are the basis of any single operation or task achieved within and between organizations. T
KEEP IN
MIND
- This explains why the success of IS has been tightly associated with the business success of organizations
- The failure of IS is also highly correlated with the failure of organizations and even their entire collapse

Example of Levi’s Strauss : In 2003, it had an old and obsolete IS as it was based on an unorganized mixture of different IS specific to each country
with no compatibility.
ð To deal with this situation, the executives at that time decided to acquire an Enterprise System from SAP with an initial budget of less than $5 million.
ð However, problems appeared then as one major customer asked that Levi’s Strauss to make sure to interface its system with Walmart’s own IS.
ð Walmart required that the system interface work with its supply chain management system which was something that was not taken into consideration.
ð This problem and others during migration forced Levi’s Strauss to shut down three U.S. distribution centers for a week.
ð In 2008, the company took a $192.5 million charge against earnings to compensate for the failed IT project and its CIO was invited to quit .

II. Definition of important terms

A. Data, infoamation and knowledge
- It is about an undefined material and/or raw symbols that are explicitly written somewhere but that are at the
DATA same time deprived from any meaning (thus, data in itself is useless and meaningless)
ð Ex : 456789 à Alone useless, but useful if I tell you it is a number of a bank account (à become information)
- It is a meaningful data
- Information is about structured data that is formatted and managed in order to be useful for a worker or a
manager who needs to make a business decision and/or to solve a problem.
INFORMATION
ð Data is tremendously important for IS since if the data you enter to the system is flawed all the subsequent
outcomes and potential business decisions will be baseless.
ð Example : The n° of the bank account is the one of Mister X (It become knowledge)
KNOWLEGDE - When the information is associated with a unique person or entity

B. Information Technology (IT)

1. Principle
IT - IT is about all the tools, that capture, store, process, exchange and use information.
IT include a wide range of possibilities
• Computer hardware (personal computer, laptops, mainframe, server, tablets)
RANGE
• Software (operating systems; business applications, database for storing data, enterprise systems such as ERP)
• Networks (modem, routers, switches)
- These different pieces do not mean anything or cannot lead to any outcome if they are unorganized
IT
INFRA.
- Thus, companies organize all these pieces in a coherent way, they build what we call IT infrastructure.
- IT infr has to be organized with integrated business processes and employees to build, operate and support IS.

2. Three kinds of IT
- IT that enable the achievement of individual and standalone tasks in a more efficient way.
- This IT is dedicated to improving the productivity of individual users.
FUNCTION
IT - Ex : Word, PowerPoint , Blackboard to upload the course material (more efficient than writing on a paper sheet, scan it and share it)
- Other example : Engineers at Tesla use simulation software to simulate the design and the outlook of the electric car before moving it to
the prototyping phase.
- IT that facilitates interaction between different kinds of stakeholders within and between organization
- Today everyone needs to communicate, exchange and collaborate with customers, colleagues…
NETWORK
IT
- Network IT has also been shown to enable the emergence of unexpected innovation and unforeseen creativity by
employees and within teams.
- Example : Enterprise social media, emails, blogs, instant messaging system (Whatsapp), Workplace
- IT that enables business processes to occur within and between organization
- This category of IT represents software that organizations adopt in order to pursue specific business goals.
ENTERPRISE
IT
- It necessitates generally the redesign of business processes, enables to make workflows become standardized,
reduces errors and duplication of efforts and makes information consistent throughout the entire organization
- Example : ERP, customer relationship management (to increase customer loyaltie), Supply Chain Management
 C. Information Service (IS)

- Once these 3 kinds of IT are integrated they represent what we call Information systems
PRINCIPLE - It is because they enable the organization to meet key objectives that are critical to its business such as reducing
costs, optimizing logistics, increasing revenue, enabling cross-selling and up-selling.
IS - IS is an ensemble of IT that collects, creates and distributes useful data to enable business decision
GOAL - IS enable the support of business transactions within and between organizations.
TRANSACTION - Anything that occurs as part of a firm’s daily business and that a record must be kept out of it.

III. The evolution of business computing

A. Mainframe architecture (1 tier architecture)

- This approach started in the late 1950s.
- These are very big servers that are mainly utilized by very large corporations for important applications such as
PRINCIPLE
payroll accounting or finance.
- They host all the data and applications.
- These giant servers offer services to equip users with processing capabilities that they don’t have in their PC
GIANT
SERVER
- In other words, mainframe are centrally managed servers that process, manage the data and shows the data to
what we call dummy terminals.
- These terminals are used by end-users who are not equipped with any processing capabilities.
TERMINALS
- Terminals are just used to display data sent by the central server.
ADVANTAGE - Security and efficiency used to be some of the most important advantages associated with approach.

B. Client/server architecture (2 tier architecture)

- In this approach, servers are giant computers with huge processing capabilities that exchange information with
PRINCIPLE remote users through networks.
- These remote users no longer use dummy terminals.
- As computing capabilities have progressed, Personal Computers can manage and process data by themselves.
PC
- Thus, the load is split between the server (PC) and the client (end user)
- Represent end-users or the program extension on users’ PC that send requests to servers and ask for services.
- In exchange, the server responds with exchanging information with clients.
CLIENTS - This is why this approach is also called centralized architecture :
ð The server manages the data
ð The client manages the application and the presentation.
- Application : is a program that integrates a functional use such as sales management or procurement.
APPLICATION
- This is what the client is called “fat client” (There are many examples, like email server, web servers…)
• Better sharing of resources : Since all clients have the possibility to access to different kinds of corporate info
ADVANTAGES
• End-users have become more empowered to perform their job with additional on- demand capabilities.
 • The Graphic User Interface of end-users had become more friendly : Compared to the previous GUI
• End-users benefit from enhanced processing capabilities thanks to the resources provided by the server.
• Support and maintenance have become easier since users can be managed in a centralized way so less support
resources are needed to manage user accounts

C. Multi-tier architecture (3-tier architecture)

It is an approach that provides the possibility to allocate the application functionality across 3 independent systems.
1. A server (one tier),
3 TIER
2. An application server (SAP Application Server, IBM WebSphere, Oracle Application Server) (one tier)
3. A client (one tier).
- In a 3 their configuration, you use your own host for the 3-tier.
- Using data from the database server, several different application servers can operate at the same time.
PRINCIPLE
- To ensure that the load on individual servers is as even as possible and to achieve optimal performance, you can
use special application servers for individual application areas such as sales planning, distribution or accounting
- In other words, the client has become thin.
MEANING - I mean the application logic is no longer managed by the client but is managed by a specific application server
- The client cares only about the presentation logic.
- The first tier is the one of the databases or what we generally call Relation Data Base Management Systems (RDBMS).
FIRST TIER - This first layer stores, manages and retrieves data.
- Data is kept independent from the application logic and the presentation logic.
- The second tier is the one of the application logics.
- This tier controls the application functionality, processing and performance
SECOND TIER
- It makes the calculations.
- An international company can have many application servers spread over the different countries
- The first and the second tier communicate thanks to a software that is called middleware.
MIDDLEWARE
- Middleware in simple terms is about the software that links two otherwise unconnected software.
- The third tier is the one of presentation that is concerned with the User Graphic Interface.
THIRD TIER
- SAP calls it SAP GUI (SAP Graphic User Interface)
• Agility : As organizations can implement and deploy new applications and satisfy users demands in a reactive manner
• Scalability : As employees can benefit from additional computing resources as their computing needs evolve over time
• Security: The application layer provides additional security as any posted data from end- users can be verified at the
PROS
level of the application tier before sending an update to the database.
• Independence: The advantage of independence enables IT departments to act on one tier without impacting the other.
Thus, you could change any of the layers without making any subsequent changes in any of the other layers.

3 tier architecture examples : AirBnb

- This first tier in the bottom is the relational database management system (RDBMS)
FIRST TIER
- It is where you have huge number of tables that share information.
- It is the one of the application tiers where you have all the associated codes that process the searching operations
SECOND TIER
of the appropriate home on the platform of Airbnb and where all calculations are made.
- The third tier will simply be the internet page that you are connected to as you are shopping online.
THIRD TIER - This tier receives input and shows output.
- It is about all what you can see on a web- browser through your laptop, your tablet or your smartphone.
 3. Case Study – Cloud Case (NDPL)
I. Synchronous Session
A. Principle
- IS, IT, MIS… involves a lot of interactions between human beings and technology
- In this class, we’re going to know what technology you have to use, which is the most adapted, that will make
INTRO the business cheaper, faster, most fluid…
- If you don’t choose the right technology regarding your business, your customers… you will fail
- Gmail is an example of cloud computing : We don’t know where our data are (stored on the cloud in internet)
- There is an alternative of cloud computing, which is the traditional way of doing this : Traditional data centers
TRADITIONAL
WAY
- In this case, you will store all the data in servers that are located in-house (in a room)
- A server is like an huge USB driver, and looks like a big computer, that are generating data
Cloud computing :
Never using your own server but using internet servers
2 WAYS 2 ways for storing data
Traditional data centers :
You use your own servers, in a certain room of the firm
- Data center : Technical facility that houses an organization’s IT operations and equipment and where it stores
manages and disseminates data
- Maintaining your own IT infrastructure involves some challenges :
• Space and money : You need to have space available, and it involves a lot of money to create and maintain
DATA CENTERS • Security : The place needs to be secured because it is important information
• Back-up : You need to create back-up services if there are problems
• Temperature : It generates a lot of energy, so you have to cool it
• Maintenance : Maintain the well-functioning, change them…
•
- Instead of having your own servers, you can access technology intelligences such as computing power, storage
and databases on an as-needed basis from a cloud provider like Amazon Web Services (AWS)
CLOUD - It is also called the utility computing model : Organization rent resources (processing, data storage, networking)
COMPUTING from an external provider on an as-needed bases
- It is a concept similar to the concept of virtualization : Each company own a virtual access to the server
- Largely utilized in today’s firms and you pay according to your own consumption
• Allow your business to become more agile, reduces costs, instantly scaled, apply immediately and globally
ADVANTAGES • It gives you direct access to data, so you can innovate faster,
• Freedom : So, you can focus on your core business
EXAMPLE
AIRBNB
- AWS allowed AirBnB to manage millions of operations with only 5 persons (better than with their own)

B. The dimensions of Cloud computing

1. Service Model 2. Deployment model

PRIVATE
CLOUD
- You don’t want to share your cloud with anyone outside the firm
- Gmail is an example of Public Cloud where everyone has a virtual mini server provided by google (the cloud provider)
PUBLIC
CLOUD
- Public doesn’t mean that my emails are shared with everyone
- But only that my emails are located on the same physical server as you
HYBRID - If you want to put sensitive information on the cloud but also non-sensitive information’s in order to master the cost
 II. Case Study – Cloud case (NDPL)
- They are wholesalers in the pharmaceutical industry in India
- They have a good position (leader, low competition) and try to expand their activity, which shows a good health

Explain how did Information System help NDPL

- IS helped better efficiency by avoiding manual errors and duplication efforts.
- NDPL is able to increase the number of orders taken
- The company is more time efficient and better communication
- Better stock management : Better manage the expired drugs
- Sales growth by 77%

Explain what went wrong with cloud-based solution implemented in 2010

- New application was enable to read barcode à customer dissatisfaction
- Connectivity problem + accountability
- Cloud provider had a limited experience for cloud provided to pharmaceutical companies
- Vendors weren’t experienced
- Latency and network shut down

Cons of the traditional way

- Expensive
- HR costs to work with different suppliers
- IT investment / Integration
- Upgrade are necessary and expensive
- Energy and security (firewall)

NPDL should go back to the cloud or NDPL should not go back to the cloud?

NDPL should choose the cloud computing because :

- Reduce costs : It is the cheaper solution (reduce and quicker to implement). NDPL does not need to invest in huge and costly IT
infrastructures that will incur additional costs (security, cooling…) and can reinvest this budget to more pertinent expenses
- Focus on core business (marketplace between hosts and guests)
- Elasticity, available at the same time for several customers, taking into account the evolution, IT needs might be unpredictable
- Better usage of resources: Space
- Access to the cloud anywhere : One of the major benefits that cloud brings, and it is useful for NDPL because of their expansion
- Better performance
- Scalability
- The fear of failure of the cloud computing system is not justified anymore because it was 10 years ago
- NPDL wanted to expand : Therefore, IT would have been a better solution as it would have helped to centralize the different
department and reduce the operation time

Why NDPL should not go back to the cloud?

- The cloud software was not adapted to the company as many problems happened since the first day of use (the first program
was unable to read barcodes and many customers were unsatisfied)
- The cloud provider has created a software which weren’t adapted to the pharmaceutical industry
- The cloud is not prepared for connectivity problems between the parties involved and the availability of the software round the
clock.
- The small decrease in sales revenues between 2011 and 2012 (exhibit 4) may be a consequence of the implementation of the
cloud system.
- The major part of departments at NDPL were integrated in automated processes, which means the systems were almost
standalone and there were not so much integration. Because of information-eccentric’s operations, if an error occurred it could
affect the whole value chain
- While not using the cloud, you are less dependent on your server provider’s errors, bug…
 4. IT Architecture Extended

I. ERP System architecture

The architecture that supports the connection between the database, processing, and presentation is called Client/Server
architecture. In recent years, new technologies have developed that make ERP software less monolithic and more flexible. As the
amount of data stored in the database and the number of sources of data increase, there is a need for efficient storage and retrieval
of corporate data from a business intelligence perspective. Data warehouses have evolved to handle this explosive growth.

A. What is a client/server architecture ?

- Client : Process that makes service requests to a server

DEFINITION
- Server : Process that responds with the requested service to a client
- The third component of this architecture is the network.
- The network can provide communication to multiple servers that service multiple clients
NETWORK
- The relationship between the client and server is many to many à A client can request services from many servers,
à A server can serve many clients.
- The client and server are usually hosted on separate computers but they could be on the same computer.
CLIENT /
SERVER
- Client and server processes are separate and autonomous even though the request is made by the client
- The sharing of the processes between a client and a server is the basis for defining thin and fat clients
- Thin client : Has minimal processing responsibilities (so the corresponding fat server does the majority of processing)

THIN & FAT - Fat client : Takes on a larger load of processing

CLIENT ð The increase in inexpensive desktop processing has helped popularize fat clients.
ð Web based client/server architectures are pushing the thin client (sometimes mobile) paradigm.
- The client is often called the front-end or front-end application.
RESUME - The server is called the back-end application.
- The network provisions the transmission of data between clients and servers.
- A communications middleware it the software that orchestrates the communication over the network.
MIDDLEWARE - The middleware plays an important role whereby client and server computers can run different operating systems,
yet seamlessly channel requests and responses.

B. Components : Presentation, Processing & Storage

The overall application logic that the client/server architecture is designed to support has several components that can be distributed
across clients and servers

- The end user interacts with the presentation logic tier.

PRESENTATION - It is responsible for formatting the data, rendering the user interface, presenting the data and also accepting
LOGIC user input (these tasks are device dependent).
- Examples of devices : Desktop computers, laptops, notebooks which all have a keyboard and mouse for input.
- This component receives user input from the presentation logic component, validates the data, and applies
- the majority of business rules.
PROCESSING
LOGIC
- This will require communication with the storage logic to retrieve additional data.
- Business transactions are processed in this component.
- Results from the processing are written to the storage logic.
- This component is responsible for handling data retrieval and storage (in the physical storage devices) requests
STORAGE
LOGIC
from the processing logic component.
- The database management system (DBMS) is synonymous with storage logic.
 C. N-Tier approach
It is important to note that the three logic components can be distributed across multiple tiers of an n-tier client/server system.
- In general, the presentation logic resides on the client
PRINCIPLE
- And the storage logic resides on the server, which is usually a database server in close proximity to the data itself (physical storage)
- This leaves the processing logic to be placed on either the client or on the server.
PROCESSING
- The processing logic server is separate from the storage logic server.
- Application partitioning : It is the process of writing programs that are distributed onto clients and servers as needed
PARTITIONING to maximize performance and data security.
- Partitioning the processing logic leads to two, three, and n-tier environments.

D. 3-Tier C/S ERP Systems

- As depicted in Figure 4, three-tier architecture has two server layers to manage the processing and storage logic.
PRINCIPLE
- Generally, the processing logic resides on an application server that executes most application programs.
- The drive towards three and higher tiered architectures is driven by flexibility and scalability.
- By delineating the tiers, it is easier to swap out any one tier’s technology with a newer one without having to rewrite
FLEXIBILITY the code for the other tiers. Scalability is achieved by introduction of multiple application servers.
- A transaction processing monitor is used to monitor the load on an application server
- Load balancing is thus achieved amongst several application servers as needed.
- The three-tier architecture is the main stay of ERP systems where thousands of end users may be accessing the
3-TIER
application concurently.

Figure 6 shows a typical schematic of an ERP system :

1. Database Tier for ERP System

- Master data : Most ERP systems use a relational database to store data about their customers, vendors, materials… in
hundreds of tables, and this data is called master data.

- Transactional data : As the ERP system is put into production, every transaction that is saved (committed) to the database
DATA
will update one or more tables and this data is called transactional data.

- As you can surmise, master data changes slowly, whereas transactional data changes rapidly, growing by large amounts
depending on the volume of business.
- Before an ERP system is put into production, it must be implemented, configured, tested, and then deployed.
- Keeping the data of each phase of the implementation cycle separate from the other phases would require the use of
ERP multiple databases. This is inefficient and unnecessarily complicated.
- An innovative way to utilize the same database for all phases of implementation is to use a field (sometimes called client
number) in all tables, making it a part of the primary key.
- A primary key : is a field (or set of fields) that uniquely identifies each row in a table.
- In this way the configuration phase can use rows with client number 100 and the testing phase can use rows with client number 200.
PRIMARY
KEY
- Each table of the database has rows of data for the configuration phase as well as the testing phase.
- They are identified by the client number field. The processing tier manages the database authorizations so that only rows
with client number 100 will be seen by configuration personnel.
 2. ERP Business Logic
The entire business logic resides in the application server. A dispatcher is the central control process.

The dispatcher performs the following important tasks :

• Together with the operating system, manages the resources for the ERP application.
• Evenly distributes the transaction load among the work processes.
• Interfaces with the presentation level.
• Manages the buffer areas in the main memory.
• Organizes all communication activities.
• Places the client requests in request queues, and then processes them in order.
• Dispatches the requests to available work processes. A work process is specialized to process exactly one request type.
• Distributes the pending requests to the appropriately defined work processes.
• Ensures proper lock management to maintain data integrity.

3. Presentation Tier
The client-side user interface can be either a custom
program or a web browser.
Either way there is a rendering program that renders the
appropriate look and feel of the UI on the client platform.
Mobile apps have limited screen space, so UIs have to be
designed specifically for this limitation.

E. Database Connectivity and Middleware – ODBC, JDBC

1. Middleware and API
Applications need to connect and communicate to a source of data over a network. The mechanism for orchestrating this is called database
connectivity. The data source is generally a relational database; however it could be any other form of data, such as a text file.

Middleware is the glue that binds all client server applications. Interoperability is the reason why middleware exists. One or more
middleware solutions are used within n-tiered client server applications to facilitate this interoperability amongst dissimilar operating
systems and components.

Several types of middleware are available. Here are some important ones as classified by Hurwitz (Hurwitz, 1998) :

• Asynchronous : In asynchronous communication, the client sends a message (request) to the server but does not wait for a response.
Examples are email and file transfer. Middleware examples :
ASYNCHRONOUS REMOTE PROCEDURE CALL (RPC) - Client makes a request after establishing a point-to-point connection. Does not wait for response.
PUBLISH / SUBSCRIBE - Middleware that pushes information that subscribers have subscribed to.
MESSAGE ORIENTED MIDDLEWARE (MOM) - Uses queues to store requests from clients, especially those that require multiple processing steps.

• Synchronous : Synchronous communication is used when a response is required by the client (in real time).
Examples are chat and audio/video communications. Middleware examples :
OBJECT REQUEST BROKER (ORB) - Object-oriented sending and receiving of information.
SQL-ORIENTED DATA ACCESS - Middleware that translates generic SQL requests into the database specific SQL.
SYNCHRONOUS RPC - Synchronous version of RPC

From an ERP perspective, middleware is important because it allows data integration and application integration between one database
and another. Application Programming Interface (API) is used to support interaction between two applications (or programs).
API : Set of routines, structures, classes and protocols provided by libraries and operating systems to simplify the creation of software applications.
ð Think of it as building blocks that a programmer can put together to build applications.
ð Database oriented middleware usually provides an API to access the database.
ð An example of an API is Google Maps APIs. This gives developers several ways of including Google maps within their web pages
either for simple use or with extensive customization.

2. ODBC – JDBC
- Open Database Connectivity (OBDC) is an interface for accessing databases (both relational and non-relational).
- Similar to an API, it provides abstraction from operating system, database and programming language.
ODBC
- ODBC drivers are used to translate the middleware commands into the DBMS specific commands.
- Changes in the database specification only require an update to the driver
- Java Database Connectivity (JDBC) is similar to ODBC.
- It is an API for the Java programming language (not language independent like ODBC) that allows any client program
JDBC
to access a database.
- It has gained popularity because Java is a network-oriented language.
 F. Web based ERP Application
So far we have mostly discussed client server architectures for enterprises distributed over a local area network (LAN).
ð However, since the early 1990s, the web browser is displacing specialized client user interfaces.
ð The ubiquitous availability of browsers for desktop and mobile devices is driving this displacement.
ð The time and cost of web development has gone down significantly.

ERP vendors have responded with user interfaces that integrate the browser into their presentation logic layer. This poses some
new challenges and opportunities. This figure 10 shows how a web-enabled ERP architecture may look :

The main difference between a web-enabled and a non web-enabled

architecture is the inclusion of a web server.
ð If a client requests a static web page (html), it will be served by the web
server and displayed in the client browser.
ð If the client request requires data retrieval from the database, the web
server will use the processing logic to create a query, which will be sent
to the database server. The results will be formatted for presentation
and returned to the client.

The web server requires additional security, which is why the enterprise intranet is behind a firewall. In addition, a proxy server can
be added to serve frequently requested pages (which are cached) without having to add load to the web server.

1. Web services
WEB
SERVICE
- Are a set of protocols to support computer to computer interaction over the web through the use of XML and HTTP.
- XML stands for Extensible Markup Language. It is a markup language similar to html but with different goals.
- It is used to structure, store and transport data. The tags in XML are wrappers for data.
XML - The sender and receiver must have software to send, receive, and process the XML file.
- Many languages have been developed using XML à Web services description language (WSD)
à Simple object access protocol (SOAP)
- Using WS, one can convert an application into a Web application which can then be shared and consumed by others.
WEB - An example of a Web service would be Amazon fulfillment Web service, which allows merchants to send orders to Amazon.com
with instructions to fulfill customer orders on their behalf.
- Interoperability: Allows applications to exchange data easily
PROS
- Reusability: Web service can be consumed as needed without the need to rewrite code

2. Service Oriented Architecture (SOA)

We have discussed APIs as a way to facilitate interoperability.SOA provides a suite of services that can be consumed by other
applications in a loosely coupled environment. Although SOA is often enabled using web services, it is not mandatory to do so. The
benefit of the SOA approach to enterprise systems is that businesses can be more agile. They can respond quickly to changing
market conditions by reducing the time to develop applications.

G. ERP Security
Cyber-security has emerged as a major concern in the client server model of ERP application development and deployment. Most
applications we use today are based on this model, which can pose serious risk to security if not properly addressed.
ð Data has to be secured from both accidental and intentional threats.
ð Web based access to data, often through mobile devices, has made securing such systems more difficult.

There are several targets for data security threats :

• Loss of system/services availability: Computer viruses, worms, and sabotage…
• Compromise of data integrity : At the core of a database is the integrity of data, which must be guaranteed at all times.
• Privacy and confidentiality breach : A breach in security can lead to theft, fraud, blackmail, financial hardship…
• Human error: Accidental compromise or loss of data by humans is possible and not uncommon.
• Software bugs and hardware failure

Security is not a single task that can fix threats and attempts :
- All servers within the ERP system must be protected against intrusion, but the most critical is the database server.
DATABASE
SECURITY
- The physical server and data must be properly secured with access limited
- Server and administrator passwords provide key defenses against attacks.
AUTHORIZATION
- Authorization rules restrict who can access what type of data, and what actions they can take on that data.
RULE
- Each profile is assigned multiple authorization (read, write, update, delete…)
 - Once a user has been assigned the appropriate authorization rule he is assigned authentication to access
LOGIN
- There are three methods of authentication : Password, biometrics and user possessions (magnetic card)
ENCRYPTION - Sensitive information must be protected by encrypting them if they are stolen
- The network that connects the components of an ERP system must be secured as well.
NETWORK
SECURITY
- Routers can be monitored to identify attacks from specific clients.
- They can be configured to restrict access by client IP addresses, country and regions.
- The Web Server is usually protected behind a firewall.
WEB SECURITY
AND PRIVACY
- In addition, encryption can be used to encrypt all data that travels between the client and the server.
- Web servers should have the lowest possible number of ports open for communication.
- Organizations routinely have controls in place to keep personnel from conducting fraud or sabotage.
PERSONNEL
SECURITY
- Apart from training users on security issues, it is also important to separate duties so that there is no conflict of
interest and no single employee has full control over a process or system

H. Data Warehouse and Business Intelligence

- A transactional system such as an ERP generates enormous amount of data on a daily basis.
- To keep the database size manageable, older data is archived periodically.
PRINCIPLE
- The challenge, therefore, is to collect and store data from multiple sources into one coherent structure based on
which business analytics can be performed.
- Enterprise Data Warehouses aim at physically framing multiple sources of data in an architecture that requires
DATA
WAREHOUSE
the mapping of data from one or more operational data sources to a target database management system
(DBMS) that supports the many decision-making processes and business intelligence (BI) systems of an enterprise
- Business Intelligence for ERP is the user-centered process of exploring data, data relationships and trends -
BUSINESS thereby helping to improve overall decision making for enterprises.
INTELLIGENCE - This involves an iterative process of accessing data (usually stored in the enterprise data warehouse) and
analyzing it, thereby deriving insight, drawing conclusions, and communicating results to authorized users.
- The database underlying the data warehouse is generally separate from the transactional database that supports
SEPARATE
the ERP.

I. New directions
1. Software as a Service (SAAS)
Should I buy a house or should I rent an apartment? The answer depends on many variables, and both options have pros and cons.
A similar option has emerged in the ERP world where Software can be rented on-demand. Instead of making huge initial investments
in IT infrastructure, a business simply subscribes to the software on a pay-as-you-go model.
- Short implementation time
- Little or no infrastructure needed
- Low total cost of ownership (TCO) : No upfront cost of system (servers and software) ownership.
- Pay-as-you-go subscription model reduces risk of IT costs when business slows down.
- A-la-carte model allows clients to pick and choose functionality as needed by business growth.
PROS
- High reliability.
- Access to expertise from solution provider.
- Higher security, particularly for small businesses that do not have adequate in-house expertise.
- Access from anywhere, at any time.
- Scalability.
- Businesses have to trust SaaS vendor to provide security, privacy, and confidentiality of corporate data.
- Low control over customizing SaaS software to fit business needs.
CONS - SaaS for vertical market is still relatively rare.
- Subscription costs can add up quickly especially in per-user model of payment.
- Future of business data after termination of contract or end of SaaS vendor.

2. Mobile application for ERP

As mobile devices gain more popularity and capability, business users will rely more on them more to do business activity that were
traditionally relegated to the office. A simple task like entering a Sales Order or potential lead can be entered into a mobile app at
a client site.
3. In memory analytics
A new development Performance in Memory Analytics.
The main innovation in the data is stored in Memory (RAM) instead of database tables.
ð Data is stored in a much simpler format. Table joins are made as needed for querying.
ð This greatly improves performance through faster data retrieval, calculations, and querying.
 II. From Monolithic to Multi-tier to Service Oriented :
Evolving ERP Architecture
Since its introduction in the 1970s, ERP and other enterprise-class information systems have progressively evolved. This evolution
has not only changed the functionality afforded by these systems, it has also affected the way the systems are engineered and
designed to interoperate.

A. Basic concepts and definitions

1. Services, producers and consumers
- . What is a service in this context?
- As the term itself states, service-oriented architecture describes a software system based on the design and
PRINCIPLE deployment of services
- The concept behind services in a software context is similar to the common usage of that term in other contexts.
In considering a restaurant as an example, many facets of services in a computing context can be observed.
ð When one visits a restaurant, it is common to examine a menu that lists the various items that the restaurant can provide.
After making a selection, one places an order with a waiter or waitress who serves as a communication vehicle between the
customer and the kitchen. This same individual delivers the food after it has been prepared.
ð In this scenario the customer examines a list of services that are available (the menu), makes a request using a communication
EXAMPLE OF channel (the waiter or waitress), some work is done on behalf of the requestor (the kitchen), and the customer receives the
RESTAURANT outcome of that request (the food) delivered by the communication channel.
ð The restaurant is providing a service (a meal) which is requested, received, and ultimately consumed by the customer.
ð The customer gains the benefit of being able to access and consume resources on demand that they did not have to create
themselves. In fact, the customer may have no knowledge of how the food was prepared; he or she simply knew how to
place the order for what they wanted and then how to consume what was prepared.
ð The kitchen is equipped to handle a variety of requests from their menu, provided the order is properly conveyed.
Just as in the restaurant example above, services in a computing context involve the interaction of two entities
connected by a communication channel.
SERVICE • A requesting software system determines what services a target software system can provide
COMUTING • Makes a request from the target software system in an appropriate fashion using an approriate communication medium
CONTEXT • And receives a response from the target system that fulfills the request.
Unlike the restaurant example where the item being provided is a physical good, in a software system the service
being provided is informational or computational in nature.
- The interacting software systems play the role of service producer and service consumer.
SERVICE - A service producer is a software system that offers one or more services to other software systems service provider)
- A service consumer is a software system that uses services provided by producers.

Consider the following hypothetical example : a company operates

globally, maintaining bank accounts in various countries.

As a part of its cash management processes, the company wants to know

how much money it has on hand in various accounts held at banks
around the world. To make this determination, a Bank Query System is
created by the company that connects to various services provided by
external financial institutions to determine account balances.

Unlike the restaurant example previously described, it is typical in software systems for one system to be both a consumer and
producer of services.

There are multiple benefits of this structure (query system) :

- Service abstraction : If a bank changes the way their balance request service works or if the company begins dealing with
another bank, the Bank Query System can be updated accordingly, and other systems would be totally unaffected by this
change. This is a significant benefit of service abstraction.
- Potential for system simplification : The assignment of clear role to a component application in an overall system, and the
previously described benefit of the hiding of functional implementation.

2. Tiered architectures
The predecessors of today’s ERP software systems were among the earliest computer systems to be used in business operations.
Just as cars of today are very different from the earliest cars produced, today’s software systems are very different from those that
predated them. Today’s systems are significantly more sophisticated and complex.
 a. Monolithic architecture
- Business software systems debuted in the early 1970s as monolithic applications.
- A monolithic application/architecture : It is a software system or architecture that provides all of its functionality
through a single piece of software that operates independent of other software systems.
PRINCIPLE ð As a monolithic application, early ERP software systems accomplished their own data storage
ð Did all of the various calculations and application of business rules internally in their own programming logic
ð And provided their own reporting and human interfaces
ð
- This software was developed to run on mainframe computer systems and provided access to users using a very
AT THE simple (by today’s standards) computer terminal.
TIME - At the time this software initially appeared in business it was revolutionary : You would have access to current
information wherever you were and could get everything that you wanted to know
PROS & - ERP systems allow companies to bring together diverse data into the management of a single software system.
CONS - It breaks down disparate information stores and bring that data into the management of a single software product

b. Modular and tiered architectures

- In subsequent software releases, ERP systems (and other business information systems) moved away from a
monolithic structure and embraced a modular architecture.
- Software with a modular structure breaks its functionality into different pieces which operate cooperatively.
PRINCIPLE - This modularity allows each of the different pieces to focus on one logical task in a system.
- This partitioning of a system into modules makes the software easier to develop, implement, and maintain.
- In a modular system that is tightly coupled each module is designed to work specifically with the other modules
that compose the system
- One common type of modular system is a tiered architecture.
TIERED - In a tiered architecture, not only is the overall system broken up into cooperative modules
- But the functionality is partitioned into tiers or layers which control the interaction within the system.

Each tier or layer provides functionality to other tiers or layers.

Note that as shown in Figure 4, each tier interacts with either 1 or 2 tiers.
INTERACT
ð Tier One interacts only with Tier Two
ð Whereas Tier Two interacts with both Tier One and Tier Three.

- It can be deployed on different computer hardware, improving the system’s power & performance
BENEFITS - Each tier can be designed, implemented, and maintained by different personnel.
- Tiers can be upgraded or changed independent of one another

1 THIER - Monolithic software systems can be thought of as a single-tiered architecture

c. 2 tier
In a two-tiered architecture, two software programs, typically based on different computers, operate cooperatively to accomplish
an intended purpose.

ð Perhaps the most commonly used example of a two-tiered structure is the fundamental architecture used by the WWW
ð When using the WWW, end users run a Web browser program on their computers.
ð Other parties set up Web servers to make Web pages and other related resources available.
ð The users’ Web browser program requests Web pages (and other resources) from remote Web server programs which
in turn transmit the requested data

This two-tiered architecture is very common in software systems and is often referred to as the client-server architecture. Within the
client-server architecture two totally independent software systems operate by passing information back and forth to accomplish a
given purpose.
d. 3 tier
The two-tiered architecture can be expanded to allow the addition of more tiers as necessary within a system.

ð In the WWW example above, a Web server might access a database server to retrieve
information—adding a third tier to the application and creating a three-tiered architecture,
ð In this case a request for a Web page is sent from the client Web browser to the Web server.
ð The Web server then requests information from the database server.
ð The database server supplies the Web server with the requested data, which the Web server
then incorporates into the response data that is transmitted back to the Web browser which
began the process.
 - In a tiered architecture one tier can only interact with direct neighbor tiers.
SECURITY
- This particular scenario illustrates one benefit of a tiered architecture : enhanced security.
A common three-tiered architecture involves the interaction of
ð A client tier : that is responsible for displaying information to the end user
INVOLVES
ð An application tier : which implements the logical functionality of the system
ð A database tier : which provides persistent storage of data used by the overall system.

e. N-tier
- Applications with more than three tiers may be created.
- These are often referred to as n-tiered architecture because any number of distinct software tiers can be combined
PRINCIPLE into a single system.
- The key element of these software products is that each of them stand alone and operate independently, yet they
receive information from other software tiers and pass information back in response.
- Multi-tiered applications are used for several reasons.
- By separating the overall functionality into multiple applications, it becomes easier to design, create, and manage
USE
each of these applications.
- Individual applications can be upgraded or replaced over time without disrupting the functionality of the other tiers.

3. From tiers to services

Within a multi-tiered architecture : One tier makes a request of another tier (by passing it a message)
The receiving tier acts on that request using its resources and functionality
TIERS And then responds to the request (by passing back a message).
In a multi-tiered architecture, each tier is specifically designed to produce and consume services for and from the
other tiers in the architecture. A key aspect of this design is that the various tiers tend to be tightly coupled.
- As multi-tiered architectures evolved over time, it was realized that instead of tightly integrating application tiers
together as a part of creating a single system, making these tiers more generic would allow a single application
to work in conjunction with multiple partners.
EVOLVE - This change in philosophy of how an application software product works in a system is the key characteristic of
a service-oriented architecture
à From being a specific provider of functionality to a limited number of tightly integrated partner applications
to being a generic provider of functionality to various diverse requesting applications
- Instead of an application being designed to interact with a limited number of partner applications, it could be
SERVICE- engineered to provide services to multiple other systems
ORIENTED - Creating an architecture based on providing services to multiple requestors—a service-oriented architecture.
ARCHITECTURE
- Within this architecture, each participating application in a system could be seen as a “service provider,”
“service consumer”, or, more typically, a combination of both.

4. Benefits of a service-oriented architecture

• Quality : If care is exercised in the creation of services and appropriate testing is done, service consumers have confidence that
the response received from a service request is accurate.
• Functionality reuse : By developing a generally useful set of services it becomes easier for the functionality provided by those
services to be used widely by service consumers and other service producers.
• Development through composition : Instead of creating software applications from scratch as a wholly new development,
applications can be created by composing operating logic based on established services.
• Flexibility : An application can be upgraded by simply changing out the use of a specific service instead of having to re-engineer
the entire system.
• Innovation : By speeding the overall software development process, services allow companies to more easily try new things and
create diverse applications to better meet their needs.
• Compliance insurance : By engineering individual services in accordance with company policies and operating procedures,
companies can ensure that applications built using these services will also conform to policies and operating procedures.
• Ease of integration : Since services operate in a uniform manner regardless of the requestor of the service, it becomes easier to
deploy company resources to other system participants, including customers, vendors, external service providers, etc.
 5. Architecture transition summary
From the above discussion it can be noted that over the past several decades the techniques for deploying enterprise information
systems has progressed through three different generations : The monolithic application era
The multi-tiered architecture era
The service-oriented application era.

B. Service-oriented Architecture (SOA) – Standardized elements

As noted in the previous section, the term “service-oriented architecture” can refer to both a general architectural design strategy
and a particular implementation of that design strategy. Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA) is one popular contemporary
implementation framework based on the principles of service-oriented architecture.

1. SOA Message Format : Extensible Mark-Up Langage (XML)

- What data format is used within request and response messages?
QUESTION - What format is used to structure the data moving back and forth between service provider and service requestor?
- The answer to both questions in the context of SOA is Extensible Mark-Up language (XML)
- XML is a tag-based language that facilitates the storage and transmission of structured information.
- It pairs data with tags that describe that data, more formally referred to as meta-information.
XLM
- By providing this descriptive meta-information, XML allows raw data to be more easily converted to usable
information.
- XML is similar to the more commonly familiar HTML in that both XML and HTML are mark-up languages that operate
by embedding tags within a document to provide context to its contents.
HTML
- Whereas HTML is primarily focused on document formatting and display, XML is focused on describing the data to
allow for more efficient and appropriate processing.

Within the above document tags such as <section> and <title> are properly
referred to as elements.
Elements describe the data contained within them—which are formally referred
to as contents.
Notice that elements are represented with tags (contained in < and >), and that
tags must be properly nested in a “well formed” XML document.

2. What a service does : Web Service Description Language (WSDL)

- How can the requestor find out what information must be sent to a service provider in order to have it operate
QUESTION correctly? How can the requestor know what information will be returned by the service?
- The answer to these questions is WSDL
- A WSDL document describes the format of inbound and outbound messages related to a particular service.
WSDL - In essence, a WSDL document tells a service consumer what information it must transmit to the service provider
and what information will be received in reply.

3. SOA Communication Methodology : SOAP

- How does the service communicate?
QUESTION
- What methodology is used to send a request to a service, and what methodology will it use to send its reply?
- SOAP is the protocol commonly used within SOA for the transmission and receipt for service-related messages
between service producers and consumers.
- In the context of computing, a protocol is an agreed upon method of structuring communication.
SOAP
- SOAP packets are built containing XML content. These packets then typically move between service producer and
consumer using HTTP (same transmission protocol that is used by the WWW.)
- Other protocols such as SMTP (used for email transport) are also possible.

4. SOA finding available service : Services registry

- How can potential service consumers find out about services that are available to them?
QUESTION
- How can potential service consumers know what a service does?
- A services registry lists various services that are available from a given service provider.
- Service registries are built using Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration (UDDI)
SERVICE
REGISTRY
- Service providers will document the services they make available using UDDI, and place them within a service
registry.
- Designers of applications can consult the services registry to determine what services may fit their applications.
 5. Why IT Project Management is Different?
I. The importance of the IT Project Management
This is a very important topic for companies for 4 main reasons :
1) Companies spend enormous amount of money on IT project management : Thus, gaining a deep understanding of IT project
management is actually critical.
2) Many reports by different consulting firms in the field of IT revealed that about 2/3 of IT projects fail to reach their expected
objectives.
3) Investment in IT constitutes the first most important investment that is recommended :
ð Improving technology is currently the N°1 investment priority.
ð 27% of the respondents answered that their top priority in terms of investment will go to Information Technology.
ð Now imagine the costs that this might cause when you know that a typical large IT project for a multinational firm could
cost millions of dollars.
4) When IS collapse, the reverberations on the operations of companies are immediate and this is remarkably serious.

Two examples to illustrate how important is IT :

Example 1 : The modernization of the Business Systems of the IRSR (Internal Revenue Service in the US)
ð The IT project was launched in 1999 with the aim to upgrade the agency’s IT infrastructure that had more than 100 business applications.
ð The IRS has too many applications and wanted to integrate them and this is a great objective.
ð The IRS tried to mobilize too many teams of known vendors with an $8 billion US budget.
ð For the IRS management, these were sufficient conditions for the project to be successful. Unfortunately, they were wrong because of
management issues of too many stakeholders with no clear accountability.
As a consequence, the agency’s ability to gather revenue, conduct audits, and search for after tax evaders was harshly damaged.
This is probably one of the most severe failures of an IT project in history as it costed the treasury of USA tens of billions of dollars and no concrete
business value.

Example 2 : The second example is from one of the worst scenarios that could happen in IT project management.
The story took place in Australia where the company Sydney Water initiated a large IT project to modernize and consolidate its IT systems.
ð Sydney Water has a very complex IT architecture and wanted to renew its delayed by 18 months and it notably exceeded the initial budget
by more than fourfold.
ð To give you an idea of the financial damage that happened: analysts estimated that this project needs at least 37 years to achieve its ROI
ð Thus, because of these reasons, we need to develop our understanding of IT project management.

This session has 3 main objectives : Define what IT project management is about
Understand the most important pillars of IT project management
Understand the most important roles associated with IT project management

II. What IT project management is about

- A project is a temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product, service, or result (PMI, 2008).
- Project management can be defined as the activity of planning organizing and attributing responsibilities for
PROJECT
the achievement of an organization' detailed objectives.
- Organizations have generally dozens and even hundreds of projects on a continuous basis.
- IT project management : It is the application of knowledge, skills technologies, and techniques to successfully
IT PROJECT
MANAGEMENT
complete specific IT projects within time and under budget.
- IT project management is both an art and a science.
- Contrary to what most people think, IT project management is not only a technological endeavor.
SKILLS
- IT project management needs creativity, psychological, financial, management and of course IT skills
- In effect, projects are not like operations.
- They could be similar, as both operations and projects integrate HR, physical resources and that there are
PROJECT AND
OPERATIONS
similar steps like execution and assessment.
- Operations are daily and ongoing tasks that are being repeated continuously (ànot the case for an IT project)
- IT projects are unique endeavors that have a specific start, a specific end and are not intended to be renewed.
- Then, IT projects are always associated with organizational change.
- For instance, implementing an ERP is not just an IT project where you change the software that you use for
ORGANIZATIONAL procurement and logistics but it is about a complete redesign of your business processes.
CHANGE - On top of that, unlike other projects where you can see the tangible output that indicate the state of
progression, it is somehow hard to make sense of the level of advancement of an IT project, as the application
is only ready after the implementation.
EXAMPLE OF IT • Implementing an ERP ; Moving to an application on the cloud ; Implementing a Datawarehouse
PROJECT • Moving from a client server architecture to a three-tier architecture
 III. The 5 key pillars of the IT project management
A. Scope
- Scope is very important as it defines what is included in the project and what is not.
PRINCIPLE
- This parameter needs to be carefully thought and communicated to all the stakeholders involved in the project.
- In general, the higher the scope of the IT project is, the harder it will be to achieve the project on time.
- Example: suppose that your organization has complex legacy systems with undocumented linkages between its
HIGHER
SCOPE
different key applications. In such case, the IT project manager needs to define exactly which critical applications
are concerned and which are not concerned.
- Leaving such questions unanswered could lead to project failure.

B. Time
Time is tremendously important too. Companies have generally many projects and need to decide on the most urgent project to
start with and thus need to decide to delay others.
ð IT project management is not done for the purpose of IT but to achieve specific business goals.
ð Thus, the more the IT project is delayed, the more delay is caused for the associated business goals.
ð This could cause troubles for companies from a competition standpoint and companies can lose important opportunities
in the market.
Generally, companies consider five main phases in executing IT projects:
- It is about articulating the IT project in business words.
DEFINING - Putting it simply, it is about telling the usefulness of this IT project from a business standpoint.
THE GOALS - For example, if your organization is considering implementing an ERP, it is important that you associate the IT
project with goals such as cost reduction, harmonization of business processes, and reaching better efficiency
PLANNING - This is a very important step as IT projects are generally split in very specific tasks with adapted milestones and
THE IT deadlines. Sticking to deadlines is very important as we do not need to forget that as IT is implemented, there is
PROJECT
a business that needs to continue running and that there are customers that need to be attended.
EXECUTING
- This phase is also fundamental.
THE IT
PROJECT - It is generally about design, development, implementation and go live.
CLOSING
- This step indicates that the objectives of the IT project were met and that the ad-hoc team and resources allocated
THE IT
PROJECT to the project have finished to enable the project team to go back to its core job.
- As you know, IT cost a substantial amount of financial resources.
EVALUATING
- Thus, many CIO and/or Chief Digital Officers are asked by their Chief Financial Officers to report on the degree
THE IT
PROJECT to which the IT team respected the deadlines and the budget of the IT project, and whether the company is on
the right track to benefit from the expected business value.

C. Quality
DEFINITION It can be defined as the degree to which the IT project answers the needs of the end-users.
Generally, the quality associated with an IT project is understood in terms of:
- Performance of the executions of the functions : how long does it take for a function to be executed?
- Functionality for end-users : do the different function answer the business needs of end-users
- Usefulness of the features : are the features easy to understand and to navigate
FACTORS - Easiness of use : that is associated with the degree to which there are icons and visual indicators that help the user
navigate the application
- Reliability of the application: in other words, is the data kept safe, do we have errors, etc.?
- Easiness of the upgrade and/maintenance of the application: is it easy to move to new versions or is there a new
learning curve for end-users?

D. Expectations
- Expectations are associated with end-users.
END - You need to know that with any IT project, there is always an important group of stakeholders called end-users.
USERS - End-users are very important because they are the most important evaluators of the quality of an IT project.
- Basically, end-users have information needs in order to meet their business goals.
- For instance, the Chief Marketing Officer and the marketing department of an international company need to use a CRM application
that will be integrated with the Supply Chain Management solution
EXAMPLE
- The teams of marketing and supply chain will be the major representatives of end-users and will be able to tell whether this
integration has enabled them to enhance their capacity to make better, faster and more reliable business decisions.
- Another example, if the quality that is provided is different from the one that is actually expected, there are significant
EXAMPLE chances that the IT project will not finish on time. In effect, there will be certainly many emergent and unplanned
rounds of specifications of the needs of end- users.
 E. Costs
- CFO and CEO always look at this parameter in order to make decisions and give the green light for the project
- CFOs and CEOs always ask the classic question about the ROI and the payback period.
IMPORTANCE - They want to know to what extent the business will benefit from such investment and when this will happen.
- Moreover, they can also ask to what extent this investment will enable them to achieve a competitive advantage
and whether this competitive advantage will be a lasting one.
- They generally ask the classic questions to the IT project leader who has the challenge to avoid budget overrun.
GOAL - Now that you know better the five pillars associated with IT project management, you need to keep in mind that
these five parameters are not isolated from one another. Rather they are highly correlated.

Generally speaking, the cost of an IT project includes 3 main parts :

THE - The capital is about the financial resources spent to acquire the IT related assets
CAPITAL - That appear on the balance sheet of the company and that depreciate as time goes by.
- Expenses are all the items that do not go under depreciation and that have a short lifecycle once they are spent.
THE Some of the most important expenses are: Consultant fees – training - travel expenses
EXPENSES - If you buy a cloud-based software for CRM, for instance, your investment is considered as an expense and not as
an asset, as previously mentioned.
- Organizations can also use internal cross-charges in order to calculate the cost of employees who are assigned to
INTERNAL-
a specific IT project over a given period of time.
CROSS
CHARGES - The rationale with that kind of decisions is to appreciate the investment in IS from an economic standpoint while
aligning it with the evolution of the nature of effort allocation of employees all through the organization.
Each organization can have its own choices between these three approaches. The choice will depend on the budgeting and
controlling mechanisms that organizations have internally.

IV. The major roles within IT projects

For any organization to succeed in its IT projects, there are many roles that need to be contemplated to enable an effective
collaboration. These roles are:
- These are generally business executives sponsoring an IT project.
PROJECT - They aim to meet a specific objective.
SPONSORS
- For instance, the Chief Marketing Officer could serve as the sponsor of an IT project that aims at implementing a multi-channel
communication platform for customers through the classic tools and the social media tools such as Twitter, Facebook, Insta…
- Generally, project managers are seasoned employees with a prior experience in IT project management.
- They are chosen by the management and trusted to form a team to manage the IT project from the initiation to
PROJECT the assessment step.
MANAFER - They make key decisions such as project business value estimate, staffing, budgeting, scheduling.
- In addition, they have the responsibility of keeping a permanent track of the ongoing project progress
- And they can take potential remedies if needed.
PROJECT In this category, we have two specific profiles:
TEAM • Technical professionals : who are responsible for the project implementation.
MEMBERS
• Business managers : Who calculate, anticipate, and make sense of the business value
PROJECT
- This is a very important group as it contains key user representatives who have the responsibility to make critical
STEERING
COMMITTEE decisions regarding the scope of project, any potential change in project scope, etc.
BUSINESS - Business analyst is the one who analyzes a company business, processes, systems…
ANALYST - In order to assess the extent to which new IT can be integrated and generate a business value.
PROJECT
CHAMPIONS
- Senior-level executives who act as advocates for a project.
END-USERS - Provide inputs regarding business needs, project scoping, testing…

V. Conclusion
Before ending, you need to understand that IT projects are never just about IT. There are systematically business stakes and
challenges associated with IT projects.

For this reason, the majority of successful IT projects include a fundamental phase that is change management.
ð Change management services are offered by many consulting firms in management and IT.
ð The objective is to make sure that end-users (such as employees) are making sense of the needed internal changes that
need to take place in order to get the most out of the new technology.
 6. How can we catch-up with a runaway project ?
2e asynchronous session : Session 6!

I. Wy should we care about IT project management

CIO (Chief Information System Officer) : Person who is in charge of the IT system in the firm

Case study : Measure the performance of the CIO Jim Barton ?

- Jim was able to make a decision
- He tried to find solutions
- He admitted failure
GREAT
- He tried to build team
- Listen the team and ask feedback, even if they are not in the IT department
- Very structured and open to new opportunities
- He tried to integrate both business and IT people
- He didn’t know about the IR project before the meeting with the top management
REASONABLE
- He had a lack of knowledge in IT, but he tried to overcome it
- Understand how IT could enhance the performance of the
- He didn’t know the real cost of the IR project $3M
- He didn’t come up with a concrete solution
POOR - He doesn’t trust his own IT department
- He underestimates the time and the benefit of the IR project
- Not come up to any solution and he is relying on the other (not leading) : No explanation to the problems

II. Criteria of assessment of an IT project

Assess what went wrong in the project :
BUSINESS VALUE CRITERION - All about money ($)
PEOPLE CRITERION - It involves all the stakeholders who were involved in the project
LEADERSHIP CRITERION - You tackle all the people that are in the leadership for the project
IT ARCHITECTURE CRITERION - What are the foundations, the skeleton of the IT?
BUSINESS PRIORITY CRITERION - Ask if the project is strategic (important) to the firm or not (not important)

Case application :
BUSINESS - There was no business value with the IR projects.
VALUE
CRITERION - No one was able to explain/justify the ROI associated with the $3M spent on the IR project
PEOPLE - Users involvement :Users were not involved in this important project that was separated from the mainstream business
CRITERION - Consultant : Had no value in mind when they sold the IR project, and they didn’t say the project was a failure
- There was a total absence of leadership in the IR project
LEADERSHIP
CRITERION
- Despite the technical expertise of the previous CIO Davis he fell in communicating, motivating people, coordinating and sharing
information
IT - The existing technical environment was based on Microsoft but the technical competences of Netfiects was limited to the Unix-
ARCHITECTURE
CRITERION based technologies and Unix technical environment
- Paradoxically and despite its importance, initially this project was not a priority for the top management in IVK
BUSINESS
PRIORITY
- Actually, this is a strategic error
- In real life, IT is always not considered as important, no one care about IT so they don’t want to invest in wind (only an expense)

III. Lessons
Do you support Barton decision to fire the system integrator Netifects ?
YES - Netifect doesn’t show any monetary value…
- Barton didn’t manage to find any alternative before firing Netifect : Don’t know where to go after firing it.
NO
- Netifect has a major reputation
 IV. IT development Method
How to develop an IT application :
DEVELOPMENT STAGE PURPOSE INPUTS PROCESS OUTPUT
Initiation :
Why and how is the system to be
developed?
Analysis :
What should the system do?
Design :
How will the system deliver
requirement
Development :
Programming and configuring the
system
Implementation :
Installing and testing the system.
Changeover from the old to the
new system
Maintenance :
Monitoring and revising the system

V. Execution of the IT development method

A. Waterfall Method

- Easy to manage, to implement

PROS
- Steps are predictable
- Time consuming
- The more I figure out the pb, the costlier it will be
CONS
- Tunnel effect between developers & end-users
- Loss of importance of task

The requirements need to be fulfilled one after the other

Good if you have limited time, budget…

B. The agile method

PROS - Scalable, iterative, user oriented

CONS -
 7. IT Project Management Extended
I. When Employees are using a non-approved software
Digital transformation that starts in the CEO office often turns into a mega project that everyone has to be a part of. The trouble
with this is that mega projects take a long time to deliver, and by the time they do deliver, what they provide may well be obsolete.
Meanwhile, out on the front lines, real managers need something they can use today in order to defend the business. Some
executives pull out their personal credit cards to pay the bills.
ð In some cases, when shadow IT solutions come to light, the CIO will shut them down completely, sometimes triggering an
early departure by the frustrated business unit executives involved. That may at times be an appropriate response,
ð Sometimes IT adopt an open-minded approach and successfully work with the rogue unit to help secure data, standardize
APIs, and ultimately assemble solutions that combine internal and external services

For the second case, applying the following 2 rules will help CIOs in a better place to anticipate and manage shadow IT projects :
1) Identify where you need to be best in class :
ð Then let line-of-business leaders decide whether to outsource or insource the best-in-class solutions that they need.
ð This may result in a split IT function, where :
• A central IT unit manages legacy structural projects
• A dedicated agile team manages digital and innovation, competing with external providers for business from the business units.
ð This flexible approach should help reduce the number of nasty IT surprises because IT will at least be part of the sourcing process for new
projects.

2) Start small everywhere else and stay out of the box :

ð CIOs are often tempted to go for total solutions from big suppliers, but as we’ve seen this usually means they end up missing the bus.
ð It’s worth reflecting on the fact that in many industries, the best IT solutions providers are narrowly focused on a specific problem.
ð We would recommend that CIOs take a similar approach : rather than try and solve a lot of problems at the same time but too late, try to
fix specific problems quickly by working with specialized vendors.
ð Working in this way you preserve the ability to swap out for new and better solutions as they materialize.

Applying these rules will transform the forward-looking part of the IT function from being the owner and controller of solution
deployment to the “orchestrator” of an ecosystem of suppliers (including itself).
ð Admittedly this adds some degree of chaos but compared to forcing rollouts of multi-year solutions that don’t really serve
the business well today, this may be best choice for the immediate business needs.
ð In this new role as “orchestrator,” IT becomes a partner and a coach to the line of business, helping them to select vendors,
properly design APIs, and ensure an appropriate level of security.

II. The Agile method

A. Introduction – Agile : How to Get in the Game
Agile a mindset and a method for improving innovation through deep customer collaboration and adaptive testing and learning.
ð Agile teams are small, cross-functional, fully dedicated work groups
ð They focused on creating innovative improvements to customer products and services, the business processes that produce
them, and the technologies that enable those processes
ð Each team has an “owner” who is ultimately responsible for delivering value to customers, and a “coach” who helps the team
continuously improve its speed, effectiveness, and happiness

Team members break complex problems into small modules and then start building working versions of potential solutions in short
cycles (less than a month) known as sprints.
ð Team members hold brief daily “stand-up” meetings to review progress and identify roadblocks.
ð They resolve disagreements through experimentation and feedback rather than endless debates or appeals to authority.
ð They test small working prototypes of part or all of the offering with a few customers for short periods of time (if customer is
excited, they release the prototype immediately even if some senior executives isn’t fan)
ð The team then brainstorms ways to improve future cycles and prepares to attack the next top priority.

Problem : Managers launch countless initiatives with urgent deadlines instead of assigning the highest priority to two or three.
ð They spread themselves and their best people across too many projects rather than concentrating everyone’s energy on full-
time, focused teams
ð Too many companies suffer from too much bureaucracy (standardized way of doing things) and not enough innovation
ð They have created static business system, that aren’t capable of adapting to dynamic markets
The solutions to this problem come with IT and the agile method :
ð Agile increases team productivity and employee satisfaction.
ð It minimizes the waste inherent in redundant meetings, repetitive planning, excessive documentation, quality defects, and low-
value product features.
ð By improving visibility and continually adapting to customers’ changing priorities, agile boosts customer engagement and
satisfaction, brings the most valuable products and features to market faster and more predictably, and reduces risk
ð When agile engages team members from multiple disciplines as collaborative peers, it broadens organizational experience
and builds mutual trust and respect.

B. Why agile goes awry and how to fix it

1. Problem formulation
In the spirit of becoming more adaptive, organizations have rushed to implement agile software development.
ð But many have done so in a way that actually makes them less agile
ð The process they’ve put in place often ends up hurting engineering motivation and productivity.

Frameworks for adaptive software development like agile have been around for a long time and have manifested in many forms.
But at the heart of most of these models are two things
• Forming hypotheses (for example, what is a feature supposed to accomplish?)
• Collaborating across domains of expertise on experiments : all in the spirit of driving learning and not careening down a path
that proves to be incorrect.

2. The 4 principles of Agile

When Agile was born in 2001, it articulated a set of four critical principles to elevate the craft of software development and improve
engineering and product manager motivation :
1) Individuals and interactions over processes and tools : in reality, processes and tools have become the driver of work, and not
individuals and interactions
2) Working software over comprehensive documentation : In reality, documentation often trumps working software
3) Customer collaboration over contract negotiation :
4) Responding to change over following plan : This is often misinterpreted to mean “don’t have a plan” (for example the agile
teams didn’t try to understand the strategy of the organization), and without plan and without a plan, teams won’t know how
to prioritize actions, and how to invest in those actions responsibly.

3. Why Agile Process go awry

Agile is supposed to improve engineering motivation and performance, but we have found that in practice, the opposite happens.
Because they’re not allowed to experiment, manage their own work, and connect with customers, they feel little sense of play,
potential, and purpose; instead they feel emotional and economic pressure to succeed, or inertia.

Agile processes go awry, because as companies strive for high performance, they become either :
• Too tactical : Focusing too much on process and micromanagement
• Too adaptive : Avoiding long-term goals, timelines, or cross-functional collaboration
The key is balancing both tactical and adaptive performance

4. Solutions to avoid this

a. Software development should be a no-handoff, collaborative process
Rather than a process where one person writes requirements (even small ones) while another executes them, software development
should be a collaborative process.In a no-handoff process, the product manager and the engineers (and any other stakeholders)
are collaborative partners from beginning to end in designing a feature :
1) The team should articulate the team’s strategic challenges : Questions about how improving some customer outcomes,
and every person is asked to contribute ideas to each challenge
2) The team develop and mature an idea collaboratively

b. The Team’s Unit of Delivery Should Be Minimally Viable Experiments

Teams often find they waste time by adapting too much. To avoid this, not only should ideas be formed for a strategic challenge,
they should also be executed with fast experiments. In order to reduce wasted effort and increase the team’s decision rights,
experiments should be short in nature. If possible, an experiment should be no longer than a week.
 c. The team approach should be customer-centric
The process of building software should be customer-oriented, and follow this guideline :
• Challenges are always framed around customer impact.
• Problem-solving meetings always start with a customer update, and representatives are included frequently in these discussions.
• Every experiment is built around a customer centric hypothesis.
• Customers must see by their own eyes how customer uses their products

d. Use time boxes to focus experimentation and avoid waste

Typical agile practitioners avoid time boxes or deadlines, for fear that the deadline will be used to create emotional pressure. To
avoid this outcome, be clear about how far an engineer should go before checking to see if the direction is still correct.
ð With that in mind, the time box isn’t a deadline.
ð It is a constraint that should guide the level of depth and quality for an experiment before a real test

e. The team should be organized to emphasize collaboration

To make sure you end up with a no-handoff process, the various stakeholders involved should function as a single cross-functional
team, also known as a “pod” in order to drive collaboration.

f. The team should constantly Question its process

A famous maxim of engineering design is known as Conway’s law. It states that any organization that designs a system will produce
a design whose structure is a copy of the organization’s communication (that is, process) structure (monolithic firm = m. process)
In order to avoid the Conway’s law, team should always question its process and try other things

5. Takeaways
In the rush to become more adaptive, some companies have implemented agile in a way that actually makes them less agile, like
misinterpreting “responding to change over following a plan” to mean “we don’t need a plan.”

To be agile in more than name only :

√ Develop a no-handoff process where the product manager, engineers, and other stakeholders collaborate from beginning to end.

√ Create teams that contain the full set of experts needed to deliver on your goal

√ Focus on short experiments (no longer than a week) : To reduce wasted effort and increase the team’s decision rights.

√ Keep customers at the center of everything : From observing them using products to starting every meeting with customer updates.

√ Use time boxes to guide the level of depth and quality for experiments.

C. How to make sure that agile teams can work together ?

VUCA have created a business environment in which agile collaboration is more critical than ever : Organizations need to be
continually on the lookout for new market developments and competitive threats, identifying essential experts and nimbly forming
and disbanding teams to help tackle those issues quickly.

Collaboration is central to agility, yet most organization don’t manage internal collaboration. We found that agility at the point of
execution is typically created through group level networks, that gather all sort of workers.

These and other lateral networks provide agility when they are nurtured along four dimensions

1. Managing the network’s center

When agility is viewed through a network lens, it becomes apparent that collaboration is never equally distributed : We typically
see that 20%–35% of valuable collaborations come from only 3%–5% of employees.

In order to avoid this, senior leaders need to :

• Encourage overwhelmed employees to redistribute collaborative work
• Understand how employees have ended up overwhelmed : And if it is a result of formal position or personal characteristics, in
order to reduce overload.
• Map the interdependencies between different teamswhere your central players contribute : In order to plan for potential risk
(when a star sits at the center of multiple projects, a surprise shock in one team can create nasty ripples in another team.
 2. Engaging the network’s Fringe Player
Agility requires the integration of different capabilities and perspectives to understand VUCA issues and figure out what kinds of
experts are needed to tackle them. But those who see the world differently or who are new to a group often languish at the network
edges, whereas those in the center may be overrelied on.

It can take three to five years for a newcomer to replicate the connectivity of a high performer, so to avoid this :
• Create a “hidden gems” program to help unearth high potential but overlooked experts : Who could take some of the burden
off overworked central players
• Help those on the fringe to create “pull” for their work : Instead of pushing expertise on others across the network, these
employees need to be seen as a strategic resource to be pulled into opportunities
• Pair newcomers and network influencers through staffing or mentoring.
• Create inclusive and trusting environments to facilitate agile collaboration.

3. Bridging Select Silos

Every organization we studied struggled with silos across functions, expertise, geography, level, and cultures. The network lens can
help uncover specific points that, if crossed, could yield agility benefits, rather than inefficiently bridging all silos.
ð Often, this means connecting people across units or geographies doing similar work to yield benefits of scale
ð Or identifying points where integrating different perspectives yields agile innovation
This type of multidisciplinary collaboration produces higher revenues and profits because it tackles higher-value problems

Senior leaders can help motivate experts with the following actions :
• Set specific goal and reward agile collaboration
• Use data and analytics to understand where silos exists, in order to unlock possible agile collaboration
• Identify experts scattered across silos and key cross-points in the firm for agile collaboration

4. Spanning External Boundaries

Agility thrives when employees understand their organization within the broader ecosystem and continually scan for market
developments that pose either threats or opportunities. Doing so requires dynamic knowledge of external parties of the firm.
ð Those who span the boundary between internal and external actors can solve problems in unique ways, because they can access
knowledge from these different worlds
ð They can also facilitate agile collaboration by efficiently integrating disparate viewpoints and creating multistakeholder solutions.

Senior leaders can help facilitates this by doing the following :

• Identify and enlist boundary spanners to help tackle vexing problems : Can provide rapid solutions since they have access to it quickly
• Nurture relationship and promote the exchange of information by organizing forums or special events that convene key players from
across the ecosystem : Helps to create more people in your organization capable of functioning as bridge.
• Promote connectivity to key external stakeholders : Performing organization are more likely to encourage interactions with external
stakeholders

5. Takeaways
Collaboration is central to agility, yet most work is done by combinations of colleagues that don’t report up the same formal ladder
or share standard processes.

To enjoy true benefits of scale and improve collaboration, the firm should :
√ Mapping interdependencies between teams to understand and plan for potential risks
√ Drawing in fringe players by creating a “hidden gems” program to help unearth high-potential but overlooked experts
√ Matching capabilities to needs across the network : Pairing newcomers and network influencers through staffing or mentoring;
and creating inclusive and trusting environments
√ Connecting people doing similar work by setting specific goals and rewarding collaboration; using data and analytics to
understand where silos exist; and establishing communities of practice to share expertise and resources
√ Staying vigilant about overload, considering where it might hinder collaboration and redistributing work accordingly
√ Understanding your organization within the broader ecosystem and scanning for market developments that pose threats or
opportunities
 8. Introducing Business Process Mapping (BPM)
I. Introduction to Business processes and BPM
- This is a very important topic as behind any business success there are critical and well-crafted business processes.
PRINCIPLE - Processes are at the heart of organizations’ success.
- Following the same way of reasoning, many failures are explained by ill-designed business processes.
- In order to enable you to make sense of business processes let us take one concrete example to start with.
- When you rent an apartment on AirBnb, you do not care about the business processes or the functions that were triggered in order
to make the rent operation a success.
- Basically, you only care about getting the best apartment in the area you are looking for with the best price.
EXAMPLE
- This operation of renting a home illustrates perfectly what we refer to as a business process.
ð Basically, you have an ensemble of steps that start with you typing the name of your destination.
ð Then, there are many additional steps that are orchestrated in a perfect way to help you reaching the very final step that is you
paying your trip and receiving a confirmation.
- Many among you are already familiar with the function aspects of organizations : I mean many among you already know
what finance, marketing, sales, human resources or operations management are about.
- These are functional areas of the organization that have human, financial, physical resources, duties…
- All these areas need to talk to each other within an organization
PROCESS
- They can only do so if there are business processes that enable them to interact and to collaborate in an efficient way.
- This is why processes cut across the functional areas of the firm.
- There are many kinds of business processes that companies rely on in order to serve their customers, manage their
employees, and interact with their exchange partners such as their suppliers.
BUSINESS
PROCESS
Coherent ensemble of activities that are performed by a collaborating group of people in order to achieve a specific organizational goal.
There are many organizational goals associated with business process, for instance :
• Make to stock process : Producing goods and then stocking them in large warehouses.
GOALS • Make-to-order process : Shipping the products that were ordered.
• Shopping process : Shopping a particular book online.
• Problem resolution : Managing a complaint that a customer posted on the Facebook page of a brand.

II. 5 key common points of Business Process

- First, in any business process, there is always a very specific activity related to it.
- This activity can be about people and/or machine doing things.
SPECIFIC
ACTIVITY - For instance, ordering is an activity and there are specific business processes associated with it.
- Another example is support. Consider that your company bought the right to use a specific software, such as a service from a
cloud provider but the software is inaccessible. You can initiate the support process by calling the support number.
- In a business process, there is always an input and an output.
- For instance, for the procurement process, you generally start by negotiating with you supplier and you end by paying your
INPUT &
OUTPUT supplier once you have received the goods that your ordered.
- Another example is when you manufacture a product, you start by sourcing the raw material, which is the primary input. At the
end, you manufacture the final goods. This is the goal of your business process.
- Third, any activity handled by a business process enables the creation of something or the change of something.
CREATION - In other words, any business process has to entail what we call a benefit or an added value.
- Thus, if there is a business process out of which there is no benefit, there must be a problem somewhere.
- Business processes that are devised by those who designed them.
2
CATEGORIES
- Business processes that are applied by those who are expected to apply them.
OF BP - Thus, you can have the best business process on earth, but failure in the appropriate implementation of a business process can
lead probably to different outcomes compared to those expected initially.
- Fifth, any business process integrates a group of people
INTEGRATION - A process typically involves many collaborators who join their efforts to reach a specific goal.
- We call these collaborators actors who interact with many other actors to fulfill the business process in question.

III. What Business Process Management is about

BPM : Achievement of an organization’s objectives through the improvement, management and control of essential business processes.
- BPM is a method that enables formalizing and enhancing the process.
WHAT IS BPM - BPM can also be seen as a technology that enables the implementation of processes by making them visible and
enabling their assessment through specific metrics.
BUSINESS - In organizations, business analysts play important roles, as they are profoundly involved in analyzing and
ANALYSTS enhancing business processes
- Technology can help you portray the flow of work and of information associated with a given business process.
TECHNOLOGY - There are documents associated with these processes that have to be stored.
- Managing business processes is part of the job of managers and leadership of organizations.
 IV. 5 important things about BPM
Actually, there are five important things that you need to keep in mind when it comes to BPM:
- Thus, organizations do not enact a business process and then stick to it forever.
BPM IS AN
ONGOING ACT
- Change is a permanent characteristic in internal and external environments of organizations
- So BPM needs to evolve as organizations and their environment evolve too.
BPM IS NOT JUST
ABOUT MODELING
- BPM is actually about modeling, implementing, executing and assessing
BPM IS NOT
THE ONLY - Employees from all levels should be integrated in this act.
RESPONSIBILITY - Reluctance : If employees do not make sense of business processes or were not involved in setting them up
OF MANAGERS
- As you will see in class, the use of the software will be the last step.
BPM IS NOT A - The most important thing when it comes to BPM is to think about them correctly before drawing them with
QUESTION OF the appropriate software.
SOFTWARE
- Thus, if business processes are analyzed in the wrong way, you can use the latest and the most comprehensive
BPM software but the likelihood that you get a benefit out of this business process will be very low.
BPM HAS TO BE - I mean that effective BP are effective because they are adapted to a particular environment in a given context.
COMPREHENDED ð Let’s assume that the environment in question will be subject to an evolution.
IN AN AGILE WAY
ð Then, the business process has to be reconsidered to match the evolution in question.

BP Modeling : It is the act of representing both the current status “As-is” and the future desired status “To-Be” processes of an
organization in way that the current status is analyzed and then enhanced.

V. Business Process Reengineering (BPR)

- Many scholars from different disciplines including IS, management, operations, etc. wrote about BPR.
- If BPR has received so much attention, it is because companies have been dealing with systematic and complex
PRINCIPLE
changes that affect their day-to-day operations.
- Companies have a huge pressure from different stakeholders who invite them to permanent transformation.
- “Fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of business process to achieve dramatic improvement in critical
BPR contemporary measures of performance, such as cost, quality, service and speed” (HAMMER, 1990)
DEFINITIONS
- “Form of organizational change characterized by strategic transformation of interrelated organizational
subsystems producing varied levels of impacts” (KETTINGER, 1997)
- BPR became very popular in the 1990s
GOAL - It is based on the rationale that radical redesign of business processes can be essential in order to reduce costs,
to improve quality or to keep customers satisfied.
MOST - BPR can be considered as the most extreme form of a change for a given business process.
EXTREME - Basically, once business processes are set-up, there are incremental improvements that can be achieved before
FORM
considering the radical change of the BP in question.

VI. The 3 different level of change associated with BPR

A. Business Process Automation (BPA)
- Here the objective is to automate one task or more within the existing business process.
OBJECTIVE
- For instance, using a software to manage a particular workflow enables the acceleration of the process.
We could take the example of the submission of a loan application for a commercial bank.
- Instead of assigning an analyst to make sense of each submission, banks can implement a workflow software that will analyze the
main attributes and calculate the potential risk associated with the submitter.
EXAMPLE
- Thus, initial screening of submissions will be automated and will no longer need human intervention at first
- We can imagine that this will enhance the ability of the commercial bank to provide an initial answer to the potential customer
and to let him or her know whether the process could be continued or not.
- Generally, there are few risks associated with BPA, as pay-off is generally achieved.
RISK
- Existing personnel can react negatively mainly if downsizing is an option when putting in place the BPA

B. Business Process Innovation (BPI)

IDEA - To go beyond automation and think about how to improve the process in order to deal with existing shortcomings.
For example, let us consider a retailer who used to manage the complaints of his customers through his website.
ð The retailer has figured out that with the introduction of social media, many customers started posting their complaints
EXAMPLE ð However, the problem is that the retailer did not have any process to integrate customers’ feedback received
ð Thus, the retailer contemplated integrating the customer voice by moving from a CRM application to a social CRM application by
monitoring, managing and responding to what customers are saying about the retailer on popular social media
RISK - Here the risk is average, as you might need less HR to handle the complaints of your customers
 C. Business Process Reengineering
- Now BPR is the third category of Business Process Reengineering.
- With BPR, the question is no longer about automation or about simple innovation.
PRINCIPLE
- Rather, it is about rethinking your existing business processes in a radical way with the hope to obtain important
improvement in critical key performance indicators such as cost, speed or quality.
For instance, we can take the case of a large industrial company that has many different unconnected platforms that manage different
functional areas of the organization :
ð The problem is that there is no communication between these platforms since they use technologies that do not talk to each
EXAMPLE other. This leads to many errors, redundancy and duplication of efforts.
ð Let’s assume that the company decide to implement an ERP software to manage all its applications, all its functional areas and all
its locations, all its employees and all its suppliers.
ð This will enable a radical transformation of business processes.
- In this situation, risks are generally high as you generate a deep change in the way employees work and in the ways
RISK
functional areas collaborate among each other.

VII. Six key steps associated with BPR

These steps are based on the framework suggested by William Kettinger and his colleagues in their MIS Quarterly paper about BPR

A. Envision
- The objective is to start by establishing the vision by asking the question about the key business process or
OBJECTIVE business processes that need to be reconsidered.
- In other words, we need to find the areas that need to be reengineered.
- These areas could be the ones that give the least satisfaction to specific stakeholders
FIND AREAS
- Or they could be the areas that are the most promising for the success of the organization.
- Once, there is a need to find-out a BPR project champion who will benefit from the support of top management.
- Generally, the BPR champion needs to form a task force to tackle this mission.
FIND BPR - This task force ideally should include senior management, managers and individuals who are knowledgeable
CHAMPIONS about the firm’s processes.
- The role of this task force is to target the business process for improvement after taking into account the business
priorities and the IT opportunities that exist.

B. Initiation
- In this step, the goal is to inform all the stakeholders who are directly and indirectly involved in the BPR initiative.
OBJECTIVE
- The objective of this stage is to get the buy-in from the senior management.
Generally, the most important output of this step is to generate a business case for the reengineering project.
ð It can be done for instance by developing a benchmark with previous cases of BPR from other industrial contexts.
BUSINESS
CASE
ð It could also be done by comparing with a competitor who did a comparable BPR.
ð We can also profit from a recent technology and benefit from the first mover advantage by radically reconsidering
our processes.
- At this stage, the reengineering team is composed and the project is planned.
TEAM
- This step is then ended by agreeing on the performance goals expected from the BPR operation

C. Diagnosis
- Here, you need to understand who the process owner is.
OBJECTIVE
- I mean who is the primary stakeholder interested in the success of your BPR (CMO, CEO, COO…).
- Generally, the BPR team analyzes the current step in terms of attributes such as activities, resources,
ANALYTICAL communication, IT, and cost.
WORK - Through this analytical work, the BPR team can reveal the causes of the problems that led to the BPR.
- The BPR can also enable the identification of the activities that do not add value to the overall process.
OUTCOME - The outcome of this step is to simply reveal what is wrong with the existing process.

D. Redesign
- At this step, the objective is to come up with a new proposition of processes and/or subprocesses.
OBJECTIVE
- There is a lot of brainstorming and creativity associated with this step.
- At the end of this stage, the outcome is to : Generate the new prototype of the new process
OUTCOME
Suggest the new information systems to support it.
 E. Reconstruction
- You might think that the BPR is done with the Redesign, but this will be a mistake.
OBJECTIVE - Actually, you need to effectively implement the BPR that you opted for in order to expect the achievement of
the goals of the BPR.
- Consequently, what you need to keep in mind is that BPR is not just about drawing sophisticated models.
ROLE OF BRP - It is also about making sure that the people of your company will make sense of these changes and will, more
importantly, follow them.
- These steps rely deeply on change management in order to ease the migration to the newly redesigned
CHANGE
MANAGEMENT
processes and to the newly implemented IS.
- Explaining the nature of the change and the consequences of the change to end-users is particularly important

F. Evaluation
- This final step is about the assessment of the consequences associated with the BPR.
OBJECTIVE
- Basically, it is about evaluating the improvement achieved in the process that was redesigned.
There are key questions that have to be asked at this particular stage such as:
KEY
QUESTIONS
ð Did we improve the key metrics?
ð Did we enhance the value associated with the output of the concerned process?
- Of course, this last step should not mean that this step will never change again.
CONTINUOUS
IMPROVMENT
- Rather, we should integrate this process in a continuous improvement program as the environment changes on
a continuous basis.

VIII. Important key success factors to BPR initiatives

There are some important key success factors that you need to be aware of in order to succeed with BPR initiatives :

• Top management sponsorship : buy-in.

• Strategic alignment: business priorities and the concerned business process.

• Compelling business case: convince CEO, CFO and executives of other functional areas that are concerned with the changes.

• Effective change management program: it is not just about BPR.

• Take into account the interdependence that exist with other business processes.

• Reengineering team composition: multidisciplinary team that is dedicated to the BPR mission.
 9. How my organization (re)think it Business Process ?
I. What is a Business Process ?
Ex : Launching a course in Blackboard à Open internet à Login on Blackboard à Check micros and cameras à Share screen…
ð By trying to look at a BP visually speaking, you will discover inefficiency, you are doing that will be losing your time….
ð Once you have identified weakness, you will make it better (reengineer it)
ð Technologies could help you to optimize some task

Business Process : Sequence of activity designed to create value

ð We split each task around different activity along the value chain of the firm
ð We assign each person with the right skills to do this task (role)

II. EPC Diagram Shape

- Events :
- Function : Print an email for example
- And ; or ; Xor (à If you follow one way, BP cannot go back to another way)
- Organization unit : Describe who is responsible for the task
MAIN SHAPES - Information or material
- System : What IS is used to support (linked to event of function)
- Enterprise Area ; Document ; Database
- Control flow : When you link an event to a function
- Information flow ; Organization unit assignment :
- online.visual-paradigm.com/app/diagrams/#diagram:proj=0&type=EPCDiagram
SOFTWARE TO USE
- (only take screen)

We have to
 III. Mapp Analysis

IV. BPA
Identify non-value activities :
• Printing orders (everything should be on a platform or on the cloud instead of printing and placing it)
• Physical storage : Same as above: everything should be on the cloud instead of transferring 3 times the printed
documents.
• Use of too many means for order taking, some of which are outdated : Mail, Email, Fax, EDI
• Creating the order : it is necessary to enter all the information that the customer sends us manually, instead of
doing it directly.
• Allocate stocks to customer order : all stocks should be allocated via ERP system, it is not optimal/efficient to
have the choice between excel file and ERP system.

Identify sequential and independent activities :

• Independent activity : making sure that there are no errors / invoice
• Sequential : print the order – create the order – enter the information

Identify activities conducted in batch mode :

• Allocate stocks to customer order via ERP system

Identify lack of information and/or feedback :

• Stock : information about stocks should be available earlier, there are 5 steps before allocating stocks to
customer order. If there is not enough stock, the manager is not aware of it when he creates the order and enter
the information --> lost of time
• No defined storage method: Normally done chronologically, but each one has its own method and can lead to
loss of information or additional delays.

Identify manual transfer of information/documents :

• Clerk physically enter all the informations (Account number, order number, products...) : Various errors can
occur while creating a customer order
• Manual allocation of stock : Only a temporary solution, but need to be enhanced

Identify the absence of (sub-)process owners :

•

Identify causes of delays in response time :

• Mistakes : If there are some mistakes identified during the process, all the process has to restart
• Delivery points : ERP system supports a maximum of 2 delivery points per customer
• ERP system does not take into account order cancellation steps
• Confirmation number : Confirmation number is allocated at the moment the order is created, but only
associated when the registration is complete
V. Business process reeginering
 10. BPM Extended
I. Change Management
A. Basic concepts and definitions
As logical human beings, we often forget that most people do not readily embrace change – in fact they tend to resist it.
ð Resistance to change : Emotional or behavioral response to real or imagined threats to established work routine
ð If employee resistance is not managed and mitigated, it can derail a change effort sometimes crucial for the firm
This chapter will help readers understand that ERP almost always means significant change, that change is not readily embraced,
and how better to manage the change process.

B. Resistance to change – Why do humans resist change ?

Aladwani (2001) suggests there are two fundamental sources of resistance to innovations such as ERP :
• Perceived risk : The perception of risk associated with adopting the new technology (loss of authority, fear of the unknown…)
• Habit : Refers to the current tasks the employee completes as part of their routine on the job (change in level of comfort…)
Gilley, Godek, and Gilley (2009) suggest an organization has an immune system just as we humans do.

There are 2 steps to change management according to HIRTZ :

1) To assess the degree of change readiness of the individual employees : They can be in 6 different categories, in the order
(indifference, rejection, doubt, neutrality, experimentation, commitment), and the goal is to move to a state of commitment
2) Do the change only when all the potential users are committed

C. Change management Theories and past research

The 2 most widely cited as critical success for ERP implementation are : Change management
Top management commitment and support
The goal of change management is to win the hearts and minds of employees.
- Unfreeze : The objective is to prepare people for change by communicating with them and obtain their approval
LEWIN
- Movement : Make the change and explain the importance for the employees
(3 steps models)
- Refreeze : Institutionalization of the change, make an habit of it.
LEAVITT’S MODEL - According to him, change must be aligned among 4 factors : Task, People, structure, technologie
- 1. Establishing a Sense of Urgency
- 2. Forming a Power Guiding Coalition
- 3. Creating a Vision ð 8 steps must be followed in order to
- 4. Communicating the Vision successfully create a major change.
KOTTER
(8 steps models) 5. Empowering Others to Act on the Visio
ð Errors or skipping in any steps can result
- 6. Planning for and Creating Short-Term Wins
in negative impacts
7. Consolidating Improvements and Producing Still More Change
8. Institutionalizing New Approaches

D. Fundamentals of Change Leadership

Smith and Doctor (1997) suggest five fundamentals of change leadership :
1) “If I’m comfortable, I know something is wrong” : Change is naturally uncomfortableand if not there is a problem
2) Create visible evidence of the change in the workplace : New color, use a war room, post updates on the wall
3) Large communication : It is important to communicate simply, clearly, and often because change is not a 1 time act
4) Don’t force people to change, but give them choices.” : They suggest that it is not wise to force people to change, but
to make it desirable for them to choose to support change.

5) Learn to communicate and frame the message in the context of the employees

E. Summary
Any change introduced into an org will be met with some resistance because employees have an emotional response to it.
ð To address the resistance and emotional response to change, change management techniques should be employed in any
system implementation.
ð The change management process should be followed step by step without skipping any steps.
ð While all steps in the change management process are important, communication throughout the implementation project is
of utmost importance.
ð Examples provided demonstrate that the successful implementation of any organization wide system is critically dependent
upon the process used to implement that system.
 II. BPM and Lean Management : Similarities and differences
On a daily basis, businesses and organizations need to compete for market share, pushing companies into constantly seeking
productivity and quality improvements while reducing costs, as a way to stand out from their competitors. Such improvements are
achieved by the use of several management methodologies that, through different concepts, tools and techniques, give support to
improve organizational performance.

For a couple of decades, two methodologies in particular have shown promising results, reached through continuous improvement
approaches: business process management (BPM) and lean management (LM).

A. Business Process Management (BPM)

1. Emergence of BPM
The development of BPM can be divided into three waves of evolution since its inception after industrial revolution :
- It started in 1960, marked by Japanese companies that became more competitive
FIRST
(1960)
- Partly due to their focus on total quality management (TQM) programs and defect reduction.
- Soon after, US companies tried to reproduce this type of approach
- It started in the late 1980s, marked by the revenues growth of US companies through practices imported from
SECOND
(1980)
Japanese processes and the search for greater compliance in their processes
- Giving rise to the approach known as Business Process Reengineering (BPR)
THIRD - It started in the mid-1990s and continues to the present moment with the “maturity” of the process-centric business,
(1990) originating a phase known as BPM, which remains until today.

2. BPM Structure
- According to Elzinga et al. (1995), BPM begins by setting goals for the company.
START - At this stage, the vision, mission and objectives of the organization are formulated
- And critical success factors are determined
- The main idea of the methodology is to develop a process-oriented organization
IDEAS - Eliminate activities that do not add value
- Improve the process flow within the limits of organizational functions
- Increase customer satisfaction
5 REASONS - Improve business process quality
TO ADOPT - Reduce costs
BPM
- Increase business process agility
- Support continuous improvement.

The BPM lifecycle steps were proposed by Dumas et al. (2013) and are described as follows :
PROCESS - This step is marked by the identification of the process to be improved.
DISCOVERY - This process may also arise from the previous phase of monitoring and controlling;
- A process-oriented strategy is developed at this step.
PROCESS - Such a development will provide framework and direction for the continuous management of the processes
ANALYSIS and its macro objective must be aligned with those of the company.
- For this alignment to take place, it is necessary to have knowledge about the organization’s goals;
- This phase is marked by the validation of the information before the effective action.
- It is the context in which the goals and objectives are measured and their variables, as external factors, are
PROCESS
REDISIGN
identified.
- In addition, this step is marked by the process design and its materialization : At this moment, questions like
“what, when, where, who and how” will be answered.
PROCESS - It is effectively related to the action, that is, when the design is put into practice.
IMPLEMENTATION - This step also marks the moment when small adjustments are made;
- This step provides information about process performance through metrics and helps us think about
PROCESS
refinement actions.
MONITORING
AND CONTROL - The monitoring execution enables the understanding and control of the actual occurrences of the
organization’s business processes, establishing the culture of continuous improvement.

3. BPM tools and practices

- Several methods, techniques and tools can be used for process modeling and simulation to facilitate the
PRINCIPLE
understanding of possible scenarios for improvement.
TOOLS - Value stream analysis ; Cause effect analysis ; Pareto analysis ; Balanced Scorecard ; Cycle time ; Ishikawa diagram
 4. Continuous improvement on BPM
BPM implies a constant and continuous organizational commitment to manage the processes of the organization.
Continuous improvement in an organization is determined by a number of aspects, such as customer, leadership, strategy,
organizational culture, along with the methodology and tools used to capture and track improvements.

To continually improve processes, several aspects need to be taken into account. Among them, the main one relates to the creation
of an organizational improvement context, which comprises a number of elements including specific business and software teams
committed to a development initiative and systematic approach to drive improvement efforts…

B. Lean Management (LM)

1. Emergence of LM
The fast spotlight gained by the Japanese automotive industry in the 1980s drew the attention of academia and researchers because
of the great performance these companies were presenting in comparison to their competitors (Yadav et al., 2010). Japanese car
manufacturers were able to make better-quality cars with fewer defects, resulting in greater consumer satisfaction and the creation
of a global image of quality.

Researchers who studied and documented the approach in this period coined the term “Lean Manufacturing” due to the ability of
delivering greater results to consumers by using fewer resources. Among the applicants of this approach, the Toyota Motor
Company stood out (With its Toyota Production System, TPS). Admired by the Japanese growth, many companies around the world
have tried to imitate or implement TPS using a variety of techniques but failed.

Lean production is an intellectual approach consisting of a system of methods and measures. Lean’s focus is to :
• Use less human effort, less inventory, less time to develop products and less space, to become highly flexible to consumer demand
• While manufacturing quality products as efficiently and economically as possible.

The authors also point out that LM has two levels :

STRATEGIC - At the strategic level, it focuses on creating value for the consumer and can be applied everywhere.
OPERATIONAL - At the operational level, it focuses on the plant floor and presents limitations.
According to the authors, this distinction at a strategic and operational level is the key to understand Lean as a whole.

2. LM structure
TPS is described as a house with different pillars :
JUST IN TIME - Customers “pull” production by demanding the product
(JIT)
- It helps avoiding production waste
- Ensures that quality products are being made
JIDOKA
- And that any opportunity to produce defective items will be eliminated.
HEIJUNKA - Which means to execute the production in a way that allows the best use of the resources
- Provides a framework for workers to engage in a collective effort of continuous improvement
KAIZEN
- In this system, everyone can suggest an idea of improvement, and all good ideas are rewarded
LEAN TOOLS - Tools applied by the methodology in the search for continuous improvement.

3. LM tools and practices

- There is a very large variety of Lean tools – up to 100 : You have to choose according to their usefulness
- Lean tools are not very different than those applied by other methodologies : Success is explained by the way they
TOOLS
are implemented
- Main tools : Value Stream Mapping, 5S, Total Productive Maintenance, Single Minute Exchange of Dies, Kanban
- Environment change, leadership, culture
PRACTICES - Proactive employees, training
- Communication and measurement.

4. Continuous improvement on LM
Harris (2006) points out three ways of creating a culture of continuous improvement in the Lean environment :
• Abandoning the “hit and run” type of change : It don’t match with continuous improvement because this project is never
completed (always improvement opportunities)
• Developing a team especially focused on continuous improvement : With a turnover rate of 6 or 12 month in order to increase
the number of employees involved, and composed with the persons that are the most apt to suggest improvement
• Deploying a daily audit behavior : It gives the leaders opportunity to talk to the operators and gather information’s that will
feedback the process of continuous improvement.
 C. Comparative analysis : BPM vs Lean Management
- Same decade : 1980-1990, but LM is more recent than BPM
- Focus on continuous quality improvement
- Standardization :
SIMILARITIES
- Decrease cost and waiting times
- Customer focus
- Difficult to implement with low success rate :
- Product/information dichotomy : BPM highlight the flow of information, and LM is more oriented to physical
characteristics of the product
- Main process balancing tool : BPM = Cycle time / LM = Takt time
- Structure of the methodology : BPM = Model, implement, deploy, execute, evaluate
LM = Plan, Do, Check, Analyze
- Support : BPM is supported by specific business and software teams
LM support is provided by teams that aim to include as many workers as possible
- Employees involvement with the productive process: BPM : Great emphasize on education and training
DIFFERENCES
LM : Emphasize on the motivational aspect of employees
- Difference on focus :
ð BPM - Top down Vue : Where processes are mostly improved by specific agents placed in a superior
position in relation to some operators of the process
ð LM – Bottom up view : Improvement is drawn mainly by ordinary workers in their own daily operations
- Method view : BPM is seen as an IT-intensive solution (Service industry s
LM is seen mainly as an overall philosophy
- Industry concerned : BPM = Service industry / LM = Manufacturing industry
 11. Introducing Business Intelligence
I. Introduction
In the previous videos, you saw to what extent structuring, planning and organizing IT was key for organizations to
get the most out of their investment in IT :
RECAP ð During the first videos, the emphasis was mainly put on these IS oriented toward transactions.
ð Actually, the transactional dimension of IS is the first orientation that is highly needed for any company in order
to manage its day-to-day operational activities.
- However, when these systems are put in place many organizations stick to the management of these systems
and do not try to go beyond. This is a big mistake.
- Actually, some organizations might be unaware of the resources that they have but the data that come from daily
BUT
transactions enabled by IS are tremendously important.
- Organizations benefit from great assets that are the unique data that they gather from their interactions with
their different stakeholders including customers, suppliers, business exchange partners, etc.
As companies want to improve their performance on a continuous basis, managers and executives need to provide
answers to important questions :
• What are the locations where my business is performing the most?
TYICAL • Who are the customers who are the most loyal?
QUESTIONS • Why are some shops doing a great job whereas others are doing a very poor job?
• What are the spare-parts that are ordered the most? What are the spare parts for which shops achieve better margin?
• What are the regions that keep the same volume of transactions and what are the regions that have important variation in their
volume of activities ?
- Put differently, business intelligence is actually no longer a privilege that only a few companies can benefit from.
IMPORTANCE
- BI is a must-have technology and a must-have capability that companies need to be equipped with.
BUSINESS
INTELLIGENCE
- Operations, tools, techniques, and methods that help managers make decisions to tackle complex business problems.
- BI includes a wide range of applications, practices, and technologies for the extraction, translation, integration,
INCLUDE analysis, and presentation of data to support improved decision making.
- There are many software that are dedicated to BI : SAP Lumira, Tableau, Microsoft Business Intelligence
- The used data in BI are often pooled from multiple databases and may be internally and/or externally generated.
USE - It can be used by employees, customers, suppliers and business partners through the internet, organizational
intranet or mobile devices

II. Why Business Intelligence ?

- As you know, companies have many applications as different managers who handle different departments deal
with different functions and have different immediate needs in terms of the data that need to be managed for
PRINCIPLE day-to-day job tasks.
- We know that there is a unique strategic plan that is guiding the destiny of a given company and that all
employees are expected to follow the same path. Still, on the operational ground, things are really different.
- Actually, what happens is that different applications exist to manage different functions and produce enormous
amount of data in terms of database, reports, forms, slides, documents, presentations, extractions…
OPERATIONAL
GROUND
- So, what happens is that data are not being consolidated for the purpose of business intelligence.
- Also, data are not being updated in a timely way and subsequently decision makers do not have access to the
kind of data they need in the moment they need to make better decisions.
- Thus, it is the duty of IS to help managers dealing with these shortcomings by providing sound BI
- Organizations face unprecedented problems that change as time goes by.
- For this reason, managers should leverage IS in order to help them guide their decisions by sound data that
NEED
enable them actually to better visualize their business operations
- The progression of IT has made access to BI not only limited to senior managers but also to operational managers
and even any business user.
- This will help sharing tools for better decision making and will somehow empower business users and managers
to back-up their decisions thanks to actual data that are comprehensive, aggregated, and longitudinal.
- So, companies will become more agile and react rapidly to the swift changes that occur in the environment by
IMPORTANCE
getting the most out of the opportunities and by quickly responding to potential troubles and/or risks.
- This need for a permanent access to BI outcomes to enhance decision making has moved from being an
opportunity to actually becoming a strategic necessity for virtually all organizations.
 III. The 3 main categories of data
A. Structured
PRINCIPLE - Simply speaking, companies generate huge amount of structured data from many interactions in a daily basis
- Companies have interactions with their customers that you can find in CRM systems.
INTERACTIONS - Companies have interactions with their suppliers that you can find in Supply Chain Management systems.
- Companies have interactions with their employees that you can find in Human Resource Management systems
STRUCTURED - Data that have been inserted into an organized and formatted repository in a way that enables its management
DATA for real processing and analysis to help decision making.
- Typically, these data are about sales, orders, invoices, payroll, etc.
USE - Our BI session will mainly revolve around the use of structured data to support business decision making.
- For instance, all the data that you find in a typical Relation Data Base Management Systems are called structured data.

B. Unstructured
- This data has started to feed BI systems notably since the advent of popular social media tools where data
PRINCIPLE
emanate from everywhere, all the time and handle an unprecedented variety of topics.
UNSTRUCTURED - Designate any data that is not structured or that is not located in a given RDMS
DATA - They are not organized in a specific format that makes it available for use and processed by end-users.
- Just imagine the enormous quantity of data that the customers of an organization can generate on popular
SOCIAL MEDIA social media such as Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.
- Customers develop a lot of what we call User Generated Content in terms of texts, photos, videos, etc.
- This is a notably important challenge when managers realize that their customers are part of new kinds of
conversations they were not before.
CUSTOMER
- Indeed, customers’ knowledge is now solicited for product development, for innovation, for branding, etc.
- Customers can also contribute to these spaces by complaining…
- At the end of the day, a huge number of customers is generating an unprecedented and important amount of
SO
digital traces that triggers important quantity of data.

C. Semi-structured
SEMI-
STRUCTURED
- It is data that have not already been arranged, consolidated, organized and shaped in order to fit in a given RDMS
- SSD somehow lies between structured data and unstructured data.
PRINCIPLE ð Unstructured : Because it is unorganized.
ð Structured : Still it can be organized in a specific way that enables access and analysis.
- Take this example of a PowerPoint document of a representation that is generally considered as being unstructured data.
EXAMPLE - Now, if we add a specific tag with a specific keyword that informs about the content of the slides, this will ease the task of a
user looking for the knowledge contained in the document. This can be considered as semi-structured data.
 IV. OLTP vs OLAP
Now that you understand the differences that exist between these three categories of data, you need to make sense of the key
differences between what we call Online Transactions Processing versus Online Analytical Processes.
ð In order to make sense of Business Intelligence, you need actually to understand two important approaches of processing data
ð In simple terms, OLTP enables to run the operational side of the business.

A. Online Transactions Processing (OLTP)

The idea behind OLTP is that companies mobilize IS in their day-to-day transactions that are called transactional systems.
They enable interactive online applications or e-commerce applications on internet that record facts in the form of transactions.

OLTP systems have the following characteristics:

SIGNIFICANT - Enormous number of users access to the online application
NUMBER OF - They use the same features and the same data at the same time.
USERS
- For instance, take the example of e bay that organizes an online auction where you have dozens of thousands of people who connect to e bay’s website and bid progressively.
HIGH NUMBER - Many transactions can occur at the same time on the same platform.
OF PARALLEL - Many industries with high volumes of transactions are concerned by OLTP such as large retailers, airline
TRANSACTIONS
companies, hotels, financial institution such as commercial banks…
AD HOC AND - The high number of users expect real and immediate response.
SHORT TERM - Take the example of an e-commerce company that runs its business in Realtime and deals with a high number of customers
TRANSACTIONS
who access to the company’s transactional website to purchase a number of items online. They need immediate response.
- This notion is extremely important as transactions such as order entry, sales, booking need reliable and elastic
IT infrastructure that is able to handle elastic mobilization of computing needs.
AVAILABILITY
- OLTP needs permanent availability in order to track instantaneously any change that might occur in one of the
records associated with the transaction
- Generally, these transactions are selective in terms of the data being manipulated.
SELECTIVE - Thus, there is a fixed number of specific data such as date of booking, amount of the transaction, customer
TRANSACTIONS information such as first and last name, date of birth, etc.
- Basically, OLTP systems enable collecting data, updating data and transforming data (order payment for ex)

If we consider the example of an airline company : OLTP is about the system being able to handle the entire customer journey
including the search of a specific flight, in the specific date, with specific departure and arrival locations and many other potential
options like additional services such as renting a car, or booking rooms in a hotel.

B. Online Analytical Processes (OLAP)

1. Principle
- RDBMS have helped companies to better their management of their data.
RDBMS - Still, RDBMS were unable to achieve a great job for generating reports based on the transactional data.
- This was actually major problem since producing such reports was very time consuming.
Suppose that you work for a large retailer that sells sport goods : Your manager asked you to generate a report on the returns of
products of the 2nd semester of last year. Your manager saw that returns have increased in an unexpected way and wants to figure-
out what went wrong.
ð What would happen next is that the server where the RDBMS is installed will have to search and navigate dozens of millions of
EXAMPLE transactions in order to generate the totals.
ð This will take a huge amount of time. At the same time, what is highly likely to occur is that your database server will just slowdown
in a significant way to the extent that this might stop critical business operations enabled by critical applications on the server
ð At the end of the day, the report in question could be generated but this would have taken a huge amount of time.
ð At this particular moment, OLAP comes as the solution to this situation.
- The basic idea with OLAP is to pre-run all the potential calculations that are needed to generate reports that enable
decision making.
- With OLAP, we try to provide answers to different questions comparing to OLTP.
- OLAP is about the operation of rapidly digging into multidimensional, rigorous and complex manipulations of
OLAP
IDEA
different dimensions of data.
- OLAP generates a UGI that is easy to generate, understand and retrieve.
- With OLAP, data aim at going beyond the basic ad-hoc queries that a user can make with the use of a RDBMS.
- OLAP is a reporting tool that enables the analysis of different indicators that emanate from different kinds of data,
including transactional data.
 2. OLAP Cube
- Now that you know better OLAP, you should naturally understand now that all these calculations should not occur
while the transactional database server is being run and solicited for daily transactions.
- This is why all these calculations happen during break moments such as nights or weekends
PRINCIPLE
- What happens next is that all the different ensembles and sub-ensembles of calculations are stored in a specific
database that is different from the database used for the transactional dimension of business.
- This different database is called OLAP Cube
- What OLAP Cube refers to is a picture of a pre-aggregated data adapted to measures and dimensions.
OLAP
CUB
- The nice thing with OLAP cube is that it can be updated as the source tables from the transactional databases are
updated.

3. Vocabulary
a. The 3 dimensions of the OLAP cube
- There are many possibilities of dimensions.
- Putting it simply, dimensions are specific criteria that are used to summarize the data.
- Let us take the example of a retailer of sport goods willing to develop its business intelligence capabilities :
DIMENSIONS
ð The dimensions could refer to time, product categories, etc.
ð Product categories are being aggregated from the total associated with each sub-category.
ð Now if you change the dimension, you also change its items.
ð Thus, if you change the item and consider time, we add another dimension through which you are analyzing your pre-
aggregated transactional data.
- In simple terms, measures are about the values that are associated with the dimensions that we previously
highlighted.
- More precisely, the measure is the total or the sub-total that is associated with the dimension.
MEASURES ð As you can see, dimensions in the cube can be about time, geography, product lines, etc.
ð When you are trying to find a value from the OLAP cube, you are looking for an intersection between one or more dimensions
and one or more measures.
ð For instance, you can request the value of the sales that occurred in April 2015 of the football shoes in the area of Bay
Village.
- Hierarchy is about a parent-child relationship between different items.
HIERARCHY - In other words, hierarchies are about relationships between an ensemble and sub-ensembles.
ð For instance, you can split the dimension of time in a hierarchy of year, quarter, and month / area by state, region…

b. The viewing of the data associated with the BI

- Drilling down is a way of viewing items that are associated with a specific dimension as represented in a hierarchy
DRILLING where users access to more detailed series of data.
DOWN - In other words, it is about showing deepening aggregated data as it is analyzed by revealing its specific structure.
- For instance, it is about digging in the sales data while moving the measure of the sales from annual to quarter, to month, to days…

- Rolling-up is the reverse situation : It is about navigating the data as users go from an item to an ensemble.
ROLLING - In other words, users elevate the level of the dimension that is analyzed from specific to aggregate.
UP
- For example, suppose that you generated a report of sales in the region of Boston according to the dimension of day and that now
you are willing to aggregate this analysis to the level of months or quarters. By doing so, you are rolling-up your BI data

- Refers to the action of splitting the cube in a way to extract the needed information for a specific slice.
- This act is crucial as it helps the user to better visualize data presentation for a specific information.
SLICING
- In other words, it is like when you are filtering data for a specific value associated with a specific dimension.
- Slicing focuses on one attribute.
- For example, out of the sales of the sport retailer, consider that the manager of the basket goods at the corporate level wants to
access to the global sales of all the basket goods over all the locations where the retailer is present only for quarter 1.
- Dicing is about zooming on a sub-ensemble of all the dimensions of the cube but for specific values.
- This approach enables decision-makers to put the emphasis on very specific information in a limited scale.
DICING - Take again the example of the retailer and consider that one manager is looking to zoom in a detailed manner on a particular
product such as tennis balls and basket balls in two locations and in two quarters. This will enable us to end-up with a 2 by 2 by 2
cube and is called dice where we get a sub-ensemble of the original cube in terms of a smaller cube.

BI is very important, as many users, managers and executives need it to answer critical questions
such as: which customers segments should we focus on? What are the areas where we performed
better last year comparing to the year before?

BI actually helps organizations willing to become “data-driven” in order to make sound decisions
that are backed-up with provable data.These organizations should be more productive and
profitable than those companies that are not data driven
 12. Why shall we care about Business Intelligence ?
I. Synchronous session
Video problems : Isolated system and lack of communication :
ð If each department has is own IT generating data, if you don’t centralize this data of each of these department in a data warehouse, you’ll have distinct IT systems in one firm with
isolated data.
ð Using a BI system helps to centralize the information in a Datawarehouse in and to establish useful insights that will visualize in an easier way to managers in order to take business
decisions.

The aim of BI is to analyze and distribute the data in order for managers to react.

The problem now is there are multiple sources of data in a firm. With BI, the manager will be able to access to this data, and modify information in every source, and create insights. The manager
will be able to use this data to take decision in a faster way.

The data mart layer are virtual small database, that will reorganize data according to departments in order to take decisions
OLAP Server : It is the added value the 3tier architecture, and help to automatically transform and extract data in real time without refreshing the table (even if someone add another data)

II. Case study – Canadian Tire (CTR)

1) How can Business Intelligence (BI) help Canadian Tire?

BI is the consolidation and analysis of internal data and external data for the purpose of effective decision-making.BI initiatives is a data warehouse to hold the data and analytics software. The
data warehouse stores data from operatinal systems in the organization and restructures it to enable queries and models to extract decision support reports.
==>Improve profit and customer services: single data warehouse enabling executives, store managers and business analysts to access and interpriet data about store sales, category sales,
financial performance and suppliers.
==>Store owners and executives could view and analyse information to aid in category managment and promotion decisions. Enable the hardware store owners to see the implications of setting
prices above or below those recommended by head office.
- User groups gradually undertook more responsibility for IW data managment activities so they could perform their own analytic tasks. User groups developed applications and hired business
analysts who extracted data from the IW, then cleaned it, integrated additional data and transformed it into their own reports. This division of labor and IT resources enabled better business
decisions because it facilitated better analysis of the available data, it also dstributed BI and IS responsibilities ad resources across the organization.
【New environment】
- Data would be sourced and consistently managed and integrated from across the company, historical daa wuld be organized according to standard data formats and housed in the central
data warhouse, and there would be simple and easy to update access to meta-data.
==>data views or data marts

- Assisting in organizing the data marts/views, retail analytic specialists would have access to BI tools and the data warehouse to perform sophisticated analysis and predictive modeling and end-
users would have instant access to information they needed to make relevant business decisions.

2) 2) Identify the most important challenges associated with the BI implementation?

- Implementation of these projects consumed hug organizational resources and was difficult.
- The larger the organization and the more complex the BI implementation, the lower the likelihood of launching BI successfully, including being on time and on budget.
- 10 biggest challenges to achieving success in implementing BI: budget constraints, data quality, understanding and managing user expectations, culture change, ime required to implement,
data integration, education and training, ROI justification, business rules analysis, management sponsorship.
(IT managers more frequently mentioned data quality and cultural change as the biggest huddles. Business managers placed higher priority on education and training for end-users. `
==>the variation could be pressure points for implementation.)
- The major challenges were the multiple independent data sources not include in the IW, lack of standard data definitions and consequent inaccuracies in the data, the strained resources
associated with storage and querying the IW, and the increasing delays and denial of access to information required by the end-users.

3) To what degree does the organizational structure influence the success of the BI initiative?
- A lack of resources (which were being used for other projects), the IW was evolving on old infrastructure and a poorly defined data model.
- A lack of standard data definitions meant that several versions of the truth could be extracted from the IW; depending on the way you defined it, different numbers for inventory levels could
be extracted.
- Some data was simply not available
==>a marketing analyst in the sports segment for instance, could not evaluate the result of a weekly promotional effort on golf clubs nor evaluate the performance of various brands against each
other. ==> The data model in the IW did not reflect the data requirements of the business.
- The shadow IT groups (end-user communities in CTR finance and supply chain in positions)provided an alternative source of IT resources to the user groups but at unknown cost and security
risk to CTC IT infrastructure.

NOTES in class: Why BI is important?

==>It exists but not anyone can get use of it. Where dose the data come from? - Business operations+external source
 4) Make an audit about the IS of CTR
ISSUE WHY DOES IT MATTER HOW TO FIX IT
Lack of alignment and absence of IT Governance ?
IT governance: formal framework that proposes the
Hire people with the necessary capabilities to
structure through which IT investments meet business stra
IT strategy not aligned with the business match needs and abilities
tegy.
Lack of staff’s IT skill
Absence of holistic understanding of the IT big picture ?
Implementation of an enterprise architecture,
No enterprise architecture : Complex architecture, with a lot The systems work independently ("siloed approach")
in order to better structure the data
of redundancies, and non-existence and does not allow to make links between different data.
and make it more easily usable.
of enterprise architecture to improve it
Lack of agility for implementing new IT
Poor IT Project Management
Lack of documentation
Agile method, try not to focus only on
about different IT systems and their linkages
They didn’t estimate the priorities of the projects short term wins but rather in order to improve
They are unable to satisfy all IS project,
Only short term solutions with quick wins
and prioritizes projects with the most immediate impact
Poor consideration of IT business value Integrate the concept of
It matters because IT has been recognized as
total cost ownership in order to calibrate the real cost of
a cost center.
Too high IT costs compare to the industry’s standards IS
Poor data integration
Unstructured data, make it impossible
It is a fundamental point, Consolidate the database with a BI initiative
to take quick decisions or to make the BI works
and BI architecture had become fragmented since its launchi
ng.
Poor data quality Poor data = Poor information
Transform the data model
The information warehouse was built on Data quality implies that you have poor outcomes from the
in order to make links between the different entities
an outdated infrastructure with a weekly data model BI
 Comparison :
ISSUE CURRENT BI ENVIRONMENT FUTURE BI ENVIRONMENT
Source of information are divided between :
Source of ð The IW where the information went through the ETL process
All data sources (ERP, HR, equity) have been grouped into a unique and coherent BI
information ð And another set of information coming from separate and independent
data source based on other standards.
Business digs in complex information emanating from structured information (ETL)
Business users will be able to dig into the adapted data mart so as to extract the
Business and unstructured information (independent data sources)
needed intelligence.
users Moreover, information is not cleansed and serves multiple communities of
Users will no longer need to ask for additional, adhoc assistance of reporting help
knowledge workers
Historical data is used in order to make basic reporting and analysis of historical data.
Historical data and statistics mobes directly to all Super Users through the
It relied mainly on the information that emanates from independent data sources.
Super Users application called retail science.
Super Users are ill-equipped for generating significant added-value out of their
This application is vital for predicting major future trends in the market
analysis
Users access data segmented by domain which provides better efficacy and
Users access directly to data into thr IW where they insert the data treated in the IW
Data specialization.
(ex : launcher reports). There is no unique understanding of data via the existence of
management The development of a metadata or master data has enhanced the way all users
metadata.
understand, insert ans use data
Risk of corrupted data
Data more secure
Risk of security
Minimal risk of data corruption
Risk No traceability
There is a layer of data exploitation and presentation since there is no direct access
Long time for data treatment
to the data of the referential. The latter is being more protected.
Risk of human error
Data mart = Allow people to connect with information they want
 13. Introducing Business Analytics
I. Definition of Business Analytics
- Decision Support System (DSS : 1970-85) : Use data analytics to support decision making

- Executive Support Systems (ESS : 1980-90) : Focus on inter/external data analysis for decision by senior executives

- Online Analytical Processing (OLAP : 1990-05) : Software for analyzing multidimensional data tables
EVOLUTION
OF IS - Business Intelligence (BI : 1990-05) : Tools to support data driven decision with an emphasis on reporting.
ð BI is about tools to analyze large amount of data and transform them in analytical comprehensive figure

- Business Analytics (2005-now) : Focus on statistical and mathematical analysis for decision making
ð Use of mathematical and statistical tools to explore organizational data in order to help data driven decision
- BA is now understood as a transformative engine to help employees turn their data into competitive advantage
- It transforms data into visual insights in way to solve business problems (reveal hidden insights , customer chart…)
PRINCIPLE
- The bottom line is to drive business effectiveness and/or efficiency with the use of BA
- It must be a competitive advantage that the company use in a regular basis
- The starting point should always be a business problem : In don’t make sense to make BA for the sake of data
WHERE TO
START ?
- It could be different business problem : Better segmentation of customer base in order to customize our offer,
what are the location where we need to intervene in order to boost sales ? ….
- BA techniques are needed in order to enable knowledge workers to investigate and analyze their data in way to
USE transform enhance their result
- It goes beyond the generic use of business methods, as different metrics have different assumptions and goals

II. The 3 main categories of Business Analytics

A. Descriptive analytics – What did happen in our business ?
- It represents first level of BA, and is oriented to explore past data
PRINCIPLE - It is useful since it enables end-users to figure out by themselves what is going right and wrong in the business in
a visually friendly way
- It involves gathering, organizing, tabulating, depicting data and describing their characteristics
DATA
- It provides familiar figures : Histograms, Box Plots, diagrams, time chart, Pie chart, Scorecard…
- Descriptive Analytics is basically about reporting : Scorecard, dashboards…
REPORTING
- It answers the question what did happen in the past
It is a generally utilized method of data analysis and exploration, and consists in :
• Collecting data about past behaviors
METHOD
• Organizing the data
• Present it in a visually friendly way to be easy understandable
- It put the emphasize on what previously occurred in a business context
- It is considered as an important introductory opening moment mobilized to enlighten or formulate data for
additional analysis
IMPORTANCE
- It is regularly used in the daily operation of an organization : report about sales, revenue, inventories…
- To do this, the organization must be able to make regularly update of data to be utilized
- It uses mathematical and statistical tools such as mean, medium, total, percentage…
EXAMPLE - A dashboard that shows the evolution of income and expense, and inform about its variation

B. Predictive analytics – What will happen in our business ?

- It represents the second level of BA, and is about predicting what will happen by using the past data
PRINCIPLE - It uses past data to determine what will happen in the future
- It answers different question : How customer will respond to a marketing promotion ? How sell will be affected?
- It identifies association among the different variables, and predict the likelihood of a given phenomenon to occur
ASSOCIATION
- It is similar to identifying relationship between and independent variable (pricing) to a dependent variable (sales)
HOW DOES IT - PA relies on probabilities, by using models such as regression in order to forecast the likelihood
WORKS ? - It is about leveraging techniques with the expected goal of predicting the future
- Useful because it empowers managers and decision makers who become more proactive thanks to this data
USEFUL - It can allow you to better understand customer’s and customize your offering
- It can also be useful for HR managers by forecasting potential employee turnover
 C. Prescriptive analytics – What can we do in our business ?
- It is the third level of BA, and answers the question what should happen ?
PRINCIPLE - It is the most powerful form of BA, and occurs by generating specific outcomes from a variety of different scenarios
- It is very helpful in the sense that it advises decisions makers by telling them what to do (GPS)
- It is about moving from a correlation prescriptive to causation prescriptive : Correlation enlighten the likelihood of
two events occur at the same time
GPS
- Prescriptive analytics uses the learning that occurs in both descriptive and analytics and built on it in order to advise
the most interesting scenarios to choose
- It uses a specific type of IA that is machine learning
MACHINE - By mobilizing algorithms and models, this kind of BA allows computers to take decision based on statistical data,
LEARNING relationship and patterns
- It foresees what, where and why an even will occur and choose the best scenarios
EFFECT - It can improve key business outcomes and operations : Customer acquisition, production…
- Suppose that you have a logistic company, and you have a track that needs to visit 10 different locations
EXAMPLE
- The order that the track should follow in order to minimize the distance could be calculated with optimization tech

III. 3 risks associated with Business Analytics

- BA has been a trendy ward for many managers and decision makers
- They implemented it without taking into account their organization readiness to embrace BA
THE HYPE
EFFECT
- Aspect like change management and resistance to change are important to take into account
- Company must develop a specific BA strategy related to there is strategy : What are the IS that we will be used
to drive BA? Can these IS talks to each other? Do the systems share the same data ?
- “Garbage in = garbage out” : This means that BA will be absolutely useless if the data used comes with IS with
DATA
unconsolidated data and centralized data
QUALITY
- IS are core and come before BA : You need to have first good data (good IS) in order to implement it
- BA is a very important tool, but this don’t mean that decision makers should only relied on it to take decisions
EXCESSIVE - Machine couldn’t replace humans for different things such as creativity, new ideas…
DELEGATION
- BA has become part of every knowledge worker toolbox, but we have to continue testing our intuition and
developing our creativity
 14. What is Business Analytics ? (ADS)
TABLEAU DESCRIPTIVE AND PRESCRIPTIVE

I. Synchronous session
BI is a solution to gather all information into a DW and create dashboard to make easy interfaces
BA is transforming Excel sheet in comprehensive dashboard, in order to make possible to take decisions.
ð Suppress all the line in Excel to make it more comprehensive and less time consuming.
ð Automatically transform raw of data in visual graphics, and make more informed decisions
ð As a data analyst, you will not analyze but just help your client analyze the data

A paradigm shift : In the traditional approach, we will only analyze part of the information, but we will miss some information, but
in the big data approach you’ll analyze all information
ð With Big data approach you will highlight the causality, the correlation and the clustering (group with similarities) between info
ð With BD approach, you don’t dig deeper : Large overview of the information (information about your information)

4 types of BA : Descriptive analytics : Analyze the past and try to deduce what happened
Diagnostic analytics: You dig further, you search why did it happen in order to prevent it to
Predictive analytics : Predicting the future based on historical patterns (show the outcomes of a decision)
Prescriptive analytics : Enabling smart decisions based on data

II. Questions
- Immersion strategies : give them deep knowledge of the entire process
- Less management need : Outsourcing the maintenance, data center management and mail, system development…
- Advisor role : Advisory from the outsourced firm, who act like a consultant and can identify opportunities of improvement
- Decentralization : Each BU adopt the most adapted solution to his own problem
- LOW MARGIN HIGH VOLUME BUSINESS MODEL : Importance of BA

1) They built the infrastructure for BA : With the creation of Datawarehouse (BW) to gather data, and make it available for everyone
in Excel (common use) in order to take decisions
ð Most end user only generated standard sales reports from the tool : Didn’t have the time to make the calculation
ð Most of the people modified the data in order to go in their way

2) The first BA solution that IT built for DSD were dashboard : Creation of easy understandable dashboards, in order to give quick
information to take everyday decisions., but also to highlight the bad days of business and the reasons
ð MyResult : Supporting primarily branch managers
ð AMPlify : Mobile analytics solution for account managers

- Past system : Report on key sales and operational metrics and compared actual vs target ; Include data from all the
BU in order to make comparison ; The generation of the report were automated thanks to BW : but it creates an
information overload (too many metrics)

- The objective was to make the data more actionable : To be more specific to the user’s the branch or region
ð Easy access : displayed in the intranet
MYRESUTL
ð Easy to understand : Graphical representation, figures, forms, organized according to a story board (organized)
ð Data organization according to the 4 main areas of concerns for a branch (sales, operation, SAV, logistics)

Problems :
ð People didn’t trust data : you have to dig deep in order to prove
ð Metrics formed part of people’s performance
- Created due to the limitation of the brick handled (CAT) : Use of paper
- Started designing a suite of sales solution : MyASD, and MyDAY (
- AMPlify is part of MYday : Use it to gather data for account Managers
- Give managers information refreshed on a daily basis they control (don’t have to ask to their boss)
AMPlify - It’s role was to highlight the account manager’s selling opportunities

- Detailed information : Use of colors, metrics to highlight areas of improvement for account managers. They can
have selling information in order to allocate the right amount of space to the product…
- Benchmarking feature : To persuade store managers to order a certain product or make promotion
 1 What are the strengths and the weaknesses of ADS’s approach to Business Analytics?
- Developing a culture of fact-based decision making : Managers learn over time how best to borach issues of poor
performance with subordinates, how to mentor.
- Motivation to take action : Poor performance cannot be hidden with increased visibility.
- Efficient : Previously managers spent 80% of their time looking for data, now only 80%; new-found time can be
STRENGTHS used to resolve problems and take action.
- Centralized : Go from isolated infrastructure to one data warehouse
- Daily follow up and transparency between the departments
- Accountability and transparency : See who did wrong, why and where
- IT department earned the trust by the employees thanks to the power of BA
- Lack of time/lack of skills : They don’t have the skills to analyze dashboard and time to make the calculations
- Implementing IT is expensive (money, time, energy)
- Decision makers in the firm fail to develop analytical skills : By simply looking at highly graphical, descriptive data
- Fear : People were afraid to ask questions about data, and no one would investigate further data
- Top-down management philosophy : Limiting the kinds of questions members in the firm can ask for data
WEAKNESS
- Confusion in the metrics : Users were overwhelmed because of them
- Lack of procedures to analyze existing data
- BA don’t analyze competitors
- No data analyst were allocated at ASD : Data analytics remained basic
- The software was not handy for all users (hard to understand)

2 How does Business Analytics impact business performance? Please say for each of the BA
type? Say both in general and at ADS in particular
The BA dashboards had succeeded in improving organizational performance was up for debate :
ð Pros : It had dramatically changed how people spent their time (for evaluation purpose for instance), it highlighted the application
development priorities
ð Cons : Relatively low adoption, culture change need, principle of simplicity and actionability that undermines the possibility of improvement

- Goal : Providing business insights (What has happened?)

- Pros : Based on past data so it can easily be applied in day to day operation, and it don’t require an extensive
knowledge of analytics
DESCRIPTIVE
ANALYTICS
- Cons : It doesn’t look beyond the surface of the data

- For ADS : With “one version of the truth”, decision makers are more likely to more quickly come to an agreement
on what the problem is. This supports the development of a data-driven culture
- Goal : Determine causal relationships (Why did it happen?)
DIAGNOSTIC
ANALYTICS - For ADS : By answering “why” questions and providing insights into the causal relationship between variables,
diagnostic analytics not only expand the intelligence phase (as things that are) ….
- Goal : Predicting the future based on historical patterns (What could happen?)
- Pros : Vital tool to forecast possible future outcomes, and also more efficiency, gain a better understanding of
PREDICITVE their customers, detect and prevent fraud and reduce the risks associated
ANALYTICS - Cons : based on probability, so it can never be completely accurate

- For ADS :
- Goal : Enabling smart decisions based on data (What should we do?)
- Pros : Provide invaluable insights in order to take the best possible solution (data based decisions) and reduce
the risk of error
PRESCRIPTIVE
ANALYSIS
- Cons : Require a large amount of data to produce useful results, and machine learning cannot always account for
all external variables

- For ADS :

3 What factors critical to the success of impacting business performance are evident in ADS?
Critical success factors (CSFs) of BA are the following:
- Agree on a single source of truth
- Use scorecards
- Explicitly manage business rules
- Use coaching to improve performance
Involving all the employees and top management in the process
 4 If you were V Du Plessis, how would you prioritize the improvement ideas proposed for the
various applications in order to develop the Business Intelligence and Sales Enablement
group’s project agenda for 2016? What are the CFS ?
Keys to success with Big data Analytics:
- A clear business need
- Strong committed sponsorship : You need to involve top management in order show its importance to the employees
- Alignment between the business and IT strategy : Define clearly the business needs in order to be efficient, and verify that
all the needs and metrics are supported with technological features
- A fact-based decision-making culture : You can’t change culture if there are habits… but what you can do as a consultant
is to do training and coaching session in order to help all employees accept the IT you are implementing
- A strong data infrastructure : Able to manage all the data
- The right analytics tools : Use what type of BA you need (descriptive, predictive) that answers the business problems
- Personnel with advanced analytical skills : Train employees in order to make them ready to use it efficiently
All these factors are managerial (and no technological)
 15. Business Analytics Extended
I. 3 things are holding back your analytics and technology
isn’t one of them – Todd Clark & Dan Wiesenfeld
During the past decade, business analytics platforms have evolved from supporting IT and finance functions to enabling business
users across the enterprise. But many firms find themselves struggling to take advantage of its promise.

A. The 3 main obstacles to realizing analytics’ full value

We’ve found three main obstacles to realizing analytics’ full value, and all of them are related to people, not technology : The
organization structure, culture and approach to problem solving
1. Structure
Structurally, analytics departments can range between two opposite but equally challenging extremes
DATA
- They are too independent of the business
SCIENCE
GROUPE - These tend to produce impressive and complex models that prove few actionable insights
EMBEDDED
ANALYST
- Analyst embedded in business function tend to be biased toward the status quo or leadership’s thinking

2. Culture
DATA - Culturally, there are organizations that are too data-driven (yes, they exist)
DRIVEN
- They will blindly follow the implications of flawed models even if they defy common sense or run counter to business goals.
INSTINCT - Alternatively, there organizations that rely too heavily on gut instinct
DRIVEN
- They resist adjusting their assumptions even when the data clearly indicates that those assumptions are wrong.

3. Methodology : Approach to problem solving

The dichotomy continues when it comes to methodology :
COMPLEX
MODELS
- Groups that create overly complex models with long lead times and limited adaptability to changing inputs.
SIMPLISTIC - Some teams create models that are too simplistic
MODELS - And fail to capture the nuances of the problems they’re trying to solve. A large fashion retailer ran into this issue.

B. 3 elements of an effective Analytics Organization

In light of these obstacle, we believe an effective business analytics organization balances functional knowledge, business instinct,
and data analysis, with an operating philosophy to add complexity only when the additional insights justify it.
This kind of organization includes:
- Ideally, a small team of independent, highly skilled data scientists
- Typically, with advanced degrees in statistics, mathematics, computer science
- They serve as the analytics nerve center of an organization.
- Also, reporting into this nerve center are analytics generalists embedded in each major business function.
AN ANALYTICAL
NERVE CENTER
- In this setup, the embedded generalists gain the deep functional know-how they need to initiate and develop
actionable analyses.
- They rely on the nerve center for additional support, model validation, and training.
- Knowing the languages of analytics and business, the embedded generalists also serve as liaisons between
the independent data scientists and the business partners in their functions.
- A chief analytics officer who brings the voice of analytics straight to the C-suite, where instinct tends to rule.
REPRESENTATION
AT THE TOP
- When analytics and instinct come together, a strategy becomes more powerful.
- When the two disagree, research can reveal whether it’s the model or the business assumption that’s flawed.
- To manage the complexity-insight tradeoff in this ideal structure, analysts initially focus on creating a type of
minimum viable product, or MVP.
- Here, an MVP is a model that solves the problem to a minimum acceptable level as simply as possible.
A CHAMPION-
- This MVP becomes the “champion” and touches off challenges to add complexity and unseat it.
CHALLENGER
APPROACH - A challenger can replace the champion, but only if all stakeholders agree that its benefits are worth the
increased complexity.
- An interesting byproduct of this approach is that it nearly always produces something usable, even if the
process is interrupted.

Modern business analytics has made it possible to extract new types of insights from vast volumes of data :
ð The result is that analytics has become crucial to any large organization’s ability to make decisions.
ð Getting this capability right means creating an analytics organization with the structure, culture, and problem-solving
methodology to reveal the actionable insights that business leaders need to compete.
 II. How to integrate Data and Analytics into every part of
your organization ?
A. Principle
Many conversations about data and analytics (D&A) start by focusing on technology. Having the right tools is critically important
but too often executives overlook or underestimate the significance of the people and organizational components required to build
a successful D&A function.
ð When that happens, D&A initiatives can falter — not delivering the insights needed to drive the organization forward or
inspiring confidence in the actions required to do so.
ð The stakes are high, with International Data Corporation estimating that global business investments in D&A will surpass
$200 billion a year by 2020.

A robust, successful D&A function encompasses more than a stack of technologies, or a few people isolated in the building :
ð D&A should be the pulse of the organization, incorporated into all key decisions (sales, customer, marketing…)
ð The best way to build effective D&A capabilities is to start developing strategy across the entire enterprise, that includes
a clear understanding of what you hope to accomplish and how success will be measured.

B. Path to follow in order to implement successful D&A function

1) Understanding that successful D&A starts at the top : Make sure leadership team are fully immersed in defining and setting
expectations across the entire organization
2) Avoid silos decisions : Which can produce shadow technologies, data analysis paralysis or competing version of the truth
3) Make sure that the data analysis help improving the business performance : Cost efficiency, accelerate change, innovation…
4) Understand that D&A team are not data warehouse that perform back-office functions : They should be a key contributor to
the development and execution of the business strategy by supplying insight into key areas
5) Leadership teams must recognize that being successful will take courage : Because once they embark on the journey, the
insights from data analytics will often point to the need for decisions that could require a course correction
6) Leaders need to be honest with themselves about their willingness to incorporate the insights into their decision making : And
hold themselves and their teams accountable for doing so.
7) Avoid cultural resistance : Make sure that it is supported by the right organizational structure and talent are aligned with the
business strategy (à study : only 51% of C-suite executives fully support their organization’s D&A strategy)
8) Don’t spread D&A capabilities or rely on a few data scientist to provide insights : Also, some are too reliant on technology
tool kits and rigid architectures, and not enough on creating the right environment to effectively leverage people with the right
expertise to drive D&A projects forward. These sorts of models usually are not capable of achieving truly transformative D&A.

C. Conclusion
According to KPMG’s 2016 CIO Survey, data analytics is the most in-demand technology skill for the second year running, but
nearly 40% of IT leaders say they suffer from shortfalls in skills in this critical area. Formally structured systems, processes, and people
devoted to D&A can be a competitive advantage, but clearly many organizations are missing this big opportunity.

While structures vary, the team should be seamlessly integrated with the company’s existing providers and consumers of D&A,
operating in cohesion with non-D&A colleagues (people who really understand both the business challenges and how the business
works) to set and work toward realistic and relevant strategic goals. The teams should also have the complete support of executive
leadership, and their goals should be fully aligned with the business strategy.

In an age where data is created on a scale far beyond the human mind’s ability to process it, business leaders need D&A they can
trust to inform their most important decisions — not just to reduce costs but also to achieve growth. And the best will use D&A to
anticipate what their customers will want or need before they even know they want or need it.
 17. R D BMS a n d E R P
In this last video of the MIS course, we will introduce the topic of data management, relational database management systems
(RDMS) and begin shedding light on a very important enterprise system that is Enterprise Resource Planning.
You already know that data in its different formats (structured, semi-structured and unstructured) are the origin of one of the
fundamental assets for organizations that is knowledge.

I. Importance of Data Management

- All organizations give high importance to their data and to data management
- They are responsible of keeping a digital trace of all internal and external activities that organizations develop with
PRINCIPLE their different stakeholders such as their employees, their customers, their suppliers, their partners, etc.
- More precisely, organizations need a rigorous management of their data in order to feed their different business
processes
- Companies need to safely record data about their employees to manage effectively their rights, duties, and careers.
- Companies need to manage effectively data about the order that they send to their suppliers in order to be able to
EXAMPLE
enhance their supply chain visibility and to inform them about the dates of the delivery of the ordered goods.
- The list is too long but keep in mind that data is one of the most important assets for any organization!!!
- Still, despite the importance of data for companies, paradoxically, many companies including small, medium and
even large companies can fall in the trap of an inappropriate management of their data.
- It is very perilous as it can simply jeopardize business operations in a significant way.
PARDOXE
- The data is direct and the repercussions have an immediate impact on the business.
- Consequently, companies that do not manage their data effectively risk harming their performance and even losing
their business.
- Imagine a company that stores its data in redundant databases where different pieces of the same information are located in
undocumented programs written with different languages.
- Thus, you could have different files containing repetitive data about the same employee or the same supplier.
EXAMPLE - So imagine that the customer has changed his or her billing address, you would have to make this change in the different databases
where there is information about the billing address of the customer.
- Now imagine that the billing address of the customer is located in different databases written in different languages.
- Thus, a very simple change could be transformed into a nightmare in companies that do not manage well their data

II. Relational Database Management Systems

- RDBMS is a software that contains structured data.
PRINCIPLE - Still, we need to go beyond that and to make sense of RDBMS in order to understand why they are so crucial for
an appropriate management of data.
- Basically, RDBMS is a must-have technology for virtually any organization that needs to process its business.
- What you need to know is that RDBMS is core for organizations.
IMPORTANCE
- It is the repository where data are saved, managed, stored and provided to applications as they are used by users
to fulfill their tasks.
- Lawrence Ellison and a team of developers from Oracle developed the first RDBSM back in 1977.
- Then, as servers became more powerful over time, RDBMS use became more affordable and widespread to serve
EMERGENCE virtually the majority of organizations.
- The leading software vendors of RDBMS are Oracle, IBM, SAP and Microsoft SQL Server. Now, we need to define
what an RDBMS is about.

A. Definition of an RDBMS
- Set of software programs that enables end-user organizations to generate, update, manage and retrieve data
RDBMS
from a database or many databases.
- Basically, an RDBMS is based on what we call a relational model.
RELATIONAL
MODEL
- A relational model is a structured and consistent language that enables the generation of data in relations by
indicating the kind of data and the kind of query that can be made.
- The system of RDBMS is based on a relational database framework where data objects can be directly accessed
SQL by end-users through a specific language called Structured Query Language (SQL).
- The SQL language is somehow the key that is used to access to the RDBMS.
- In simpler words, an RDBMS is used to allow end-users to interact with the data in the database.
SIMPLE
WORD
- Users can mainly store, change and extract data from the RDBMS.
- RDBMS are indispensable for preserving operational records and supporting various kinds of business processes
- A given company needs an RDBMS to save the data associated with all its financial transactions (forecast, requirement…)
EXAMPLE - They will need also an RDBMS to manage its marketing expenses in the different locations where it operates.
- They will also need a RDBMS to keep track of its sales records coming from different sales forces in different regions …
 B. How things work in an RDBMS ?
- Suppose that you are running an e-commerce website and that you want to know those users who were not active
TIME
SAVING
during the previous fiscal year.
- Without RDBMS, a user would have to find the information manually which is time consuming and inefficient.
- To enable you to understand a RDBMS, imagine that you are in charge of the library at your university and that you want to help
EXAMPLE the students find the appropriate book in an efficient way rather than losing their time and searching manually for the right outlet.
1 - You will create an RDBMS where the all the content of the library will be managed by designing specific attributes such as: Book’s
title, Discipline, Publisher, Author, Year…
- An RDBMS stores data in the form of tables
WORING
- And these tables have related data about a specific entity and then this table is split in columns and rows.
- Let us take the example of an RDBMS that manages the sales transactions for a SME.
- There are many tables in the RDBMS.
- One of the tables contains information about a specific entity that is the customer.
- Tables are always about entities and there are many entities that organizations deal with in their day-to-day business
EXAMPLE
2
- In each column, you have fields or attributes : For instance, if your database is about your sales transactions, the attributes will be
about your: customers names, phone, city, date of birth, email, purchased items, dates of purchases, etc.
- In each row, you will have different records about individual information that refer to the different attributes we spoke about
regarding your customer. Thus, you need to inform the data table with the information pertaining to the records associated to each
attribute of your customers.
- RDBMS enable users to filter the data and to stick to the specific data that they are looking for.
KEEP IN
MIND
- In an RDBMS, a single database is spread across different tables, which is different compared to other types of self-
contained databases.

III. Pros and challenges aof RDBMS

A. The advantages of RDBMS
Accessibility: data can be accessed by more than one end-user. In organizations, many users need the same data at the same time.
Therefore, this is a great advantage as you can share your data in a centralized way.
- Data is presented to end-users in a consistent, clear and concise way
ACCESSIBILITY
- This will enable users to easily extract the data they need.
- The management and administration is carried out in a centralized way.
SECURITY
- In addition, copying the data and backing it up can minimize data redundancy.

- Thus, business applications can evolve in a permanent way to meet business changes.

INDEPENDENCE
- However, this does not alter your data as data and programs are separated.
- This is a great advantage as it enables your programmers to be more efficient in developing new applications
without being scared of losing the data.

DATA QUALITY - An RDBMS offers the advantage of a better quality as you improve data consistency
- As an RDBMS is administered and managed in a centralized way, data that is altered in the central database is
EFFICIENCY
reproduced immediately in all the applications.

B. The challenges of RDBMS

- The back-up of the data stored in the RDBMS is crucial as companies need to make sure that data is available,
BACK-UP
accurate and accessible all the time.
- As you already know, there are many stakeholders that have important needs in terms of access to the data.
OWNERSHIP OF
DATA
- An important question that needs an answer is who owns the data and who can alter it or not?
- These are important decisions that need to be answered internally to avoid later conflicts.
- Your company has legacy systems that are generally based on old technologies or on old programming
CONVERSION
languages that are no longer supported.
OF DATA IN
LEGACY SYSTEM - Still, they might encompass data that is valuable for your organization.
- In this case, you need to migrate the data to an RDBMS, which could be costly.
 IV. Data management in an RDBMS : The key elements
Now that you know more about RDBMS, we need to understand how to use it in an efficient and effective way.
To do so we need to navigate some vocabulary such as reports, forms and querying.

A. Data model
PRINCIPLE - Data model is key as it indicates the logical structure of an RDBMS.
- Basically, it includes the relationships and the constraints that define the relationships between the different entities.
INCLUDE - It includes also information about the way data are stored and accessed to enable an efficient management of the
database.

B. Meta data or data dictionary

- Now when a given data model is done, we need to create what is called a metadata repository.
PRINCIPLE - Metadata can also be called data about the data or data dictionary.
- Metadata provides the needed documentation of other data in the RDBMS.
For a database about sales transactions, the Metadata contains important elements such as:
ð The attributes : such as name, date of birth, gender, goods purchased, times of purchases, etc.
EXAMPLE ð The expected values associated with each attribute in a coherent manner : by explicitly indicating that for the
name only letters are accepted, that for the date of birth only numbers that refer to days, months and years are
accepted and that for the gender only man or women are accepted.
IMPORTANCE - These elements among others make it the spine of making sense of an RDBMS: forms, reports and SQL.

C. Forms
- As its name indicates, a form is screen with many blanks that await to be filled out by system users.
PRINCIPLE
- Forms actually refer to information a user insert and to what we call an attribute.
- For instance, suppose that you are trying to purchase an airline ticket over the internet.
EXAMPLE
- From the outset, you have a web form where you enter information about attributes
PURPOSES Entering data ; Updating data ; Revisiting data ; Deleting data

D. Reports
- A report is an assembling of data from the RDBMS that is structured, organized and showed in order to enable end-
users make decision.
PRINCIPLE
- We could also define a report as the formatted output that emanate from querying the database in order to help
users make meaningful decisions.
SQL - For the RDBMS to generate a report a specific language is commonly used and that is SQL

E. SQL and Querying

- As I mentioned before RDBMS use the language Structured Querying Language
PRINCIPLE
- SQL language enables the operation of querying.
- SQL was initially created in the 1970s.
- Since then, it has become the standard for programming.
CREATION - It enables the management and the manipulation of the data stored in an RDBMS.
- SQL is commonly used by database administrators and developers who are in charge of the integration of scripts
from different databases.
- Thus, SQL is the command that enables the execution of the query in order to retrieve data from a given
QUERIES database.
- SQL enables end-users to use ensembles of commands or queries to retrieve or update data on the database
- SQL is essential to enable users to establish communication with the database.
- For example, these queries can be delete, insert, select, drop.
IMPORTANCE
- SQL enables users to save a huge amount of time as they can quickly access to the information they are looking
for without searching all the database.
Suppose that you want to select only the customers located in a specific geographic area :
ð You need to Select the customers ID from the list of all the customers.
EXAMPLE ð Then, you might want to filter further by adding the where clause and you add location
ð This will enable you to obtain the list of all the customers located in this area
Now you can target these customers in a more effective way for marketing or sales purposes for instance.
- This is one example of what we call Data Query that ends-users can make in RDBMS.
DATA QUERY - Naturally, there are many other complex manipulations of RDBMS where you can associate more attributes and
many databases in the same RDBMS.
CONCLUSION - In other words, SQL is mobilized to query, insert, make an update and change the data stored in the RDBMS.
 V. Conclusion
Despite all the elements that we covered, RDBMS can be limited to manage in an effective and efficient way the firm’s business :
ð Actually, as you know, a given RDBMS hosts the data that serve specific business applications on application servers.
ð On a given server, you might have different applications such as sales, production, logistics, finance….
ð Still, these different applications are not built to talk to each other.

Actually, companies can build applications that use different RDBMS that serve different functions.
ð Classically, companies have main function areas such as marketing, procurement, finance, etc.
ð Then companies build their applications around these functions without necessarily having the big picture in mind.
ð Even though it could seem efficient, companies end up turning their IT systems into siloed environments where specific
applications store their data in different RDBMS.

This situation creates the kind of troubles that you saw in the last case about SAP ERP Implementation and will initiate the need to
leave the narrowed approach to IT systems and to move to an integrated approach through the ERP.