Page 41 - DCAP205_DCAP409_ANALYSIS_AND_DESIGN_OF_INFORMATION_SYSTEMS

Unit 2: Managing Application Development Portfolio and Project Review & Selection

Notes
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Caselet Enterprise Management — Building Intelligence into
Information Systems

nterprise Applications (enterprise resource planning, supply chain, customer
relationship management, and the like), coupled with business process redesign,
Eare a part of the IT and corporate firmament worldwide. Enterprise Applications
are not used just to computerise ways of doing business, but as drivers of the change
business corporations must undergo to compete successfully in the information age.
New versions of Enterprise Applications do not limit transformation to individual business
corporations. Equipped with powerful adjunct capabilities such as Composite Applications
and Service-Oriented Architecture (SOA), they are making wholesale changes to the entire
supply chain: suppliers, suppliers’ suppliers, customers and customers’ customers. The
complexities of implementing these packages and the consequent obsession with data
management have led many to believe, incorrectly, that there is no life after Enterprise
Applications deployment.

While the power of Enterprise Applications is awesome, it falls short of supporting the
most vital tasks of management. Sooner than later, business corporations will migrate
from mere data management to sophisticated knowledge management efforts. Such efforts
will result in a set of powerful information systems called Enterprise Management Systems
(EMS) that will be a legitimate sequel to Enterprise Applications.
Task of Management
Many management thinkers, including Peter Drucker, have presented diverse models to
describe the task of management. But none argues the case more cogently than the Shewhart
Cycle, known better to the world as the Deming Cycle. The Deming Cycle was originally
proposed by Walter Shewhart and popularised in Japan by Edwards Deming after which
it came to be known as the Deming Cycle. The Deming Cycle, sums up the task of
management as a closed loop activity system.
The four principal steps in the Deming Cycle are:
Plan: Define the destination you are aspiring for. The destination could be that of the
enterprise, of a business process or of a small team. Using appropriate techniques validate
that this destination is worthy of reaching. Generate alternative ways of reaching the
destination and choose one.
Do: Carry out the plan of action. The plan is implemented in one or more business processes.
Check: Using appropriate measurement systems determine if the destination was reached.
If you did, go back to generating fresh plans.
If not, move to the next step, Act.
Act: As in the Plan step, except for being informed by the results from the Check step,
generate alternatives to close the gap between the current state and the destination. Migrate
to the Plan step to add plans for new initiatives.
The endless repetition of this P-D-C-A cycle constitutes the task of managing and running
the business enterprise.

Contd.....

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