IS Projects!!!

I cant avoid to admit that Knowledge Management Systems Class keeps reminding of my Change Management Class! 

We talk about Business projects and project management as well in both classes  which I think it's great because Project Management is the stream I chose for the third term. 

So, to start it is good to say that there is no such thing called IS Projects, they are actually business projects as well. So they should be implemented and manage as good as any business project.

In order to do that, managers need to plan a project. A project is made by making a plan of all the tasks, activities, phases of the projects. The methods to use, the resources, the plan, the staff, dependencies, etc. These plans are well recommended to do it in gantt charts. 

The key components of a project to have into account are all the people involved in it, the structure of the organization, the organizational culture, all the process to be undertaken and the final products. An important thing to say is that in order to succeed it is essential to manage the project succesfully, because as any project there are potential risks of failure. 

Here is a video where you can see a discussion about risks and risk management in projects and information systems projects.



In the next video, Vince Rogers briefly explains how organizations can get a competitive advantage by implementing information systems, he talks about all the things to consider in order to manage sucessfully an information system project.

IMPORTANT! Privacy and Security!!!

The most important thing that managers need to be aware in terms of privacy and security is that it has to be updated as quickly as possible! You cant take the risk of leaving the privacy and security of your company behind. So this should be a priority for managers because the company is always on threats. 

These threats could take many forms, and on this video you can see a 5 mins explanations of how important it is for organizations to protect themselves against those threats. 

Those threats could be internet related or not. 

Internet related threats can take many forms as well. You can perceive them as cyber stalking, cyber terrorism, cyber squatting, brand abuse, denial of service, among others.

Cyber stalking is used among corporations in order to harass other competitors. Cyber terrorism are basically attacks on IS motivated by politics or religions. Cyber squatting refers to selling an internet domain in order to over sale for profits to another party. Brand abuse could be any type of activity made to damage the brand of a company. Denial of service is a type of attack made in order to halt the company's IS. 

Other type of threats are online stock fraud, social engineering and pishing. They are all dangerous threats that managers need to be aware.

However, there are ways to manage those threats by applying software apps that can prevent or help you prevent these type of activities. 

You can see another interesting video about the internet related threats and all the risks that we all face .

E-Business and E-Commerce

It is widely known how the internet has changed everybody's lives in the modernist era. As it has changed our lives, it has also changed our way of buying and making business. Now we don't need to go out in terms to pay bills or just buy a dress! Yeah, it really is making our lives easier.

So companies have seen Internet as a great tool to transform their organizations in order to increase their competitive advantage and becoming more global. Because as we all know, Internet is global. However, not everything is as good as it sounds. Companies also have to face some other issues like privacy and security which I will talk about it in a next blog.

First of all, I think we may all think that e business and e commerce are the same thing. Well, let me tell you about that ladies and gentleman, you are all wrong! yep!I was wrong too!

When we think about e commerce and e business we just think simply. It is about making business through the net.

E commerce as defined by the UK government is : “ The exchange of information across electronic networks, at any stage in the supply chain, whether within an organization, between businesses, between businesses and consumers, or between the public and private sector, whether paid or unpaid”. (Cabinet Office, 1999)

So basically e-commerce is not only about selling and buying through internet. E commerce is all the electronic transactions between an organization and any third party it deals with. Those transactions could take the form as financial transactions and non financial transactions. For example when a customer requests further information about products and services, that could be said it is a non financial transaction.

On the other hand, e business is when a company has integrated the technology into all its businesses process, changing all its business model for a new one called e business. It includes all the process within the organization like marketing, development, manufacturing, logistics, etc.

So it could be said that e commerce is a subset of business.

You can see a nice video below of an explanation about e business and the differences between e business and e commerce in general.