Word Count (3000) Banner id: 000959901 Due Date: 27th April 2017 Information Technology Planning Strategic Evaluation Document for Heaven Hotels National College of Information Technology (NACIT) – BlantyrePage 2 of 15 Table of Contents Introduction …….
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. 3 Background …
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…… 4 Strategic evaluation ..
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… 6 SWOT Analysis…..
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………………………………. 6 Strengths …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 6 Weaknesses………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 6 Opportunities ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 7 Threats ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 7 Impact of IS ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 8 Major systems the hotel needs ……………………………………………………………………………………………… 8 The type of information the Managing Director Expects ………………………………………………………… 9 Managing director ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 9 Hotel Managers …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 9 Organizational changes faced and how they can be addressed. …………………………………………. 10 Processes which might lend themselves to outsourcing………………………………………………………. 10 Steps undertaken to ensure that systems are resurrected quickly in the event of disaster. …. 11 Ideas to persuade the managing director that the new system is affordable. ………………………. 12 Conclusion ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. 14 References ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 15Page 3 of 15 Introduction The document is titled strategic evaluation for heaven hotels. The document has the background information, which discusses the issues that are hindering the organization to expand and what it needs to focus on so that the hotel chain can move forward. The second section has the strategic evaluation for heaven hotel, SWOT (an abbreviation which stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) has been used to analyze the hotel chain for heaven group hotels, SWOT tool analyses the Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats that an organization has. In the last section of the document, there is a discussion of the impact of information systems. Under this section several issues have been highlighted supported with their reasons, why the issues have been highlighted. Firstly a description of major systems which heaven hotels needs and what the systems need to do has been discussed, then the type of information which the managing director needs has also been included in the document, this includes the comparisons and contrasts to the information which the hotel managers need. The other issues which have been discussed in the document in their chronological order include the following: the biggest organizational changes faced with the new systems and suggestions on how they should be addressed, processes lending themselves to outsourcing and their reasons. The steps undertaken to ensure that the systems can be resurrected quickly in the event of failure or disaster at head office and the ideas to persuade the managing director that the new systems will be affordable.Page 4 of 15 Background Heaven hotels group has 43 6 – star hotels which are located in different locations throughout the world. The hotel group is rich in cash and it has been growing progressively by purchasing and acquiring run down and dilapidated premises which are turned into top of the range hotels. The vision of the managing director is that they should become the number one hotel group in the world by offering unsurpassed luxury accommodation. The hotel group has good ratings on websites that produce reports for hotels. Medical practitioners recommend heaven hotels to run-down high earning executives needing a break from everyday life. The issues that are hindering the hotel group from moving forward include the following on the list: The first factor hindering the hotel group from moving forward is the ban of all Eastern Europeans from entering the American continent – as it is read in the scenario of heaven hotels (page 3, paragraph 3) the hotel group (heaven hotels) heavily relies on Eastern European employees who are highly skilled in renovating properties and work thoroughly and creatively. Meaning that if these migrants are banned in entering the American continent, the hotel group has to find other laborers who can work on the renovations this means that the new laborers might not be cheaper as their counterparts from the Eastern European region. The second factor hindering the hotel group from moving forward is the retaliation of the governments of Europe, Africa, Asia and Australasia, these mentioned governments have also banned all citizens from North America and Latin America to travelling to their shores. With this retaliation it means that the hotel group cannot collect much revenue in the hotels which are located in the areas where the governments have banned all Americans from entering their countries as the American tourists will have to stay in their continent and not travel anywhere. The third factor is the lack of fundamental I.T systems. In the scenario of heaven hotels (page 3 paragraph 5) it has been stated that currently most of the hotel activities are done manually for example recording of bookings which is done through the phone only. This means that the receptionist have to record whatever is said on the phone on paper, and if they lose this booking information a booking cannot be reserved for that customer. The fourth factor hindering the growth of the business of heaven hotels is the lack of appropriate qualifications for employees who are employed in the finance department this is also an issue hindering the hotel group from moving forward. As the external auditors noted that the end of year accounts were below the standard expectation of a commercial company which means that thePage 5 of 15 revenue which is used for expenses is above average as the accountants are not well qualified and they do not know how to trim the expenditure revenues used. The areas which the hotel group needs to focus on in order to move forward include the following highlighted below: Firstly the hotel group can take advantage of the change of policy of the world’s government whereby the governments are refocusing on other trades such as plumbing, decorators. The hotel group can employee these people who can learn from the eastern European citizens on how to renovate run-down buildings, by doing this the hotel can overcome the challenge whereby eastern Europeans have been banned from entering the American continent. The second point is that the hotel group needs to computerize its manual based system, by doing this, most of the activities can be done using computers thereby relieving the receptionist from writing down bookings from phone calls which they receive from customers. Thirdly the hotel group also needs to employee staff who are qualified for example staff in the accounts department should have the right qualifications so that when auditing is done the accounts should be above expected standard for a commercial company like heaven hotel group.Page 6 of 15 Strategic evaluation This section of the document highlights the strategic evaluation of the hotel group heavens hotels using SWOT analysis. SWOT Analysis According to (Taylor 2016) SWOT is an abbreviation which stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. SWOT is an analytical framework that helps a company face its greatest challenges and find its most promising markets. The same author (Taylor, 2016) says in business context SWOT enables an organization to identify both internal and external influences. Strengths Strengths are internal factors, attributes and resources that support a successful outcome this is according to (Rouse 2013). ? From the scenario of heaven hotels (page 3 paragraph 1) it is said that the hotel group is rich in cash which means it can be able to expand to the areas where they are not in existence and they can buy properties in these places where they are not present. ? Good ratings on websites that produce hotel reports (page 3, paragraph 1), this is an area of strength as many tourist like to spend their money in places where there is good hospitality and they are treated nicely with this in mind the hotel group can collect much revenue from the tourists. ? Highly skilled work force on the renovations of dilapidated premises (page 3, paragraph 3), the employees who work on the dilapidated premises are hard workers who are highly skilled in their field of work this means the hotel does not need to outsource these laborers from elsewhere. Weaknesses According to (Rouse 2013) weaknesses are the internal factors and attributes that work against a successful outcome. ? Lack of fundamental I.T systems, the hotel operates using a manual system where by the procedures are paper based for example booking from customers are recorded on paper from phone calls received. ? Employing staff who have no proper qualifications. Employing someone without the right qualifications for a particular post is a weakness this shows lack of seriousness as the hotel can afford to pay those who hold relevant qualifications as they are rich in cash.Page 7 of 15 Opportunities The opportunities are external factors the organization can use to its advantage ? Recommendations by medical practitioners to run – down high earning executives needing a break from everyday life. ? Worlds government policy changing and now they are refocusing on promoting trades such as plumbing ? Identification of the 22 neglected properties which are suitable to convert into hotels. Threats Threats are external factors that could endanger the project (Rouse 2013). ? Flooding of the basement when heavy rains have fallen ? Managing directors concern of raising costs to an extent that people may be charged more for staying at the hotel.Page 8 of 15 Impact of IS Major systems the hotel needs The hotel chain needs a hotel management system with an enterprise resource planning (ERP). According to (Rouse 2013) an ERP is a business process software which allows an institution to use a system of integrated applications to manage the business and automate back office functions with technology. The ERP need for heaven hotels needs to have the following sub components which have been explained in detail below: Central reservation system – with this system customers will be required to make bookings through the hotels group website or mobile application, there will be no need for the receptionist’s to receive bookings from customers through phone calls. The reporting tools which are required from this sub – component of the system include the following; expected arrival of hotel guests, the number of the days which a customer has requested to be reserved for him or her and a daily booking activity summary this according to (Provab 2013). Customer relationship management system – with this subsystem it is expected to gather and compile customer’s information through the company’s website, direct e-mail and also through the websites that rate hotels. The reporting tools which would be needed from this sub system is what the customer likes and their purchase histories (Griffith 2016). Billing software – this sub system is the one which is going to handle the bills of the customers which are supposed to be settled down and invoicing the customers for the services rendered to them. The reporting tool which is needed from this sub system is the number of days the customer has booked for, the services rendered and what amounts have been received from customer’s payments or the amounts a particular customer is supposed to settle down after services were rendered to him or her (Griffith, 2016). Marketing automation – this is mainly for the marketing department, to enable it to market the hotel chain easily through various mechanisms such as social media and direct emails to its customers. The reporting tool which is needed from this software are lead scoring which according to (Rouse 2015) this is an approach used by marketing departments to determine the worthiness of potential customers by attaching values to them based on their behavior relating to their interest in products or services. Inventory management system – with this component in the main system it is going to help in tracking of commodity levels in the stores room and notify relevant authorities when commodity levels are dropping down. The reporting tool required from this system is the ABC analysis (alsoPage 9 of 15 known as the selective inventory control) which provides a mechanism for identifying different categories for stock which require different management and control this is according to (Myob 2016). An accounting system – this will be used for gathering and storing financial records of the hotel group. The main reporting tools which will be required from this are the cash flow statements, expenditure reports which will be showing the a mount of funds collected and used within a certain period of time respectively (Rouse 2015). An executive information system – this system will be used by senior management and it is going to be used to support senior management in decision making process. The reporting tools which will be required from this sub system are the company’s performance with other companies, the investments which have been made and the how funds have been used (Gray 2014). The type of information the Managing Director Expects Managing director ? Group hotel performance reports – the managing director has to know how his company is performing against other competitors on the market and know what are the areas in which the group is lagging behind so that he or she can know what is supposed to be done. ? New properties acquired – the managing director has to know the properties that have been acquired for him or her to have a clear picture on how the hotel group is growing and what new opportunities will be offered in the areas where the new properties were purchased. ? Fiscal year earnings for the hotel group – apart from the two types of information suggested above the managing director also needs to know how revenue collection has been when a fiscal year has ended as he is the one who probably makes the final decisions about the hotels and how they should be run. Hotel Managers ? Hotel performance – as each hotel that heaven hotel operates has its own manager, the manager at each of the hotel where they are based at, they would want to see how the hotel they are operating is performing on the market against other competitors within the area. ? Staff performance under their hotel – the hotel manager would want to see how each of the staff members has performed during the year as the staff members would be givenPage 10 of 15 appraisal forms which would be used to assess each individual staff performance against their planned work. ? Financial performance per month – the hotel managers would like to know how much profits or losses they have made at the end of each month in order to see how processes and procedures could be improved. Organizational changes faced and how they can be addressed. ? Changing job roles – for example in the case study it is stated that all the booking are manually recorded and are only taken over the phone, the ones who carry out the bookings probably the receptions will have their job roles changing as they will be focusing more on welcoming the hotels guest and directing them to their rooms. ? Job losses – job cuts will be there because bringing in a computerized system means that work which was done by ten people would be carried out with two or three people which means in the accounts departments some of the staff there could lose their jobs as an accounting software would automate some of the processes which were done manually. ? New job creations – the hotel group wants to implement an IT system, which means the hotel group has to create an IT department where they can employee persons such as a system administrator, network and database administrators to operate the IT systems which the hotel group wants to implement. Processes which might lend themselves to outsourcing. ? Accounting – as it was stated in the scenario that the accounts personnel who are currently employed now by the hotel group have no appropriate qualifications, the accounts department is a critical part of the organization and employing people without proper qualifications could lead into a disaster. The hotel group would be encouraged to outsource this part so that end of year accounts should be in the expected standard as it is expected for a commercial company. ? Payroll – this could be outsource, and could be done with the accountants who are hired to do the accounting services of the hotel group. ? Car rental services – as a hotel there is no need for them to be running such kind of services, what they need to concentrate on is their hotel business which is to offer hospitality to clients, they can have an agreement with leading Car Company hiring services to run such kind of businesses on the hotels premises. ? Cleaning services – as it has been stated that the hotel is rich in cash they can also outsource these type of services while they are focusing more on the development andPage 11 of 15 implementation of the IT system. Cleaning services which can be outsourced could include laundry services, where they can have an agreement with laundries which would do the laundering and a cleaning company which can do all the housekeeping for the hotel group. ? Auditing – the advantage of having this service being outsourced according to (Gray 2014) is that an independent auditing consultant often specializes in a specific industry and brings an in-depth knowledge of that industry and utilizes the years of experience they have to support an internal audit function within the organization they have been hired to carry auditing. Steps undertaken to ensure that systems are resurrected quickly in the event of disaster. In order for the systems to be resurrected as quickly as possible when disaster has hit the organization the following measures could be under taken: Firstly the hotel group needs to have a hot site, the site would be useful when the impact of the disaster that has his the hotel group I.T systems is very huge. A hot site is defined as a disaster recovery facility that mirrors the organization’s production databases and other IT resources in real time. A hot site has the other equipment necessary to become active at a moment’s notice, including but not limited to; office furniture, active network/internet connections, phones this is according to (Yeager 2016). The advantages of having this is that it will be readily available when disaster has struck and the hotel group can quickly switch on to the hot site with a minimum down time to operations. Whereas the impact of the disaster which has hit the hotel group I.T systems is so minimal and other systems are working heaven hotel group should consider implementing a cold site. A cold site is defined as an available facility that has not yet been fitted out with an organization’s hardware or other necessary items to begin operations immediately but is under the control of an organization. A cold site typically requires some significant effort and time to become operational, but is available to the organization at a moment’s notice this is according to (Yeager 2016). The advantage of using this type of recovery facility is that in terms of cost it is cheaper and it would be required for applications which do not require much protection. Heaven hotels group could also utilize cloud computing which is defined as the process of storing and accessing information over the internet instead of a computer’s hard drive (Griffith 2016). The advantages of using this recovery plan is that when a disaster has hit the organization employees can work from anywhere what will be need is just an internet connection, using devices such as smart phones, tablets or even laptops.Page 12 of 15 Database replication – with this method electronic data is copied from one computer to another computer in order for users to share the same level of information resulting in a distributed database (Rouse 2013). The advantage of this method is that in terms of availability it is easy to access the data, for example if disaster hits station A, the data which was being held at station A can be accessed at station B because of the replication which was done. Ideas to persuade the managing director that the new system is affordable. Below are some of the ideas which could be used to persuade the managing director to invest in the new systems. Cost benefits analysis – this is a method where all the business process are analyzed, the benefits of a business related action are summed up and the cost associated with taking such actions are subtracted (Investopedia 2007). The advantage of using this kind of method within the company is that when the cost have been analyzed of implementing the new hotel management system with an enterprise resource planning, then possible benefits have to emerge which would include automation of marketing processes, there will be no need to record bookings on paper because this would be done on the hotels website. Return on investment – this measures the gain or loss generated on an investment relative to the amount of money invested (Investopedia 2007). The advantage of this is that when the hotel management system has been implemented and is in use, for example the billing software would be giving the correct amounts that a customer is supposed to pay when services have been rendered to him or her. Strategic management analysis – this is the management of an organization’s resources to achieve its goals and objectives it involves setting objectives, analyzing the competitive environment, analyzing the internal organization this is according to (Taylor 2016). Using methods such a SWOT (abbreviation standing for Strengths, Weakness, opportunities and threats) PEST (an acronym which stands for Political, Economic, Social and Technology factors) and Porters five forces would enable the organization (heaven hotels) to know its internal and external factors which are hindering heaven group’s hotel from moving forward and what needs to be done by exploiting the opportunities which are there and also working on the weaknesses which the organization has. A differentiation strategy would be suggested to the marketing director with this strategy after inviting tenders for bids for the development of the system, the managing director has to look atPage 13 of 15 the different prices which are offered by developers on the market, the developer offering his price at a reasonable price would be recommended to the managing director.Page 14 of 15 Conclusion In summary these are the areas which have been discussed in this document titled strategic evaluation document for heaven hotels. Firstly the document looked at the background which explained the issues which are hindering heaven hotels to go forward and the areas it needs to focus on in order for the hotel chain to expand. The second part looks at the strategic evaluation, analyzing the organizations current position with the help of SWOT (an acronym which stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Strengths) which is an analytical framework which analyses the strengths, weakness, opportunities and threats an organization has in relation to internal and external factors. The third section looked at the impact of information systems. The issues which were discussed under this section include the following; the major systems that heaven hotel group needs together with brief descriptions of what the particular system is required to do and the reporting requirements which are expected from that system. Then the type of information which the managing director wants with comparison and contrasts with the information which the hotel manager’s needs. In the third the section also, the document discussed the biggest challenges that would be faced with the new systems and how the challenges could be addressed. The others areas which were also discussed in this document are: the processes which might lend themselves to outsourcing with their supporting reasons, the steps undertaken to ensure that the systems can be resurrected quickly in an event of disaster and lastly the ideas which would be used to persuade the managing director that the new systems are affordable.Page 15 of 15 References Gray, K., 2014. LowersRiskGroup. Online Available at: http://www.lowersriskgroup.com/blog/2014/09/30/outsourcing-internal-auditing/ Accessed 22 March 2017. Griffith, E., 2016. PC Mag. Online Available at: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2372163,00.asp Accessed 19 March 2017. Investopedia, n.d. Investopedia. Online Available at: http://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/cost-benefitanalysis.asp Accessed 20 March 2017. ITIP ASSIGNMENT 2017, Heaven hotels group Myob, 2016. Myob. Online Available at: https://www.myob.com/au/blog/5-tools-for-inventory-management/ Accessed 1 April 2017. Provab, 2013. Provab. Online Available at: http://www.provab.com/hotelbookingsystem/hotel-crs-hotel-central-reservation-system/ Accessed 7 April 2017. Rouse, M., 2013. TECHTARGET NETWORK. Online Available at: http://searchcio.techtarget.com/definition/SWOT-analysis-strengths-weaknesses-opportunities-and-threats-analysis Accessed 5 March 2017. Rouse, M., 2015. WhatIs. Online Available at: http://searchsalesforce.techtarget.com/definition/lead-scoring Accessed 19 March 2017. Taylor, N. F., 2016. Business News Daily. Online Available at: http://www.businessnewsdaily.com/4245-swot-analysis.html Accessed 5 March 2017. Yeager, R., 2016. ONGOING OPERATIONS. Online Available at: https://ongoingoperations.com/blog/2012/12/definition-of-hotsite-coldsite-and-warmsite-for-credit-unions/ Accessed 5 March 2017.
