Information And Knowledge Management

Answer :

Introduction

Technology is enhancing day by day, therefore the organizations these days need to incorporate those technologies into their account in order to enhance their business performance. In order to incorporate the new and innovative technology the organizations need to have the proper structure and proper amount of expertise. Along with that, the organizations also need to identify their strengths and weakness before implementing the technology. Otherwise, according to Hwang (2017), it may create an adverse impact over the overall organizational performance. This particular study deals with the emergence of the cloud technology along with the big data technology.

The man aim of this study is to evaluate the impact of the recent technologies over the business organizations. Along with that, the study also aims to satisfy the fact that how the organizations can extract benefit from this particular set of technologies. In addition to hat, the study also describes the impact of the recent technologies over the existing technology that the organization FINRA (Financial Industry Regulatory Authority) had earlier. Along with that, the study also defines the different steps regarding the corporate strategic planning. Moreover, the study also provides a brief argument regarding the fact that whether the Knowledge Base system is better than the traditional IT system or not. Along with that, he study also derives the implications of data mining technology over the organization FINRA.

Question 1

1.1 Discussion regarding the emerging technologies and their impact over the organizations

Cloud technology

Financial Industry Regulatory Authority started to use the cloud technology. That is providing them with an ample amount of advantage over their rival organization. Cloud platform is considered as the result of the evaluation of the existing technologies (Rittinghouse and Ransome, 2016). The main goal of the cloud computing technology is to permit the users to take the benefits from all the technologies without having a proper amount of knowledge regarding all of hose technologies. The cloud platform mainly helps the business organizations to reduce their cost and helps them to put the focus over their business operations. The main technology that is behind the cloud platform is the virtualization. 

This particular technology separates the physical computing device into multiple virtual devices and each of those devices can be used easily. In addition to that, those devices can also be used to manage the different computational tasks. As the operating system level virtualization is able generate a scalable system that includes multiple computing devices, therefore, the different idle computing resources can be used more effectively and efficiently (Almorsy et al. 2016). The organization FINRA has adopted the private cloud platform that is being managed internally. It enhances their business process. However, it produces the security threat in their every project. When it comes to the impact of the cloud computing over the business process, it has the following advantages.

Figure 1: Benefits of cloud computing

(Source: Botta et al. 2016)

Fresh software

With the SaaS model of cloud computing, the updated versions of the applications are required to run the business process and those applications are available to all the customers since they are release in the market. FINRA is using the most recent applications for their business process that can easily enhance their overall business process and provide them with an ample amount of advantage over their rival organizations (Dave et al. 2016).

Performance enhancement

Using the cloud platform, FINRA has become able to reduce the size of their data centers. Along with that, the reduction in the number of servers and the cost regarding the software and hardware, the organization can easily enhance their mode of business performance.

Cost flexibility

When it comes to the cost factor regarding the cloud platform, it is more flexible than the traditional computing system. The organizations just need to pay to the third party service provider based on their capacity. There is no additional cost regarding the installation of hardware or software. Therefore, according to Xia et al. (2016), it saves a proper amount of money for the organizations. 

Availability

The cloud service providers are very much reliable in terms of their service. The applications run through the usage of internet. On the other hand, few applications are able to run offline. That can help the business organization to perform their tasks properly.

Improved mobility

All the data and the different applications are available to the employees of FINRA no matter where they are. The employees can use their smart phones in order to have a look at the organizational data set. Therefore, it can be said that the cloud platform has the enhanced amount of mobility feature. 

Collaborative nature

Cloud platform enables multiple users to meet virtually and share the different resources by the shared storage. According to Di Spaltro et al. (2016), this ability of the cloud platform enhances the process of product development and the service providence to the customers.

Cost effectiveness

As FINRA do not have to purchase different equipments and develop a data center, therefore it saves an ample amount of cost for them. Along with that, the organization also did not have to pay for any kind of hardware or software for the installation of this platform. According to Dave et al. (2016), it also save cost for the organization.

Expenses can be reduced

As the cloud platform provides a flexible cost structure, therefore it also create limit to the exposure of the resources. 

Capacity

The cloud platform has the flexible capacity that it can be turned up or turned down based n the situations of the organization. As for example, it can be said that if the organization is dealing with a sales process, the they may add capacity regarding their requirement. When the process is terminated, then the organization may reduce their capacity that in turn reduces the cost of the resources. 

Less impact over environment

As the cloud platform has very few data center and very much efficient in terms of operations, therefore they produce less amount of impact over the external environment. As FINRA is using the cloud platform by sharing different resources in their business operations, therefore it also improves the green computing credentials (Mahajan et al. 2016).

Big data technology

This particular technology comes into action when the traditional data processing software becomes inadequate to handle the large data sets of the organizations. As FINRA needs to deal with an ample amount of data, therefore it can be id that the decision of taking the big data technology into their business process is a good decision from the management of the organization. In addition to that, this particular technology is also able to use the predictive analysis, user behavior analytics. The data sets are growing rapidly because of the different IoT (Internet of Things) devices such as the mobile devices, radio frequency identification, remote sensing along with the different wireless sensor networks.

When it comes to the impact of the big data technology over the business processes, following are the few areas.

Lean management

The concept of lean management deals with the improvement in the quality of work and reduction of the different cost factor (Jakóbik, 2016). This technology helps FINRA to improve their quality of performance, as the organization needs to deal with an ample amount of data set. In addition to that, the usage of the different analytical tools can also help the organization to identify the areas in which they need to put more focus.

Improve target segmentation

As this technology is able to analyze a huge set of data, therefore it is also useful for the improvement of the target segmentation. This technology helps FINRA to gather the feedback of their customers and analyze those in order to target their market.

Predictive analysis

The big data analytics is also very much useful for the recruitment process. As this technology is able to perform the predictive analysis, therefore, it can be easy for the organizations to understand the process of employee retention and employee turnover rate.

Enhanced revenue and reduce cost

The big data technologies such as the Hadoop along with the cloud-based analytics mainly bring an ample amount of advantage to the business organizations. This enhances the level of performance for the business organizations (Vatsalan et al. 2017). Along with that as this technology has no set up cost, therefore it also reduces the cost factor for the organization.

1.2 Impact over the existing system if the organization moves to the new system

Earlier FINRA used to have the traditional information technology system that helps them to perform their business operations. However, it was becoming tough for the employees to keep track of the large amount of data set as the number of clients is increasing day by day. Therefore, the management has decided to shift from the traditional information system to the recent and updated technological system. They have implemented the cloud-based technology for their data storage and resource sharing purpose and the big data technology that would help them for better data analytical approach.

However, the organization needs to understand their strength and weaknesses before the change in the information technology system. New and innovative technologies are sometimes tough enough to understand for the employees. Therefore, it can reduce the work performance of the employees and the employees may resist the change management process (Bertino and Ferrari, 2017). In addition to that, the new technologies also have an ample amount of impact over the existing technology. Earlier the organization maintains different spreadsheets in order to keep track of their data sets. Therefore, it has a lack of security system. Anyone can easily have access to those spreadsheets and take all the data sets out from the resources. However, with the introduction of the cloud platform has mitigated this particular risk factor as it provides a proper amount of security for the data set of the organization.

In addition to that, the amount of data is being enhanced day by day; therefore, it is becoming tough for the employees to track all the data sets properly. According to Dubey and Srivastava (2016), the cloud technology also provides them with the advantage of having a proper amount of storage space that can help them to store an ample amount of data. In addition to that, the storage space is flexible enough that the organization may enhance the capacity of the space based on their requirements. However, the employees need to have a proper training regarding the usage of the cloud-based technology. Otherwise, it may adversely affect the organizational performance. If the employees understand the different areas of the cloud platform, then it would become easy for them to handle the entire platform and then the overall business process can easily enhance.

When it comes to the big data technology, it also helps the organization to deal with a large set of data regarding their business process. Earlier the organization is not able to perform the predictive analysis based on the customer’s feedback. Therefore, it was tough for them to understand the requirement of their clients and they failed to bring the ideas that can enhance their customer base. However, the introduction of the new and innovative data analytics technique enhances the opportunity for the organization to understand the customer feedback through the predictive analysis (Gai et al. 2016). It can help FINRA to understand their target market.

Along with that, the most important thing that needs to be taken into consideration is the fact that the usage of the recent technologies reduces the cost factor or the organization. That reduced amount of cost can be invested in the business development process of the organization. That can in turn produce the opportunity regarding the overall organizational growth. Therefore, it can be said that the existing technologies are able to help the organization with their business process; however, they are not up to the mark. According to McCormack and Smyth (2017), the new and innovative technologies such as the cloud platform and the data analytics technique helps the organization to such extent that the organization can easily survive in the competitive market with having the cost efficiency that the other rival organizations.  

Question 2

2.1 Different steps of Corporate Strategic Planning process and identification of any planning technique for the organization

When it comes to the strategic planning process of an organization, there are few steps that the organizations need to consider. Those steps are described below.

Determine the strategic intent

In order to get started with the process of strategic planning, the organization first needs to understand the basic concept of the strategic planning process. The organization needs to address the different kind of issues while generating a strategic planning process. This particular step also derives the fact that what the organization is going to do (Riel and Flatscher, 2017). If an organization is  determined regarding this fact, the they can easily move forward to start the strategic planning process.

Define the mission of the organization

Every organization has their own mission statement that derives their purpose. In other words, it can be said that the mission statement determines the fact regarding the reason for which the organization exists. In addition to that, it also includes the value statement of the organization that drives the employees to follow a certain path regarding the working process. If the organizations are able to understand their purpose and mission statement, then it will become easy for them to implement the strategic planning process that can enhance their business performance.

Analysis of the overall environment

In order to implement the strategic planning process, the organizations also need to assess their current situation. It can help the business organization to respond regarding the situation. Assessment of the situation means that the organization is gathering an ample amount of information regarding their strength and weaknesses along with the level of performance. These factors can be defined by few areas. According to Cassidy (2016), one of them is the level of competition in the global market. In addition to that, the organization also needs to gather proper knowledge regarding the economic and political condition of the area in which they are operating.

Formulation of the strategy

The strategy is mainly formulated base on the needs of the organization. As FINRA needs to deal with an ample amount of data and they are facing certain difficulties regarding their storage process and analysis process, therefore they have shifted towards the cloud-computing platform. Before formulating the strategy, they have identified their strengths and weaknesses and based on that they have decided to move to the cloud platform. It provides the organization with certain amount of benefits. One of them is the cost leadership (Channon and Jalland, 2016). Along with that, it also helps FINRA to be differentiated from their competitors.

Implementation of the strategy

When it comes to the implementation of the strategy, Mckinsey’s 7S model can be taken into consideration by the organizations. One of them is the strategy that defines the proper direction and scope of the organization in terms of long run. Along with that, the origination need to have a look at their structure regarding the fact that the taken strategy is useful for them or not. Finally, it comes to the systems that the organization is going to adopt. In addition to that, according to Wolf and Floyd (2017), the organization also needs to consider skills of the employees along with the shared values, behavior of the staffs, and style of management into their account.

Monitoring the strategy

This is the final step in the strategic planning process that gathers an ample amount of feedback about the results of the implemented strategy.

In the given scenario as the organization has already implemented the cloud-based technology and big data solutions into the account, therefore it can be said that the organization has already implemented the strategy. Now they only need to monitor the entire strategy that they have implemented. They need to get feedbacks from their employees regarding the fact that whether they are acing any kind of issues regarding the new system or not. In addition to that, they also need to ask feedback from their clients regarding their overall performance (Haines, 2016).

2.2 Formulation of a Business Intelligence system for the senior manager

When it comes to formulate a suitable business intelligence system for the senior manager of the organization to monitor the entire functionalities of the organization, knowledge management system can be taken into consideration. The knowledge management system includes huge rage of practices that are used in the organization in order to identify, generate, represent, distribute, and enable the proper adoption to the insight and the experience. This mainly includes knowledge regardless of the fact that whether it is embedded or embodied (Wheelen and Hunger, 2017). The knowledge management system has an ample amount of advantage for the organization. It can easily enhance the performance of the organization. In addition to that, it can also provide the organization with the actual level of competitive advantage and the courage regarding the innovation. Moreover, it also makes the organization able to share the knowledge that they have. Along with that, it also helps the organization to have a continuous process of improvement by driving the strategy, solving the issues at a fast rate, development of the professional skills. When it comes to the different kind of activities of the knowledge management system, the organizations need to start with the issues related to the business. After that, they need to identify the fact that what kind of strategy would be helpful for them in order to deliver their business value. After that, the management of the organization needs to think regarding the system that would be implemented for the business process maintenance. According to Harris et al. (2017), next step they need to think about the technical infrastructure that would be implemented in the organization. As the organization here has shifted from the traditional computing platform to the cloud-based platform, therefore it would be good for the senior manager to have a proper knowledge management system so that the entire business process can be monitored.

The proper architecture of the knowledge management system can be comprised of three different layers or services. These are presentation services, knowledge services along with the infrastructure services.

Figure 2: Architecture of Knowledge management system

(Source: Curé, 2017)

The first of the above model includes the different infrastructure serves that focus on the storage and the communication related technology. Storage technology is considered as the basis for supporting the knowledge management. In addition to that, the communication technology makes it easy for the KMS to support the transferring of knowledge in between the different users (Park et al. 2017). The next tier of this model is the knowledge services that mainly focus on the different technologies for the creation, sharing ad reusing of the knowledge in the system. The sharing technology of knowledge means the fact that the pool of knowledge is transferred from one organizational source to another. The third layer of the model is the presentation services that mainly focus on the proper display of the information set for the users that can help in the process of decision-making.

Question 3

3.1 Argument regarding the preference for KBS over the conventional IT system

When it comes to advantages of the knowledge-based system over the traditional IT system, few aspects can enhance the operational processes of an organization. Knowledge based system is considered as a computer program that provide reasons and utilizes a proper base of knowledge in order to solve the complex issues. The knowledge-based system has three sub-systems. These are knowledge base, user interface along with the interface engine. The knowledge based represents the different kind of information regarding the overall organization. The user interface is the area, which derives the set of information and the interface engine represents the different logical assertions that can be easily represented by the “if-then” rules.

Figure 3: Knowledge base system

(Source: Jansen, 2016)

The knowledge-based system is able to enhance the knowledge of the user by providing an ample amount of knowledge regarding the different kind of functionalities of the organization (Jansen, 2016). The traditional IT based system can also perform this task, but it do not have the kind of efficiency that the knowledge based system has. Therefore, the users or the managers tend to prefer the KBS to the traditional IT system. In addition to that, the knowledge-based system is very much cost effective and it reduces the cost of finding different source of information. Therefore, it does not need any kind of hardware or software to incorporate. On the other hand, according to Fu et al. (2016), in the traditional IT system if the user needs to store a set of data that can be termed as knowledge, then they need to implement the different software that can store the set of data. Along with that, another benefit of using the knowledge based system is the fact that it as a consistency in its answers to the user. As it extracts information from the set of data, therefore the answers regarding the different queries are very much consistent in their nature. This kind of characteristics is not present in the traditional IT based system. Therefore, the users tend to choose KBS over the traditional IT based system.

Along with that, few more features make the users to choose the KBS over the traditional IT based system. These are the proper explanation of the different solutions along with the fact that the knowledge based system is able to deal with the uncertainty of the user’s requirements and the knowledge-based system is also a facilitator of the green IT systems (Rebele et al. 2016). However, the KBS also has some sort of limitations. One of them is the lack of common sense and it is very much difficult to modify. In addition to that, the knowledge-based system is not always reliable to the users. Still, the advantages of the knowledge based system makes it far better than the traditional IT based system and therefore the users tends to choose the knowledge based system over the traditional IT based system.

3.2 Implication of KBS in Cloud Computing 

The cloud platform enables the users to deal with a vast range of data in a scalable online environment. That also does not create impact over the performance of the users. In addition to that, the cloud platform is very much useful for the small and medium size business organizations as the platform do not require the investment regarding proper IT infrastructure. The knowledge-based system enables the organizations to deal with an ample amount of data in order to help them in the process of decision-making. Bogaerts et al. (2016) said that, those data sets need to be stored properly. Therefore, the emergence of cloud platform is very much helpful for the organizations dealing with a huge amount of data. In addition to that, when it comes to the implication of the knowledge-based system in the introduction of the cloud platform the first thing that the organizations need to taken into consideration is the fact that reliability of the data set.

The reliable data set in the cloud platform enhance the business functions of the organization. That can help the organization to enhance their overall performance. Along with that, the enhanced level o security in the cloud platform also makes the organization able to store their data set properly. The knowledge-based system also provides a helping hand in this aspect by maintaining the flexibility of the data set regarding the different organizational functions. In addition to that, according to Yih et al. (2016), the big data technology helps the business organizations to analyze the set of data and the knowledge based system stores the result of the analyzed set of data. Therefore, it can be said that the knowledge-based system is also helpful for the organizations in order to make the predictive analysis. Moreover, the cloud platform is also able to have a proper backup of the data set that the organization deals with. Therefore, the knowledge-based system helps the organizations to sort out those set of data and extract the required set of information based on the different situations.

Question 4

4.1 Data mining technology in business applications

Data mining is considered as the computational process that discovers the different patterns in the large set of data. The primary aim of the data-mining concept is to extract the required set of data from the data pool and then transform that data set into an understandable form so that it can be further used. Along with that, the process of data mining also includes the database and the data management aspects. The process of data mining is based on the different aspects such as the extraction of data, transformation of the data along with the load transaction o the data set on the data warehouse system. In addition to that, it also stores and manages the set of data in a multidimensional database system (Shmueli and Lichtendahl Jr, 2017). Moreover, this technique is able to present the data in a proper and useful format such as a graph or table. Along with that, this technique can help the business organization to analyze the data set through proper application software and it provides the access of the data to the business analysts and the information technology professionals.

Figure 4: Data mining techniques

(Source: Shouval et al. 2016)

Gathering the data is essential for the business organizations, still the usage of the data set is also an important factor for the organization. The business intelligence is considered as the ability that can transform the set of data into some sort of useful information and the set of information to knowledge. Therefore, it is considered as the best way for the decision making process. In addition to that, business intelligence also combines the data analysis applications that include the online analytical processing, real time business intelligence, mobile business intelligence along with the cloud and software as a service. In addition to that, the different data mining tools also provides the organization with a better amount customer-relationship management (Miljkovic et al. 2016). Along with that, the business intelligence strategy also needs to be used in such way that it can apply the set of knowledge in order to maximize the different advantages to the organization. In addition to that, data-mining techniques also have a good implication in the business applications that enhances the opportunities for the new and innovative processes to thrive in the organizations.

4.2 Implication of using data analytics to unfairly exploit data on user behavior 

The intelligent data analytics process is very much helpful for the organizations in order to make proper amount of decisions. Along with that, as the big data technology is able to perform the predictive analysis; therefore it also helps them to analyze the fact regarding the employee turnover rate. In addition to that, the data analytics is also useful for measuring the feedback from the customers (Torgo, 2016). Therefore, it can provide the organizations with the requirement of the customers. However, this process can be used for unfairly means. The organizations having a lack of security measures for their data set can be a victim of this kind of attack. The intruders are very much technically skilled that they can access the data storage of the organizations. Therefore, they can also manipulate the data set that can hamper the overall organizational functionalities. If the data analytics is used for the analysis of the customer feedback or the customer behavior, then the organization need to keep that data set safe enough from the intruders. Otherwise, if the intruders have the access to the data set then they can change the figures that can direct the organization in the different way. Therefore, the organization may lose the way of analyzing the customer feedback properly. This can be considered as an ethical aspect regarding the organizational aspect. On the other hand, the organizations may also use the data analytics to change the customer feedbacks and then may put that report into the organization’s website (Leech et al. 2017). As for example, it can be said that the organization may manipulate the negative feedback of the customers to the positive feedback and use that aspect for the promotional activity for the organization. That may gather an ample amount of customers, however in long term this process would be enough for the organizational growth. Therefore, the customers need to be aware of the fact that the organizations may use the intelligent data analytic aspect in a negative way to manipulate the customer’s feedback.

Conclusion

After summing up the entire study, it can be evaluated that the organizations need to implement the new and innovative technologies in order to enhance their overall performance. Along with that, the study also provides an analysis regarding the traditional information technology and the new and innovative technology that the organizations are using these days. In addition to that, the study concludes the fact that in order to enhance the competitive advantage over the rival organizations they need to use the cloud based technology. Moreover, the study also provides a proper analysis regarding the fact that how the organizations may implement the cloud technology along with the big data technology.

There needs to be a proper human resource for the organization so that they can maintain the working functionalities. Moreover, the study also concludes the fact that business intelligence is also an important aspect for the organizations that can help them to identify the areas of strength and weakness. Based on that aspect, the organization may implement the strategic changes. In addition to that, the study also provides an ample amount of knowledge regarding the knowledge based system and how this system is used in the organizations to enhance their business functions. Therefore, it can be concluded that the use of the new and innovative technologies needs to be suitable enough for the organizations so that it can enhance the overall functions of the organization.