Library+-+Technology+Strategy

Technology Strategy Library 70-451 Library > Technology Strategy Library

Overview:
Technology decisions are made at many different levels and over many different scopes. Some of those decisions are tactical - specific, local, and relevant to one specific question and instance. Other decisions about technology are strategic - broad, long-lasting, and used as guidance for a much broader set of individual decisions that must be made in the course of managing a technology organization. The resources in this section of the library relate to technology strategy.

Library Entries:

 * Title**: Tesco: Homeplus subway Virtual Store
 * Author(s)**: Majedhs1417
 * Link or reference information**: []


 * Core ideas**
 * After entering the Korean market, Tesco changed their name to Homeplus, after conducting a study about the Korean market they created a new strategy for their business.
 * The idea was Virtual stores, a virtual store shows a grocery store's shelf filled with products.Clients can purchase the product by scanning the barcode using their mobile phones.
 * The importance of the research phase.
 * Information system based strategies can lead business and help them gain a competitive advantage over their rivals.

The video shows how information systems and information technology can tackle day-to-day problems. It can also offer innovative solutions and help businesses to distinguish themselves. The video also shows the importance of the research phase; the intensive study on how Koreans are and what are their preferences helped Homeplus to focus on certain things. In addition the virtual store helped Homeplus to cut down costs by not building the actual stores and it increased their revenues, online sales increased by 130% and number of new registered members rose by 76%.
 * Commentary**:

Given that Koreans are the second most hard-working people in the world, integrating technology in this case is the most logical way to go because grocery shopping is probably a tedious time-consuming task to them.
 * Commentary ** :


 * Entry history**:
 * [Noor Al-Mohannadi, initial post on Oct. 19, 2011]
 * [Maryam Al-Subaie, Nov. 7th, 2011]
 * [<>, <

[]
 * Title**: BBC Technology Strategy.
 * Author(s)**: Spencer Piggott
 * Link or reference information**:
 * Core ideas**
 * How BBC is handling the changes in the Technology world and how it affects the level in which customers keep using their services.
 * How BBC developed a criteria for their principles that they would keep on following for all their future projects.
 * The Technology strategy framework that BBC decided on applying and how it relates back to the companies main goals and objectives.

This simple report by BBC shows the readers how even a big company like BBC fear the new changes that are happening around it and how people these days depend more on certain resources and ignore the old traditional ways of getting the same resources. BBC lists ways in which they believe their company should stay up to date with recent technology and still be able to get all the same level of high quality information their customers are used to in both the short and long term.
 * Commentary**:


 * Entry history**:
 * [Ayah Abujarbou, initial post on Oct. 19, 2011]
 * [<>, < >


 * Title**: Strategic Management of Technological Innovation
 * Author(s)**: Melissa A. Schilling
 * Reference information**: [Sch10] Melissa A. Schilling, Strategic Management of Technological Innovation, 3rd Edition, McGraw-Hill Irwin, 2010. ISBN: 978-0-07-338156-5


 * Core ideas**:
 * Although technologies change very quickly in many industries, there are standard strategic approaches to creating and utilizing those technologies that change much more slowly.
 * Businesses that understand the common patterns and strategic decisions regarding technology innovation will be much better positioned to take advantage of those advances than those who try to 'wing it' and come up with a unique solution for each new technology.

In her book Strategic Management of Technological Innovation, Melissa Schilling provides a broad background of common issues that arise in organizations that create new technologies to sell or embed in their own products and services. This includes issues of project and technology selection (opportunity identification and selection), project and team management, timing the market properly (not too soon, not too late), and bringing together diverse teams to turn technology innovations into great new products. The book also outlines and discusses a good set of common patterns of how new technologies are adopted in the market and provides strategic recommendations on how to take advantage of those patterns.
 * Commentary**:


 * Entry history**:
 * [Bob Monroe, initial post on Oct. 10, 2011]
 * [<>, < >]


 * Title**: << title of the article, book, video, etc. >>
 * Author(s)**: << the author(s) who wrote the article, video, book, etc. >>
 * Link or reference information**: << the URL to the article and/or bibliography reference >>
 * Core ideas** (1, 2, or 3 bullet points that summarize the core idea presented in the article):
 * Commentary**:


 * Entry history**:
 * [Bob Monroe, initial post on Oct. 1, 2011]
 * [<>, < >

__Entry template:__
[]
 * Title**: Cloud benefits are speed, simplicity and resource leverage
 * Author(s)**: ENTERPRISE CIO FORUM
 * Link or reference information**:
 * Core ideas**
 * Joel Dobbs, Vice President of IT at Eisai Corporation of North America, shares his view on cloud computing
 * He argues that cloud commuting will be a simple, fast and a way to leverage resources

Joel Dobbs describes the benefits of cloud computing on business operations by describing how its simple, fast and a way to leverage resources. He argues that people of a corporation can spend time focusing on other things rather than focus on business operations. Employees will be then able to focus on strategic plans for the business.
 * Commentary**:


 * Entry history**:
 * [Hind Al Khulaifi, initial post on Oct. 18, 2011]
 * [<>, < >


 * __Entry template: __**
 * Title **: The PC is dying, but very, very slowly
 * Author(s) **: David Goldman
 * Link or reference information **: http://money.cnn.com/2011/10/19/technology/intel_pc_sales/index.htm
 * Core ideas **
 * =====Personal computer sales are declining  and tablets and smartphones sales are booming =====
 * =====<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 8pt;">PC sales growth is higher in emerging markets than in US and Canada =====
 * =====<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 8pt;">Although PC sales are falling, the PC is not going away soon =====

=

 * <span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 8pt;">Commentary **<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 8pt;">: This article shows how the sales of PC are declining in some parts of the world such as in US, Canada and in Europe, but in the emerging markets it is growing. Intel says that their sales have grown 28% and their profit grew by 17%. The biggest problem faced by PC is the huge demand of tablets that are eating PC sales. This shows us how the market is changing and how people are being more mobile in their day to day business. =====

**<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 8pt;">Entry history **<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 8pt;">:

 * =====<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 8pt;">[Mohammed Al-Rawahi, initial post on Oct. 19, 2011] =====
 * =====<span style="color: black; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 8pt;">[<<next person who added commentary>>, < > =====


 * Title**: Gartner Identifies the Top 10 Strategic Technologies for 2012
 * Author(s)**: Orlando, Fla.
 * Link or reference information**: thttp://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=1826214
 * Core ideas** (1, 2, or 3 bullet points that summarize the core idea presented in the article):
 * Gartner defines a strategic technology as one of the factors that would have a big impact on the enterprise in the next three years.
 * The strategic technology could be existing and become mature to be used in a wider uses.
 * Gartner identifies the top 10 strategic technologies for 2012 which are
 * 1) **Media Tablets and Beyond.**
 * 2) **Mobile-Centric Applications and Interfaces**.
 * 3) **Contextual and Social User Experience**.
 * 4) **Internet of Things**.
 * 5) **App Stores and Marketplaces.**
 * 6) **Next-Generation Analytics.**
 * 7) **Big Data.**
 * 8) **In-Memory Computing.**
 * 9) **Extreme Low-Energy Servers.**
 * 10) **Cloud Computing.**

Gartner is the world's leading information technology research and advisory company. Having such a companies which do researches for strategic technologies for every year, that will help enterprise to manage their data and businesses more. Moreover they will have the chance to check their existing technology and check for their matureness to use them in wider uses.
 * Commentary**:


 * Entry history**:
 * [Dalia Saleh, initial post on Nov. 19, 2011]
 * [<<next person who added commentary>>, < >

.....................................................................................................................................................................................
 * Title ** : Informational technology strategic plan
 * Author(s) ** : Michel Desbois head of ISMT unit.

** Link or reference information **: []
 * Core ideas **
 * Aligning technology with core business needs and vision
 * Advancing knowledge management and continuing the improvement of IT services
 * Focussing on efficiency and effectiveness of technology
 * Technology practices that strengthen Management practices

** Commentary **: This document details the Information Technology Strategic Plan for FY 2007-2012 that supports the accomplishment of the CSREES mission. The plan was prepared by the Information Systems and Technology Management (ISTM) unit. In preparing the plan, extensive interviews were conducted of senior CSREES management, national program leaders, and staff to determine challenges facing the agency, business information needs, and issues arising from the CSREES mission. Through these interviews, ten key trends were identified that influence the ability of ITSM to provide service to CSREES. The interviews also showed that CSREES has a unique culture in government that exhibits an open, collaborative, and academic style. This style in everyday activities is a strength that fosters cooperation and deliberative decision making. ISTM then used the information collected to propose appropriate CSREES responses to the ten key trends. This work resulted in four goals, each with subordinate objectives. These goals are: • Expand ISTM’s Agency IT solution leadership • Focus on increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of ISTM support to the Agency • Expand electronic support for end-to-end Grants Management • Expedite short-term solutions to common administrative tasks [<<next person who added commentary>>, < >]
 * Posting history ** :
 * [Jim Briggs, initial post on Nov. 19, 2011]

** Title ** : << The Risks of Outsourcing IT >>

** Author(s) ** : << Michael J. Earl >>

** Link or reference information ** : << http://web.ccsu.edu/business/faculty/petkovao/mis498/risks%20of%20outs.pdf >>

** Core ideas ** (1, 2, or 3 bullet points that summarize the core idea presented in the article):


 * Companies should first ask why they should not insource IT services.
 * There are eleven risks that a company takes when they outsource their IT services.
 * Weak management is the greatest risk that an outsourcing company faces when they outsource their IT services.

** Commentary ** :

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 10pt;">The author starts by mentioning that outsourcing IT used to be a trend, but it is no longer a new phenomenon. Thousands of companies outsource their IT services every year to countries such as India, China and Philippines. I think companies’ main objective of outsourcing is to cut cost and the desire to focus on the business not the IT. However, a company exposes itself to eleven risks when they make the decision of outsourcing. These risks involve possibility of weak management, inexperienced staff, business uncertainty, outdated technology skills, endemic uncertainty, hidden costs, lack of organizational learning, dangers of an eternal triangle, technological indivisibility and fuzzy focus. The eleven risks of outsourcing do not occur in every sourcing decision but they are not unusual.

** Posting history ** :


 * [Mohammed Kamal, initial post on Nov. 19, 2011]

TITLE: The Impact of E-Commerce Strategies on Firm Value: Lessons from Amazon.com and its Early Competitors.


 * Author(s):** Darren Filson


 * Link or reference information:**

http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/381640?&Search=yes&searchText=systems&searchText=Information&searchText=warehouse&list=hide&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dwarehouse%2BAND%2BInformation%2Bsystems%26gw%3Djtx%26acc%3Don%26prq%3DDATA%2BAND%2BInformation%2Bsystems%26Search%3DSearch%26hp%3D25%26wc%3Don&prevSearch=&item=12&ttl=179&returnArticleService=showFullText


 * Core ideas**

1. E-commerce is the new market where companies compete with each other in the virtual world.

2. Different strategies work in different atmosphere and it is hard to determine and implement them

3. Amazon is giant company which had big share in the market, how did it achieve it?


 * Commentary:**

Managers in new environment are involved in a learning process. They experiment. make mistakes and adapt to changes in the environment. This article explores what worked and what did not in one new environment, the e-commerce environment. The lessons may be applied to other Internet ventures and other new environments where firms are uncertain about the impact of their strategies on firm value.The results for Amazon.com show that the product line expansion efforts that generated the most value involved products a traditional mail order firm might favor: small, high value/weight objects such as books, electronics, health and beauty products. The services that generated the most value allowed Amazon.com to exploit its expertise across a variety of products: auctions, devices to make shopping easier ant etc.


 * Title ** : Green IT – Sustainable Information Technology
 * Author(s) ** : GreenIT®
 * Link or reference information ** :[|__http://greenit.net/__]


 * Core ideas ** :
 * With the increasing pressure to ‘go green’, IT professionals need careful guidance on what sustainable objectives/goals to set for the organization and how to achieve them.
 * Whether the goal is to reduce energy consumption or help formulate policy for reducing e-waste, GreenIT can create a roadmap that will help an organization get started with a sustainability program by evaluating current performance first.
 * Sustainable information technology provides a remarkable challenge because “it crosses organizational, cultural and geographical boundaries.”

This is a website of a firm that offers design and consulting assistance on sustainable IT services to a wide range of commercial, non-profit, government and educational enterprises. Reducing the ecological-footprint to drive sustainability initiatives requires the development of new management and business processes. GreenIT offers a variety of recommendations and services/solutions to these enterprises. Examples of these include: system sustainability analysis, Environmentally Preferred Purchasing (EPP) design, sustainability training, EPP requirements seminars and many others. This is a great tool for businesses with strong ethical values, as GreenIT will assist with developing viable sustainability goals and frameworks.
 * Commentary ** :


 * Posting history ** :
 * [Maryam Al-Subaie, initial post on Dec. 3, 2011]
 * [<<next person who added commentary>>, < >]

** Title ** : Critical Failure Factors that discourage the Growth of Electronic Commerce. []
 * Author(s): ** Mee Hyun Noh, Kyeong Seok Han
 * Link or Account Information: **


 * Core Ideas:**
 * The paper analyzes the factors that hinders the growth of electronic business.
 * A significant goal of the paper is to identify the critical failure factors that could ruin the growth of E-Commerce and develop strategies to improve and prevent these conditions.
 * The paper investigates the reasons that leads to failure of e- business to appeal its customers inspite of having great techniques and ideas compared to that of the traditional business approach.


 * Comments:** The paper discusses several hypotheses to figure out what are the factors that are found most commonly among the critical factors that result in failure of the e-commerce business. Based on the results of these hypotheses, the paper also focuses on trying to investigate and develop strategies or other alternatives that can help overcome the critical failure points and improve the e-business performance by increasing the rate of success.


 * Posting history ** :
 * [Jevika Shetty, initial post on Dec. 12. 2011]
 * [<<next person who added commentary>>, < >]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDh21Hr1BE8
 * Title ** : What is Technology Strategy?
 * Author(s) ** : James Faghmous
 * Link or reference information ** :


 * Core ideas ** :
 * How can we leverage technology to fulfill the organizational outcomes (if non-profit). Organizational outcomes are objectives that are derived from mission statement, which should be checked every year.
 * Technology has to have strong leadership for it to satisfy organizational objectives. CEO, CTO, CIO, and CFO are the planners for the strategy. They all work together to improve the long term vision of the organization.
 * If management is not committed to the process that all chief executives go through to implement vision, it is very difficult to move forward with the strategy.

Technology strategy does not only matter for technology departments of the organization. For a non-profit to work, the combination of work that happens among many departments of the organization is what makes implementation of the strategy much easier and more successful. I believe that the teamwork of the different departments in the organization is what makes the organization successful. Synergy is what mostly matters for any project within an organization to work. Even if it is a technological issue, it needs to be discussed with the different departments of the organization
 * Commentary ** :


 * Posting history ** :
 * [Hamsa M Al-Massri, initial post on Dec. 12, 2011]
 * [<<next person who added commentary>>, < >]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=co48f88vHEk
 * Title**: <span style="color: #333333; font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">The New Normal - Chapter 8: Technology strategy for the new normal
 * Author(s)**: Peter Hinssen
 * Link or reference information**:


 * Core ideas**
 * IT has grown a lot in companies. Now, companies cannot live without IT.
 * We have to rethink technology, instead of having to build big things, we need to consider what we need to build and build it.
 * IT has gone from building things, buying things, to now using things in the cloud, and the new normal is going to be an illustration of that.
 * If everybody has access to technology, then we need to think of how one can be clever with technology; companies have to rethink the role of technology and IT. IT has to go from technology implementation, to focus on technology enabled innovation.
 * The old concept of IT department is dead. We need to make the shift from technology implementation to innovation into the reality.

I believe this is a very important video to raise awareness that people now need to innovate with technology. Since technology is already there provided to everyone, then instead of actually focusing on implementing it, we need to innovate. People need to be aware of the shift that happened to the world, and how everyone is already familiar with IT. So, why not use our resources to make something new? This is a very important question to motivate companies into making competitive innovations.
 * Commentary**:


 * Author(s) **: Tom Kelly


 * Link or reference information **: []


 * Core ideas **
 * The advantages of managing multiple companies on the cloud.
 * Cloud products can replace softwares.
 * Shifting document management to the cloud improves safety and security.


 * Commentary **:

The article talks about shifting companies’ key business processes to the cloud, and managing multiple companies on the cloud. One of the advantages Kelly mentions is having full access to all companies information available in the same place. This is a critical point, especially for companies that have joint ventures, this makes a lot of process easier and time efficient. Kelly gives the example of substituting Microsoft’s products with Google Apps, this didn’t only save time and money but it also enabled them to share and edit jointly. Many companies can benefit from similar products, companies should consider researching all the available cloud products.

[Noor Al-Mohannadi, initial post on Dec. 12, 2011] [<<next person who added commentary>>, < ]
 * Entry history **:


 * Title **: What is XML and why should companies use it?


 * Author(s) **: Alzn Pelz-Sharpe


 * Link or reference information **: []


 * Core ideas **
 * What does XML mean.
 * Using XML, companies can analyze information including data in different ways.
 * XML enables companies to repurpose and re-use data.
 * XML offers easier interaction between the company, it suppliers’ data and it partners’ data.
 * XML helps the company to manage it’s information better in short-terms and long-terms


 * Commentary **:

The article talks about how companies can use Extensible Markup Language, the article states that “XML aim to separate presentation, structure and meaning from the actual content”. The user is not required to read or write the XML there is a software for that, this would encourage a lot of mangers who have little technical background to use XML.

[Noor Al-Mohannadi, initial post on Dec. 12, 2011] [<<next person who added commentary>>, < ]
 * Entry history **:


 * Title **: PayPal to offer mobile payments, location-based deals.
 * Author(s) **: Courtney Rubin


 * Link or reference information **: []


 * Core ideas **
 * PayPal will also introduce new features that include story inventory lookup and barcode scanning via handheld device
 * The features offer the customers a new option on how to pay.
 * The new features will increase PayPal customers.
 * Commentary **:

PayPal is introducing mobile payments, this is a step forward in competing with Amazon in e-commerce. The new features are aimed to help companies to make the customers experience better. One of my previous library posts talked about Tesco developing a technology that allows customers to purchase items using their phone, this shows how companies are trying to implement the technologies in innovative and beneficial ways. [Noor Al-Mohannadi, initial post on Dec. 12, 2011] [<<next person who added commentary>>, < ]
 * Entry history **: