CLA2 Presentation - MIS

Running head: IMPLEMENTATION AND STRATEGIC PLANNING 1

IMPLEMENTATION AND STRATEGIC PLANNING 6

Implementation and Strategic Planning

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Implementation and Strategic Planning

Technology advancement has brought about numerous technologies that seeks to improve people lives. Strategic planning and implementation is quite essential in ensuring effective utilization of technology. A case in point, expounds on strategies deemed practical in making virtual teams much productive, and discussion on Knowledge Management (KM). Also, factors affecting decision to buy versus custom-building (inhouse) software bas been detailed

Strategies making virtual teams more productive

A virtual team, also known as a remote team is a group of individuals that depend on electronic communications for their interaction. Communication in such an organization is not in person since its members are in different geographical regions, this necessitates the need for excellent communication and building trust for such a team to be successful (Zornoza, Sánchez, & Ripoll, 2015). It can be a big challenge to manage a virtual team since it creates a need to have a remote corporate culture. Several strategies can be used to serve as support for building a productive virtual team.

Defining work systems is the first strategy that should be put in place to enhance the virtual group's productivity. Identifying all the repeatable systems and setting the standards required can help in shortening the time needed to achieve preferred results. Establishment of multiple communication tools is another crucial strategy; this ensures that any urgent communication to the right person is done, this unifies processes and can contribute to creating a feeling of cohesion (Guo & Zhang, 2009). To reduce team stress and put members at ease, there should a regular meetings schedule, which creates a routine. The use of things like video calls is some of the preferred ways in maximizing efficiency as it produces an office feeling that virtual teams may be missing.

It's advisable to clarify all tasks and processes and ensure that working hour’s overlaps, team members being online simultaneously can bring them closer together. Video calls should be chosen over emails and chatting, this will ensure that members connect at a personal level (Guzmán, & Esteban, 2010). Choosing the right people to work with and establishing a meritocratic system to keep members motivated is also a key strategy not to be ignored. For any remote team to be successful, the use of a project management tool should be incorporated to send deadline alerts and keep deadline tracks; this tool also gives an overview of every operation.

Knowledge Management (KM) Concepts

The term knowledge management was used first in 1987 at McKinsey on their internal study about handling and utilization of information (Dalkir, K. (2017). KM is the concept of creating, gathering, assessing, dispensing, using, and organizing data and knowledge in an organization effectively to make the best use of expertise available to achieve organizational objectives. The knowledge and information consist of resources, documents, workers' skills, and procedures. KM is a tool that companies use to help them gather and manage crucial information to enable them to efficiently complete projects and tasks (Gao & Clarke, 2008). It is, therefore, an essential map outlining information flow, facilitating a successful fulfilment of the company's duties, projects, and responsibilities.

The knowledge management process can be universal to any enterprise, but techniques and tools can be unique depending on the organization's environment. The process starts by gathering information using tools and methods that the organization may deem fit. Collected information is then organized based on defined rules of the organization (Perrott, 2007). The summary of data using tools such as charts and software packages is done. Analysing the summarised information is then done to find any patterns, relationship, or redundancy. After analysing the data, people try to synthesize or to derive artefacts and concepts from this information. Knowledge acquired can be stored in the knowledge base of that particular organization to be useful in their decision making (Dalkir, 2017). KM is, therefore, an essential practice in any organization, and every mature organization should incorporate it to enhance the overall capability of its operations.

Factors that affect the decision to buy versus custom-building (inhouse) software

The decision to either buy or to build software can sometimes emerge to be a somewhat complex one. It is, therefore, inevitable to evaluate all the relevant factors influencing such a decision to be able to make a well-informed decision in any organization (Badampudi, Wohlin, & Petersen, 2016). The first factor affecting this decision is time, for in-house software, there must be a considerable amount of time required, time required is relatively shorter when buying the same software. One should ask themselves if they are in the position to wait any long, and if not, they can consider buying other than building. Opportunity cost or the resources required should also be considered; purchasing software can take opportunity cost out of the equation. In contrast, in-house software can take internal resources that could be useful in high-profit opportunities.

There should be a consideration of Maintenance of the new software, comparison of the costs attached to maintaining both the in-house and the purchased software should be made. The cost of buying or building the software may also be varying depending on the integrations, complexity, and size of the software. The last factor to consider is the control that will be attached to the newly purchased or in-house software. A buyer mostly lack the total power of a purchased software compared to when the software is built internally (Bujang, Jiram, & Jaafar, 2015).

In conclusion, working remotely is kind of a privilege but can bring some problems. Thus, taking advantage of technology can be an important to bring individuals together. Hence taking advantage of collaborative technology can help improve efficiency even if members are not close to each other. Thus, utilization of virtual team can come in handy despite the challenges it might bring. Effective leadership can help overcome virtual team barriers and bring out a good and productive team. Besides that, a team’s challenges can be overcome through effective decision making.

References

Badampudi, D., Wohlin, C., & Petersen, K. (2016). Software component decision-making: In-house, OSS, COTS or outsourcing-A systematic literature review. Journal of Systems and Software, 121, 105-124.

Bujang, A., Jiram, W. A., Zarin, H. A., & Jaafar, M. N. (2015). Factors affecting the housing financing of Bumiputera in Iskandar Malaysia. Journal of Economics, Business and Management, 3(11), 1031-1036.

Dalkir, K. (2017). Knowledge management in theory and practice. MIT press.

Gao, F., Li, M., & Clarke, S. (2008). Knowledge, management, and knowledge management in business operations. Journal of Knowledge Management, 12(2), 3-17. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/13673270810859479

Guo, Z., D'ambra, J., Turner, T., & Zhang, H. (2009). Improving the effectiveness of virtual teams: A comparison of video-conferencing and face-to-face communication in China. IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, 52(1), 1-16.

Guzmán, J. G., Ramos, J. S., Seco, A. A., & Esteban, A. S. (2010). How to get mature global virtual teams: a framework to improve team process management in distributed software teams. Software Quality Journal, 18(4), 409-435.

Peñarroja, V., Orengo, V., Zornoza, A., Sánchez, J., & Ripoll, P. (2015). How team feedback and team trust influence information processing and learning in virtual teams: A moderated mediation model. Computers in Human Behavior, 48, 9-16.

Perrott, B. E. (2007). A strategic risk approach to knowledge management. Business Horizons, 50(6), 523-533.