Eigth Post : MIS : Assignment 2

Question: Based on the organization(s) that you visited, what do you think are the risks associated with business and IS/IT change?


In assignment two, I adopted to companies to be my bases with the question, “what do you think are the risks associated with business and IS/IT change?” I consider all the opinions coming from the two companies, the GH Office Depot (located at 88A Monteverde Avenue, Davao City) and the Lapanday Foods Corporation (located at Maryknoll drive, Lanang, Davao City). For the first company, I was blessed to interview there IT personnel and on the other hand, for the second company I was given a chance to talk with their MIS manager.

In a certain company, having a new or changing the information system is a tasking job. However, if it is used properly and accordingly, it will be considered as a good benefit for the organization. We are all aware that technologies nowadays are fast evolving. Big or even small and medium enterprises aim to adopt the latest breakthroughs that will be helpful for their company. But using technologies might give the company the risk as well. Change is important, but it should also be controlled so that the risk does not escalate to unacceptable levels. For a company to cope up with the rapid advancement of information technology, changes and facing the risk must be obtain. Risks in changing of the IS of an organization reflects the events that may affect the flow of business in an organization.

As what I have understand from the manager of Lapanday, when changing an information technology or information system they make sure that they all back up the files. They have this off site (usually every end of the week) and on site back up (everyday back up). It is also a big risk for them because every data is essential so they are very sensitive in terms of changes in their systems. In changing with their hardware components, he said that they have these guidelines in which they follow or analyzes before they bought a new one. He told us that some companies may change their computers every (maybe) 3 years but for them it depends. If that computer can still work well, then they will still continue to use it. And I ask him some of those guidelines and he unselfishly elaborate some like a minimum of dual-core, 160GB memory for hard disk, and a 1GB RAM. He added up that they only use higher specs for those computers that are used for engineering department or those with autocad software installed. Since they are the main office, they always secure all their data, because they are afraid to loss all of it. And whenever they used a new system, all the employees (who will be involved with it) are obliged to have their training first before they could use it to avoid some errors. Risk is caused by the reluctance of the employees to use the new system probably because they are not familiar with it. So further training should be done to the employees on how to handle the new system enable to maximize its functions. These are just some of the ideas that I have gathered as we have a talk with the Lapanday’s Management Information System manager.

Another company that I have interviewed is the GH Office Depot. The one who entertained us is there IT personnel. When we ask what are the risk associated with business and IS/IT change, he then said,”there is a BIG risk”. For him it’s not that easy to instantly change their information system because they have to consider everything since they have 35,000 different items. They always make sure to have their backups. Before, according to the IT personnel of the GH Office Depot, they are using those dos base systems and now they are using the visual basic 2005. So, he told us that it is also good to change a system for a faster and more reliable work but they always consider the risk that it may gave to the company. They made some strategies to be able to avoid such risks. They always consider if that system would work or not and if it would satisfy their needs or if it would come up with their desired output to minimize or avoid problems. As what I have said from the first assignment, the GH Office Depot has no proper hierarchy in terms of orders or request. The IT personnel told us that if the boss asked him to do this and do that, they directly follow orders. They consider the cost, functionality and the capacity if they want to change some of their hardware components.

As a whole, I conclude that some of the possible risks that an organization may encounter in changing their information technology or information system are the following: loss of data, incomplete system, unreliable system, security, organizational risk and technical risk. A company may loss data if they change into a new system so it is very essential for them to always have their backups. An incomplete system is also a big risk because it will not satisfy the needs of the company and the organization may spend a system that would not be that useful. So, the company must observe and analyze first before changing their actual system. Security would be a risk because every data that the company have are confidential. When we say organizational risk, the problem occurs if the employees don’t know how to use the new system so it is very essential to conduct a training first. In terms of technical risk, the company must consider if the system will function properly and accordingly.

There are lots of risks that a business may encounter. The success of implementing new or changing the system depends on the people’s acceptance of the change. And the success comes to those organizations that identify and manage the risk more effectively and of course proper management. It is also essential to have some strategies and proper planning on handling the possible risk that may occur. These are just few of the risk that a company may encounter so we must not take it for granted because it is so dangerous so we should always be aware and alert.