ETM – MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEM

INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT

NATARAJ PANGAL

Q1 - Describe the difference between automating, informating, and strategizing and

provide examples of each from your own experience.

Automating : - Information Systems can be used for automating processes and business

functions to enable the organization in executing specific tasks more quickly and accurately with

a consistent quality and reduced cost.

Example : - In my workplace at Citigroup Global Services, previously whenever a new

employee would join, we would have to fill various forms and submit to different departments

for creating User Ids to provide access to computers, shared drives and other systems. This was a

very time consuming and tedious manual job, which was later replaced by an automated online

system – Virtual Resource. Using this system we could raise a request for ID creation and with

just one request all the concerned departments would be automatically notified about access

request. Once, the Ids were created the manager of the new employee would be electronically

notified, thus completely eliminating the need to fill various documents and personally

submitting them to all the departments and then personally collecting the IDs and password from

the respective departments.

Informating : - The process of using Information Systems to not just automate specific

operations, but also use to learn and improve the day-to-day activities within that operation is

termed as Informating. Informating does not limit the use of Information System to just

automating a process but also extends the use of Information System in understanding trends,

patterns, performance of the operations and hence further improve the processes. Informating

helps in unearthing flawed business processes which might have been blindly automated using

Information Systems.

Example : - At Citigroup Global Services Ltd, previously whenever we had a technical issue

with the computers, network or softwares, we used to call a helpline number and as and when

any technical engineer would be available he would come and resolve the problem. This was

later replaced by a completely automated system – Virtual Tech. Employees used to access this

system to register the problem that they were facing and the system would automatically assign

the issue to a technical engineer depending on his availability. Not only did the system reduce

the time taken to register and resolve issues, but also proved beneficial in substantially

improving the process. This system helped immensely to comprehend the amount of time an

associate took to resolve the issue, identify recurring issues, categorize the time periods when

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maximum issues were registered, decide whether additional engineers were required, etc. Thus,

the system not only helped in automating the process, but also helped in improving it and making

it more effective and efficient.

Strategizing : - Using Information System to facilitate and advance the organization’s strategy

and sustain competitive advantage over other firms is termed as Strategizing. In this case

Information System is not just circumscribed to automating and learning but also aligning with

the organizational strategy and provides competitive and strategic value.

Example : - Citibank Buffalo is the hub for Funds Transfer for Citibank customers in North

America and its goal is to ensure quick, accurate and cost effective transfer of Funds resulting in

customer satisfaction and higher profits. Inorder to realize this goal Citibank Buffalo replaced

their existing legacy system FTN, with Global Pay Plus (GPP)1. The new system reduced costs

by over USD1million per month since the cost of maintaining the legacy systems were extremely

high. Also, GPP resulted in significantly faster and more accurate transfer of funds locally as

well as internationally. The system could easily handle high amount of wire traffic of both

corporates and consumers. After the implementation of GPP, Citibank Buffalo witnessed a

significant increase in the number of wires processed per day. Most importantly the legacy

systems being used by Citibank across the globe are going to be replaced by GPP, making all the

systems standardised and thus communicate with each other more efficiently thus aligning with

Citibank’s Fund Transfer strategy across the globe2.

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