Chapter 2. Information Systems: Concepts and Management - Chapter Exercises

Implementing Strategy with IT
For the first week of your internship, you got to know Lisa and Reuben, the owner/managers of Club IT, and learning some of the back office operations. You’ve become familiar with the Club IT website, and you want to help Lisa and Reuben see how they can achieve their primary strategic objective - “to build a community that meets regularly at Club IT.”
After reading Chapter 2, you have seen many real business cases where IT has helped organizations achieve strategic objectives. The real estate industry has seen a major transformation with electronic communications and the web, the airlines are continuing to innovate, and even your course registration process is getting easier with online options. While Club IT doesn’t have the IT resources of Kmart or Sears, it is much more agile and should be able to take advantage of it’s information base to help build a community with the support of IT. 1. Many organizations now have a members’ website, where customers can keep track of different kinds of information related to the organization. Many have “wish lists” where you can keep track of items related to that business – eBay is a good example. Visit a site that allows users to keep a “my favorites” type of list (eBay, Amazon, Dell, Old Navy are examples) and prepare a paragraph discussing the kinds of competitive information the organization can gain by providing this service.

2. Consider the different strategies for competitive advantage listed in the chapter: a. Cost leadership b. Differentiation c. Innovation d. Operational effectiveness e. Customer orientation Can ClubIT compete with all of these strategies? Choose one strategy for Club IT to focus on and describe the kinds of information it