information systems

Business Performance Management (BPM) is gaining currency all over the world as an important segment of ecommerce and web business enterprises. Business performance management is what today helps companies to gauge their business performance through a a set of processes. Business performance management is considered as a quality tool for business intelligence. BPM is focused on business processes such as planning and forecasting. It helps businesses discover efficient use of their business units, financial, human and material resources.

Business Performance Management relies on the following steps:

• collecting data

• discerning patterns and meaning in the data (generating information)

• responding to the resultant information

These information or intelligence are then analysed and performance parameters arrived at.

Today business volumes have increased several fold. Collecting and analysing data has become tedious and cumbersome. However Data Management technologies have today resolved the issue of large volume of data. Improved Enterprise Application Integration tools have increased the speedy collecting of data. Reporting technologies have allowed faster generation of new reports which analyze the data. Business intelligence has now become the art of filtering through large amounts of data, extracting information and turning that information into action.

BPM involves consolidation of data from various sources, querying, and analysis of the data, and putting the results into practice.

BPM enhances processes by creating better feedbacks. Continuous reviews help to identify and eliminate problems before they grow. BPM’s forecasting abilities help organisations to take corrective action in time to meet earnings projections. Forecasting is characterized by a high degree of predictability which is put into good use to answer all possible scenarios. BPM is especially useful in risk analysis and predicting outcomes of merger and acquisition cases.

BPM provides key performance indicators (KPI) that help companies monitor efficiency of projects and employees against operational targets. BPM often uses Key performance indicators (KPIs) to assess the present condition of business and to set up a course of corrective action. More and more organizations have started to make data available more promptly. Business Performance Management simply means use of several key performance indicators to assess the present state of business and to prescribe course of action.

Typically the data collected by a business enterprise could reveal new customers acquired, status of existing customers and level of satisfaction of customers. Data relating to turnovers generated by different segments of customers ,the gap between projection and achievment etc could be gathered so that the yawning gap between customer expectations and products/services quality could be effectively bridged.

Importantly though, the following should be ensured:

1. Key Performance Indicatiors should be consistent and correct.

2. Timely availability of KPI-related data.

3. Easy interpretation of data

4. Patterns and trends should be easily observed.

BPM integrates the company’s processes with CRM or ERP. Companies become able to gauge customer satisfaction control customer trends and influence shareholder value.Technology tools like Online Analytical Processing or OLAP, Data Warehouses, Data Mining, Executive Information Systems, Decision Support Systems and Management Information systems are set up and effectively utilised for optimised Business Performance Management. Developers involved in business intelligence have developed these tools that ease the work, especially when the intelligence task involves gathering and analyzing large amounts of unstructured data.

The first step in Business Performance Management is determining is the performance segments identification and determining the goals of the organisation. Current data collection technologies have to be upgraded and optimised. The cost implications of such a large scale business intelligence methodology must be viewed with scrupulous concentration. The targeted beneficiary of the BPM should be clearly identified. These information requirements must be operationalized into clearly defined parameters. The BPM programme should be monitored to ensure that objectives are being met. The programme should be tested for accuracy, reliability and validity.

The success of business performance management in the correct identification of performance optimisation areas, correct collection of important data and the correct devolution of benefits to the targeted segment. With improved data collection and analysis technologies available, there is no need for any organisation to shy away from the Business Performance Management or Business intelligence initiative. BPM is in reality a friend of the business enterprise rather than being a cumbersome procedure. Today it is an essential exercise for any company worth its’ name and would help to trim excess fat and improve bottom lines.Training and exposure in Business Performance Management must be imparted to important key persons in the administrative hierarchy. This would become a nice long term investment for the company concerned.

“If an information requirement is stated improperly to begin with, then everything else that follows will be incorrect.”

- Bryce’s Law

One of the biggest challenges in any system design effort is to produce a viable design that is well thought-out with all of the pieces and parts working harmoniously together. If something is forgotten, regardless of its seeming insignificance, it will undoubtedly cause costly problems later on. The task, therefore, is to produce a design that is demonstratively correct.

Fortunately, the answer is actually quite simple and something we have long advocated in our “PRIDE”-Information Systems Engineering Methodology (ISEM); namely, work backwards during system design.

The primary objective of Systems Design is to define the system in terms of:

 



WHAT business processes (sub-systems) make up the system.

 



WHEN these processes need to occur (timing).

 



WHAT data will be required for processing.

 



WHAT inputs and outputs will be used during processing.



The emphasis in Phase 2 (System Design) of “PRIDE”-ISEM is to design a system that correctly satisfies information requirements. To do so, it works backwards, to wit:

 



From Information Requirements back to all of the data elements needed to produce it.

 



From the receiver of the Information back to the originators of the data.

 



From outputs back to inputs.



Later, during Phases 3 and 4, the process is reversed and design moves forward as opposed to backwards. Here, the design expresses how the data will be physically processed in order to produce information.

 



From the source of the data to the destination of the information.

 



From Inputs to Outputs.

 



From the start of the business process to the end.



This backwards approach to design in Phase 2 is based upon the “PRIDE” concept of Information Driven Design whereby information requirements are precisely designed in terms of the business actions/decisions to be supported, when they have to be made (timing), and the data elements needed to produce the information. Timing is an essential part of this approach because information is a perishable commodity. It only has value during a particular point in time. Users require information to support actions and decisions on a routine and timely basis, either instantaneously, daily, weekly, monthly, etc. All information systems operate routinely based on timing. Since this is true, why not make use of this timing consideration during system design as opposed to discovering it after the fact?

Timing will ultimately dictate how data will be collected and stored (availability requirements) and how data will be accessed to produce information. This approach implies that there are substantial differences between information and data, one of which is that data is the raw material used to produce information.

The supporting data must be defined in such a way that we can easily understand what primary data must be supplied by a User and what generated data must be calculated internal to the system. Data relationships can be extensive. For example, take NET-PAY which may be based on a complicated calculation:

NET-PAY = GROSS-PAY – FICA – CITY-TAX – UNION-DUES – (etc.)

The data elements used in the formula may also be calculated, such as:

GROSS-PAY = HOURS-WORKED X PAY-RATE

What this means is that in order to arrive at the correct value for NET-PAY, we must be able to reach all of the primary values, such as HOURS-WORKED and PAY-RATE, in a TIMELY manner. If we cannot do this, NET-PAY will be incorrect.

Defining these data dependencies has typically defaulted to the programmer who redefines the relationships with each application and buries it in the source code making maintenance and change difficult.

The timing and data specifications resulting from the information requirements will ultimately dictate the type of system to be created. For example, if information is required upon request and within a matter of seconds, this will probably result in an “interactive” type of process. However, if the information is required upon request but within a few hours, this will probably result in “batch” type processing (it may even be processable manually). These specifications are the basic building blocks for all systems and software design.

Information Driven Design organizes all of the data required to support the application, into logical files (objects). As such, it synchronizes the data base with the application.

Perhaps the biggest benefits derived from Information Driven Design is that it forces the Systems Analyst to consider all of the required data and simplifies processing. It also emphasizes the need for shring data. As a design develops, consideration is given to using data from other applications. After all, why create new files and processes if they already exist?

With the logical system design defined, consideration is then given to the most appropriate way to physically process the data, either manually or computer assisted. Here is where Functional Decomposition and Data Driven design techniques excel. For software engineering, the characteristics of the data, its structures and what functions the computer must perform (e.g., create, update and reference) dictates the required programs. These specifications are the result of Information Driven Design. The physical characteristics of the data defines its validity. The data structures denote input, file and output relationships. The functional requirements determine how the data will be read and written in a program, whether sequentially, iteratively or selectively. In other words, Functional Decomposition and Data Driven Design will dictate physically “WHO” and “HOW” the data will be processed.

It is very important to understand that Phase 2 “System Design” represents the logical design phase. The design produced can be physically implemented many different ways. The ensuing phases therefore, Phases 3 and 4, represent the physical design phases which details the best way to implement the business process (sub-system).

This approach to system design, although effective, is predicated on well defined Information Requirements. If they are poorly or superficially defined, than everything that follows will be wrong. Garbage in – garbage out. But if the information requirements are well thought-out, the chances of producing a good system design are not just likely, it is highly probable.

For more information on “PRIDE”-ISEM’s Phase 2 “System Design” see:

http://www.phmainstreet.com/mba/pride/is20.htm

If you would like to discuss this with me in more depth, please do not hesitate to send me an e-mail.

 

 

Network security is always been the most concerning topic for the experts. Every one wishes to keep their network safe from hackers. We are in the age of network security revolution.

Many companies have been trying to launch a product that keeps the network safe from hackers. As the volume of data keeps increasing it is indispensable to focus on network security.

There are certain expectations from sender of data so that it reaches the receiver safely. The confidentiality of the users are greatly broken if the data is susceptible to hacking. There is a great need to maintain the confidentiality and data integrity. The users want to identify the sender of the message and the receiver must have the ability to prove that a message has been sent by the sender. Lots of money has been invested to bring a revolution in network security.

There are four aspects of network security which includes privacy, authentication, integrity, non-repudiation. The basic thing expected by any user of the network is privacy. Every sender expects only the receiver to receive the message. To all other people the method must not be in the readable form.

Authentication is another factor which expects the sender to take full ownership of the data and it prevents any hacker to compose data and send it in the name of the sender.

Integrity is the factor which expects the sender to receive data in the form sent by the sender and there must not be any change in the data while being received by the receiver.

Non repudiation is the factor which enables the receiver to prove that a message has been sent by the sender. This is an important point which is greatly expected by the users of the data.

Privacy of data is ensured by encryption and decryption techniques. Secret key encryption and decryption is a popular method in which a secret key is used by both the parties. These algorithms are normally called the symmetric algorithm as the use the same key in both the directions. Public key algorithm is another method and is rather easy as it employs a common key to decrypt the message. One can combine the public key and secret key algorithm to generate good mechanisms that guard’s privacy.

Digital signature is another method where the whole document is signed in order to maintain authentication, integrity. One can sign the document using public key encryption and a private key is used to encrypt while a public key is used to decrypt.

There is one more method called pretty good privacy which tries to guard all four aspects of security.

Access authorization is another method used to protect the security. It is based on a very simple concept where a person who requires entering must know a pass code. Thus it is based on archaic idea and it ensures good security.

There are also access authorizations techniques based on public keys where public and private keys are used by the requesting party.

There are lots of advancements in network security and many algorithms try to cover the loopholes in security in order to ensure a hacker free network.