Discuss about the IT risk assessment of a Company.
The assessment that is carried out in this report discusses about the critical success factors that are considered for various IT related projects. The sources responsible for the complexity of these projects will be analyzed successfully in this report. Moreover, this report will also include a risk assessment of the projects which will be used to get an efficient analysis of the requirements. This report mainly discusses about the adoption of advanced systems which can be used for delivery and receiving sections of the company. In addition, this report also discusses about the risk assessment of these projects along with the stakeholder management processes.
Success factors of a project are termed as those parameters which are effective in contributing to the success of a project. The most important parameter which is considered for any project is the factors which can contribute to the project both in a positive and in a negative way. This helps in increasing the chances of success for a project (Ergu et al., 2014). However, the main sources of complexity of this project are the various factors like the economic, social and technical factors which contribute to the influence of the objectives.
Figure 1: Complexity model
(Source: Lo, 2015, pp 400)
A project related to IT is always is always conducted considering an uncertain environment. In such environments, different amount of issues are responsible for contributing to the success or the failure of a project which in turn leads to the development of a complexities. The sources of these influences are considered by using the PESTEL framework which consists of political, economical, social, technological, environmental and legal. These environments are mostly classified into two different types (Li, 2014). The first is the macro-environment and the other is the micro-environment. For the macro-environment, the surroundings of a project are massive and the various PESTEL frameworks are included in this environment as well. The most important part of this type of environment is that the speed of changes occurring in the system may lead to any other complexity in the system. However, for the micro-environment, the major parameters are the clients. For determining the requirements of the clients, a complexity may arise in taking into account all the major requirements. Due to the presence of technical or logical issues, there can be any presence of arising complexities in the system. The development, constriction, understanding and communication of such requirements is considered as a challenge for all the members of the project team, especially when setting up a reasonable project scope by considering the input from the users and deciding the level of involvement in setting up the scope and system requirements.
Courier services are a major part of any business. This involves the sending or receiving shipments. This is termed as a major sub-part of any company. For this report, the assessment will be based on a courier company. The courier company operates for 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. The parcel from any source is taken to any destination within the country that it is involved in business (Grunwald, 2015). However, these parcels can be sent to any destination worldwide when they are requested by premium clients.
This is normally done by utilizing an IT based projects. This is the Advanced Information Based Allocation (AIBA) which is supposed to be a fleet management and dispatch management system. This is mainly used to allocate an order id to the parcel and then allocate it to the proper vehicle so that it can be transferred easily to its destination. The vehicles that are taken for dispatch can range from motorbikes, vans or even bicycles. This also involves sending message notification so that the status of the travel system can be determined. Moreover, the Advanced Information Based Allocation system can also be used to detect the nearest location of the pickup vehicle so that any changes in the level of congestion can be effectively monitored. This will be notified to the vehicle in charge so that the dispatch can be effectively made without the possibility of any delays. Aside from the congestion level, the weather conditions are also notified to the vehicle in charge of the dispatch.
Furthermore, the company has made various upgrades for their customers as well. This is mainly done for addressing the concerns of the customer. As customers are always on the lookout for their parcels, it is necessary to address these requirements for keeping the brand image of the company (Avgerou & Walsham, 2017). Due to this reason, the parcels can be tracked in real-time on the map by using the GPS technology. In addition, the shortest route of the parcel is also shown to the customers so that billings are made according to the route covered. After receiving the parcel, an email confirmation is sent to the receiver. This is the main business model which provides an idea of dedication to the customers about the company involved.
There are various kinds of issues which are reflected in both types of environments. For the macro-environment, the PESTEL framework is used to denote the assessment techniques. These mainly involve the political, economic, social, technological, environmental and legal factors.
Political risks
The project which involves major IT related infrastructures can be heavily affected if the government enforces law on this. However, it has been seen that the courier industry is not subjected to any government related factors (Teo, 2015). As some of the government actions like sending credentials or notices also involve utilizing the dispatch systems, the courier system is not always monitored.
Economic risks
There are various economic factors which are to be considered while making a risk assessment of the company concerned. The geographical factor may lead to risks in the economic factors of the company. For the company to get daily orders, the location needs to be assessed first. This involves determining the market of the company so that there can be orders made available on the company. The website of the company must also be effectively advertised in front of traffic such that their attention can be successfully captured for availing the services.
Technical risks
There are various technical risks that are evident through the normal processing of the company. The company website may experience heavy server load. Due to this, it can lead to downtime of the website. The server will have to deal with excessive load from the traffic.
Another technical risk that may have an impact is the presence of vulnerabilities to the system. As a result, the advanced tracking system which is the most important part of the company can experience faults. This will result in losing valuable time in business. These risks are considered to be technical in nature and any threats or risks in this system can lead to problems in the normal business flow (Valacich & Schneider, 2015). For addressing such problems, the company need to identify the risks associated and must make effective investments on their chosen technologies.
The environmental issues are other aspects which are to be considered by the company concerned. As the company operates by using different vehicles, they might be subjected to various issues. For example, for parking related fines, larger vehicles may experience major deductions in applying for delivery of the parcels. Similarly, lack of internet connection may make a driver forget to update the requirements. The IT project will be considered for selecting the most appropriate delivery parcel in place of the most environmentally secure.
The company may face legal issues from various factors. As customer satisfaction is a very important concept which is always considered by any company, it also has its negative impacts as well. Any unsatisfied customer may press charges against the company (Köhler et al., 2015). In addition, due to any unfavorable conditions, if the parcel is subjected to any damages or impacts, the customer may press charges against the company concerned.
In addition, the output of the project may be subjected to any kinds of government legislation which generally involves specific guidelines. For addressing these conditions, the company may apply for patent protection so that an effective product creation is finalized. In case the government signs the patent, it might be able to reduce the complexity related to the project such that threats due to new entrants in the macro-environment are mitigated.
The success factor of the project defines all the parameters that are necessary for a successful project completion. There are three different phases in the project which involves project completion (Laudon & Laudon, 2015). They are pre-implementation, implementation and post-implementation. In the pre-implementation process, the requirements of the project is analyzed and planned. In the implementation process, it involves adopting the processes for successful project completion. The post-implementation phase involves all the activities that are undertaken after getting the outcome of the project.
Figure 2: Critical success factors
(Source: Teo, 2015, pp 25)
The critical success factors involve various parameters which are mentioned in the diagram above. They are market research, project plan, technical issues, change management, stakeholder management, risk management and communication management.
For successfully achieving the outcomes of the project, the responsible personnel must make a full market analysis such that the scope of the project can be determined. In addition, the demands of the product can also be effectively measured. This helps in making an analysis of the product demand such that it can effectively tailored to meet the business needs of thr population concerned.
The manager of the project must have a sufficient format of doing the project. This will be utilized in following the steps of a project. This involves making an analysis of the requirements of the project which generally involves timeline, scope, budget and resources. There are various phases of a project management plan. The first phase is the planning phase which involves planning of the project. In this phase all the requirements all accounted and analyzed. The next phase is the initiation phase where the project is started and the processes involving a project are followed. In this process, the requirements are gathered (Richardson et al., 2015). The third phase is the execution phase where all the necessary steps for completing the project are followed. In the fourth phase, then monitoring of the system is adopted. This is involved with the monitoring of the systems such that errors can be minimized. The last phase is the closure phase which involves closing of the project. In this phase, the outcome of the project is usually discovered.
The personnel responsible for the project must be technically strong such that designing, developing, implementing and evaluating of the system will be adopted. When there are various issues persistent in the project life cycle, the team responsible must be able to achieve the outcome in their own way by considering the budget and the availability of the resources. The major technical issues that are mainly involved are the problems in the structure of the department (Boud, Cohen & Sampson, 2014). In addition, the issues pertaining to the technical level must not be addressed by the technical development but by the major departments as well. This is mainly denoted by shared organization structures.
The system that has been made will be responsible for meeting the demands of the company and the stakeholders. For example, in case of a website, any changes in the user experience will be responsible for impacting the systems. As such, the end-user experience must be improved by making changes in the system.
Change management is an effective factor considered in critical success factors. Change is driven by technology, knowledge and business environment. In case of any IT project, change management is basically applied to maintain the possibility of control in the system and reduce and chances of risks in the system which will add to the benefit of the program (Lo, 2015). For ensuring the success of a project, small amount of changes are involved which mainly consist of small radical changes to substantial amounts of changes. This will be responsible for company operations and initial scope.
The stakeholder management is responsible for taking into account the various amount of stakeholders to the system. The stakeholders are those people who are responsible for the activities accounted to the system or the project (Galegher, Kraut & Egido, 2014). For the courier company, the major stakeholders involved in this process are the customers, the employees, government and the technical experts. As all these stakeholders are different, the contributions and the capabilities of them can be considered in a different manner.
Risk management
Risks are always evident in any kind of complex IT based projects. The major risks to the system involves the IT based risks like cyber securities or any other threats corresponding to security of the system. For these reason, the need for risks management is required. This will help in adhering to the standards of the market such that all the risks to the system are mitigated. In addition, this will also be used to give a general idea to the managers of the project who will be responsible for the risk management processes.
Communication plays an important role in the business organization. Communication helps in maintaining a proper atmosphere in the business organization. The use of communication helps in providing a proper production and performance of the employed in the workplace. Communication management is an important aspect in the business organization. In this case, a courier company needs communication for maintaining the source of work in the company (Noble, 2017). Simple and clear communication helps in conveying messages from one employee to another, The service provider of the company have to be communicated by the customer relationship department of the company this help in grabbing customers from the market. The use of the communication system in the courier company provides various opportunity to the customers for retaining in the company.
Conclusion
Thus, it can be concluded that the IT risk management t is s an important aspect in the courier companies. Various risks and threats are discussed in the report that helped in maintaining the risk control strategies in the company. The use of the risk management policies includes various strategies including change management, stakeholder management, communication management and market research. The risk management deals with proper planning and designing of the plan in the market. The risk management plan helps in maintaining risks and threats included in the courier company the major problem of the courier company is the customer relationship management in the company. Communication management has helped in maintaining a proper communication in the courier company. The use of the communication have helped in the maintaining a decent approach in the workplace. The stakeholder management has helped in providing better approach towards organizational point of view. The stakeholders of the company are main aspects of the company that helps in developing the growth of the company in the market. Therefore, security forms the cyber threats and risks are the aim of the study.
References
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