SIS or the Strategic Information System can be defined as the Information System which has been developed in order to respond to the various business initiatives. In a business there exists several business initiatives which are required for the purpose of making the organization successful and to reach all the goals and objectives of the organization (Galliers & Leidner, 2014). The SIS or the strategic information system also associated with providing different kinds of competitive advantage which initially makes the organization very popular and significant for everyone. The SIS is also subsequently associated with delivering typical services and products which are having extremely low cost and is focused upon the typical market segments. Another significant advantage of the SIS is that it helps the organization in becoming much more innovative by providing different kind of innovations for the processes and operations of the business. The SIS acts as an important feature or characteristic of the IS or the information system. The SIS helps in categorization, storing, processing and transformation of the information (Arvidsson, Holmström & Lyytinen, 2014). The ERP or the Enterprise Resource Planning can be considered as the effective and efficient method which is used for the integration of the processes of the business. Thus it can stated that it is an integrated management system for most of the business processes and this is mediated by different type of software.
The literature review which has been done below is mainly associated with discussing about one of the major bank present in Australia known as the Westpac Bank. The review is associated with discussing about the selected ERP for the bank which would be helping them in conducting their various business processes (westpac.com.au, 2018). The review is also associated with discussing about the requirements of the bank for various business processes, the requirements of the system and many more.
Westpac Banking Corporation or Westpac is an Australian based bank and financial service provider which has its headquarter in the Westpac Palace situated in Sydney. This is one of the Australia’s “Big four” bank. This is the Australia’s largest branch network having almost 1429 branches and 3850 ATMs. This is the Australia’s second largest bank in term of assets. This bank also has its branches in New Zealand and is the second largest bank over there. This bank started its business operations in the year of 1817 and was named as Bank of New South Wales which was the first bank of Australia (westpac.com.au, 2018). Its core business activities can be classified into five key divisions which mainly includes the “Consumer Bank”, “Commercial and Business Bank”, “BT Financial Group”, “Westpac Institutional Bank” and “Westpac New Zealand”.
The structure of the Westpac bank mainly includes the management section along with the corporate section. Along with the management and the corporate section there also exists the managing bodies and the employees. The customers are also included in the organizational structure (Laudon & Laudon, 2016). There has been certain changes in the structure of the organization. The Australian Financial Services or the AFS doesn’t exists anymore with the CEOs of the Westpac retail and business banking. This model is responsible for strengthening of the unique portfolio of this brand along with maintenance of the one team approach which has been acting as one of the most important feature for the success of eth organization (Haux et al., 2013). The figure provided below shows the organizational structure of the organization:
Fig 1: Organizational structure of the organization: Westpac bank
(Source: westpac.com.au, 2018)
Fig 2: The block diagram of the organizational structure: Westpac bank
(Source: westpac.com.au, 2018)
Westpac is considered as one of the Big four Banks of Australia which has its business running over almost all across Australia as well as New Zealand. The main business of this bank includes the customer banking assisted by centers for home loans. Other business of this bank includes the business banking, institutional banking, fund management and many more (Pearlson, Saunders & Galletta, 2016). All this are done through interests in the BT Fund Management. Despite of all this business processes the bank is facing a lot of problems. The price of the share of Westpac has fallen by 5% at one point to almost an amount of $29.29. The business processes did not looked too bad. The earnings by cash rose by 3% along with the increase in the revenue by 5%. This isn’t any kind of development for the bank. A lower level of profit has been seen due to the low price in the market. The figure which has been provided below shows the performance of the Westpac bank in last few years. From the figure it is clearly understandable that the stocks peaked few years ago with a $40 per share (Willcocks, 2013). But now the share costs around $30 per share. The trend has remained to go down and with this the shares has gone down to $28 per share. From this it is clearly understandable that the fundamental backdrop is getting worse and worse for the organization Westpac bank.
Fig 3: Shares of Westpac bank in last few years
(Source: westpac.com.au, 2018)
One of the problem which is included in the Westpac bank of Australia is the problems regarding the employees who are working in the bank and also the staffs. It is often seen that in the bank the officials are reacting in a rude way towards the clients. This is another problem which is associated with the creation of a negative impact on the minds of the clients. For eliminating all this problems the bank is associated with taking certain steps (Cassidy, 2016). This steps would not only be associated with eliminating the problems but would also be helping in the improvement of shares which they are having. However, the strategies which are being adopted by the Westpac bank is not sufficient to tackle all the problems. This mainly happened due to the fact that most of the strategies which were adopted by the bank were not sufficient in order to match the constant changes which were taking place inside the market. The reason which lies behind all the problems faced by Westpac is due to its organizational structure. In many cases it was seen that the bank was not capable of fulfilling the needs of the customers and this initially lead to different type of problems. Other reasons due to which the customers lost their interest over the bank included high interest rate and the complicated way of loan payments. The major impact on the customers due to fall in the shares was that the new customers as well as the old customers were afraid of making any type of further investments in the bank (Majchrzak & Malhotra, 2013). The fall in shares also made the customers afraid of creating new accounts in the bank as well.
After facing various type of problems it was understood by the bank that they need to adopt certain strategies in order to tackle all the problems that they are facing right now in their various business operations. In order to tackle all the problems the bank has been thinking of adopting four elements for their various business process to succeed. The elements which have been identified by the bank are listed below with a brief description.
Westpac bank has understood the fact that the first and most important element required for running a bank is the Customer. The bank having more number of customers to likely to succeed. The bank would become totally non-functional if the customers stop visiting the banks. Due to this they are thinking of focusing more on their customers rather on any other aspects in order to satisfy their customers and to attract more customers towards the bank (Amrollahi, Ghapanchi & Talaei-Khoei, 2013).
The second element where the bank needs to focus is the technology. The bank should change the way they think about the new technologies. Technologies plays a very vital role in success in today’s world. The bank has understood that they require new and more innovative technology in order to deal with the various types of problems. The technology that they would be adopting would not only be helping them in eliminating the problems but would also be helping them in becoming more successful. The adaptation of the new technologies would be helping the staffs as well as all the work that they do would become easier.
The main strength of the bank is totally dependent on the capability that the various team of the bank is having. Team work would not nly be helping the bank but is also necessary in each and every organization. The staffs and the employees of the bank has the responsibility of working together ((Ramazani, Zanjani & Vali, 2012). By working together the bank would be capable of achieving all the goals and objectives that they are having.
The last element which is included is the productivity. This is one of the important feature which is needed by the business in order to succeed. It is the responsibility of the bank to keep a track record of the employee’s productivity. Along with keeping track of the employee productivity the productivity of the entire organization should be recorded.
Figure 4: Strategies of Westpac bank of Australia
(Source: westpac.com.au, 2018)
In today’s world it is seen that most of the organizations are associated with the usage of the ERP or the Enterprise Resource Planning. The Westpac has also been associated with the usage of the ERP (Luet al., 2012). Assisted by this ERP the bank has been capable of manufacturing a variety of control associated with the amalgamating of the major portion of the business. the management of the bank consists of the information system or the IS and the ERP which are combined together for various type of processes of the bank which mainly includes the marketing, planning, sales, finance and many more (Kumar & Reinartz, 2012). Westpac is also associated with the use of basic systems along with the applications and different product model or SAP model in order to conduct the various business process. With the introduction of the SAP in the business model of Westpac there has arouse the need of lot of knowledge and this has happened mainly due to the fact that the introduction of the SAP is a very complex process. The introduction of the SAP would not only be increasing the proficiency of the bank but would also be increasing the flexibility of the organization. The SAP would also be integrating the various models of the business at an extreme rate (Kirmaci, 2012). The SAP is also very cost effective. The adaptation of the wrong strategies in the past days is one of major reason lying behind the problems faced by Westpac. The SAP is updated and renewed is done for the purpose of making the shares much more steady. Besides this it is also being tried by the shareholders to reduce the rate of interest and to make the clients much more interested towards the bank.
Figure 5: Systems Flowchart of Westpac Bank
(Source: westpac.com.au, 2018)
The figure which has been given above is mainly associated depicting the flow of different processes in the bank. The figure has also been associated with illustrating the different kind of procedures which are conducted by the bank and this illustration has been provided in detail. Along with the illustration of the processes the figure has also been associated with helping in the process of finding the loopholes which mainly exists in the processes of the bank. The flowchart consists of three major categories and which mainly includes the review, evaluation and lastly the responses (Kwak, et al., 2012).
The different type of modifications that has taken place in the shares of the bank is considered as the major reason lying being the problems which are faced by the Westpac Bank of Australia (Hasibuan & Dantes, 2012). Along with this the different aspects that are responsible for the growth of bank is totally dependent upon the shareholders, clients and the marketing team of Westpac bank of Australia. The problems in the system has been greatly affecting the reputation of the Westpac bank of Australia.
CRM or the Customer Relationship Management is associated with acting as one of the major feature for any kind of organization especially for the banks (Alqahtani & Saba, 2013). Westpac Bank is associated with the usage of the CRM in order to deal with the clients and it is totally the responsibility of the bank to fulfill all the requirement of the clients. Customer Relationship Management is the characteristic, which mainly refers to the techniques and the various strategies which is used by the bank in order to maintain a good relation with their clients (Kumar & Reinartz, 2012). The CRM of Westpac Bank is not at all sufficient for the different kind of processes of the bank. Besides this they are also not capable of maintaining a good relation with the customer (Payne & Frow, 2013). The bank should also think of putting an extra focus on the customer relationship management for the purpose of making the clients seek their interest in the bank.
The different kind of problems and the challenges which are being faced by the Westpac bank of Australia can be reduced by including the accounting software in the various business processes of the bank. Westpac bank of Australia is also associated with the usage of the B2C or Business-to-Customers software package (Rai, 2012). The advantages of B2C software are as follows:
Figure 6: Current Market size of Westpac
(Source: westpac.com.au, 2018)
There are various competitors of Westpac Bank of Australia (Gögüs & Özer, 2014)
. They are as follows:
Figure 7: Core Competitors of Westpac Bank.
(Source: westpac.com.au, 2018)
The figure which has been provided below helps in describing the core and main competitors of Westpac bank. Seven banks are the core competitors of this particular bank.
Conclusion
The above discussion helps in concluding to the fact that the Westpac Bank of Australia is one of the leading banks in Australia. Westpac bank has also been associated with facing various type of problems even after being listed as one of the top four bank of Australia. Due to the presence of different kind of problems the customers are also losing their interest on the bank and besides this the shares of the bank are also falling. Despite of all the problems the bank has been trying a lot with different type of efforts to evolve out of the situation and they have thought of bringing new ideologies and strategies in their business. The above literature review covers a basic discussion on the structure, errors, inefficiencies and the process designing of Westpac Bank of Australia. It also covers the market size, market leaders and competitors of the bank. Specific recommendations are also provided to overcome the risks and challenges of the organization.
References:
Alqahtani, F. A., & Saba, T. (2013). Impact of social networks on Customer Relation Management (CRM) in prospectus of business environment. Journal of American Sciences, 9(7), 480-486.
Amrollahi, A., Ghapanchi, A. H., & Talaei-Khoei, A. (2013). A systematic literature review on strategic information systems planning: Insights from the past decade. Verified OK.
Arvidsson, V., Holmström, J., & Lyytinen, K. (2014). Information systems use as strategy practice: A multi-dimensional view of strategic information system implementation and use. The Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 23(1), 45-61.
Cassidy, A. (2016). A practical guide to information systems strategic planning. CRC press.
Galliers, R. D., & Leidner, D. E. (Eds.). (2014). Strategic information management: challenges and strategies in managing information systems. Routledge.
Gögüs, C. G., & Özer, G. (2014). The roles of technology acceptance model antecedents and switching cost on accounting software use. Journal of Management Information and Decision Sciences, 17(1), 1.
Hasibuan, Z. A., & Dantes, G. R. (2012). Priority of key success factors (KSFS) on enterprise resource planning (ERP) system implementation life cycle. Journal of Enterprise Resource Planning Studies, 2012, 1.
Haux, R., Winter, A., Ammenwerth, E., & Brigl, B. (2013). Strategic information management in hospitals: an introduction to hospital information systems. Springer Science & Business Media.
Kirmaci, S. (2012). Customer relationship management and customer loyalty; a survey in the sector of banking. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 3(3).
Kumar, V., & Reinartz, W. (2012). Customer relationship management: Concept, strategy, and tools. Springer Science & Business Media.
Kwak, Y. H., Park, J., Chung, B. Y., & Ghosh, S. (2012). Understanding end-users’ acceptance of enterprise resource planning (ERP) system in project-based sectors. IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, 59(2), 266-277.
Laudon, K. C., & Laudon, J. P. (2016). Management information system. Pearson Education India.
Lu, K., Fu, Y., Gu, C., & Zhang, L. (2012). Problems and Solutions of Popularization of Accounting Computerization. Physics Procedia, 33, 1155-1159.
Majchrzak, A., & Malhotra, A. (2013). Towards an information systems perspective and research agenda on crowdsourcing for innovation. The Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 22(4), 257-268.
Monk, E., & Wagner, B. (2012). Concepts in enterprise resource planning. Cengage Learning.
Payne, A., & Frow, P. (2013). Strategic customer management: Integrating relationship marketing and CRM. Cambridge University Press.
Pearlson, K. E., Saunders, C. S., & Galletta, D. F. (2016). Managing and Using Information Systems, Binder Ready Version: A Strategic Approach. John Wiley & Sons.
Rai, A. K. (2012). Customer relationship management: Concepts and cases. PHI Learning Pvt. Ltd..
Ramazani, M., Zanjani, M., & Vali, F. (2012). Accounting Software Expectation Gap Based on Features of Accounting Information Systems (AISs).
westpac.com.au. (2018). Westpac – Personal, Business and Corporate Banking. Retrieved from https://www.westpac.com.au/
Willcocks, L. (2013). Information management: the evaluation of information systems investments. Springer.
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