Midsouth Chamber of Commerce

Midsouth Chamber of avocation (MSCC), a non-profit member supported organization that lobbies bring up government for local businesses, needed to update its IBM AS/400 based UNITRAK corpse to a more(prenominal) advanced structure to meet the growing demands of employees and members. golosh Gramen, a former figure de delinquency trainer for an restitution broker, who had no experience with the AS/400 estimator or the UNITRAK software product product product, was hire for the job.After struggling to follow the previous hardware, software, data structure and organization operations, he urged MSCCs executive charge to purchase the IBM RS/6000 com reposeer organisation (a system he was familiar with) to enhance MSCCs computing capabilities. Despite Leon Lassiters (vice president of marketing) admonition, the executive committee unhesitatingly granted Gramens request. Shortly thereafter, Gramen accepted a contract with the inapt and inexperienced vendor, Data vigilance Associ ates (DMA) to bewilder the software and convert the UNITRAK database into the new system.Gramen did non canvass the contract in great peak and sent it to MSCC president, Jack Wallingford for approval. Even worse, Wallingford, without having any external specialist or corporate counsel to review the document, blindly signed the contract. The contract later revealed no explicit or quantifiable performance standards for the operate to be provided, and that DMA only offered a certain turn of free culture hours for the creation of the software.Moreover, DMA had the right to affix the price of services and products provided at its discretion, while restrict its financial and performance liabilities. Not surprisingly, DMA encountered a countless of problems from the moment of implementation. And as difficulties with the software conversion mounted, DMA readily used up the development hours, and started billing the MSCC for the hunt down beyond the free hours guaranteed. Conseq uently, the relationship between DMA and the MSCC declined. The software break ination was subsequently stopped within a few months due to erroneous billing issues and the insufficiency of progress.Additionally, the MSCC could not receive reimbursement from DMA to buy another system or hire another vendor to enounce the required software since it had already made plenteous payment (which implied acceptance of the software system). Before long, it became seeming(a) that Gramen did not possess the necessary expertise to substantiate and support the hardware platform or net problems regarding software implementation. In my opinion, MSCC could have avoided this predicament if focal ratio management had initially chosen a qualify individual to manage its reading Systems.Gramen failed to carefully prize the existing data resource and rushed to install a new system. He also miss the organizations operations, and disregarded meaningful feedback from Lassiter, one of MSCCs highe r-ranking business leaders. Needless to say, the agreement with DMA ought to have been reviewed by someone who specializes in computer software contracts preliminary to signing. When Lassiter officially took over as President, he hired Sage Niele as financial officer and vice president of operations. This was a prudent maneuver by Lassiter given that he could no longer hand to leave Gramen in-charge of MSCCs discipline systems.Niele earned her MBA from Wharton School of Business, and had formerly performed systems management tasks for a large pharmaceutical beau monde in the Midsouth area. She also managed her own data systems and financial consulting business. Niele began gathering information from the MSCC staff on the deficiencies of the computer system as well as the involve of the organization. At the same time, she sought support from the executive committee and key board members to determine the resource of the MSCC for the available future.This bottom-up and top-dow n approach was effective, and it flatten her learning curve about the MSCC and its current information systems. She also identified several RS/6000 compatible software packages that were worthy of further investigation, and sent only billable payments to DMA. I believe Niele is off to a pretty in force(p) start. By analyzing the present information system and reasonableness the organizations needs, she will eventually be able to develop a well-organized strategic plan that will put an end to MSCCs long history of poor operational decisions.In conclusion, Niele must consult other vendors for the development of the needed software seeing as the DMA software module will most likely neer become operational. On the other hand, if this option is not viable and proves to be more costly in the long run, she must recommend the acquisition of a suitable up-to-date computer system, and reengineer MSCCs entire information system in order to improve efficiency. References 1. Brown, C.V. , De Hayes, D. W. , Hoffer, J. A. , Martin E. W. , & Perkins, W. C. (2009). Managing Information Technology (6th ed. ). (pp. 192-200). New Jersey Pearson Education, Inc. 2. Brown, J. (2002). Midsouth Chamber of Commerce. 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