Fesalbon, Shery Ann F BSIT FREE ELECTIVE 3

BSIT 4-1

DECISION PROBLEMS

1. Snyders of Hanover, which sells more than 78 million bags of pretzels, snack chips,
and organic snack items each year, had its financial department use spreadsheets
and manual processes for much of its data gathering and reporting. Hanover’s
financial analyst would spend the entire final week of every month collecting
spreadsheets from the heads of more than 50 departments worldwide. She would
then consolidate and re-enter all the data into another spreadsheet, which would
serve as the company’s monthly profit-and-loss statement. If a department needed to
update its data after submitting the spreadsheet to the main office, the analyst had to
return the original spreadsheet and wait for the department to re-submit its data
before finally submitting the updated data in the consolidated document. Assess the
impact of this situation on business performance and management decision making.

ANSWER: The impact of this situation to the business process and the
management decision making may slow down the performance of the business and it
can waste a lot of time in encoding the data from different departments worldwide. It may
also have a chance of making errors while inputting the data from the spreadsheet.
However, it has a huge effect regarding decision making because the managers need to
have complete and accurate data in making decisions to improve or maintain the
strategy in operating and improving a business. In the stated situation the business has
a problem in collecting the data in different departments so it may cause poor decision
making that can affect the whole business organization.

2. Dollar General Corporation operates deep discount stores offering housewares,

cleaning supplies, clothing, health and beauty aids, and packaged food, with most
items selling for $1. Its business model calls for keeping costs as low as possible.
Although the company uses information systems (such as a point-of-sale system to
track sales at the register), it deploys them very sparingly to keep expenditures to the
minimum. The company has no automated method for keeping track of inventory at
each store. Managers know approximately how many cases of a particular product
the store is supposed to receive when a delivery truck arrives, but the stores lack
technology for scanning the cases or verifying the item count inside the cases.
Merchandise losses from theft or other mishaps have been rising and now represent
over 3 percent of total sales. What decisions must be made before investing in an
information system solution?
 ANSWER: Before investing in an Information System solution they must create a
budget. How much is the company willing to spend? Based on this value they can
determine how much to spend on training employees, and what equipment to purchase.
Based on the budget designated to hiring and training the employees, Dollar General
should hire regional and in-store managers who are qualified to properly manage the
store. The corporation must have a strong IS development team before investing in IS
solutions to make sure that they have appropriate people who will be able to handle any
arising information system related issue. That includes hiring sufficient people and
training those the company already has. There must be training programs to enhance
management decisions skills and IT-enriched educational programs so everyone in the
company is ready for enhancing new business strategies in the corporation. And lastly,
they must hire and train more employees to have a will build and strong corporation.