Operations and Information Systems

Operations and Information Systems

Information systems is something that has helped globalize business as a whole. It all started out with emails. But this is not very effective because you need to work on the document, then save it, and then send it back. This makes it hard for people to look at it at the same time. But, the creation of ERP’s (Enterprise Resource Systems) has allowed employees in different locations in the same company to collaborate, manage, create, and design data that previously had to be handled manually.

Information systems have really helped globalize the supply chain and make it efficient. For example, at Wal-Mart, as soon as a customer picks an item of the shelf and the cashier scans it, a signal is sent to their ERP that they have sold this product and it is easy for the managers to see exactly what has been sold in each store. It can also track the inventory and they may even reorder inventory automatically knowing they are running out of stock. This is without Wal-Mart even having to do anything.

The supply chains have influenced globalization because has supply chains grow, the more global standards are needed which in turn eliminates border friction. This creates a global collaboration as companies starts to feed off other companies. Globalization also helps companies to build their supply chains because of the fact that companies can find the best producers as well as the lowest prices around the world. In that sense, the supply chains help progress globalization as well because now companies from countries all over the world can find and sell products from countries all over the world (Lawlor B. R., 2007).

The information systems has also helped enable the consolidation of operations and supply chain management work into Shared Service Centers. A Shared Service Center is a unit that is structured as a centralized point of service and is focused on defined business functions. These functions are supported by IT and IT services for multiple business units within the enterprise. Shared services may come from several different physical locations, and may involve a lot of business functions and IT processes (Gartner).

Shared Service Centers reduce the costs for an organization by consolidating one or more back-office operations used by multiple divisions of the same company such as finance, information technology, customer service and human resources into a shared operation. By creating an independent Service Center, companies can eliminate unnecessary activities and improve efficiency, services and customer satisfaction. Because of the need of every corporate department for finance and human services, these functions offer a common opportunity for a Shared Service Center model. Many of the savings come from standardizing technology and processes on a national and regional basis, making it easier to provide support for multiple business units,