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How using agile changed BT/British Telecom?

Agile development methods are being adopted by a growing number of software development teams and organizations. Until 2004, British Telecom (BT) has yet made any serious inroads into agile development. After the arrival of the new CIO at the company, he understood and was aware of the business benefits that can be derived through faster and more effective software delivery and the motivational impact it can has on development teams if agile development is adopted. Therefore; he systematically replaced the company’s long-standing waterfall based delivery processes with a new one that shaped the key principles of agile delivery (Evans, 2006). Where Agile is a time boxed, iterative approach to software delivery that builds software incrementally from the start of the project, instead of trying to deliver it all at once near the end. It works by breaking projects down into little bits of user functionality called user stories, prioritizing them, and then continuously delivering them in

How British Telecom used agile to add a competitive advantage?

In 2005, British Telecom adopted agile programming. The need for agile programming came about as British Telecom began to replace an aging phone-traffic monitoring system. British Telecom wanted to give traffic managers the ability to more quickly make adjustments in the network loads, without the risk of system overloads. (Hoffman, 2008). The system that was replaced was not easy to upgrade. Additionally, the process of updates, included up to nine months of data gathering. Following, was at least 18 months of development. Competitive Advantage By implementing agile development, British Telecom experienced a change in the landscape of its employee base. Initially Managers were concerned with what their role would be and how would they demonstrated their value to the organization. By implementing an agile environment in which employees were encouraged to meet with customers to better learn their needs so that they could be met. Historically, British Telecom moved from documentation, qu

How Agile development methodology helped British Telecom?

BT Group plc (trading as BT and formerly British Telecom) is a British multinational telecommunication holding company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It has operations in around 180 countries and is the largest provider of fixed-line, broadband and mobile services in the UK, and also provides subscription television and IT services (BT, 2018). Its obvious to recognize the impact of BT in the world of telecommunication, because its available in almost every country, and most importantly due to the qualities of their staffs and their business strategies. As state (Evans, 2006), “BT employs some 8,000 IT professionals in a variety of roles including project & delivery management architecture & design, software engineering, integration & testing, operational support and service management. Much of its internally-focused development work has traditionally been channeled through a number of business-focused delivery projects or programs, ranging from quite small, simpl

How information system changed the world?

The 21st century has seen a remarkable advance in terms of advances in information technology (IT) and corporate globalization. According to Roy (2017), "Literature and theory are used to develop a conceptual model for the adoption of information technology (IT) and the globalization of business purchasing behavior. and global are also examined. " Nowadays, information technology is able to do the following tasks: - Storage of large amounts of information - ubiquitous access to information - Astronomical types and amounts of calculations on information - Instant Wide distance communication in any format (text, video, audio) at low cost. - Things can be automated and scripted. (Storage of large amounts of information All of this ultimately means that the Internet is uniform throughout the world and accessible too (Khan, 2017) All this shows us that the Internet is uniform throughout the world and equally accessible and has transformed the world as a global village. We will, th

What is digital divide?

Technology is a vital force in the modern form of business globalization. Technology has revolutionized the global economy, become a critical competitive strategy, and globalized the world. The technology revolution is sweeping the globe and the transition from manual to electronic delivery of services both in public and private sector leads to the advancement of the business community throughout the world (Lamba & Malhorta, n.d.). Ultimately, it’s the Internet’s presence throughout the world that is behind the IT globalization. Information Technology being consistent and accessible means so is the internet. This, in turn, means the storage of large amounts of information and ubiquitous access to the information. Astronomical types and amounts of calculations on the information, as well as instant communication from a large distance in any format (text, video, audio) at low cost. Things can be automated and scripted. Given the preceding internet involvement, Information Technology’

What does Information Systems Ethics mean?

Information technology is now being perceived as the driving force in today’s globalization. This is because of the various roles played by information technology leading to a competitive world. These roles are: Information Technology has helped in changing the global marketplace (international trade) by enabling marketers to overcome some significant barriers like lack of common ethical standard, transportation cost, and delay in information exchange. Information Technology has achieved this by allowing software experts to work collaboratively over the network with companies from around the world and quickly establish operating standards and frequently keep in touch. Thus, this technological advancement has equally fostered research and development and has helped markets to manage globally at a rapid pace, as indicated by several kinds of trade extended to foreign countries (Lamba & Malhotra, 2009). Information technology has fostered communication and connections. Here, the em

What role does information technology have in globalization?

Globalization is the term used to refer to the integration of goods, services, and culture among the nations of the world. Globalization is not necessarily a new phenomenon; in many ways, we have been experiencing globalization since the days of European colonization. Further advances in telecommunication and transportation technologies accelerated globalization. The advent of the worldwide Internet has made all nations next-door neighbors (Bourgeois, 2014). Information Technology (IT) is a driving factor in the process of globalization. Improvements in the early 1990s in computer hardware, software, and telecommunications greatly increased people’s ability to access information and economic potential. While advancements in Internet-based tools over the past five to ten years, such as social networking websites, twitter, and other Web2.0 applications are changing the way people use and share information for personal, political, and commercial purposes. These developments have facilitat

What is SDLC?

Systems Development Lifecycle System development is the process of defining, designing, testing and implementing a software application. This includes the internal development of customized systems as well as the acquisition of software developed by third parties (Zandbergen, n.d.). The systems development life cycle, or SDLC, is the process of creating systems and the models used to develop these systems (Zandbergen, n.d.). There are following six phases in every Software development life cycle model (Linkedin, 2017): Requirement gathering and analysis. Business requirements are gathered in this phase. These requirements are analyzed for their validity and the possibility of incorporating the requirements in the system to be developed is also studied. Design. In this phase, the system and software design are prepared from the requirement specifications which were studied in the first phase. Test strategy is developed. Implementation or coding. The code is produced; the longest phase o

What are the pros and cons of Agile?

The system development life cycle, known as the SDLC, is the industry-standard approach to managing phases of an engineering project (it can be thinks of as the equivalent to the scientific method for software development and other IT initiatives). The common breakdown of the SDLC includes seven phases that trace a product or project from a planned idea to its final release into operation and maintenance (innovativearchitects, n.d). There are a number of different System Development Life cycle methodologies, such as (innovativearchitects, n.d): - Waterfall: The waterfall approach is one of the oldest SDLC models, but it has fallen out of favor in recent years. This model involves a rigid structure that demands all system requirements be defined at the very start of a project. Only then can the design and development stages begin. - Iterative: The iterative methodology takes the waterfall model and cycles through it several times in small increments. Rather than stretc

What is BPR?

As per PEARSON(n.d), "Business process reengineering is the act of recreating a core business process with the goal of improving product output, quality, or reducing costs." Become popular in the business world in the 1990s, we will say in general that its role is to analyze the workflow of a company, while looking for processes that have lost their performance or are simply inefficient then, to find ways of ameliorating them by modifying them, or of removing them. Since it is not an easy task, process reengineering, it aims to fundamentally change all processes to create new ones, unlike the management or improvement of business processes, which aim to work with existing processes and processes and improve their mode of operation. According to EDUCBA (2017)"Business Process Re-engineering is the radial designs of the business that help to experience dramatic improvements in the business cycle, quality, as well as productivity.....Particularly this system designs for the

What is Business Process Re-engineering (BPR)?

Business Process Re-engineering (BPR), is not about making small changes, it's about re-thinking the approach to a business concept, or re-designing a solution to meet the demands of the customer. In 1990, Michael Hammer, a former Professor of Computer Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), published “Re-engineering Work: Don’t Automate, Obliterate”. He made bold statements and claimed, "the major challenge for managers is to obliterate forms of work that do not add value, rather than using technology for automating it". (M. Hammer 1990). In many businesses, from SMB through Mid-Market and Enterprise; what started as "quick-fix" to an issue may no longer be sustainable, or will not scale to cope with growth volumes. For example, an in-house accountant running the accounts, managing expenses and payroll, may have initially supported a small business; but as the business grows, they may need to hire an additional accountant. Alternatively, &qu

What is business process reengineering?

According to the video by Prolearn posted on Youtube, business process reengineering or BPR has three components of action (Nagasundaram, 2014): adding value to the customer, carefully and completely rethinking an organization’s goals and processes, and radically transforming the processes to achieve efficiencies and new, and formerly unachieved goals. BPR was a significant movement in the thoughtful restructuring of an organization that began in the early ’90s. The idea behind it was to make your company more flexible, responsive, efficient and effective for all stakeholders, including customers, employees, and owners (Grimsley, 2019). That idea of company reform comes with plenty of radical changes. Some easier to get behind than others: The focus must shift from management to customer (who now becomes the boss) Empower employees with decision-making powers Shift emphasis from managing activities to result driven Focus on leading and teaching employees, not “scorekeeping” Change the

What is BPM?

There are several definitions for a system, but the most generic and practical is that a system is a group of parts or components that work together to achieve a common goal. For example, every person has many body parts that combine to form the human body and its systems, which has goals such as growth and survival. In a business organization, employees and groups work together to achieve the organization's goals, such as higher market share and technological leadership (White, n.d.). We can define a system's main elements as the "parts" that perform the work and the "relations" that define how the work will be accomplished. Obviously, both parts and relations are important for a system to perform adequately. For instance, a basketball team could be a good example of a system. The system parts are the players, and the relations are the way the players work together. Both the players and teamwork are important to the team's success. In the same manner, p

How does Amazon beat competition?

Wikipedia posts the following information about competitive forces: “Porter's Five Forces Framework is a tool for analyzing the competition of a business. It draws from industrial organization (IO) economics to derive five forces that determine the competitive intensity and, therefore, the attractiveness (or lack of it) of an industry in terms of its profitability” (Wikipedia, n.d.). Those five forces are the threat of new entrants, the threat of substitutes, bargaining power of customers, bargaining power of suppliers, and competitive rivalry (Wikipedia, n.d.). Porter also spoke to value chains. “A value chain is a set of activities that a firm operating in a specific industry performs in order to deliver a valuable product or service for the market. ... In Porter's value chains, Inbound Logistics, Operations, Outbound Logistics, Marketing and Sales, and Service are categorized as primary activities” (Wikipedia, n.d.a). The following analysis looks at the competitive forces of