ESOFT METRO CAMPUS
#3, De Fonseka Road, Colombo 04.
Higher National Diploma in Computing & Systems Development / Business
Management
Assignment Submission Form
Name
ESOFT Reg. No
Edexcel No
Module Name
Name of the Lecturer
Date Due
Date Submitted
Fine
Email-Address
Contact No
Check List
CD
()
H. D. S. Enura Indula
COL/A-060329
KJ86935
Business Intelligence
Mr. Lilanka
11/07/2019
11/07/219
Name of Group Members (If
Applicable)
sri.indula@gmail.com
Assignment
Brief
Signature
Coversheet
Formatting
Harvard Referencing
Sheet
on
Signature on Student Declaration
Herewith I agree for the given terms and conditions on plagiarism & Academic dishonesty also I declare the
work submitted doesn’t breach these regulations.
Note: Keep the softcopy of the assignment with you until the official results released by ESOFT. ESOFT has all rights to request the softcopy
again at any time.
_______Enura Indula_____
Signature
_______11/07/2019_______
Date
Higher National Diploma in Computing & Systems Development / Business
Management
Assignment Submission Form
Name
Student Reg. No
Edexcel No
Module Name
Name of the Lecturer
Date Due
Date Submitted
Fine
Email-Address
Contact No
Check List
CD
()
Assignment
Brief
Signature
Coversheet
Formatting
Harvard Referencing
Sheet
on
Signature on Student Declaration
I will keep the copy of this sheet until I receive the Results of my Submitted work
_______________________
________________________
Signature
Date
Higher Nationals
Internal verification of assessment decisions – BTEC (RQF)
INTERNAL VERIFICATION – ASSESSMENT DECISIONS
Higher National Diploma in Computing
Programme title
Assessor
Unit 14:
Unit(s)
Internal
Verifier
Business Intelligence
Assignment title
H. D. S. Enura Indula
Student’s name
Pass
List which assessment criteria
the Assessor has awarded.
Merit
Distinction
INTERNAL VERIFIER CHECKLIST
Do the assessment criteria awarded match
those shown in the assignment brief?
Is the Pass/Merit/Distinction grade awarded
justified by the assessor’s comments on the
student work?
Has the work
accurately?
been
assessed
assessment
decision
Y/N
Y/N
Is the feedback to the student:
Give details:
• Constructive?
• Linked to relevant assessment criteria?
• Identifying opportunities for improved
performance?
• Agreeing actions?
Does the
amending?
Y/N
Y/N
Y/N
Y/N
Y/N
need
Y/N
Assessor signature
Date
Internal Verifier signature
Date
Programme Leader signature (if required)
Date
Confirm action completed
Remedial action taken
Give details:
Assessor signature
Internal
Verifier
signature
Programme Leader
signature (if required)
Date
Date
Date
Higher Nationals - Summative Assignment Feedback Form
Student Name/ID
H. D. S. Enura Indula / COL/A-060329
Unit Title
Unit 14:
Assignment Number
01
Submission Date
Business Intelligence
Assessor
11/07/2019
Date Received
1st submission
Date Received 2nd
submission
Re-submission Date
Assessor Feedback:
LO1 Discuss business processes and the mechanisms used to support business decision-making.
Pass,
Merit
&
Distinction Descripts
P1
P2
D1
LO2 Compare the tools and technologies associated with business intelligence functionality.
Pass,
Merit
&
Distinction Descripts
P2
M2
D2
LO3 Demonstrate the use of business intelligence tools and technologies
Pass,
Merit
&
Distinction Descripts
P3
P4
M3
D3
LO4 Discuss the impact of business intelligence tools and technologies for
effective decision-making purposes and the legal/regulatory context in which
they are used.
Pass,
Merit
& P5
P6
M4
D4
Distinction Descripts
Grade:
Assessor Signature:
Date:
Resubmission Feedback:
Grade:
Assessor Signature:
Date:
Internal Verifier’s Comments:
Signature & Date:
* Please note that grade decisions are provisional. They are only confirmed once internal and external moderation has taken place and grades
decisions have been agreed at the assessment board.
Assignment Feedback
Formative Feedback: Assessor to Student
Action Plan
Summative feedback
Feedback: Student to Assessor
Assessor
signature
Date
Student
signature
Date
Pearson Higher Nationals in
Computing
Unit 14: Business Intelligence
Assignment 01
General Guidelines
1. A cover page or title page should be attached to your assignment. Use page 1 of this assignment brief
as your cover page and make sure all details are accurately filled.
2. The entire assignment brief should be attached as the first section of your assignment.
3. The assignment should be prepared using a word processing software.
4. The assignment should be word processing in an A4 sized paper.
5. Allow 1” margin on top, bottom and right sides of the paper and 1.25” on the left side (for binding).
Word Processing Rules
1. The font size should be 12 point, and should be in the style of Time New Roman.
2. Set line spacing to 1.5. Justify all paragraphs.
3. Ensure that all headings are consistent in terms of size and font style.
4. Use footer function on the word processor to insert your name, unit, assignment no, and page
number on each page. This is useful if individual sheets get detached from the submission.
5. Use the spell check and grammar check function of the word processing application to review the
use of language on your assignment.
Important Points:
1. Carefully check carefully the hand in date and the instructions given with the assignment. Late
submissions will not be accepted.
2. Ensure that sufficient time is spent to complete the assignment by the due date.
3. Do not wait till the last minute to get feedback on the assignment. Such excuses will not be accepted
for late submissions.
4. You must be responsible for efficient management of your time.
5. If you are unable to hand in your assignment on time and have valid reasons such as illness, you
may apply (in writing) for an extension.
6. Failure to achieve at least a PASS grade will result in a REFERRAL grade.
7. Non-submission of work without valid reasons will lead to an automatic REFERRAL. You will
then be asked to complete an alternative assignment.
8. If you use other people’s work or ideas in your assignment, it must be properly referenced, using
the HARVARD referencing system, in your text or any bibliography. Otherwise, you’ll be found
guilty of committing plagiarism.
9. If you are caught plagiarising, your grade will be reduced to a REFERRAL or at worst, you could
be excluded from the course.
Student Declaration
I hereby, declare that I know what plagiarism entails, namely to use another’s work and to present it as
my own without attributing the sources in the correct form. I further understand what it means to copy
another’s work.
1. I know that plagiarism is a punishable offence because it constitutes theft.
2. I understand the plagiarism and copying policy of Edexcel UK.
3. I know what the consequences will be if I plagiarise or copy another’s work in any of the
assignments for this program.
4. I declare therefore that all work presented by me for every aspect of my program, will be my own,
and where I have made use of another’s work, I will attribute the source in the correct way.
5. I acknowledge that the attachment of this document signed or not, constitutes a binding agreement
between myself and Edexcel UK.
6. I understand that my assignment will not be considered as submitted if this document is not attached
to the assignment.
sri.indula@gamil.com
Student’s Signature:
(Provide E-mail ID)
11/07/2019
Date:
(Provide Submission Date)
Higher National Diploma in Business
Assignment Brief
Student Name /ID Number
H. D. S. Enura Indula / COL/A - 060329
Unit Number and Title
Unit 14:
Academic Year
2017/18
Unit Tutor
Mr. Lilanka
Assignment Title
Business Process Support Mechanisms
Business Intelligence
Issue Date
Submission Date
11/07/2019
IV Name & Date
Submission format
Submission to include:
Part 1: The submission is in the form of an individual written report. This should be written in a
concise, formal business style using single spacing and font size 12. You are required to make use of
headings, paragraphs and subsections as appropriate, and all work must be supported with research
and referenced using the Harvard referencing system. Please also provide a bibliography using the
Harvard referencing system. The recommended word limit is 2,000–2,500 words, although you will
not be penalized for exceeding the total word limit.
Part 2: Comprehensive table
Part 3: The submission is in the form of a ten-minute Microsoft® PowerPoint® style presentation.
The presentation can include links to performance data with additional speaker notes and a
bibliography using the Harvard referencing system. The presentation slides for the findings should
be submitted with speaker notes as one copy. You are required to make effective use of headings,
bullet points and subsections, as appropriate. Your research should be referenced using the Harvard
referencing system. The recommended word limit is 500 words, including speaker notes, although
you will not be penalized for exceeding the total word limit.
Unit Learning Outcomes:
LO1 Discuss business processes and the mechanisms used to support business decision-making.
LO2 Compare the tools and technologies associated with business intelligence functionality
LO3 Demonstrate the use of business intelligence tools and technologies
LO4 Discuss the impact of business intelligence tools and technologies for effective decisionmaking purposes and the legal/regulatory context in which they are used
Assignment Brief and Guidance:
Business processes are pivotal to the operation, functionality and accomplishment of
organisational goals. As a collection or set of tasks/activities, business processes ensure that the
end goal of delivering a service or product to a customer is accomplished successfully.
Scenario:
Data and information are core to any organization and business process. The necessity of having
meaningful information is the key driver for effective decision making and problem-solving.
Business intelligence has evolved from technologies such as decision support systems (DSS) to
include tools and methods associated with data mining, data integration, data quality and data
warehousing in conjunction with other information management systems and applications.
Suppose you are recently recruited as a Business Analyst to a leading Sri Lankan
Organization. As your initial project, you are required to prepare a management report to
the Board of Directors including the following details.
Part 1
Background details of the organization.
Identify and explain different business processes and supporting processes models used at the
selected organization with examples.
Explain data that have been used by the different process models given above.
Differentiation between data classification based on the selected organization in terms of
structured, semi structured and unstructured.
What are the application softwares used in the given process models?
Evaluate the benefits and drawbacks of using application software as a mechanism for business
processing.
Part 2
Compare the tools and technologies associated with the business intelligence functionalities and
support available for business decision making at various levels within the organization
• Compare the types of support available for Business Decision making at different levels
of the organizational structure
• What are the business intelligence tools commonly used in selected organization? Justify
with specific examples of the key features of business intelligence functionality
Part 3
Design a simple business intelligence tool/application with user friendly and functional
interfaces that can perform a specific task to support problem solving or decision making at
an advanced level the selected organization.
Provide a critical review of the design in terms of how it meets a specific user or business
requirement and identify what customization has been integrated into the design.
Part 4
Discuss the importance and the impact of business intelligence tools and technologies that can
be used by the organization for effective decision making.
Describe the legal/ regulatory issues involved in the secure exploitation of business intelligence
tools in an organization. What are the legal issues you can identify in the system designed by
you?
Identify new Business Intelligence trends and technologies that can be further enhance the
operational activities in the selected organisational context
Evaluate how organizations could use business intelligence to extend their target audience and
make them more competitive within the market, taking security legislation into consideration
Grading Rubric
Grading Criteria
LO1 Discuss business processes and the mechanisms
used to support business decision-making.
P1 Examine, using examples, the terms ‘Business
Process’ and ‘Supporting Processes’.
M1 Differentiate between unstructured and semistructured data within an organization.
D1 Evaluate the benefits and drawbacks of using
application software as a mechanism for business
processing.
LO2 Compare the tools and technologies associated with
business intelligence functionality
P2 Compare the types of support available for business
decision-making at varying levels within an organization.
M2 Justify, with specific examples, the key features of
business intelligence functionality.
Achieved
Feedback
D2 Compare and contrast a range of information systems
and technologies that can be used to support organizations
at operational, tactical and strategic levels.
LO3 Demonstrate the use of business intelligence tools
and technologies
P3 Determine, with examples, what business
intelligence is and the tools and techniques associated
with it.
P4 Design a business intelligence tool, application or
interface that can perform a specific task to support
problem-solving or decision-making at an advanced
level.
M3 Customize the design to ensure that it is user
friendly and has a functional interface.
D3 Provide a critical review of the design in terms of
how it meets a specific user or business requirement and
identify what customization has been integrated into the
design.
LO4 Discuss the impact of business intelligence tools
and technologies for effective decision-making
purposes and the legal/regulatory context in which
they are used
P5 Discuss how business intelligence tools can
contribute to effective decision-making.
P6 Explore the legal issues involved in the secure
exploitation of business intelligence tools.
M4 Conduct research to identify specific examples of
organizations that have used business intelligence tools
to enhance or improve operations
D4 Evaluate how organizations could use business
intelligence to extend their target audience and make
them more competitive within the market, taking
security legislation into consideration.
Acknowledgement
Many people have contributed to the success of this Report. Although a single sentence hardly
suffices, the author would like to thank Almighty God for blessing him with his grace.
The author is profoundly indebted to his class guide, Mr. Lilanka, for innumerable acts of
timely advice; encouragement and the author sincerely express his gratitude to him. His
guidance made the author to successfully complete the report. The author extends his sincere
and heartfelt thanks to Dr. Dayan, Ms. Chathuri and Ms. Eranga, for providing him the right
ambiance for carrying out this work.
The author expresses his immense pleasure and thankfulness to all the teachers and staff for
the cooperation and support. In addition, a huge thank to the google and other sources that the
author have used in this report.
Last but not the least, he thanks all others, and especially his classmates who in one way or
another helped him in the successful completion of this work.
The author hopes contributors will recognize that he has done his best to reflect the variety of
views and the wealth of information, which were so generously provided, to him. The author
takes full and sole responsibility for the content of the report and for any errors or
misrepresentations of fact or opinion it may contain.
Regards,
The Author,
Enura Indula.
H.D.S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
i
Table of Contents
Acknowledgement ..................................................................................................................... i
List of Figures .......................................................................................................................... iv
List of Tables ............................................................................................................................ v
Introduction .............................................................................................................................. 1
Company Overview.................................................................................................................. 2
Business Process ....................................................................................................................... 3
Core Business Process ........................................................................................................... 4
Core Business Process at Zara ........................................................................................... 4
Supporting Business Process ................................................................................................. 5
Supporting Business Processes at Zara .............................................................................. 6
Data Modelling ....................................................................................................................... 10
Data Flow Diagram for Manufacturing Process .................................................................. 10
Data Flow Diagram for Human Resources Process ............................................................. 11
Data Flow Diagram for Finance Process ............................................................................. 11
Data Classification ................................................................................................................. 12
Structured Data .................................................................................................................... 13
Un – Structured Data............................................................................................................ 13
Semi – Structured Data ........................................................................................................ 14
Differences between Structured, Semi-structured and Unstructured Data .......................... 14
Application Platforms & Business Processes....................................................................... 17
Managerial Levels at Zara.................................................................................................... 18
Top – Level Management ................................................................................................ 19
Middle – Level Management ........................................................................................... 19
Lower – Level Management ............................................................................................ 20
H.D.S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
ii
Application Softwares for Top – Level Management .......................................................... 21
Application Softwares for Middle – Level Management..................................................... 24
Application Softwares for Lower – Level Management ...................................................... 27
Benefits and Drawbacks of Using Application Softwares .................................................. 30
Pros & Cons of Executive Support System ......................................................................... 30
Pros & Cons of Decision Support System ........................................................................... 31
Pros & Cons of Management Information System .............................................................. 32
Pros & Cons of Transaction Process System ....................................................................... 33
Levels of Management Decision Making ............................................................................. 34
Strategic Decisions in Zara .................................................................................................. 35
Support available for Strategic Decision-making Process ............................................... 35
Tactical Decisions in Zara.................................................................................................... 36
Support available for Tactical Decision-making Process ................................................ 37
Operational Decisions in Zara.............................................................................................. 37
Support available for Operational Decision-making Process .......................................... 38
Business Intelligence Tools .................................................................................................... 39
Use of BI Tools in Zara........................................................................................................ 40
Business Intelligence Tool Dematic ................................................................................ 40
Business Intelligence Tool TradeGecko .......................................................................... 41
Key Business Intelligence Features ..................................................................................... 43
Designing a Business Intelligence Tool................................................................................. 47
Business Intelligence Tool for Zara ..................................................................................... 47
Impact of Business Intelligence Tools and Technologies .................................................... 54
Impact of BI Tools and Technologies in Zara Company ..................................................... 56
Business Intelligence and Security........................................................................................ 60
Data Security Issues Involved in the Organization .............................................................. 60
Laws Involved in Information Security ............................................................................... 63
H.D.S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
iii
General Computer Crime Laws ....................................................................................... 63
Privacy Laws .................................................................................................................... 63
Copyright Law ................................................................................................................. 64
Legal Issues Identify in The Designed System .................................................................... 65
Future Enhancement of Business Intelligence..................................................................... 68
Advancements in Business Intelligence ............................................................................... 68
The Future Business Intelligence ......................................................................................... 69
Use of Future Enhancement of BI in Zara ........................................................................... 70
Business Intelligence and Marketing.................................................................................... 72
Expanding Target Audience Through Business Intelligence ............................................... 72
Application of Business Intelligence in Marketing.............................................................. 74
Conclusion............................................................................................................................... 76
References ............................................................................................................................... 77
List of Figures
Figure 1 - Chosen Company (ZARA) Logo .............................................................................. 2
Figure 2 - Manufacturing Process Flow Chart ........................................................................... 7
Figure 3 - Human Resource Management Flow Chart .............................................................. 8
Figure 4 - Finance Management Flow Chart ............................................................................. 9
Figure 5 - Data Flow Diagram of Manufacturing Process ....................................................... 10
Figure 6 - Data Flow Diagram of HR Management ................................................................ 11
Figure 7 - Data Flow Diagram Finance Process ...................................................................... 11
Figure 8 - Illustration of Data Classification ........................................................................... 12
Figure 9 - Managerial Level in an Organization ...................................................................... 18
Figure 10 - Application platforms must support unstructured business processes, where
applications act as tools ........................................................................................................... 21
Figure 11 - Functionalities of ESS/EIS .................................................................................... 22
Figure 12 - Structure of MIS .................................................................................................... 24
Figure 13 - Structure of DSS.................................................................................................... 26
H.D.S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
iv
Figure 14 - Application platforms must support structured business processes, where an
application implements a repeatable sequence of well-defined steps ...................................... 27
Figure 15 - Decision Structure in an Organization .................................................................. 34
Figure 16 - Illustration of BI tool features ............................................................................... 39
Figure 17 - BI Tool Dematic logo ............................................................................................ 40
Figure 18 - BI Tool TradeGecko logo ..................................................................................... 41
Figure 19 - Top BI Features for year 2018 .............................................................................. 46
Figure 20 - BI Tool User Interface 01 ...................................................................................... 48
Figure 21 - BI Tool User Interface 02 ...................................................................................... 48
Figure 22 - BI Tool User Interface 03 ...................................................................................... 49
Figure 23 - BI Tool User Interface 04 ...................................................................................... 50
Figure 24 - BI Tool User Interface 05 ...................................................................................... 51
Figure 25 - BI Tool User Interface 06 ...................................................................................... 52
Figure 26 - BI Tool User Interface 07 ...................................................................................... 53
Figure 27 - Zara’s Data Processing Center receives real-time data from around the world using
BI tools ..................................................................................................................................... 57
Figure 28 - ZARA Shop the look AR Campaign ..................................................................... 70
List of Tables
Table 1 - Classification between different data types .............................................................. 15
Table 2 - Executive Support Systems Pros and Cons .............................................................. 30
Table 3 - Decision Support System Pros & Cons .................................................................... 31
Table 4 – Management Information System Pros & Cons ...................................................... 32
Table 5 - Transaction Processing System Pros & Cons ........................................................... 33
H.D.S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
v
Introduction
In a data-dominated world, it's more important than ever that companies understand how to
extract every drop of value from the vast amount of digital information at their disposal.
According to Better Buys, 85% of business leaders believe that using big data to their advantage
will significantly improve the management of their business, and they are not mistaken. By
enabling you to understand which datasets are relevant to specific goals, strategies, and
initiatives in your organization, you can identify trends or patterns that will help you
significantly improve a number of key areas of the organization. organization. This concept is
called Business Intelligence.
In a simpler way, Business Intelligence (BI) refers to the collection and analysis of data to
generate information that improves the processes of a business. The importance of business
intelligence grows at the same rate as data, which becomes less understandable for the normal
human brain. We live in a world full of digital data, and without using it to your advantage,
you will soon be left behind, which will make your empire obsolete in a few years.
However, despite the power of digital data for decision making and improving business
efficiency, it is only beneficial if you know how to handle them properly. This is where the
current BI concepts come in. BI concepts will help companies to capture wealth of insights,
predict business future, do benchmarking more accurately, minimize data drowning and enable
powerful data visualizations.
In this study, the author will be covering the importance of business intelligence concepts in
the modern era. In addition, he will be applying these different concepts for a particular of his
choice on order to get a vivid idea about the study. Through completing this document, the
reader will gain a lot valuable knowledge in business intelligence and its different concepts.
Also, how BI can save companies from losing the upper hand in the market.
Keeping those points in mind, let’s start the report with a brief overview of the company of
author’s choice. One of the main industries booming around the globe right now is apparel
industry. Therefore, the author will be concentrating on an apparel company and its business
processes and how he can apply the BI concepts in to that industry.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
1
Task 1
1.1 Background details of the organization.
Company Overview
Zara is a Spanish brand of clothing and accessories and is the flagship brand of the Inditex
Group. Few clothing brands follow the latest fashion, they are high quality but affordable. It is
probably the fusion of all these qualities that has allowed Zara, the Spanish clothing brand, to
become the quintessential fashion brand for all. Not surprisingly, Zara, which was originally a
small store in Spain, is now the world's largest retailer and its founder, Amancio Ortega, the
fourth richest man in the world (UKEssays.com, 2019). Zara slowly extended its empire from
the Spanish city to the rest of the country, then to Portugal. In the 1990s, the store expanded to
the United States, France and most European countries. Today, Zara has almost 6,500 stores in
88 countries around the world (UKEssays.com, 2019).
Figure 1 - Chosen Company (ZARA) Logo
The secret of Zara's success was largely due to the way street fashion followed with changing
times. The brand examines the evolution of fashion every day. Create new models and put them
in stores in one or two weeks. Most other fashion brands would take six months to market their
new models. Zara stores offer clothing for men and women, as well as children's clothing (Zara
Kids). Zara products are provided according to consumer trends. Its highly responsive supply
chain sends new products to stores twice a week. Once the products are designed, it takes ten
to fifteen days to reach the stores. All clothing is processed by the distribution centre in Spain.
New items are inspected, sorted, labelled and loaded into trucks. In most cases, clothing is
delivered within 48 hours. Zara produces more than 450 million items a year.
Zara clothing brand has a very modern goal; which is “Through Zara’s business model, we
aim to contribute to the sustainable development of society and that of the environment
with which we interact”. In addition, the company holds a common vision and mission; which
is to “Give the customer an exclusive choice of fashion by providing a quicker turnover
of new stock than other fashion retailers” (Businessoffashion.com, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
2
1.2 Identify and explain different business processes and supporting processes models
used at the selected organization with examples.
Business Process
A business process is a series of repeatable steps taken by a team or business to achieve a type
of business purpose: managing deliveries, assembling products, incorporating employees, and
so on (Techopedia.com, 2019). The key aspect of a business process is repeatability: a process
is not a matter of time. The main advantage of business processes is that they optimize your
business. On the other hand, with a structured business process, the manager knows exactly
what to do step by step. This, in turn, makes your business much more efficient;
Clearer responsibilities: Everyone knows what task they are supposed to perform. For
example, you will not have employees working on the same job, or a job is not cancelled
because no one thought it was your job.
Fewer mistakes: Everyone is aware of his work, there is much less room for human error
Increased productivity: With tasks properly communicated throughout the organization, your
employees will eventually be more productive because less time is spent on organizational
problems.
Cost reduction: With extra productivity, employees will have a much better "production"
because they spend less time on unnecessary tasks and more on tasks that really matter (Nicole,
2019).
This is the main concept of a Business Process. Business Processes can be derived into three
main sub-domains. Which are;
•
Management Process
•
Core Business Process
•
Supporting Business Process
In this report, we will be discussing about core business process and supporting business
process for ZARA Clothing Company (Nicole, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
3
Core Business Process
In general, a core business process is defined as the minimum of individual tasks to be
performed to provide a certain level of consistency in production, regardless of hardware,
software or performance (BPM Platform, 2017). When a main process is implemented,
everything can be added to make it more efficient, but nothing can be eliminated. When the
main business process indicates that certain tasks must be executed in sequence, this should be
reflected in the implementation. Similarly, any specific formula or step associated with a task
must also be reflected in the implementation. A core business process can be consisting by the
below sub categories: (Bidur, 2015)
•
Sales
•
Design & Manufacturing
•
Technology
•
Services
•
Operations
•
Financial Intimidation
Core Business Process at Zara
In Zara clothing brand, their core business process is to retail new design of clothes often.
Through their business model, they aim to contribute to the sustainable development of society
and that of the environment with which people interact. Their core business process is so
valuable, that it gives the customers an exclusive choice of fashion by providing a quicker
turnover of new stock than other fashion retailers. In Zara clothing brand, they mainly rely on
Design, Manufacturing and Sales (Bidur, 2015). Zara brand does consist of a strong core
business process that, they occupy the designing and fashion market very easily. As mentioned
earlier, Zara relies on designing and they most of the time produce new designs and concepts
of fashions weekly. While the other retailers concentrate on promotions and marketing, Zara’s
core business process concentrate about the customer turnover rate and sales. Zara brand hardly
do any marketing or promotions, due it’s massive popularity. Zara clothing brand thrives on a
business model, which is agile and flexible. Due to these key points, Zara as a clothing brand,
has the upper-hand and it is really working for the company (BPM Platform, 2017).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
4
Supporting Business Process
Support processes are all processes whose sole purpose is to guarantee the functioning of the
core processes (main processes) and the functioning of the company itself. Because they
support core processes, they provide the commercial resources in the quality and quantity
needed, ensuring the quality of resource supplies or support services and covering the overall
efficient operation of the organization (Traviata.eu, 2019).
For instance, support processes include:
•
Human Resource Management
•
Financial Management processes
•
Building and property management, cleaning and maintenance, Facility management
•
IT processes
•
Procurement and sourcing processes
•
Vendor Management processes
•
Operational processes and routine operation and organization management
•
Risk Management processes
•
Security Management processes
•
Quality Management processes
•
Corporate Governance processes
Unlike core processes, they are relatively similar in different types of organizations (human
resource processes are similar in both the automotive business and the bank). Support processes
tend to be more complex and complicated in larger companies because there are more people
involved, a higher organizational structure, and so on. In small businesses, one person may be
responsible for a particular support process or activity (Khalaf, 2008).
Now the reader knows about the supporting business process and in next section of the repot,
the author will be concentrating about the supporting business process at the chosen company
Zara. As the Zara company has one of the best core business models it is not a stand-alone
model. The core business model/process, is very successful because it gets all the support
needed from the other process. Which are the Supporting business processes. In the next
section, the author will be elaborating about the supporting business process at Zara (Khalaf,
2008).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
5
Supporting Business Processes at Zara
In Zara company, to support the main business process they indeed use supporting business
processes. Below is a list of supporting process, which they are using to get the work done.
Zara clothing company consist by supporting business processes which are manual and
automated (GradesFixer, 2019). If manual, the process is achieved without the aid of an
automation or assisting technology. If automated, a technology aid has been put into place
which assists users in implementing the process in a more accurate, standardized or optimized
manner. Therefore, let take a look at some of the supporting business processes at the Zara
company.
•
Manufacturing – a product assembly process, a quality assurance process, a
corrective/preventive maintenance process.
•
Finance – an invoicing process, a billing process, a risk management process
•
Health – a medical assessment, a drug approval
•
HR – a starters process, a leavers process, vacation request
•
Compliance – a safety audit, a legal check
•
IT Department – check vulnerable activities, keeping softwares up to date
The above supporting processes are some of the main processes at Zara clothing company.
Manufacturing supporting process holds the product assembly process and quality assurance
process at the company. This process is so important, it actually acts as a core process inside
the company at times. Likewise, Financing and HR also plays a major role inside the Zara
clothing company (Cheng, 2019).
In this section we will be concentrating about three main supporting business process at Zara
clothing company. We will be discussing about Manufacturing Process, HR Process and
Finance Process in the company (GradesFixer, 2019).
A business process can often be visualized as a flowchart or workflow of logical steps. Business
Process Management is the discipline which attempts to formalize this method. Therefore, to
have a better idea about the processes, the author will be exhibiting all the necessary flow charts
for the above-mentioned process at the Zara clothing company (Cheng, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
6
Manufacturing Supporting Process
Manufacturing is the production of products for use or sale using labour and machines, tools,
chemical and biological processing, or formulation, and is the essence of secondary industry.
Zara clothing company thrives on manufacturing process as it is one of the main supporting
processes at the premises (Cheng, 2019). At Zara, the engineering team is experimenting with
different types of manufacturing processes to produce garments more efficiently. As to the
workers at Zara, apparel is one of the main features of human societies, and they take it as the
motive when manufacturing these luxuries apparel. The types of apparel or clothing worn is
totally depends on the body type, size, geographic and social considerations. The below flow
chart represents a details discussion on apparel or clothing manufacturing process sequence at
Zara company (GradesFixer, 2019).
Figure 2 - Manufacturing Process Flow Chart
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
7
Human Resource Supporting Process
Human Resources Management is the process of recruitment, selection, employee engagement,
orientation, training and development, evaluation of employee performance, determination of
salary and benefits, motivation of employees, employees, maintaining good relations with
employees and their unions, ensuring the safety of employees, social protection and sanitary
measures in accordance with the country's labour legislation (GradesFixer, 2019). When
considering the recruitment process at Zara clothing company, they have a very stiff method
of recruiting people as they are aiming for the best sample of employees from around the world.
Even though, Zara is a huge franchise, all outlets/franchises have a single method of recruiting
people. The below flow chart will give an elaborative idea of recruitment process at Zara
clothing company (Cheng, 2019).
Figure 3 - Human Resource Management Flow Chart
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
8
Financing Supporting Process
Accounting is the way to maintain a company's business score, but finances give life to a
business. Finance goes through all parts of a company's operations. Few decisions are made
without the participation of financial managers (Cheng, 2019).
When considering Zara
clothing company, financing is essential in almost all business decisions at the premises. From
planning and budgeting and cash flow management to risk and cost management and capital
structure all the necessities at the Zara, is done by the finance department (Cheng, 2019). To
get a vivid idea about the flow of financing situation in the company, the author has scribbled
a flow chart with necessary actions, in regarding the invoice process at finance sector in Zara
clothing company. By going through the flowchart, the reader can gain a vivid idea about the
financing supporting process at the Zara’s.
Figure 4 - Finance Management Flow Chart
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
9
1.3 Explain data that have been used by the different process models given above.
Data Modelling
Data modelling is a process used to define and analyse the data requirements needed to support
business processes as part of organizations' corresponding information systems. As a result, the
data modelling process involves professional data modelers who work closely with the
company's stakeholders, as well as with potential users of the information system. In this
section of the report, we will be discussing about the data which have been used in the above
three process models (Pearlman, 2019).
The three main supporting models at Zara is, Manufacturing, Human Resources and Finance.
These three processes, use a lot of data in order to get the work done perfectly. As the reader
already know the process flow of the above supporting businesses, let’s take a vivid idea about
what data will be using in those processes. In addition, it is convenient to use data flow
diagrams to show the data which have been used in the above supporting models. Hence, let’s
check the below three data flow diagrams and understand the data modelling for the above
business processes (Pearlman, 2019).
Data Flow Diagram for Manufacturing Process
The below diagram shows the manufacturing process at Zara company. All the data which
needed to complete the process have been added. The reader can go through it to have a vivid
idea about the process.
Figure 5 - Data Flow Diagram of Manufacturing Process
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
10
Data Flow Diagram for Human Resources Process
The below diagram shows the HR at Zara company. All the data which needed to complete the
process have been added. The reader can go through it to have a vivid idea about the process.
Figure 6 - Data Flow Diagram of HR Management
Data Flow Diagram for Finance Process
The below diagram shows the Finance process at Zara company. All the data which needed to
complete the process have been added. The reader can go through it to have a vivid idea about
the process.
Figure 7 - Data Flow Diagram Finance Process
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
11
1.4 Differentiation between data classification based on the selected organization in terms
of structured, semi structured and unstructured.
Data Classification
Data classification is broadly defined as the process of organizing data into relevant categories
so that they can be used and protected more effectively. At the basic level, the classification
process facilitates the location and retrieval of data. Data classification is particularly important
for a company to improve risk management, compliance and data security (Aggarwal, 2014).
Data classification involves the labelling of data to facilitate research and traceability. It also
eliminates multiple data duplications, which can reduce storage and backup costs while
speeding up the search process. Although the classification process may seem very technical,
it is a problem that should be understood by the leaders of your organization.
Zara brand thrives on data as they gather a lot of valuable data about the competitors and
employees. Zara has a wide range of outlets and it is important to wholesome data and evolve
around one main protocol. For the ease of analysing the relevant data, Zara have mainly divided
data into three main categories (Aggarwal, 2014).
•
Structured Data
•
Semi – Structured Data
•
Un – Structured Data
This classification is so vital for the process of Zara clothing brand in multiple ways. As the
reader in the grove of understanding supporting business process, let’s take this example.
Recruiting employees are done by the HR department. They consider different CVs and
Resumes when recruiting people (Rouse, 2019).
All the information of a particular person in Resume or CV including his educational details,
personal interests, working experience, address etc. in pdf, docx file format having size in kb’s.
This is very small-sized data which can be easily retrieved and analysed. But with the advent
of newer technologies in this digital era, there has been a tremendous rise in the data size.
Therefore, to store relevant information, it is good to have a vivid knowledge about data
classifications (Rouse, 2019).
Figure 8 - Illustration of Data Classification
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
12
To understand this section of the report vividly, let’s have a closer look at those three main
parts of data classifications. At the end of this section the reader will go through a comparison
chart of these data in order to have a better idea.
Structured Data
Structured data is data that adheres to a predefined data model and is therefore easy to analyse.
Structured data conforms to a tabular format with the relationship between different rows and
columns. Common examples of structured data are Excel files or SQL databases. Each of these
has structured rows and columns that can be sorted (Beal, 2019).
Structured data depends on the existence of a data model, a model of how data can be stored,
processed, and accessed. Due to a data model, each field is discrete and can be accessed
separately or together, with data from other fields. This makes structured data extremely
powerful: it is possible to quickly add data from various locations in the database (Beal, 2019).
Structured data is considered the most "traditional" form of data storage because early versions
of database management systems (DBMS) could store, process, and access structured data
(Beal, 2019).
Un – Structured Data
Unstructured data is information that does not have a predefined data model or that is not
organized in a predefined way. Unstructured information usually contains text, but it can also
contain data such as dates, numbers, and facts. This results in irregularities and ambiguities
that make it difficult to understand the use of traditional programs over data stored in structured
databases. Common examples of unstructured data include audio, video, and non-SQL
databases (Beal, 2019).
Unstructured data storage and processing capacity has increased significantly in recent years,
thanks to many new technologies and tools available on the market that can store specialized
types of unstructured data. MongoDB, for example, is optimized for storing documents.
Apache Giraph, on the other hand, is optimized to store relationships between nodes (Beal,
2019).
The ability to analyse unstructured data is particularly relevant in the context of Big Data, as
much of the data in organizations is not structured. Think of images, videos or PDF documents.
The ability to extract unstructured data value is one of the key drivers of the rapid growth of
Big Data (Beal, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
13
Semi – Structured Data
Semi-structured data is a form of structured data that does not correspond to the formal
structure of data models associated with relational databases or other forms of data tables, but
which contain tags or other markers to separate the semantic elements and apply them.
hierarchies of records and fields. in the data Therefore, it is also known as a self-descriptive
structure. Examples of semi-structured data include JSON and XML are semi-structured data
forms (Robb, 2019).
The reason this third category exists (between structured and unstructured data) is that semistructured data is considerably easier to analyse than unstructured data. Many Big Data
solutions and tools have the ability to "read" and process JSON or XML. This reduces the
complexity of analysing structured data over unstructured data (Robb, 2019).
Differences between Structured, Semi-structured and Unstructured Data
Well, the first thing to understand is that not all data is created equal. This means the data
generated from social media apps are completely different from the data generated by pointof-sales or supply chain systems (Sint, Schaffert and Stroka, 2019).
Some data is structured or semi-structured, but most is unstructured. The way this data is
collected, processed, and analyzed all depends on its format.
To clear things up, let’s compare the distinct differences between structured, semi – structured
and unstructured data (Sint, Schaffert and Stroka, 2019).
PROPERTIES
Technology
STRUCTURED
DATA
It is based on
SEMISTRUCTURED
DATA
It is based on
UNSTRUCTURED
DATA
It is based on character
Relational database
XML/RDF
and binary data
table
Transaction
Matured transaction
Transaction is adapted
No transaction
management
and various
from DBMS not
management and no
concurrency
matured
concurrency
Versioned as whole
technique
Version
Versioning over
Versioning over tuples
management
tuples, row, tables
or graph is possible
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
14
Flexibility
It is schema
It is more flexible than
it very flexible and
dependent and less
structured data but less
there is absence of
flexible
than flexible than
schema
unstructured data
Scalability
Robustness
It is very difficult to
Its scaling is simpler
scale DB schema
than structured data
Very robust
New technology, not
It is very scalable
—
very spread
Query
Structured query
Queries over
Only textual query is
performance
allow complex
anonymous nodes are
possible
joining
possible
Table 1 - Classification between different data types
As the reader already knows, Zara thrives on data. The above differences can be really effective
when classifying different data when gathering information at the company. At Zara data
classification consists of categorizing and organizing data for better analysis and decision
making (Sint, Schaffert and Stroka, 2019).
For an example from the Zara clothing company, classifying data based on business criticality
and frequency of use may be important for business process definitions. Data classification
based on compliance and regulation can be part of a risk management program. The creation
of data profiles depends largely on data types and data collections with similar content.
A particular type of data classification that is highly sought after in a client MDM program is
the customer hierarchy (Sint, Schaffert and Stroka, 2019). Customer hierarchy management
involves managing customer data relationships to represent the organizational structures of the
organization, for example. Another classification (in MDM of products, for example) is the
taxonomy of products, which is necessary to organize products for a variety of purposes (Sint,
Schaffert and Stroka, 2019).
From the Business Intelligence (BI) perspective at Zara brand, a hierarchical data organization
is essential. This provides a better understanding of market and industry segmentation. The
volume of basic data can be very heavy. Classifying this data hierarchically is an essential first
step in providing the best sense of information. The results can be applied to market campaigns,
cross sales and incentive sales (Framework, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
15
From an operational point of view at Zara clothing company, hierarchy management is also
essential to improve basic data management efforts. Some industries, such as sales, may have
a direct interest in the organization of the line in order to segment the territory and obtain sales
commissions.
It is unlikely that a single hierarchical representation for each data entity will meet the needs
of all LOBs in a large company. Multiple representations are not rare, but they increase the
cost of the project. Maintaining a single hierarchy can be very difficult. As different
perspectives develop, companies run the risk of compromising the main reason they participate
in an MDM project: an agreed vision of master data throughout the company. Finding the right
balance is the key (Framework, 2019).
Most likely, a multidomain MDM repository has relational relationships (for example, a
customer has multiple addresses or accounts, an asset is associated with a particular account,
etc.). These types of relationships are inherent in the structure of the repository and are
conceptually different from hierarchical management (Framework, 2019). Also, your MDM
repository may not support hierarchy management. Its implementation may not be a problem,
as some organizations choose to manage hierarchies outside an MDM multi-domain operating
centre and in an analytical environment. Expert advice is always useful to advise on the best
approach (Sint, Schaffert and Stroka, 2019).
In conclusion, the reader can clearly see how and why data is so important for a brand and a
company. As Zara clothing brand is a leading company in the apparel market, the abovementioned data classifications play a huge role (Framework, 2019). These will help the
company to run smoothly and it can reduce the issues regarding the different data pointed
issues. In addition, data classification can help the Zara company to maintain the standards and
compete with its’ competitors more effectively. Therefore, by reading this section of the report
the reader can have vivid idea about what is data classification, differences between data types
and wat is the importance of data classification.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
16
1.5 What are the application softwares used in the given process models?
Application Platforms & Business Processes
Whether it's a large company, a small business or a government agency, each organization is
defined by its business processes. Each process implements a part of what the organization
does. The Zara clothing company uses software / application platforms to do its job effectively.
Today, most business processes are compatible with applications that run all or part of their
business. These applications, in turn, rely on an underlying application platform to provide a
database, storage, and so on. The discussions on the application platforms generally revolve
around the technology. However, it is at least as important to adopt a business-oriented
approach: observe these platforms in terms of the business processes they support. What does
an organization need to effectively support its business processes? And what do these
requirements mean for the application platform the organization needs? One way to think about
the business process requirements of an application platform is to group them into two
categories: (OpenText, 2019)
•
The ability to support structured business processes, which are executed in the same
way each time. Common examples include billing, many manufacturing processes and
web commerce.
•
The ability to support semi-structured business processes, which are the back bone of a
company and where decisions and data can be vary time to time.
•
The ability to support unstructured business processes, a process that is characterized
by collaboration between people, is different every time.
As an example, Zara company includes sales process, management consulting and
manufacturing process, etc. An application platform must provide good support for both types
of processes. The requirements are quite different: each process style uses applications in its
own way, but improving both with software has real value (Bonitasoft.com, 2019).
However, before moving forward let’s have an idea about the managerial levels in a company.
Therefore, the reader can understand the application platforms/softwares and its’ work more
accurately. There are three main managerial levels in a company. There’s no exception at Zara
clothing company. They also, indeed have these three layers to manage the company and
franchises more efficiently. Therefore, in the next section let’s have a vivid idea about those
three managerial layers in Zara Company (Bonitasoft.com, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
17
Managerial Levels at Zara
Zara's three management levels separate the management positions from the organization. The
administrative rank of the worker in the organization determines the degree of authority, the
status he/she enjoys, and the chain of command he/she can control. Within the Zara franchises,
there are three levels of management. Managers at these levels have different roles to play in
order for the organization to function without problems. The levels are as follows:
•
Top-Level Management/ Administrative level
•
Middle-Level Management/ Executory level
•
Low-level Management/ Supervisory level
The above-mentioned managerial levels can be shown graphically by using a pyramid. This
way, the reader can have a better idea about the three main managerial levels at Zara clothing
company (Chand, 2019).
Figure 9 - Managerial Level in an Organization
The Zara clothing company consist of above three levels of management. Senior management
has the key to different decisions in the company. Senior management has a chief executive
officer, a chief financial officer, a chief operating officer, and so on. Middle managers mainly
interpret plans and actions in Zara. Finally, the lower level management implements the plans
and continues the workload of the company. This is a rough idea of the management levels in
Zara society. To get a clear idea of these levels, let's look at the next section (Chand, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
18
Top – Level Management
Top level management is additionally referred to as the executive level. They coordinate
services and have an interest in planning. the top - level administration consists of the board of
administrators, the chief director, the chief financial officer and the director of operations or
the president and also the vice-president (Studiousguy.com, 2019).
The top – level management controls the management of objectives and policies, still because
of the ultimate source of authority for the organization. They apply the management and
coordination of all the corporate activities organized by the assorted departments of the
company, together with its budget, its techniques and its agendas (Studiousguy.com, 2019).
Top – level management is accountable to shareholders for the performance of the
organization. This level performs several functions, but three of them are the most important:
•
Establish the policies and objectives of the organization.
•
Strategies of the company's plans and alignment of the competent managers on the
departments or the intermediate level to carry them out.
•
Maintain communication between the company and the outside world.
Middle – Level Management
Middle-level management is additionally called the execution level. It's subordinate to toplevel management and is liable for the organization and direction of the lower-level
management. They represent top-level management for the activities of their departments.
Middle managers are semi-executives and consist of department administrators and branch
managers. They may be divided into middle and top-level cadres if the organization is massive.
They coordinate the responsibilities of the sub-unit of society and have access to the
effectiveness of lower-level managers. Middle managers are liable for employment and
training at the lower levels. They're additionally the communicators between the upper and
lower levels once they transfer information, reports and different information from the
corporate to the next level. Additionally, to this, there are three main mid-level management
functions within the organization that are detailed below: (Chand, 2019)
•
Execute the organization's plans in accordance with policies and guidelines established
by senior management.
•
Organize the activities of the division or department.
•
Be an inspiration or motivate beginner executives to improve their effectiveness.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
19
Lower – Level Management
The lower level of management is additionally referred to as the level of supervision or
operational managers. They supervise and direct operational employees. They pay most of their
time taking care of the functions of the corporate, in keeping with the instructions of the
managers who exceed them (Chand, 2019). Lower-level managers are the primary level of
management because they're the basis of operations. they're so essential personnel who
communicate the fundamental issues of the corporate at the upper levels. This level of
management includes the foreman, line manager, shift supervisor, platoon leader, chief nurse,
superintendents and sergeants (Chand, 2019). They're the intermediaries, solve the issues
among the employees and are liable for maintaining the appropriate relationships among the
organization. They're additionally liable for training, supervision and guiding operational
workers (Chand, 2019).
Lower-level managers represent the management of operational employees because they
guarantee discipline and efficiency within the organization. The duty of inspiration and
encouragement lies with them, as they have strengthened the workforce. They additionally
organize the machines, tools and different essential materials necessary for the work of the
staff. The most functions of lower-level management are elaborated below: (Chand, 2019)
•
Assign tasks and responsibilities to operational employees.
•
To guarantee quality and be responsible for the quantity of production.
•
Communicate the goals and objectives of the company established by the highest level.
•
Managers to employees as well as suggestions, recommendations, calls and information
on employee issues to senior management.
•
Provide instructions and advice to workers in their daily tasks.
•
Provide periodic reports from workers to senior management.
Additionally, the reader should also have an idea about the decisions which these managerial
levels are being taking inside the company. There are three main decisions processes for the
three main managerial levels in a company (Studiousguy.com, 2019).
•
Top – Level Management: Unstructured Decisions
•
Middle – Level Management: Semi Structured Decisions
•
Lower – Level Management: Structured Decisions
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
20
To take these different types of decisions the organizations use application softwares and
different application platforms. This is how the application softwares and business processes
correlate with each other. In this next section of the study, the reader will have a vivid idea
about the different decision-making processes which are taking inside an organization and
different application platforms which are using to take those decisions.
Application Softwares for Top – Level Management
Automating structured business processes has been the main task of applications for many
years. However, more recently, organizations have realized that software systems also can
improve unstructured business processes. In these scenarios, people are accountable, not
applications. Rather than passively providing comments or waiting for departure, they run the
process using the software system. The below figure shows what it's like (Capterra.com, 2019).
Figure 10 - Application platforms must support unstructured business processes,
where applications act as tools
As the figure suggests, users might even see applications used to support unstructured business
processes as tools instead of applications. Typically, it's difficult to explain what's happening
as a process: it's more like people working informally with shared information, as shown by
the example on the right in the figure. And because the figure conjointly shows, the
demarcation line between applications and the application platform will become quite arbitrary
for a software system that supports unstructured processes. It's vital to grasp how this sort of
business process has become critical (Courses.lumenlearning.com, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
21
Most companies have spent years automating their structured business processes, which means
that they have already obtained most of the benefits available in this area. Providing better
support for unstructured business processes is much less mature in most organizations, which
implies that there is still a lot of value (Capterra.com, 2019).
When considering Zara franchise, they are using an important application software to generate
the unstructured decisions effectively. Top – Level managers thrives on this software most of
the time. Top – Level management at Zara franchise uses ESS – Executive Support System
to generate the top-level ideas and decisions. ESS is a major part of the organization as all the
other levels which are below the top – level management have a direct influence on this level.
Executive Support System
An executive support system (ESS) is software that permits users to remodel business data into
fast-access, executive-level reports, such as those used by billing, accounting, and private
services. ESS improves decision-making for executives (Tutorialspoint.com, 2019).
ESS is additionally referred to as the executive information system (EIS).
An ESS facilitates access to the organized structure and division information while providing
analysis utilities and performance evaluation predictors. an ESS provides potential results and
quick statistical information that apply to decision-making processes. Ultimately, the tools and
results of the ESS report depend on the developer's application and sector. The author will
present benefits and drawbacks of these systems in a very elaborative way (Tutorialspoint.com,
2019).
Figure 11 - Functionalities of ESS/EIS
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
22
It is equally important that those who participate in unstructured processes are those who create
the greatest value for the organization. Because many structured processes have been
automated, company employees have much less routine work to do.
However, unstructured processes cannot be completely automated. they depend on the
experience of the people who perform them, as well as the interactions between these people.
Unlike structured processes, where applications can replace people, software can only improve
the capabilities of people who do informal work. And because this work generally provides the
greatest value to modern organizations, improving unstructured business processes can
generate the most competitive advantage of the moment (Tutorialspoint.com, 2019).
Improved support for unstructured processes makes collaboration software an essential part of
the application platform. Tools like Microsoft SharePoint are designed to help knowledge
workers in various fields collaborate in different ways (Capterra.com, 2019). In addition, given
that some business processes combine structured and informal work, a collaboration tool could
allow an organization to define a structured workflow and provide tools for less structured
collaboration, such as effective ways of exchanging data. Think about managing a Complex
claim, for example, that is based on unstructured interactions between experts evaluating the
claim in the field and a series of more structured steps to deal with the claim within the insurer.
The software can help with both aspects of this process (Courses.lumenlearning.com, 2019).
The software development process is another important example of an unstructured business
process that benefits from software support. Developers have been using the software for a
long time to create other software, but currently the available tools provide much more
complete support for Application Lifecycle Management (ALM). Companies often do not
consider software development to be a commercial process, but it is certainly the case
(Courses.lumenlearning.com, 2019). Because it creates unique applications that support
custom business processes, applications that offer a competitive advantage, it is one of the most
important business processes in many organizations. That is why effective ALM tools are an
essential part of a modern application platform (Courses.lumenlearning.com, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
23
Application Softwares for Middle – Level Management
Middle level management is the level at which all plans to be performed are interpreted for
workers. Some might say that this is the backbone of society, which has many responsibilities
within the organization. At this level, some of the key features include interpretation policies
framed by senior managers. As the marketing director presents to his sellers the sales policy of
the company according to which credit sales will be made. In addition, prepare the
organization, designate employees, motivate employees, create cooperation, etc. (Beal, 2019).
When considering Zara franchise, they are using important application softwares to generate
the semi-structured decisions effectively. Middle – Level managers thrives on these softwares
most of the time. Middle – Level management at Zara franchise uses two main application
softwares which are, MIS – Management Information System and DIS – Decision Support
System to generate the mid-level ideas and decisions. MIS and DIS are major parts of the
organization as the other level which is below the mid – level management have a direct
influence on this level (Beal, 2019).
Management Information System
Managers at all levels require information to be provided to them with speed, brevity, precision
and economy to enable them to carry out their functions effectively. This need is satisfied by
means of a management information system (Beal, 2019).
A Management Information System (MIS) is a system that gathers comprehensive data,
organizes and summarizes it in a form that is of value to functional managers, and provides
them with information they need to carry out their work (Beal, 2019).
Figure 12 - Structure of MIS
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
24
MIS is used to transform data into useful information to facilitate management decision making
with structured or programmed decisions. In simple terms, a MIS is a computerized information
system that helps managers make decisions, control and plan more effectively (Beal, 2019).
The typical MIS consists of four main components: data collection, data entry, data
transformation and use of information.
Modern MIS are based on a centralized database of raw data. The data is stored in the database
so that the portions can be selected, modified, used in calculations and transformed into useful
information that can be used in a wide variety of applications (Beal, 2019).
MIS offers a wide range of services at all levels and for all functional areas of the organization.
It provides management with information about the external environment. It provides
intermediate managers with useful information for operational plans and top-level managers.
Provides useful internal information to control operations.
Decision Support System
A Decision Support System (DSS) is an interactive computer system that can be easily accessed
and operated by people who are not computer specialists. It helps them to plan and make
decisions. In other words, DSS is a computer-based information system that supports the
process of managerial decision-making in situations that are not well structured.
Such systems do not actually provide “answers” or point to optimal decisions for managers.
Rather, they attempt to improve the decision--making process by providing tools that help
managers analyze the situations more clearly (Segal, 2019).
Thus, DSS does not replace managerial decision-making but supports it and makes the process
more effective. DSS has become increasingly popular because of advances in computer
software and hardware.
A typical DSS consists of the following elements:
•
An MIS that supports several methodologies for accessing and summarizing data
•
A sophisticated database that allows information to be accessed in various ways
•
A user-friendly interface that allows the user to use simple commands rather than
technical computer terms when communicating with the DSS
•
A database built from both external and internal sources so that the manager can relate
internal events to external forces
•
Rapid response time, which makes DSS an easy and rewarding system to use.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
25
Figure 13 - Structure of DSS
A DSS must provide information to managers whenever it is needed in a form they can easily
understand. A typical DSS places the information under the manager’s direct control.
According to Hogue and Watson, the unique executive user configuration of the DSS is based
on the following characteristics: (Segal, 2019)
•
Executive Decisions are the Focal Points: The data for the DSS and associated models
are organized around the executive’s decisions rather than around existing databases.
•
Specialize in Easy-to-use Software: The DSS specializes in easy-to-use software that
uses simple English commands rather than technical computer terms
•
Employs Interactive Processing: The rapid response time of a DSS permits interactive
processing.
•
Use and Control Rests with the User: The use and control of the DSS rests with the user
and not the central information management department.
•
Flexible and Adaptable: The DSS is flexible and adaptable to change in the executive’s
style or in the external environment.
An MIS is a DSS if, and only if, it is designed with the primary objective of managerial decision
support. Thus, a DSS is a specialized MIS designed to support a manager’s skills at all stages
of decision-making, namely identifying the problem, choosing the relevant data, selecting the
approach to be used in making the decision, and evaluating the alternative courses of action
(Segal, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
26
Although there are similarities between MIS and DSS, there are also some differences.
Compared to a MIS, a typical DSS provides more advanced analysis and better access to several
models that managers can use to examine a deeper situation. In addition, an DSS tends to be
more interactive than MIS (Segal, 2019).
It allows managers to communicate directly (often both ways) with computer programs that
control the system and obtain the results of several analyzes almost immediately. Finally, a
DSS is often based on information from external sources as well as internal sources, which fall
largely within the domain of MIS (Segal, 2019).
Application Softwares for Lower – Level Management
A structured business process executes a predefined sequence of steps. The process can have
many options, with different steps performed by different instances of the process at different
times. However, the creators of the process have determined the possible steps in advance.
When an application supports a structured business process, it is common for software to
implement the entire process. Think of an automated manufacturing process, for example, in
which an application asks a group of machines to repeat the same steps over and over again. In
such situations, users mainly provide tickets, accept departures and handle exceptions. The
software performs the process itself. The following figure illustrates this idea.
Figure 14 - Application platforms must support structured business processes, where an
application implements a repeatable sequence of well-defined steps
Most often, an organization bakes a structured business process into software to make the
process cheaper, faster, more consistent, and less error-prone. Whatever the motivation, the
organization’s application platform must provide effective support for this kind of process.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
27
When considering Zara franchise, they are using an important application software to generate
the structured decisions effectively. Lower – Level managers thrives on this software most of
the time. Lower – Level management at Zara franchise uses TPS – Transaction Process
System to generate the lower-level ideas and decisions. TPS also hold a key position on an
organization as all the interpreted ideas and decisions come to life through these application
softwares (Zandbergen, 2019).
Transaction Process System
A transaction processing system (TPS) is an information processing system for commercial
transactions that involve the collection, modification and retrieval of all transaction data. The
characteristics of a TPS include performance, reliability and consistency. TPS is also called
transaction processing or real-time processing (Zandbergen, 2019).
A transaction processing system and transaction processing often contrast with a batch system
and a batch process, in which many requests are executed all at the same time. The first requires
user interaction, while batch processing does not require user intervention. In batch processing,
the results of each transaction are not immediately available. In addition, there is a delay during
which the numerous requests are organized, stored and possibly executed. In transaction
processing, there is no delay and the results of each transaction are immediately available.
During the batch processing time, errors may occur. Although errors may occur during the
processing of the transaction, they are rare and tolerated, but do not justify the complete
shutdown of the system (Zandbergen, 2019).
To ensure performance, reliability and consistency, the data must be easily accessible in a data
warehouse, there must be backup procedures and a recovery process to address system failures,
human failures, computer software viruses, software applications or natural disasters.
Some examples for TPS in Zara company;
•
Point of Sale Systems – records daily sales
•
Payroll systems – processing employees’ salary, loans management, etc.
•
Stock Control systems – keeping track of inventory levels
But what’s required for an application platform to effectively support software that implements
structured business processes? For a typical organization, the answers are clear:
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
28
•
The platform must support a large set of packaged applications for structured processes.
Many organizations use similar business processes—billing, employee onboarding, and
lots more—and so packaged applications provide a relatively low-cost way to automate
these processes. Thousands of vendors sell these today, including Microsoft, SAP,
Oracle, and others (Segal, 2019).
•
The platform must provide effective support for creating custom applications. Packaged
applications are a good choice for automating common processes. But since every
organization has the same set of packages to choose from, these applications don’t
typically provide much competitive advantage—it’s hard to differentiate with off-theshelf software. Accordingly, creating custom applications that carry out unique
business processes is essential for most firms (Zandbergen, 2019).
•
Think of a financial services company that creates its own risk-management software,
for instance, or an online retailer with a distinctly different Web site. To support these,
application platforms must provide development foundations such as the .NET
Framework or Java application servers, along with database systems and other
supporting software. And because new technology is so often the foundation for
business differentiation, it’s also important that the platform keep up, quickly adding
support for modern options (Segal, 2019).
Today, for example, an application platform should support running software in the public
cloud. Every organization strives to improve its operational efficiency; packaged applications
allow this (Zandbergen, 2019). Every organization also needs to have a strategy, a way to
differentiate itself from its competitors; custom applications allow this. Whether an
organization chooses to be a business leader with custom software or a follower with packages,
its application platform must support both options for structured business processes (Segal,
2019).
In conclusion, these application softwares can be really important to an organization or a
franchise in different ways. These softwares can really make or break a company. Therefore,
the users of these softwares should have a full awareness of what’s happening and how to
manage these things perfectly. By reading this section the reader can have a vivid idea about
the application platforms and how they can be helpful for a specific organization (Segal, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
29
1.6 Evaluate the benefits and drawbacks of using application software as a mechanism
for business processing.
Benefits and Drawbacks of Using Application Softwares
All systems possess benefits and drawbacks. However, it all depends on the use and users. In
this section the reader can understand the pros and cons of each and every application software,
which mentioned in the above section. It is quite obvious that every software has its’ own
downfalls as well as the ups. These benefits and drawbacks, can either harm a managerial level
of a company or can be very effective on that level. Hence, let’s take a closer look at the pros
and cons of those application softwares/platforms (nibusinessinfo.co.uk, 2019).
Pros & Cons of Executive Support System
ESS is the hierarchy of the application platforms as it is used in the highest level of the
company. Even ESS has its own advantages and disadvantages. In this section, the author will
be discussing about the Advantages and Disadvantages Executive Support System (ESS). To
have a vivid idea, let’s take a look at the below table (nibusinessinfo.co.uk, 2019).
Executive Support System
Benefits
Drawbacks
Top-level management can easily use a wide System dependent.
range of computer experiences that do not
require operations.
Provides timely delivery of company profile Limited functionality by design.
information.
Data Management Filter.
Benefits hard to quantify.
The information provided well understood.
Higher implementation cost.
Provides efficiency to decision makers.
The system can be slow, large and difficult to
maintain.
Can Access and integrate internal, external A good internal data management process is
data which range for broad
required.
Table 2 - Executive Support Systems Pros and Cons
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
30
These are some of the benefits and drawbacks of ESS. These points should be understood by
the CEOs and COOs of a company to gain the upper hand in the relevant market. Like-wise,
the author will be talking about the middle and lower level managing application softwares in
the below sections (nibusinessinfo.co.uk, 2019).
Pros & Cons of Decision Support System
Being used by knowledge workers, it is possible to consider using decision support systems in
any knowledge domain. In fact, they are so widespread that people don't consider that they are
using DSS. The spreadsheet is a simple DSS that is very commonly used in many different
situations (Thadani, 2019).
When you use a search engine, you have used a DSS to organize a huge amount of information,
in the form of text files, images and videos, in order to make your decision. Of course, many
businesses have integrated DSS applications into their day to day operations in order to analyze
large amounts of data such as budget sheets, sales figures and forecasts. They rapidly shift
through available data and are used extensively to allow faster decision-making, identification
of market trends and improved allocation of resources (Thadani, 2019).
In this section, the author will be discussing about the Advantages and Disadvantages of
Decision Support System (DSS). To have a vivid idea, let’s take a look at the below table.
Decision Support System
Benefits
Drawbacks
Improves performance and effectiveness of Too much emphasis/control given to the
machines.
the user and allows faster decision-making.
Has been seen to improve collaboration and False sense of being objective - humans still
feed information in and decide how exactly
communication within groups.
to process it.
Reduces training times because the Disgruntled employees who feel they are
now only doing clerical work.
experience of experts is available within the
program’s algorithms.
Provides more evidence in support of a Shift of responsibility - easy to blame
computer.
decision.
Providing
different
perspectives
situation.
to
a Reduction in efficiency
information overload.
because
of
Table 3 - Decision Support System Pros & Cons
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
31
These are some of the benefits and drawbacks of DSS. These points should be understood by
the regional managers and project managers of a company to gain the upper hand in the relevant
market (Thadani, 2019).
Pros & Cons of Management Information System
Management information systems give business owners the ability to collect, process and
interpret data. Data sets can include nearly all aspects of business operations, including sales
revenues, production costs and employee output. Business owners examine MIS data, compare
it to previous time frames and adjust their production strategies. While MIS affords some
noticeable advantages for owners and managers, it also carries some significant drawbacks.
In this section, the author will be discussing about the Advantages and Disadvantages of
Management Information System (MIS). To have a vivid idea, let’s take a look at the below
table (Thadani, 2019).
Management Information System
Benefits
Accuracy of the data.
Drawbacks
Complexity of the system.
Allow speedy decisions for urgent situations. Poor communications between professionals
Avoid information overload.
Lack of professional standards.
Providing data in an appropriate form.
Inappropriate hardware and software.
Flexibility of data analysis.
Inadequate initial analysis.
MIS assembles, process, stores, Retrieves, Budgeting of MIS extremely difficult.
evaluates and disseminates the information.
Table 4 – Management Information System Pros & Cons
These are some of the benefits and drawbacks of MIS. MIS facilities integration of specialized
activities by keeping each department aware of the problem and requirements of other
departments. It connects all decision centers in the organization (Thadani, 2019).
Therefore, these points should be understood by the regional managers and project managers
who are the middle level managers of a company to gain the upper hand in the relevant market.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
32
Pros & Cons of Transaction Process System
A transaction processing system is a computer database system that balances and controls
purchases of goods and services within a business network. A common example is a company's
online store. The transaction processing system coordinates the warehousing and distribution
of the item, the credit and bank transaction from the consumer's payment account and the
business's management of inventory, sales, profits and payroll. This complex system has many
advantages and disadvantages (nibusinessinfo.co.uk, 2019).
In this section, the author will be discussing about the Advantages and Disadvantages of
Transaction Processing System (TPS). To have a vivid idea, let’s take a look at the below table.
Transaction Processing System
Benefits
Batch or real-time processing available.
Drawbacks
High setup costs.
Reduction in processing time, lead time and Hardware and software incompatibility.
order cycle time.
Reduction in inventory, personnel and Lack of standard formats.
ordering costs.
Increase in productivity and customer Retrieval and dissemination are depended on
satisfaction.
technology hardware and software.
These systems are most efficient and have Potential for inaccurate information.
excellent response times.
The format of the data collecting device of
the form is easy to follow and understand.
Table 5 - Transaction Processing System Pros & Cons
In some ways, the main benefit of a transaction processing system can also be a disadvantage:
the handling of several thousand operations at once. TPS must simultaneously coordinate
thousands, even millions, of purchases, debit consumers' bank accounts, hold each person's
private banking and address information and ship out or process the order to the consumer.
Transaction processing systems are a combination of software and hardware used to handle
immense quantities of consumer and business data. Because of this, viral security breaches may
occur in this system, especially because consumers' private information is held within the
database. Therefore, as the lower – level managers it is really hard to use these systems. Hence,
they should be careful and responsible when using these systems (nibusinessinfo.co.uk, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
33
Task 2
Compare the tools and technologies associated with the business intelligence
functionalities and support available for business decision making at various levels within
the organization.
Levels of Management Decision Making
Managers of all levels must make decisions on behalf of a company. The difference between
decisions at different levels lies in the scope of the choices made. Long-term decisions that
affect the company as a whole belong to the highest levels of management, while decisions that
affect daily business activities fall to the level of background management. All decisions are
directly or indirectly related to broader management functions: planning, organization,
management, personnel and control. Different levels of management devote more time to some
functions than others.
As the reader already knows, there are three levels of management in the organization Zara. In
those three levels, different personnel take different types of decisions. Generally, those
decision can be divided in to three sections. Which are;
•
Strategic Decisions – Top – Level Management
•
Tactical Decisions – Middle – Level Management
•
Operational Decisions – Lower – Level Management
Figure 15 - Decision Structure in an Organization
In the next section, the reader will understand about those decision-making processes and what
is the support available in those levels to make those decision separately. First, let’s take a look
at the Strategic Decision making at Zara and the support available for it. Then. Tactical and
Operational decision making will be taking into account.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
34
2.1 Compare the types of support available for Business Decision making at different
levels of the organizational structure.
Strategic Decisions in Zara
A strategic decision is what you think is a long-term investment that helps change the direction
of the activities of any organization. Such a decision can be very risky due to the rapid evolution
of the market, but if it is successful, it offers a competitive advantage over its competitors. The
decision will be taken by the top executives of a company and shareholders will be consulted
for this purpose (Harrison and Pelletier, 2019).
As an example of a strategic decision, we can examine its design strategy: they produce around
11,000 styles per year, which means that they produce around 1,000 new styles each month,
managed by a team of design field experts and development of more than 200 people. This
means that each team member produces an average of approximately 60 styles per year. With
this in Zara stores, a customer can always find new products and the latest products. This turns
out to be a successful strategic decision to obtain a competitive advantage and greater profits
in the market (Harrison and Pelletier, 2019).
Support available for Strategic Decision-making Process
Upper management must translate the vast scope of mission and vision into concrete
achievements over time. In other words, upper management needs a strategic plan. Decisions
related to strategy involve company-wide matters enacted over the long term. The goals are
what the company hopes to accomplish at least a year – more often five years – into the future.
Executive Support Systems are the main supporting factor for the decision-making processes
at organizations (Harrison and Pelletier, 2019). Strategic decisions can be easily made by using
ESS and can have accurate data. The author has already talked about these systems in the
previous section. Therefore, to get a vivid idea, the reader can go through it again. However,
below the author has mentioned some of the uses of Executive support systems (Harrison and
Pelletier, 2019). ESS supports, facilitates, and makes decisions for senior executives by
providing easy access to both internal and external information. ESS can also be considered a
specialized form of a Decision Support System. The focus on ESS is on easy to use user
interfaces and graphical displays.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
35
The benefits of this is that they offer strong reports and drill down capabilities. Drill down
capabilities are when you move from summary information to detailed data by focusing in on
something.
ESSs are important because they help top-level executives analyze, compare and highlight
trends in important areas so they can monitor performance and identify opportunities and
problems. Over recent years however, the popularity of ESS has decreased due to Business
Intelligence, analytic(s), and digital dashboards. These are the support available in strategic
level in Zara franchise (Harrison and Pelletier, 2019).
Tactical Decisions in Zara
The second type of decision is called tactical decision making. Such a decision can be made by
a group of managers, but the shareholders are not involved because it is a medium-term
decision that has less effect than a strategic decision. The result of such a decision is visible in
less than a year or so and has no impact on the company's management change (BerishaNamani, 2019).
Zara's unique approach to advertising and marketing is an example of this decision. This is an
additional factor in your business model that adds a lot to your success. They spend 0.3% of
their total income on advertising and marketing (Berisha-Namani, 2019).
This percentage is much lower than that of competitors in their markets, because on average
companies such as GAP and H&M spend about 3 to 4% of their total income for a similar
expense, proving that Zara retains an advantage successfully. In terms of costs compared to its
competitors in marketing activities. (Berisha-Namani, 2019).
To successfully complete its peers, Zara uses several useful locations, store designs and product
life cycles as an effective marketing tool. They open their stores in the markets of choice for
maximum visibility. And as mentioned earlier, your product is in stores for a very short period
of time, which leads the customer to go several times and make a quick purchase decision,
since this product may not be recovered when you visit the store even the next day (BerishaNamani, 2019). Zara also spends a lot of time designing its stores: each store is remodeled
every five years to keep up with current trends.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
36
Support available for Tactical Decision-making Process
Once upper management decides the overall direction of the company, it’s up to middle
management to choose smaller tactical objectives that, put together, accomplish strategic goals.
Middle managers create tactical plans, which have more detail than strategic plans. The tactics
often are geared toward some function or department such as production, where a possible
objective could involve some measurable efficiency or quality improvement. Middle
management’s choices and plans see fruition in a year or less (Adekeye, 2019).
Managers in this tier oversee other middle managers or operational managers. Management
Information Systems and Decision Support Systems are the main supporting factors for the
decision-making processes at organizations in this level. Tactical decisions can be easily made
by using MIS and DSS and can have accurate data. The author has already talked about these
systems in the previous section. Therefore, to get a vivid idea, the reader can go through it
again (Adekeye, 2019).
Operational Decisions in Zara
Operational decisions are those that are taken regularly. The effects of such decisions are often
minimal and generally do not last more than a week. Therefore, these decisions are usually
made by staff and do not require much attention from the higher levels of management
(Berisha-Namani, 2019).
The example of such a decision in Zara is its centralized logistics and distribution. They need
to maintain control and have optimized their supply chain very effectively on many different
levels. In one week, there are two specific orders or days and times prescribed with shipments
usually prepared at night in LA Corunna (Berisha-Namani, 2019).
There are specific moments for the departure of trucks and expeditions to reach the stores, the
clothes are previously suspended, already labeled and have a price, even those fixed by air.
Due to this clearly defined rhythm, customers do not know the time and days needed to reach
stores to obtain new arrivals and new designs (Adekeye, 2019). It is very interesting to know
that within a standard period of 6 months; the product must be extracted from the sketch to the
store. Zara does this in a remarkably short time of only 2 weeks (Berisha-Namani, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
37
Support available for Operational Decision-making Process
Also called first-line management, operational management is the level directly responsible for
employees. By choosing their own goals on a daily, weekly or monthly basis, first-line
management accomplishes the objectives of middle management. The scope of operational
management covers departments, sections or teams. Inventory, scheduling and budgeting are
examples of plans and decisions that operational managers adopt. Goals might include a certain
number of sales for the day (Harrison and Pelletier, 2019).
Transaction Processing Systems are the main supporting factors for the decision-making
processes at organizations at this level. Operational decisions can be easily made by using TPS
and can have accurate data. The author has already talked about these systems in the previous
section. Therefore, to get a vivid idea, the reader can go through it again. However, below the
author has mentioned some of the uses of Transaction Support systems (Berisha-Namani,
2019).
TPSs provide an execution environment that ensures the integrity, availability, and security of
data. They also ensure fast response time and high transaction throughput. In addition, TPSs
provide administrative support that lets users configure, monitor, and manage their transaction
systems (Adekeye, 2019). TPSs provide functions for use in custom business applications,
including functions to access data, to perform intercomputer communications, and to design
and manage the user interface. These are the support available in operational level in Zara
franchise.
The above section vividly talks about the different sort of support available, for the decision
making at different levels at Zara clothing company. Though, the elaboration of this section is
vast, the author has taken necessary steps to summarize and take the essence of the study.
Therefore, the reader can have good idea about these concepts.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
38
2.2 What are the business intelligence tools commonly used in selected organization?
Justify with specific examples of the key features of business intelligence functionality.
Business Intelligence Tools
Business Intelligence (BI) tools are tools that use a set of methodologies and technologies to
prepare, present and help analyze data. Through this process, data is transformed into
actionable business information that helps decision makers and end users make decisions based
on more efficient data (Financesonline.com, 2019). The set of methodologies and technologies
used by business intelligence varies greatly depending on the purpose of the solution. Some
tools focus on data preparation and may include elements such as the extraction,
transformation, loading (ETL) layer to better organize and use the data. Some tools focus on
broader business use and can also focus on combining data to help companies make
organizational decisions based on information from disparate departmental systems. Some
tools focus more on self-service capabilities and end-user experience. And some tools focus on
enabling the analysis of other applications, focus on what is called "Integrated BI" or
"Embedded Analysis" and include a wide range of additional features that facilitate integration
into other applications existing systems (Technologyadvice.com, 2019).
In simple words, Business intelligence tools are all about helping you understand trends and
deriving insights from your data so that you can make tactical and strategic business decisions,
plus BI tools help organizations to improve their decision making & social collaboration. It
provides the means for efficient reporting, thorough analysis of data, statistics & analytics.
Figure 16 - Illustration of BI tool features
Hence, in this section the author will be talking about the BI tools which are commonly used
by the Zara franchise, and the key features and functionalities of those BI tools. By reading this
section, the reader can a gain knowledge on most common BI tools and its’ features.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
39
Use of BI Tools in Zara
Zara has used management information systems (MIS) and has advanced in many areas. This
resulted in great success for the company. This included the Business Intelligence (BI)
application that involves technologies, collection practices, integration and presentation
applications, and commercial information analysis. Business intelligence focuses on promoting
better business decision making (Technologyadvice.com, 2019).
BI describes a set of information about concepts and methods for better business decision
making. This is achieved through the use of a fact-based support system. Intelligence systems
are data-based and are sometimes used in information systems for managers. Predictive views
on business operations can be provided through the use of BI systems. Predictive views on
business operations can be provided through the use of BI systems since historical and current
data is collected in a database that compares the performance of other companies in the same
sector (Financesonline.com, 2019).
In Zara's franchise, they use two main business intelligence tools/software to maintain the
workload. Which are;
•
Dematic BI Tool - Supply Chain Management & Logistics
•
TradeGecko BI Tool - Inventory Management Software
Business Intelligence Tool Dematic
Dematic designs develop and deliver solutions that optimize your supply chain, improve
performance and increase productivity. They understand the economic drivers of their business
and are in tune with the constantly changing market trends. Its industry-leading automation
software and technologies will allow your organization to meet customer demands, job
challenges and asset and space utilization requirements. With more than 75 years of solid
design and delivery experience, Dematic solutions will strengthen and improve your supply
chain and catapult your organization into the future (Financesonline.com, 2019).
Figure 17 - BI Tool Dematic logo
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
40
Business Intelligence Tool TradeGecko
TradeGecko is empowering retailers and wholesalers to become as fast and efficient as today’s
modern e-Commerce businesses. TradeGecko beautifully fuses inventory management
operations, critical business applications and online commerce to build the central core of
wholesale business operations. TradeGecko is a cloud-based inventory management platform
for retailers and wholesalers that want effortless commerce.
Figure 18 - BI Tool TradeGecko logo
Since Zara has a large network and therefore handles large volumes of data, a corporate
information system has been used in the company. It is usually a type of computer system that
involves a business class, which generally provides a complete, high-volume, data-based
service that a large organization can support. With this system, a technological platform is
provided that allows the company to have information that can be shared at all useful levels of
management. Business systems are essential to eliminate the problem of information
fragmentation. This happens when there are many information systems in a company. The
problem is solved by developing a standard data structure (Technologyadvice.com, 2019).
Zara is a great organization. Business systems are housed in many data centers and include a
content management system as the main application. Zara's team is made up of technology
professionals. These include content specialists, network and systems engineers, Flash
developers, database administrators and business administrators, software developers, quality
control managers and IT support technicians. application. All these specialists work together
to provide companies with a competitive advantage by allowing them to react quickly
(Technologyadvice.com, 2019).
The Zara is devoted to integrating information technology appropriately into all areas of its
operations and activities. The range of services and resources available to its clients is attributed
to the commitment of integration of IT properly in the organization. The client services group
in the Zara partners with staff and clients to identify and meet each group’s technological
requirements. This group of technical advisors associates with departments to execute a
roadmap for a team’s technological vision and then defines this vision within entity projects.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
41
Significant support is needed for an invariable innovation. Zara IT Group is dedicated to
community development through technology and works closely with business partners. The IT
group is dedicated to the development of the community through technology and works closely
with business partners. The IT group has the technical support and tools they need to present
new ideas and disseminate them to the general community. This ensures that customer needs
are met. An increasingly advanced technological infrastructure has allowed the company to
develop and maintain a fully integrated organization/company. The infrastructure has allowed
the company to develop and maintain a fully integrated organization/company. The
infrastructure includes a core of systems and tests designed to produce flexibility and the
capacity for innovation and growth (García Aller, 2019).
Zara thrives in an environment of change, experimentation and learning that extends modular
tools, models and platforms that are easy to use and involve all aspects of life in Zara.
Companies that include professional development, administration and operations are created
and developed (Santaolalla, 2019).
In Zara, other web solutions with advanced knowledge management are implemented, which
drastically changes the quality and speed of work in commercial operations. In the explosive
growth of the software market, new global growth for the software market, a new world of
connectivity is being realized in Zara. The urgency of the company, aware of the importance
of the corporate portal, has allowed the linking of information, data, people, and knowledge to
provide commercial solutions. Business portals come from consumer portals such as AltaVista, Yahoo and Lycos (Santaolalla, 2019).
The portals (gateways) show the importance of allowing customers to have a wide range of
varied information on the Web. This has led to more multitasking tasks, receiving information
and verification from various sources, allowing participation in projects that transcend
geographical boundaries with this technology, meeting the needs of the community, employees
and even extended, more advanced networks.
Zara is perhaps the most devastating and innovative retailer in the world. With more than 1,000
stores worldwide, Zara has turned the control of clothing factories into a competitive advantage
when making and designing clothes. By making your own clothes, you can react quickly to
different market trends. Zara has managed to build a great brand, without promotion or
advertising, but through information systems and information technologies (García Aller,
2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
42
Key Business Intelligence Features
Most companies have started their business intelligence adventure using Excel spreadsheets.
Also, at that time, spreadsheets were probably enough to create dashboards and simple graphics
to give management a holistic view of business data, such as sales, revenue, costs and
personnel. There was no exception for the Zara franchise. Before the company was in full
swing, they used Excel spreadsheets (Adair, 2019).
But as the company grows in size and turnover, the data also increases. At that time, Zara
discovered that Excel sheets were locked as the data grew. As a result, updating your control
panels has taken longer and sharing large files has become difficult (Adair, 2019).
When Zara reached that point, they made a great leap by switching to a dedicated analysis
solution, such as QlikView, Tableau, SAS or Dome. These BI tools provide the most common
features, including data analysis, data visualization, ad hoc analysis, panels, ad hoc consultation
tools, ad hoc reports, performance metrics and performance indicators (Izenda, 2019). While
some of the above features may sound similar to the capabilities of an Excel sheet, they differ
in some important ways, for example:
•
The scale and usability of these functions is much greater in a dedicated BI software
platform; BI tools are capable of handling huge data volumes without errors.
•
They let you work with dynamic real-time data and offer a wider range of data
visualization options, including heat maps, sparklines, geographical mapping, and
spider charts.
•
The reporting and dashboard capabilities of BI solutions are far more interactive than
those of MS Excel.
•
In addition, most of the common features offered by BI solutions are easy to use and
do not require any specialized IT expertise.
Keep the above points in mind. Let’s look at the most important BI features for an organization
as well as for the Zara. The most important business intelligence features include:
1. Ranking Reports
Ranking reports allow you to easily see the best performing and low performance facets of
your business, from products to marketing campaigns and vendors. You can show
classifications in several dimensions and specify several criteria to guide your results (Izenda,
2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
43
2. What-If Analysis
If you want to know how a future decision will affect your business, you can perform an
analysis of "what would happen if" using historical data to predict possible impacts. The
scenario analysis tools give you an objective view of the risks and benefits inherent in each
potential decision and allow you to better plan your future (Izenda, 2019).
3. Executive Dashboards
Executive panels provide executives in your organization with real-time information about
your business in the form of graphs, diagrams, summaries and other informational reports.
They help their business leaders to make smarter, faster and smarter decisions (Adair, 2019).
4. Interactive Reports
Interactive reports allow users to condense the massive amounts of collected data into a wide
variety of possible views. Users can take advantages of features like statistical analysis and
regression to identify trends, anomalies and outliers in the data (Izenda, 2019).
5. Geospatial Mapping
Applications using location intelligence can take your information and transform it into
graphical and cartographic representations, simplifying your geographical data. At a glance,
judging which regions are performing better than others — and which ones need particular
attention — becomes much easier (Eiloart, 2019).
6. Operational Reports
At the end of each day, business intelligence features like these can provide your organization’s
executives with a detailed summary of the daily events, giving them the information, they need
to make critical decisions (Adair, 2019).
7. Pivot Tables
Pivot tables can automatically extract important features from a large and messy data set. They
can perform calculations such as sorting, counting or averaging the data stored in one table and
displaying the results summarized in another table. Pivot tables are essential tools to analyze
information and discover hidden trends (Izenda, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
44
8. Ad-Hoc Reports
Instead of burdening your IT department with requests for detailed reports, ad-hoc reports are
one of several important features of BI that let your nontechnical end-users generate their own
reports on the fly. Users can pick and choose the elements that they wish to be included in the
report, emphasizing only those aspects that are relevant to their query (Eiloart, 2019).
9. User-Specific Security
If you need to restrict certain users’ access to particular data sets, your BI tool should allow
you to personalize your BI features and applications to individuals or groups of users. Some
solutions provide user-specific data sources, where a single application pulls from different
sources of data depending on who’s using the application (Adair, 2019).
10. Open Integration
Smart BI platforms will be able to access not only your organization’s own data, but
information from email, social media, websites and more. For example, instead of only
providing your internal sales data, your BI platform could accompany that information with
reviews and comments about your products (Eiloart, 2019).
The characteristics mentioned above are mainly used by the Zara organization to conquer the
market. Several authorized staff members will use these functions and analyze the data, mainly
their competitors, and will take the necessary measures to maintain the growth of the company.
(Izenda, 2019).
The figure below will emphasize that the characteristics mentioned above are the most sought
after by buyers in the last year of 2018 (Eiloart, 2019).
Based on the responses of representatives from more than 600 companies, we have compiled a
list of the key features that business intelligence software buyers are looking for in 2018
(Izenda, 2019).
Our respondents represented several different sectors, from government entities and law firms
to guitar retailers and manufacturers of electronic products for the aerospace industry.
Their responses provided us with data on the characteristics most sought by market players for
a business intelligence system (Adair, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
45
Figure 19 - Top BI Features for year 2018
With so many data formats and applications to extract, it is important that your BI platform can
integrate so many different types of data under one roof, perfectly combining disparate forms
of information in a single database. exploitable report (Eiloart, 2019).
In conclusion, in general, most respondents want basic functions of their business intelligence
software: panels, visualizations and reports. But many buyers have also expressed interest in
more advanced analytical capabilities, for example. Predictive analysis, data mining, ETL,
OLAP and exploration functions (Eiloart, 2019).
It seems that buyers' needs are generally basic or that the gap can be based on awareness.
Buyers are more aware of the standard features of Business Intelligence and may not be familiar
with advanced analysis tools, their features and how the features can help their business in its
current state (Eiloart, 2019).
A tendency to prioritize familiarity is evident. When choosing a decision support software,
buyers tend to be interested in the features they know, hoping to streamline the decision-making
process (Eiloart, 2019).
This means that buyers should explore the options in greater depth to make informed decisions
about BI software. A complete portrait of the characteristics of the industry can give the
supplier the option to transform the data of one-dimensional information into an insightful work
tool.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
46
Task 3
3.1 Design a simple business intelligence tool/application with user friendly and functional
interfaces that can perform a specific task to support problem solving or decision making
at an advanced level the selected organization.
Designing a Business Intelligence Tool
Companies often need panels that contain specific information, and the garment industry is no
exception. In fact, clothing brands often have a complex set of parameters, ranging from digital
marketing performance to store sales parameters. There is rarely a board that contains all this
information. That is why clothing is a good example of a sector in which a 360-degree vision
of the business is essential. Although the most recent clothing dashboard takes into account
very specific key performance indicators, there is a much longer list of indicators that can be
considered for other clothing brands, all of which can be organized. and seen on a custom
board. Therefore, in this section, the author will design a custom BI tool, using various
functions, such as panels, graphs, analysis, etc. The reader must understand that this is a custom
BI platform in which Zara is authorized. Staff and executives can use it to track the activity.
With this in mind, let's take a look at the section below on Zara's BI tool.
Business Intelligence Tool for Zara
As the reader already knows, the author will be designing a BI tool with different BI features
such as dashboards and graphs. A retail dashboard is a performance tool to visualize and report
all important retail KPIs in one central interface and turn this collected data into actionable
insights. Among other things, it empowers retailers to identify consumer patterns, enhance
stock management, lower rate of returns and ultimately increase sales as well as profitability.
The below designed tool will enhance the power of BI and it can help Zara to increase different
aspects of the business. The newly designed BI tool is consisting by a lot of screens and user
interfaces. As for the time been and to make understand easier, the author has specifically
chosen the most important user interfaces and crafted them below to have an idea about the BI
tools for the reader. Newly designed BI tool consists;
•
Login and Signup Pages
•
Project Reports
•
Admin Dashboards
•
Zara Products
•
Retail Store Dashboards
•
Product Ratings
•
Customers and Feedbacks, etc.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
47
Login and Signup Pages
Figure 20 - BI Tool User Interface 01
Figure 21 - BI Tool User Interface 02
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
48
3.2 Provide a critical review of the design in terms of how it meets a specific user or
business requirement and identify what customization has been integrated into the
design.
Admin Dashboard Overview
Figure 22 - BI Tool User Interface 03
More and more sectors are not only attracted to data collection, but they can also benefit from
it, and the retail sector is one of them. It is an extremely data-based industry that needs as
much information as it can get at any time. Therefore, a retail board is more appropriate to be
injected into this newly designed BI tool for the Zara clothing brand. If Zara's top-level
administration gives a person access to this board, he/she can simply enter credentials and
connect to that credential. Once connected to the system, the user can simply view the board
and continue the analysis easily. Zara senior executives can use the previous control panel to
identify customer trends and adapt their strategies appropriately. That is why it is interesting
to measure these metrics in different periods and visualize them together in a single graph, to
have a more global vision of the evolution of society. Therefore, this user interface can help
Zara in many ways by providing a critical design review in terms of meeting the business or
user requirements and identifying the customization integrated into the design.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
49
Figure 23 - BI Tool User Interface 04
Zara is a global commercial franchise and it is important to also focus on information from
other countries. By comparing each aspect, users can identify the defects that the business
faces. Once the user has an overview of customers' shopping and shopping habits, they can
focus on items and stock. To always have the right items at hand and avoid shortages, it is a
good idea to make a list of the 5 main articles, which are among the 10 main articles.
In this way, Zara can anticipate its inventory and avoid pending orders, which will leave
customers unsatisfied and damage both the image and the shortages. Inventory management is
an integral part of the Zara franchise, which replenishes the inventory every week. If an action
is renewed monthly or for 3 months as a normal activity, it is actually easier. However, with
Zara, this is the next level because they renew stocks every week.
Monitoring of depleted items is a priority to keep the business above performance. If the
company faces shortages or long periods of shortages, management should be concerned about
the effectiveness of inventory and supply chain management. In parallel, establishing a list of
the most profitable products by volume of sales can also be of interest to the company to
identify the most profitable products and determine if they are also the easiest to sell. Therefore,
this user interface can help Zara in many ways.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
50
Figure 24 - BI Tool User Interface 05
The previous dashboard model will focus more on online sales. Zara has a composite base of
online customers and it is important to pay them the same attention as store visitors. With
professional online retail, data collection is easier and more abundant. In today's connected
economy, consumers know their competitors more than ever. In addition, they are surrounded
by many different ways of shopping, which gives them even more opportunities to change and
makes loyalty more difficult.
Hence the need to be even more rigorous and creative to foster customer satisfaction and
retention, and this is where data analysis comes in. Zara focuses on customer satisfaction and
really keeps his word. In the online retail business in Zara also needs attention. Therefore, this
newly designed BI tool gives users access to millions of customers, as well as their preferences
and history.
With retail boards like this one, Zara has all the key performance indicators they need to track,
compiled in an effective overview. Starting with an estimate of the total number of orders, Zara
has an approximate size of the company's transactions during the year. The company can
calculate an average order per customer to get an idea of their behavior, but this metric is best
tracked for short and long periods and compared to obtain a more reliable average. Therefore,
this user interface can also help Zara in the manner mentioned above.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
51
Figure 25 - BI Tool User Interface 06
The Zara clothing brand offers a variety of products in the market. As a result, inventory
management and updating is an important part of the business. Through the previous control
panel, users can identify existing, depleted and overdue products. In the total orders of a
company, the figure calculates the number of orders placed in the business during the day,
month or year. This will help the company know what the peak periods are and adjust the stock
accordingly, to avoid any lack of stock or lack of stock. It will also help you adapt to staff
management and avoid errors or defects due to staff overload. To perform the tasks mentioned
above, Zara Administration Board users can use this board, which will make their lives easier.
When designing this BI tool, the author has always opted for one-click solutions because users
do not like to click on so many buttons to get information or numbers. Therefore, by using
these interfaces, users can easily obtain management of their inventory and products.
Therefore, thanks to this panel, users can effectively identify the products and their
management aspect quite easily. The best thing about this is that administrators can view the
inventory and product management of their country, as well as other countries, and make a
smooth exchange of products between them. The most important thing of these dashboards
is, all the databases are inter connected row ach other and users can access basically each
department’s data using just one click. Therefore, this user interface can also help Zara in
the manner mentioned above.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
52
Figure 26 - BI Tool User Interface 07
The Customer Feedback is a part of every company’s units and plays an important role for the
company’s image. Providing an exceptional customer service means that the teams are
surpassing customers’ expectations, who often set the bar high: it is hence highly important for
the business to track the metrics that will reach these expectations. There’s no exception for
Zara clothing brand. As a huge franchise, their customers have set the bar pretty high on
customer service and it is very important for the company image. Due to that sole purpose, the
author has injected a customer feedback and rating matric to the newly created BI tool.
Above the reader can see a customer feedback dashboard focusing on a team’s performance on
a daily and monthly basis. It is divided in two parts each analyzing an aspect of their work.
Finally, and this is what every business aims for, above support dashboard template displays
the most important of all KPIs: customer feedback and satisfaction. You can measure it with
simple, short questions surveys at the end of every online visit or store visit, emails exchange
or directly on the mobile app, to evaluate Zara’s support service quality in the eyes of the
customers. When customers recognize the efforts a brand is making, their loyalty follows, and
so does business growth. Hence, this is an important part of the Zara business as well as the BI
tools. In conclusion, this BI tool can help the Zara brand to evolve much better and achieve
greatness through different statistics and analytics. That’s why this BI tool is more efficient
and graphical than the other BI tools in the market.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
53
Task 4
4.1 Discuss the importance and the impact of business intelligence tools and technologies
that can be used by the organization for effective decision making.
Impact of Business Intelligence Tools and Technologies
BI is a general term for all the tools and processes used to access and analyze data to better
understand the business. For example, create visualizations and reports that support business
operations. Traditionally, BI tools have focused on helping business users explain "what was
going on?" And "why was something happening? With whom and what is involved and what
can happen in the future. Descriptive analysis is certainly useful, but it is time to look beyond
the basics and try a modern BI tool. Next, the reader can see the importance of BI tools and
technologies (Wieder and Ossimitz, 2019).
A Better Big Picture
With the ability to provide historical and current views of everything that happens in your
business, BI provides you with real-time information about your business data. Instead of
waiting for something to happen and then looking for a way to solve and avoid it, BI tools use
the processing power to allow you to access and analyze all your data. the fly
Real-time analyzes keep you up to date with your organization's news by helping you identify
models using relevant and updated data (Wieder and Ossimitz, 2019).
And as you collect and interpret data in real time, it's easier than ever to share those results with
your employees quickly and efficiently. You will also get a complete image because you can
safely extract all your data and create visualizations to help you understand all that (Williams
& Williams, 2010).
Working Smarter
We all know that in the modern business landscape, data-driven decision making is not
optional. It’s a must for doing business, and is an imperative part of making sure your customers
are happy and your employees are maximizing their productivity. Though BI tools are handy
for analyzing both historical and current data, they’re also useful for capturing evolving trends
and seasonality of data to predict future values (Williams and Williams, 2010).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
54
Forecasting is crucial for smarter decision-making, and a good BI tool can help with just that.
Properly analyzed and visualized data leads to more easily interpreted insights. The insights
you gain can help you remove the guesswork and focus on what really matters.
BI tools can also increase efficiency, making sure every resource – human and otherwise – is
being maximized. The right BI platform helps guide your company’s investments of time and
talent on its activities, products, or services that have the most impact on company
performance. Deep data analysis also leads to opportunities for better monitoring and
evaluation. The key takeaway? Business Intelligence empowers you to make the best decisions
about your customers, employees, and overall business going forward (Azeroual, 2018).
Do It Yourself
As we have said, the data is important, but it can also be confusing. While there are many
options to outsource the analysis of your data, expecting someone else to understand your
numbers is counterproductive. One of the key aspects of today's powerful BI platforms is its
ability to deliver real-time information to users without the need for a degree in computer
science or engineering. BI tools allow you to adopt a more independent approach to analyze,
visualize and project future performance with your data, while allowing you to obtain results
that you can use. Most BI tools contain integrated interactivity and data mining tools that guide
you in the analysis of your own data. The best of these tools allows you to automatically adapt
the user experience to your skills, all without having to wait for someone to do it. you. This
helps you use your own data as efficiently as possible and make sense when you need it most.
In addition, BI tools are generally designed with deep integration with other key business
applications and systems, such as CRM, logistics, project management systems, human
resources platforms and more. They can even be integrated and integrated into existing
websites, adding powerful panels and interactive reports to your internal or public websites.
This means that the rich data sets that you have accumulated will no longer be
compartmentalized or difficult to extract when prior analysis and forecasting are needed
(Azeroual, 2018).
A Better Bottom Line
When it comes down to it, the most valuable aspect of a good BI tool is that it can help you
improve your bottom line. Whether you’re looking to improve that through costs savings or
investment, BI can help you do it.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
55
The right BI tool helps you visualize your current data, AND identify long-term and emerging
patterns (Azeroual, 2018).
For example, keeping a closer eye on expenditures of time and money on leads and prospects
– with BI-powered dashboards to monitor what is working and what is not – can provide a
better data picture to help you identify where your expenditures are not contributing. The right
BI tool can also make you more competitive by creating a better understanding of what
customers are responding to, and how best to reach them (Azeroual, 2018).
The idea of adding a new technology to your company’s stack may feel overwhelming. But
business intelligence isn’t the next new thing. Modern BI is the “New Normal”. Going beyond
basic reporting, BI gives you the power to use your own data to your advantage. With a better
big picture, the ability to make smart business decisions through a do-it-yourself approach, and
the opportunity to better your bottom line, the right BI tool needs to be a “must” for a company.
Below the reader can see the impact of BI tools and technologies for the company Zara. Above
mentioned factors are general idea and below the author has gone a little deeper. Hence, let’s
move into the next section (Azeroual, 2018).
Impact of BI Tools and Technologies in Zara Company
Zara produces around 450 million items a year. How can you remain so effective with the
considerable volume that your supply chain traverses? Regular deliveries in small batches
occur with clock accuracy twice a week in all stores worldwide (Paola Palladino, 2010).
That's what Zara does best: make sure everything goes well, control its manufacturing chain
and supply chains better than most of its competitors. These are done by your analysis
department using BI tools (Paola Palladino, 2010).
Inditex is a gigantic retailer, which produces more than 840 million garments in a year, most
of which are sold by Zara. Before leaving a centralized warehouse, each garment is labeled
with an RFID chip, which allows you to track that inventory until it is sold to a customer (Paola
Palladino, 2010). The sales data for each SKU, the inventory levels in each store and the speed
at which a particular SKU moves from the shelf to the point of sale are sent in real time to the
Inditex Data Center (see the following illustration). The center is open 24 hours a day and
collects information from more than 6000 Inditex stores in more than 80 countries. It is used
by teams to improve inventory management, distribution, design and customer service.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
56
Figure 27 - Zara’s Data Processing Center receives real-time data from around the world using BI
tools
When the garment arrives at the store, the RFID allows the inventory to determine which items
should be replenished and where they are, making the inventory and inventory up to 80% faster
than before. If a customer needs a particular reference, sellers can better serve it by placing it
immediately in or near the store. In addition, each Zara site receives inventory refills twice a
week, which adapts to this store's real-time updates to inventory data at the unit inventory level
(Dowsett, 2019).
Sales tracking data is essential so Zara can offer customers the trends they really want and
eliminate designs that are not attractive to customers. Zara's design team is an equal team of
more than 350 designers who are inspired by the podium to design everyday clothes. Every
morning, they explore sales data from stores around the world to determine which items are
sold and adapt their designs accordingly. They also receive qualitative comments from
authorized sales employees who send their comments to the central office daily, for example,
"customers don't like the zipper" or "they want it to last longer" (Dowsett, 2019).
At the beginning of the planning process, Zara orders its manufacturers very small batches of
any design (even 4 to 6 shirts per store). Most Zara factories are located near Europe and North
Africa, allowing them to manufacture new models near home and send them to their stores in
2-3 weeks. Then they test these designs in the store, and if the data suggests that the designs
are taking off, Zara can quickly order more inventory in the correct sizes, where necessary.
Such store-level data allows Zara to be hyperlocal to meet the needs of its customers, since
tastes may vary from one neighborhood to another.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
57
Zara’s Results vs. Competitors (Through Decision Making and BI Tools)
Zara sells more than 11,000 different items a year, compared to 2,000 to 4,000 for its
competitors. However, Zara also shows the lowest end-of-year inventory levels in the fashion
sector. This adjusted working capital management compensates for their higher production
costs and allows them to achieve rapid turnover rates (SCM Globe, 2019).
In Zara, only 15% to 25% of the lines are designed before the season and more than 50% of
the items are designed and manufactured in the middle of a season depending on what is
becoming popular. This contrasts directly with a nearby competitor like H&M, where 80% of
the drawings are designed before the season and 20% in real time during the season. Most other
retailers commit 100% of their designs before the season and often end up with excess
inventory, which they must then drastically reduce at the end of the season. Zara's rapid
replenishment cycles create a sense of scarcity that could actually generate more demand (SCM
Globe, 2019).
Zara Leverages Data Analytics to Understand Consumer Tastes
Zara is using data analytics to guide its design and manufacturing process, making it a leader
in the fashion market.
Zara is a key player in the fast fashion retail business. It got to this position thanks to its
approach towards data analytics. Zara is huge, In FY 2014 it sold $19.7bn worth of
merchandise, slightly behind H&M’s $20.2bn and ahead of giants such as Uniqlo ($16.6bn)
and GAP ($16.4bn). And sales are constantly growing, in the first half of 2015 Zara revenues
were up 17% compared to H12014. Behind these impressive numbers is a revolution in the
world of fashion, which Zara is spearheading. Zara and its fast fashion competitors are
leveraging data analytics to change the approach towards supply chain management and
inventory (SCM Globe, 2019).
Traditionally, retailers would do their best to estimate demand for the different SKUs, mostly
based on industry experts’ opinions. Next, retailers would manufacture in China or another
low-cost market, stock stores, and, well, that’s it. From then on models that sold well would
quickly be out of stock, and models that didn’t sell as well would have large inventories and
later on be discounted and sold with thinner margins. Early on in the season retailers had some
room for re-stocking, but because of the long cycle time from order to distribution, the ability
to adapt to demand was quite limited (Dowsett, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
58
Zara solved this problem with the management of the adaptive and data-based supply chain.
The Zara process begins in the same way as traditional retailers, with the initial order. The
difference is that, instead of asking for most of the amount for the season, Zara only asks for a
small amount of merchandise. Once the merchandise arrives at the stores, Zara collects sales
data and analyzes the sales of each inventory unit based on the supply. Zara further analyzes
the performance of the features of different SKUs. For example, they could identify that pants
with patches sell better than pants without patches, or that some colors or cuts move faster than
others. Zara then uses this information to guide the following commands. They will design and
build models with the most popular features to meet demand (Dowsett, 2019).
The key to the success of this process is the manufacture of small batches and short cycles.
Instead of going to the Far East, Zara manufactures approximately half of its products in
company-owned facilities in Spain and Portugal, reducing the production cycle from a few
months to a few weeks. If the production process is more expensive, Zara still manages to
maintain its profitability: the gross margin of Inditex (parent company of Zara) was 56.9% in
the second quarter of 2015, compared to 37.4% of GAP. Zara can maintain these high margins
and generate significant value by reducing inventories and costs associated with retaining
excess inventory and selling fewer discount items through its flexible production process.
With this data-based approach, Zara can create more value for its customers. Zara offers
customers the models they want when they want it. While in the traditional world, the most
popular models sell out quickly and there are only flaws available, in the world of fast fashion,
the offer is highly adaptable and adapts to the evolving taste of consumers. Customers know
that the items they buy at Zara are new and trendy. As mentioned earlier, Zara can generate
value by selling more items at full price and offering fewer discounts. Customers know that the
lots are small and if they don't buy the item, they like to leave soon. Therefore, they will be
less likely to wait for end-of-season sales and will be more willing to pay the high price.
In conclusion, these are the main impacts of the decision-making process through the BI tools
of the Zara organization. In the end, Zara's management must understand that, although Zara
has been a pioneer in data mining to direct production, many companies have evolved into the
fast fashion model. Zara's ability to remain a strong player in the market depends on many
factors (brand strength, cost structure, marketing, for example), but also on the quality of its
knowledge, which helps increase margins. As more and more companies adopt this model,
Zara must continue to develop its data analysis and demand forecasting skills to stay ahead of
its competitors (Dowsett, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
59
4.2 Describe the legal/ regulatory issues involved in the secure exploitation of business
intelligence tools in an organization. What are the legal issues you can identify in the
system designed by you?
Business Intelligence and Security
The business intelligence strategy has opened a new era for organizations around the world.
By focusing on data analysis, business leaders benefit from reduced costs, greater efficiency
and better decision making in general. When the return on investment, which had never been
seen before, appears regularly in the news, it encourages more companies to do the same and
participate in the Bl movement. However, many do so without considering all the implications
of strategic intelligence on data security (Sowells, 2019). The mere fact of producing, receiving
or hosting data is always a danger if it is not safe. Those who integrate the BI strategy into their
operations are at least more aware of their data, who they are and where they are. But
knowledge does not equate to security. The analysis information and Bl data is no longer an
unstructured 1 and 0, but very sensitive and easily understandable information that makes it
even more useful for hackers. If they can steal data that has already been analyzed, they actually
steal the keys to their success (Sowells, 2019).
Data Security Issues Involved in the Organization
Information systems are frequently exposed to various types of threats that can lead to different
types of damage that can lead to significant financial losses. The damage to information
security can vary from small losses to the total destruction of the information system. The
effects of different threats vary considerably: some affect the confidentiality or integrity of the
data, others affect the availability of a system (Sowells, 2019). Today, organizations are
struggling to understand threats to their information assets and find ways to combat them,
which remains a problem. In this section, the author analyzes the legal and security aspects that
may be involved in the company's facilities in Zara. In addition, all these security concerns are
parallel to the company's business intelligence.
Technology with Weak Security - New technology is being released every day. More times
than not, new gadgets have some form of Internet access but no plan for security. This presents
a very serious risk- each unsecured connection means vulnerability (Sowells, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
60
Social Media Attacks - Cybercriminals are leveraging social media as a medium to distribute
a complex geographical attack called "water holing". The attackers identify and infect a cluster
of websites they believe members of the targeted organization will visit (Information Security
Buzz, 2019).
Mobile Malware - Security experts have recognized the security risks of mobile devices in the
early stages of their internet connectivity. The minimal unfair play of mobile phones among
the long list of recent attacks has worried users much less than they should. Given the relentless
dependence on our culture of mobile phones and the few target cybercriminals, this creates a
catastrophic threat (Information Security Buzz, 2019).
Third-party Entry - Cybercriminals prefer the path of least resistance. Target is the poster
child of a major network attack through third-party entry points (Information Security Buzz,
2019).
Neglecting Proper Configuration- Big data tools come with the ability to be customized to
fit an organization's needs. Companies continue to neglect the importance of properly
configuring security settings (Information Security Buzz, 2019).
Outdated Security Software - Security software update is a basic technology management
practice and a mandatory step to protect large data. The software is developed to defend against
known threats. This means that no new malicious code that reaches an outdated version of the
security software will be detected (Sowells, 2019).
Social Engineering - Cybercriminals know intrusion techniques have a shelf life They have
turned to reliable non-technical methods fake social engineering, which rely on social
interaction and psychological manipulation to gain access to confidential data. This form of
intrusion is unpredictable and effective (Sowells, 2019).
Lack of Encryption - Protecting sensitive business data in transit and at rest is a measure few
industries have yet to embrace, despite its effectiveness (Sowells, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
61
Corporate Data on Personal Devices - Whether an organization distributes corporate phones
or not, confidential data is still being accessed on personal devices. Mobile management tools
exist to limit functionality but securing the loopholes has not made it to the priority list for
many organizations (Sowells, 2019).
Inadequate Security Technology - Investing in software that monitors the security of a
network has become a growing trend in the corporate world after the painful data breaches of
2014. The software is designed to send alerts when intrusion attempts occur. However, alerts
are only useful if someone is available to process them. Companies rely too much on
technology to protect themselves completely from attacks when it is supposed to be a managed
tool (Sowells, 2019).
Unfortunately, most security teams still have a long way to go before they can contribute
productively to business BI. The good news is that security contains a lot of information: a
multitude of firewall logs, IDS events and policy exceptions. The bad news is that none of these
elements is organized or presented in such a way that it lends itself to strategic intelligence.
Worse, in the past, most security decisions were based on intuition: they were rough estimates
of what it would cost to protect the organization from a future risk based on a past incident.
To achieve security, BI begins with the procedures it has heard thousands of times: assign value
to information assets; obtain timely information on relevant vulnerabilities; Evaluate threats
based on the target environment and exploit the potential of the code. and react appropriately
in case of an attack (Information Security Buzz, 2019).
One way to create a security BI is to create a "criticality panel", giving priority to the risks you
need to manage. The dashboard is where all your risk management work is located. Each risk
is assessed according to the severity of the threat and the relevance of the vulnerability in terms
of asset value, existing security defenses and applicable norms or regulations. You can create
this type of dashboard through a relational database or buy automation software from an
unlimited number of security solution providers (some providers call it a "dashboard").
However, a lot of fat is needed in the elbow to produce the desired results (Information Security
Buzz, 2019).
Before moving on to the legal questions and privacy concerns of the author's intelligence tool,
the reader must understand some key laws and policies to get a better idea of what happens
next. Therefore, let's review the most important laws and regulations that a company must
follow to prevent a company from shrinking.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
62
Laws Involved in Information Security
General Computer Crime Laws
The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986 (CFA Act) - is the cornerstone of many
computer-related federal laws and enforcement efforts. It was amended in October 1996 by the
National Information Infrastructure Protection Act of 1996, which modified several sections of
the previous act and increased the penalties for selected crimes. The punishment for offenses
prosecuted under this statute varies from fines to imprisonment up to 20 years, or both. The
severity of the penalty depends on the value of the information obtained and whether the
offense is judged to have been committed: (Chen and C. Storey, 2019)
•
For purposes of commercial advantage
•
For private financial gain
•
In furtherance of a criminal act
Computer Security Act of 1987 - It was one of the first attempts to protect federal computer
systems by establishing minimum acceptable security practices (Chen and C. Storey, 2019).
Privacy Laws
Many organizations are collecting, swapping, and selling personal information as a commodity,
and many people are looking to governments for protection of their privacy
Privacy of Customer information
Federal Privacy Act of 1974 - regulates government agencies and holds them accountable if
they release private information about individuals or businesses without permission.
Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986 - is a collection of statutes that regulates
the interception of wire, electronic, and oral communications (Chen and C. Storey, 2019).
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act Of 1996 (HIPAA) - also known as
the Kennedy- Kassebaum Act, protects the confidentiality and security of health care data by
establishing and enforcing standards and by standardizing electronic data interchange. HIPAA
affects all health care organizations, including doctors' practices, health clinics, life insurers,
and universities, as well as some organizations that have self-insured employee health
programs (Chen and C. Storey, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
63
HIPAA specifies stiff penalties for organizations that fail to comply with the law, with fines
up to $250,000 and/or 10 years' imprisonment for knowingly misusing client information. It
also requires a comprehensive assessment of information security systems, policies, and
procedures where health care information is handled or maintained (Chen and C. Storey, 2019).
Electronic signatures have become more common, and HIPAA provides guidelines for the use
of these signatures based on security standards that ensure message integrity, user
authentication, and nonrepudiation (Chen and C. Storey, 2019).
Financial Services Modernization Act or Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999 - contains a
number of provisions focusing on facilitating affiliation among banks, securities firms, and
insurance companies. Specifically, this act requires all financial institutions to disclose their
privacy policies on the sharing of nonpublic personal information (Tallan, 2019).
Copyright Law
Intellectual property is a protected asset in the United States. The copyright laws of the United
States extend this privilege to published words, including electronic formats. Fair use allows
the use of copyrighted material for news coverage, teaching, scholarships and a series of similar
activities, provided that its use is for educational or educational purposes. library, nonprofit or
excessive (Chen and C. Storey, 2019). As long as the original author of these works is duly
recognized, including an exact description of the location of the sources (citation), and the work
is not presented as their own, it is quite permissible to include parts of another person's work.
as a reference (Tallan, 2019).
These are the most common and important laws for the security of data and information in a
business. There is no exception for the Zara brand as well. Regardless of the size of the
business, these laws are always related to an organization. Taking into account the laws and
policies mentioned above, let's now turn to the legal / regulatory problems of the author's own
business intelligence tool for the company (Chen and C. Storey, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
64
Legal Issues Identify in The Designed System
Several legal problems must be resolved to implement and administer an effective BI / BA
program in the internal and external supply chains of the organization. According to the BI tool
designed for the Zara organization by the author, there are some political problems and
concerns. When creating a BI tool for the organization, business strategies should be designed
(or at least audited and reviewed periodically) to capture the innovation opportunities that arise
from compliance analysis. contractual data and other operational and performance data. In this
section, we will look more closely at these legal problems (Tallan, 2019).
SLA Design and Management
Service level agreements (SLA’s) should be designed for achieving multiple goals:
•
quality services for reliability, predictability, scalability and cost management;
•
metrics tied to the returns on investment (and equity) for operations that are considered
“core” or “prime value drivers” for the internal organization.
Thus, paradoxically, outsourcing can be used to shed light on insourced functions to improve
ROI, ROE and overall shareholder value (Tallan, 2019).
Data Rights Management for BI Processing
Most BI software applications process data from different sources and different data types.
The enterprise needs to ensure that it has legal rights to access and use all data that it wishes to
analyze (Sowells, 2019).
•
The enterprise should specify, in its third-party supply chain and service contracts, that
performance data obtained from evaluating the services of the service provider belong
to the customer and may be used for any internal purposes.
•
Service providers, of course, may wish to prevent the publication of performance
outcomes through the use of appropriate confidentiality agreements.
•
The outsourcing contract should address how to handle performance metrics and their
disclosure in any dispute resolution process.
•
Since most enterprises are also service providers and may be subject to similar vendor
management, they need to ensure that they can use the “big data” from vendor
management tools for their own internal process improvement and innovation
strategies. In short, every customer is also a vendor, and everyone needs to have access
to use “supply chain data” across internal and external supply chains.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
65
Software Rights Management
Service providers and corporate clients should ensure that they have the right to use licensed
BI / BA tools. This requires an audit of the software licenses for both parties whenever vendor
governance tools and BI / BA tools are used (Sowells, 2019).
Patents for business methods, trade secrets and "property rights": property and license.
Information derived from the decision analysis of subcontracted (and subcontracted) operations
can create new management methods. Such methods may include patentable methods.
Companies that invest in SLA management, analysis of performance indicators and BI must
protect their information property rights and new business models developed using data
processing fees from internal sources and external service providers. The organization must
take all appropriate measures to ensure that it will have trade secrets (and all patents for related
business methods). These agreements must be reflected in non-disclosure agreements,
confidentiality clauses in subcontracting contracts, subcontracting (at all levels of the supply
chain), employment documentation (job offer letters, manuals, stock option plans and
procedures of completion) (Tallan, 2019).
The waters are a bit dark in terms of ownership of the improvements developed by the service
provider. Most outsourcing contracts stipulate that the service provider provides a better service
without being specifically compensated for "continuous process improvements." These clauses
are treated as standard "gadgets" at no cost or inconvenience to the customer, and many
suppliers ignore them or change them for a contract. Price concession over time (Tallan, 2019).
Instead of swimming in troubled waters, service providers and corporate clients can benefit
from a frank discussion about whether to identify who owns these improvements and if there
is a license fee for them. At this point, the customer thinks that all improvements should provide
an advantage, but such thinking converts any incentive for the supplier to offer real value
without additional compensation. As a result, most service providers sell "consulting services"
for "business process transformation" or "organizational review" and try to keep "innovation"
out of the outsourcing contract. At a minimum, through independent decision analysis
("continuous process improvement"), the service provider can conduct its own business
intelligence analysis and have its own trade secret rights (and any related business method
patent) (Sowells , 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
66
Confidentiality
Outsourcing contracts should include BI-type data and insights in the definition of
“confidential information.” Of course, whose “confidential information” its is should be
defined as well. Trade Secrets: Protection and Survival. The insights and process changes
derived from BI / BA analysis should be protected as trade secrets. Non-disclosure agreements
should segregate “confidential information” from “trade secrets” so that “trade secrets” can
survive the expiration of the non-disclosure period (Sowells, 2019).
Competitive Advantage and Innovation
Sometimes BI will yield some crucial insights that the organization does not want to reveal to
its service providers (or business management consultants), who might recycle such processes
to benefit the organization’s competitors. The BI governance model should help managers
identify the competitive impact of sharing improved processes with outsourcing service
providers. If there is a significant innovative competitive advantage, then the process becomes
“core” and thereby ineligible for further outsourcing until it is “best practice” widely known
among competitors. This example underscores the tension between outsourcing for operational
excellence and outsourcing as a tool for “innovation.” Recently, savvy service providers have
begun developing and deploying their own proprietary business models for generic industry
operations, thereby reducing this tension and making it easier to sell “best of breed” BPO
(Tallan, 2019).
Value Creation Process: Training. Generally, outsourcing customers and their service providers
do not compete for the same pools of talent.
In the field of business analytics, this
generalization does not apply. Service providers hire talent from the customer’s industry (and
potentially from customers) to acquire process expertise, regulatory and risk-management
expertise and build service delivery models. The outsourcing contract should address matters
of permitted and prohibited employment practices relating not only to operational personnel,
but also to GRC and BI initiatives (Tallan, 2019).
In conclusion, confidentiality is lacking very much in the designed BI tool and outsourcing
engagements have spawned “big data” that can be analyzed for improvements to core
processes. The legal framework for BI should be carefully planned and implemented to ensure
that the enterprise retains flexibility, legal rights and avoids potential infringement in pursuing
its mission and innovating its core processes.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
67
4.3 Identify new Business Intelligence trends and technologies that can be further
enhance the operational activities in the selected organisational context.
Future Enhancement of Business Intelligence
While Business Intelligence (BI) is booming in developed countries, Sri Lanka continues to
prepare for this powerful technology. In simple terms, Business Intelligence is a data-based
decision making that includes generating, compiling, analyzing and visualizing data to help
managers make better decisions. In other words, BI is a human technology: it involves
processes and procedures that improve our ability to collect, share and analyze data and make
informed decisions (Sharma, 2019).
Customer data is like a goldmine and Business Intelligence can help organizations leverage
this data to increase customer engagement and satisfaction and solve mismatch problems.
Slowly but surely, Indian companies are realizing the hidden potential of BI. Factors such as
increasingly demanding consumers, strict government and industry regulations and an unstable
market have led to the adoption of Business Intelligence. This has led to a radical improvement
in operations and processes, as well as in the development of skills. In this section we will
discuss the future of business intelligence (Sharma, 2019).
Advancements in Business Intelligence
Imagine having the ability to view your company's information in a social login interface
designed to be customizable according to your personal preferences. Imagine a program that
promotes configuration, mobility and updates on the fly to keep you informed as new data
becomes available. These information analysis and transfer capabilities are the future of
business intelligence for finance. This software is available for companies of all shapes and
sizes (Sharma, 2019).
Each year, new technological advances offer even greater opportunities in the field of business
information. For modern companies, especially those that deal with Internet marketing and
information transfer, it is important to stay at the forefront of Business Intelligence technology
(commonly called BI). Previously, a company had to hire teams of full-service analysts to meet
its BI needs. Now, with the unprecedented increase in the understanding of software and social
networks, companies can access information that is more accurate, accessible and easy to
understand than ever. And the best part is that it can cost a fraction of the price (Sharma, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
68
The Future Business Intelligence
Various business intelligence companies have developed such software programs in order to
help business owners gain a comprehensive view of their company’s data. While there are
many different advantages that come with integrating a computer application with a specific
organization’s business intelligence for finance, there are a few aspects of this technology that
make it superlatively advantageous (Digumarti, 2019). One the fundamental successes of any
Business Intelligence initiative is developing a consistent, single “version of the truth” across
all sources of information, yet this is also one of the most challenging (Loshin, n.d.).
As many economists and technical experts have pointed out in recent years, technology is not
slowing down, but is growing steadily. This means that old and obsolete methods are less and
less relevant (Digumarti, 2019). However, when companies use business intelligence for their
finance software, the need for periodic review of their systems is significantly reduced. This is
because the software can be updated from the program, often without human interaction with
the program. This means that business intelligence software can remain relevant for a long time
(Loshin, n.d.).
It not only helps you as a business adapt to the changing economy, but it also undergoes
adaptation itself. In addition to the adaptive qualities of BI software, there are also financial
implications that can save businesses money while increasing the effectiveness and efficiency
of their enterprise. In years past, companies would either need to create entire departments to
conduct analytical processes, or else outsource their BI needs to a different company. Both of
these practices came with a high price and lacked the efficiency that many companies were
looking for. However, now—for a fraction of the cost—businesses can access information
faster and with more accuracy (Loshin, n.d.).
This is the future of business intelligence which can be relatively achievable. Though there are
some concepts of Artificial Intelligence in combining with Business Intelligence, which can be
a game changer if and only if it can make it through. Therefore, for now the above-mentioned
facts are the general future enhancements of business intelligence (Digumarti, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
69
Use of Future Enhancement of BI in Zara
Inditex, the world's largest clothing retailer and owner of Zara stocks up on Artificial
Intelligence, Big Data and analytics into its business strategy to stay ahead in the race of
competition. The biggest fashion retailer is hooking up with tech companies and hiring talent
from startups and partnering Analytics and investments, which offers an AI-powered consumer
behavior forecast platform (Sharma, 2019).
Most of the traditional fashion industries are lagging behind because they run on a bi-annual
or seasonal basis where it takes huge production lead time and typically low cost-centers. This
involves high stock inventory which leads to increase the price of holding that particular stock,
but ZARA trumps over such inefficiencies by leveraging big data. It understands the taste and
preferences of the customer by data analytics and manufactures the product accordingly to
attract customer attention, as customers are king of the market. But still the company is testing
ways to improve stock handling and they tied up with California based Fetch Robotics to
measure the stock inventory and test the robots (Sharma, 2019).
Figure 28 - ZARA Shop the look AR Campaign
This is the best example of Zara using the technology and the future at their stores. Though it
has some realistic issues, this marketing campaign brought millions to the revenue. The
advertisement campaign was called, “SHOP THE LOOK” which was an augmented reality
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
70
piece of work, that was done superbly. Shoppers were able to see a live picture of what they
have bought or going to buy through these technologies, and the robots like figures will dress
what you bought in order to have a better third person look. Through this people tended to go
to the Zara stores more often. Some people just went to the store to check the advertisement
and ended up by buying something for them (Digumarti, 2019). The campaign was that good
and it was something people haven’t seen in the fashion industry by that time. This was a huge
step for the brand and this was all possible because of the use of business intelligence and better
decision making (Digumarti, 2019).
Retailers use customer-centric technologies, such as augmented reality (AR) applications,
virtual assistants and artificial intelligence chatbots, to stay in the mainstream of digital
retailers. Retailers are now investing in artificial intelligence and expect to reach $ 7.3 billion
in the next five years and integrate the automation, chatbot and analysis solution into the
market.
Competitors such as the great H&M brand are also turning to advanced analysis, new
technologies and supply chain management to generate profits and run smoothly. As a result,
ZARA responds quickly to changing trends using agile production based on a supply-based
supply chain (Sharma, 2019).
This is very important in the coming years because it involves data analysis and the data is
growing uncontrollably, which is now called Big Data. which includes data from social
networks, Twitter, Facebook, etc., as well as unstructured data SMS, MP3, video clips,
YouTube, etc. (Digumarti, 2019).
All this gives us the power to leverage information to make smart business decisions to achieve
profitable growth, reduce unnecessary expenses, obtain customer information and more.
Therefore, by exploiting artificial intelligence, the large amount of data and analysis, large
fashion retailers can carry out their activities and, with the help of artificial intelligence, they
can predict customer behavior and, when analyzing, Know the real needs or preferences of
your customers.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
71
4.4 Evaluate how organizations could use business intelligence to extend their target
audience and make them more competitive within the market, taking security legislation
into consideration.
Business Intelligence and Marketing
Business Intelligence tools help marketers in their marketing efforts. When business
intelligence tools are unified and used by marketing specialists, marketing campaigns are more
effective (Sullivan, 2001). Business intelligence includes many information analyses tools that
provide important information about customer characteristics and allow the company to
understand their wishes and attitudes. With this information, companies can design better
campaigns, target the right audience more accurately and better understand the initiatives that
generate the best results (Sullivan, 2001).
Expanding Target Audience Through Business Intelligence
Developing a business is a great challenge. It requires dedication, foresight and insight. If you
build this business from scratch, the bets are even greater. However, success is at the crossroads
of business acumen and hard work. Successful business owners know the needs of their ideal
clients. They know where they are. And they know how to convey the message. This includes
the collection and proper use of data that drive, inform and encourage new actions. That's where
business analytics comes into the discovery of self-service data with data governance and a
touch of planning and forecasting. Here are five ways in which business analysis can help you
grow your business in a data-based way (Sullivan, 2001).
Expansion planning
Suppose you're ready to grow your business and open a branch, store, restaurant, or office in a
new location. And he has a ton of information about his growing customer base, the
maintenance of his equipment and other assets, the compensation of his employees and his
delivery or distribution programs. Did you know that you can use everything to develop a
detailed expansion plan based on your knowledge? (Sullivan, 2001)
With business analytics, you can find information about visualizations and panels, and then
study them in more detail using Business Intelligence and reports. In addition, you can interact
with the results and use the information to create your expansion plan (Sullivan, 2001).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
72
Finding your audience
You should review the current data of your customers to prepare. But you should also find out
what people say about your company or brand and in what parts of the country or region.
Business Analytics offers a social network analysis that can be combined with internal
customer data. Then take it and create a profile of your current and potential customers. As a
result, you can find your ideal demographic (Prescott and Miller, 2001).
Comparing this demographic objective with publicly available census data allows you to see
even more. You can identify where people are most likely to benefit from your products or
services. From there, you can delve into the data, researching your competitors, for example.
As a result, it can limit the area that offers the greatest expansion and potential for the customer
(Prescott and Miller, 2001).
Creating your business plan
All these real-time interactions with your data provide you with a detailed map of what is
happening right now, but you also need to know how you are doing it. Through business
analysis, you can use business performance solutions to research and forecast sales, revenue
and growth trends. You can then use what you have discovered and develop a detailed business
plan for the next phase of your burgeoning franchise. You go from being a data scientist to a
business planner. And soon, it has pointed to the correct location for its expansion (Prescott
and Miller, 2001).
Developing your marketing campaign
With what you’ve learned about your audience and local competitors with business analytics,
you can send the right message to the audience most eager to try your restaurant as part of a
perfect marketing campaign (Prescott and Miller, 2001).
Moreover, you can narrow down branding details, messaging tone and consumer preferences,
like the right offers that will differentiate you from the other businesses in the area. You gain
the competitive edge by making sure you offer something new to your customers and prospects.
Business analytics enables you to use your data to make insight-driven, targeted marketing and
business development decisions so you can make decisions that can grow your business with
confidence (Prescott and Miller, 2001).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
73
Use predictive insights to take action
All these real-time interactions with your data provide you with a detailed map of what is
happening right now, but you also need to know how you are doing it. With business analysis,
you can use business performance solutions to research and forecast sales, revenue and growth
trends. You can then use what you have discovered and develop a detailed business plan for
the next phase of your growing franchise. You go from being a data scientist to a business
planner. And soon, it has indicated the correct location for its expansion (Prescott and Miller,
2001).
Application of Business Intelligence in Marketing
Predictive Analytics
Predictive analysis reveals data that reveals future trends. The forecasts generated by these
analyzes offer the best suggestions for future actions. The information provided by the
predictive analysis supports the sales team's approach and helps increase their revenues (Better
Buys, 2019). Predictive analysis not only determines the best message for customers by
analyzing their past behavior, but also tells the company which products are the best for the
market and customers. When marketing specialists better understand customer behavior, they
can be proactive about the future needs of their customers. Predictive analysis also helps
marketers improve their customer engagement efforts and use more valuable messages to reach
their target audience (Better Buys, 2019).
Technology Integration
When customers use business intelligence tools for marketing, they create a fully integrated
marketing approach. Customers use all available channels and resources to research and discuss
a product or service and make the decision to buy or not. As a result, marketers must integrate
data from all available platforms to design the best interactions. The integration of marketing
technology is the best way to convey a unified message throughout the customer's experience
with your business (Better Buys, 2019). Unifying the message throughout a customer's journey
is important to provide a seamless customer experience. This can be achieved by integrating
real-time data to customize customer responses. When marketing technologies are integrated,
companies provide their customers with consistent messages across all platforms, ensuring that
the brand remains in the client's mind (Better Buys, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
74
Social Analytics
These tools collect information from conversations and user actions on all online platforms.
Social analytics provides marketing departments with information about customer behavior
and thinking processes. These scans examine page navigation statistics and social networks.
Web analysis provides marketers with information about what's on your site, what links and
ads bring customers to your site, and is more successful. This data helps marketers make better
decisions about their business. content and messages on your site. The analysis of social
networks gives marketing specialists a unique vision of the hearts and minds of their customers.
This information allows companies to obtain more information about their target audience and
improve their ability to interact with their customers. The analysis of social networks provides
actionable information, such as campaign tracking. Campaign tracking evaluates the
performance of a campaign and determines the factors that affect its performance. Social
analysis promotes an intimate understanding of customer opinions, which is important to
improve engagement, campaign strategies and performance monitoring.
Customer Data
When all customer data is collected, they can be used to make more informed marketing
decisions. When companies have more accurate data, they can interact better with their
customers. Therefore, unified customer data is important. When customer data is not unified,
marketing specialists communicate inaccurate and obsolete messages to their customers and
do not take advantage of all the data they have. Business Intelligence tools collect data from
multiple domains and organize them in a unified format. This data provides information about
customers and where they come from, allowing marketing specialists to know where each
customer comes from. These tools are the most effective business intelligence for marketing
and sales. The role of business intelligence in marketing allows companies to make better and
more informed marketing decisions (SplashBI, 2019).
In conclusion, it cannot impress everyone with a single message, so it is useless to try to market
the masses. For a marketing campaign to really have an impact, it must respond directly to the
unique wishes and needs of a specific group of customers. As you have seen, there are ways to
effectively determine your target market so that you can adapt your marketing strategy to those
customers. And once it has established itself as a reliable brand in a target market, try
expanding your target market using the techniques we have mentioned here. These are the BI
application for marketing purposes (SplashBI, 2019).
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
75
Conclusion
In an organization, managers have a key role in the success of operations. The managers have
to take decisions that directly affect the organization. A bad decision by a poorly informed
source will lead to disastrous outcomes. The decisions are taken at individual level right to the
organizational level. The implementation of BI will improve the decisions taken by the
mangers. The BI systems will in fact empower all the employees with enough information and
make them capable of decision making.
In an organization a lot of data is present. Data can be related to customers, suppliers, invoices,
purchase orders, pay slips, employee information, sales data, financial data, training data,
product data, client data, etc. It becomes cumbersome to manage such huge amounts of everincreasing data. BI systems can make the management of these huge amounts of data easy by
using technologies like OLAP and Data Warehousing. From this paper, we can conclude that
the implementation of Business Intelligence will result in three mains;
•
Lower Costs
•
Increased Revenue
•
Satisfied Customers
In conclusion, business intelligence and business analysis are the essential elements that a
company needs to effectively manage its information. Both terminologies seem to have
similarities that allow students to infer that they are connected. In fact, it should be recognized
that analysis is a function of business intelligence. The information analyzed by the analysis to
predict the future is the same as that obtained from the business intelligence component. BI
and BA are committed to ensuring that the business progresses rapidly. It has been discovered
that most industries that run BI platforms have more sophisticated tools capable of performing
different types of analysis, including descriptive analysis, visual model discoveries, prediction
models and more. data mining. The two components of the company also showed many
advantages for what seemed to contribute to competitiveness. Based on the articulations
discussed in this document, it is therefore important that organizations support high levels of
analysis-based systems that can revolutionize the organization's ability to rediscover and use
the information it already has. . This is attributed to the fact that today, it is intrinsically
important not only to analyze the activity, but also to examine the actions in response to an
analysis and consider them as process change parameters. of the company.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
76
References
1. Adair, B. (2019). Business Intelligence Capabilities | BI Capabilities List for 2019.
[online] Selecthub.com. Available at: https://selecthub.com/business-intelligence/listbi-capabilities/ [Accessed 6 Nov. 2019].
2. Adekeye, W. (2019). The importance of management information systems. 5th ed.
MCB UP Ltd, pp.318-327.
3. Aggarwal, C. (2014). Data classification. 2nd ed. Boca Raton: Taylor & Francis,
pp.14-19.
4. Azeroual, O. and Theel, H., 2018. The Effects of Using Business Intelligence Systems
on an Excellence Management and Decision-Making Process by Start-Up Companies:
A Case Study. International Journal of Management Science and Business
Administration, 4(3), pp.30-40.
5. Beal, V. (2019). What is MIS - Management Information System? Webopedia
Definition. [online] Webopedia.com. Available at:
https://www.webopedia.com/TERM/M/MIS.html [Accessed 19 Oct. 2019].
6. Beal, V. (2019). What is Structured Data? Webopedia Definition. [online]
Webopedia.com. Available at:
https://www.webopedia.com/TERM/S/structured_data.html [Accessed 10 Oct. 2019].
7. Beal, V. (2019). What is Unstructured Data? Webopedia Definition. [online]
Webopedia.com. Available at:
https://www.webopedia.com/TERM/U/unstructured_data.html [Accessed 10 Oct.
2019].
8. Berisha-Namani, M. (2019). The role of information systems in management decision
making – an theoretical approach. Manager, [online] (12), pp.109-116. Available at:
https://www.ceeol.com/search/article-detail?id=539582 [Accessed 25 Oct. 2019].
9. Better Buys. (2019). Business Intelligence for Marketers Resource Guide. [online]
Available at: https://www.betterbuys.com/bi/business-intelligence-marketers/
[Accessed 6 Nov. 2019].
10. Bidur, B. (2015). 5 core business process | Business Process | Strategic Management.
[online] Scribd. Available at: https://www.scribd.com/document/258617131/5-corebusiness-process [Accessed 6 Oct. 2019].
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
77
11. Bonitasoft.com. (2019). What is a process bases application | Bonitasoft. [online]
Available at: https://www.bonitasoft.com/library/what-process-based-application
[Accessed 13 Oct. 2019].
12. Businessoffashion.com. (2019). The Business of Fashion. [online] Available at:
https://www.businessoffashion.com/organisations/zara [Accessed 4 Oct. 2019].
13. Capterra.com. (2019). Best Application Performance Management Software | 2019
Reviews of the Most Popular Tools & Systems. [online] Available at:
https://www.capterra.com/application-performance-management-software/ [Accessed
16 Oct. 2019].
14. Chand, S. (2019). The Top 3 Levels of Management. [online] Your Article Library.
Available at: http://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/management/the-top-3-levels-ofmanagement-933-words/8602 [Accessed 15 Oct. 2019].
15. Chen, H. and C. Storey, V. (2019). SPECIAL ISSUE: BUSINESS INTELLIGENCE
RESEARCH. 36th ed. [ebook] pp.1165-1188. Available at:
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/f5fe/b79e04b2e7b61d17a6df79a44faf358e60cd.pdf%
3E.[Accessed 1 Nov. 2019].
16. Cheng, L. (2019). Zara: Fast Growth through Fast Fashion – Technology and
Operations Management. [online] Digital.hbs.edu. Available at:
https://digital.hbs.edu/platform-rctom/submission/zara-fast-growth-through-fastfashion/ [Accessed 7 Oct. 2019].
17. Comidor BPM Platform. (2017). Operational Processes | Knowledge Base | Comidor
Low-Code BPM. [online] Available at: https://www.comidor.com/knowledgebase/business-process-management-kb/core-business-processes/ [Accessed 6 Oct.
2019].
18. Courses.lumenlearning.com. (2019). Types of Management | Boundless Business.
[online] Available at: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundlessbusiness/chapter/types-of-management/ [Accessed 18 Oct. 2019].
19. Digumarti, S. (2019). Scope And Future Of Business Intelligence Systems In The
Indian Market. [online] Consultantsreview.com. Available at:
https://www.consultantsreview.com/cxoinsights/scope-and-future-of-businessintelligence-systems-in-the-indian-market-vid-459.html [Accessed 3 Nov. 2019].
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
78
20. Dowsett, S. (2019). Zara looks to technology to keep up with faster fashion. [online]
U.S. Available at: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-inditex-technology-focus/zaralooks-to-technology-to-keep-up-with-faster-fashion-idUSKBN1JB0HG [Accessed 30
Oct. 2019].
21. Eiloart, J. (2019). Top 10 business intelligence trends for 2018. [online] ITProPortal.
Available at: https://www.itproportal.com/features/top-10-business-intelligencetrends-for-2018/ [Accessed 27 Oct. 2019].
22. Financesonline.com. (2019). 15 Best Business Intelligence Tools For Small And Big
Business - Financesonline.com. [online] Available at: https://financesonline.com/15best-business-intelligence-tools-small-big-business/ [Accessed 25 Oct. 2019].
23. Framework, B. (2019). Data Types: Structured vs. Unstructured Data | Big Data
Framework©. [online] Big Data Framework©. Available at:
https://www.bigdataframework.org/data-types-structured-vs-unstructured-data/
[Accessed 11 Oct. 2019].
24. GARCÍA ALLER, M. (2019). Zara: Technology and User Experience as Drivers of
Business | IE Insights. [online] IE Insights. Available at:
https://www.ie.edu/insights/articles/zara-technology-and-user-experience-as-driversof-business/ [Accessed 26 Oct. 2019].
25. GradesFixer. (2019). The Zara Business Culture in Information Technology: [Essay
Example], 1167 words GradesFixer. [online] Available at:
https://gradesfixer.com/free-essay-examples/the-zara-business-culture-in-informationtechnology/ [Accessed 6 Oct. 2019].
26. Harrison, F. and Pelletier, M. (2019). The essence of management decision. 7th ed.
pp.462-470.
27. Information Security Buzz. (2019). Cyber Security + Business Intelligence = Cyber
Business Intelligence | Information Security Buzz. [online] Available at:
https://www.informationsecuritybuzz.com/articles/cyber-security-businessintelligence-cyber-business-intelligence/ [Accessed 1 Nov. 2019].
28. Izenda. (2019). 6 Key Features Your Business Intelligence Software Needs - Izenda.
[online] Available at: https://www.izenda.com/6-key-features-your-businessintelligence-software-needs/ [Accessed 26 Oct. 2019].
29. Khalaf, R. (2008). Supporting business process fragmentation while maintaining
operational semantics. Berlin: dissertation.de.
30. Loshin, D. (n.d.). Business Intelligence, 2nd Edition. Waltham, USA, pp.1-13.
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
79
31. nibusinessinfo.co.uk. (2019). Advantages and disadvantages of Software as a Service
(SaaS). [online] Available at: https://www.nibusinessinfo.co.uk/content/advantagesand-disadvantages-software-service-saas [Accessed 23 Oct. 2019].
32. Nicole, A. (2019). [online] Gluu.biz. Available at: https://www.gluu.biz/processmanagement-glossary/business-process-definition/ [Accessed 4 Oct. 2019].
33. OpenText. (2019). Business Process Management (BPM) Application Tools |
OpenText. [online] Available at: https://www.opentext.com/products-andsolutions/products/digital-process-automation/business-process-management-bpm
[Accessed 14 Oct. 2019].
34. Paola Palladino, A. (2010). Zara and Benetton: Comparison of two business models.
1st ed. [ebook] Organización de Empresas (OE), pp.54-95. Available at:
https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/41800315.pdf [Accessed 28 Oct. 2019].
35. Pearlman, S. (2019). Data Modeling: Ensuring Data You Can Trust - Talend. [online]
Talend Real-Time Open Source Data Integration Software. Available at:
https://www.talend.com/resources/what-is-data-modeling/ [Accessed 8 Oct. 2019].
36. Prescott, J. and Miller, S. (2001). Proven strategies in competitive intelligence. New
York: Wiley.
37. Robb, D. (2019). What is Semi-Structured Data. [online] Datamation.com. Available
at: https://www.datamation.com/big-data/semi-structured-data.html [Accessed 11 Oct.
2019].
38. Rouse, M. (2019). What is Data Classification and Why is it Important?. [online]
SearchDataManagement. Available at:
https://searchdatamanagement.techtarget.com/definition/data-classification [Accessed
8 Oct. 2019].
39. Santaolalla, B. (2019). Zara’s intelligent use of search data is transforming it’s online
store and putting the customer back at the centre. [online] Medium. Available at:
https://medium.com/empathyco/zaras-intelligent-use-of-search-data-is-transformingit-s-online-store-and-putting-the-customer-67961b74e1ab [Accessed 27 Oct. 2019].
40. SCM Globe. (2019). Zara Clothing Company Supply Chain. [online] Available at:
https://www.scmglobe.com/zara-clothing-company-supply-chain/ [Accessed 31 Oct.
2019].
41. Segal, T. (2019). Inside Decision Support Systems—DSS. [online] Investopedia.
Available at: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/decision-support-system.asp
[Accessed 18 Oct. 2019].
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
80
42. Sharma, L. (2019). Performance Enhancement of Information Retrieval via Artificial
Intelligence. 1st ed. [ebook] pp.187-192. Available at:
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/a968/c06f8fc9488587b9b86425ad7e0daa489f89.pdf
[Accessed 3 Nov. 2019].
43. Sint, R., Schaffert, S. and Stroka, S. (2019). Combining Unstructured, Fully
Structured and Semi-Structured Information in Semantic Wikis. 4th ed. [ebook]
Siemens AG, pp.73-83. Available at:
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Max_Voelkel/publication/230824995_4th_Sema
ntic_Wiki_Workshop_SemWiki_2009_at_the_6th_European_Semantic_Web_Confer
ence_ESWC_2009_Hersonissos_Greece_June_1st_2009_Proceedings/links/5911675
2aca272ec9a4e7182/4th-Semantic-Wiki-Workshop-SemWiki-2009-at-the-6thEuropean-Semantic-Web-Conference-ESWC-2009-Hersonissos-Greece-June-1st2009-Proceedings.pdf#page=83 [Accessed 11 Oct. 2019].
44. Sowells, J. (2019). Understanding Business Intelligence and Data Security. [online]
Hackercombat.com. Available at: https://hackercombat.com/understanding-businessintelligence-and-data-security/ [Accessed 1 Nov. 2019].
45. SplashBI. (2019). How to Use Business Intelligence for Marketing Effectively!.
[online] Available at: https://splashbi.com/business-intelligence-for-marketing/
[Accessed 6 Nov. 2019].
46. Studiousguy.com. (2019). Three Levels of Management: Top, Middle & Lower –
StudiousGuy. [online] Available at: https://studiousguy.com/three-levels-ofmanagement/ [Accessed 15 Oct. 2019].
47. Sullivan, D. (2001). Document warehousing and text mining. New York [etc.]: John
Wiley & Sons.
48. Tallan. (2019). Business Intelligence, Data Security & Analytics. [online] Available
at: https://www.tallan.com/business-intelligence/ [Accessed 2 Nov. 2019].
49. Technologyadvice.com. (2019). [online] Available at:
https://technologyadvice.com/business-intelligence/ [Accessed 27 Oct. 2019].
50. Techopedia.com. (2019). What is a Business Process? - Definition from Techopedia.
[online] Available at: https://www.techopedia.com/definition/1168/business-process
[Accessed 4 Oct. 2019].
51. Thadani, R. (2019). Advantages And Disadvantages of Application Software You
Didn't Know. [online] Techspirited. Available at: https://techspirited.com/advantagesdisadvantages-of-application-software [Accessed 23 Oct. 2019].
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
81
52. Traviata.eu. (2019). Business Process Support | Traviata. [online] Available at:
https://www.traviata.eu/features/business-process-support [Accessed 8 Oct. 2019].
53. Tutorialspoint.com. (2019). MIS - Executive Support System - Tutorialspoint. [online]
Available at:
https://www.tutorialspoint.com/management_information_system/executive_support_
system.htm [Accessed 20 Oct. 2019].
54. UKEssays.com. (2019). Zara Company Analysis. [online] Available at:
https://www.ukessays.com/essays/marketing/a-background-to-zara-clothing-brandmarketing-essay.php [Accessed 3 Oct. 2019].
55. Wieder, B. and Ossimitz, L. (2019). Procedia Computer Science. 64th ed. Australia:
University of Technology Sydney, pp.1163-1171.
56. Williams, S. and Williams, N. (2010). The profit impact of business intelligence. 9th
ed. San Francisco, CA: Morgan Kaufmann, pp.123-135.
57. Zandbergen, P. (2019). Transaction Processing Systems (TPS): Batch and Real-Time
Systems - Video & Lesson Transcript | Study.com. [online] Study.com. Available at:
https://study.com/academy/lesson/transaction-processing-systems-tps-manual-andautomated-systems.html [Accessed 22 Oct. 2019].
H. D. S. Enura Indula (COL/A-060329)
Business Intelligence
82