WHAT IS MANAGEMENT



Information Technology

in Business

Other Teaching Tools 11.2

Video Notes 11.3

Brief Chapter Outline and Learning Goals 11.4

Lecture Outline and Lecture Notes 11.6

Career and Study Skills Notes 11.21

Career Development: Make Good Career Planning Habits a Life Skill 11.21

study skills: Importance of Doing Your Own Work 11.22

Lecture Links 11.23

lecture link 11-1 Digital Data: We’re Losing It 11.23

lecture link 11-2 Why We Type This Way 11.24

LectURE LINK 11-3 Web Shopping Safety 11.24

LectURE LINK 11-4 Revising Moore’s Law 11.25

LectURE LINK 11-5 John Atanasoff’s Computer 11.26

LectURE LINK 11-6 E-Mail Never Goes Away 11.27

LectURE LINK 11-7 E-Mail Rules 11.27

LectURE LINK 11-8 Password Overload 11.28

LectURE LINK 11-9 Cyberthieves Are Winning 11.29

Bonus Internet Exercises 11.30

Bonus INternet Exercise 11-1 Online Education 11.30

Bonus INternet Exercise 11-2 Spam Statistics 11.31

Bonus Cases 11.32

Bonus case 11-1 Rescuing Tulane 11.32

Bonus case 11-2 Denver Health Systems 11.34

Bonus case 11-3 Cell Phone Privacy 11.36

Other Teaching Tools

FOR A DESCRIPTION OF EACH OF THESE VALUABLE TEACHING TOOLS, PLEASE SEE THE PREFACE IN THIS MANUAL.

Student Learning Tools

Student Online Learning Center (OLC) diasbusiness

Student Study Guide

Spanish Translation Glossary (OLC)

Spanish Translation Quizzes (OLC)

Instructor Teaching Tools

Annotated Instructor’s Resource Manual

IRCD (Instructor’s Resource Manual, Test Bank, PowerPoints, EZtest)

Asset Map

Online Learning Center (OLC) diasbusiness

PageOut

PowerPoint Presentations (on IRCD and OLC)

Test Bank

Business Videos on DVD

Enhanced Cartridge option

Spanish Translation Glossary (OLC)

video NOTES

TWENTY VIDEOS ARE AVAILABLE, GEARED TO INDIVIDUAL CHAPTER TOPICS. THE TEACHING NOTES FOR THESE VIDEOS ARE ALSO INCLUDED IN THE VIDEO NOTES SECTION OF THIS INSTRUCTOR’S RESOURCE MANUAL, BEGINNING ON PAGE V.1.

Video 11: “Digital Domain: Reality on Request”

Digital Domain is one of the world’s largest digital production studios, responsible for providing the special effects for countless movies. This video shows how this company uses sophisticated operations management techniques, such as Gantt charts, PERT, CAD, and a computer tracking system to deliver a high quality, customized product in a timely fashion.

BRIEF CHAPTER OUTLINE AND LEARNING GOALS

CHAPTER 11

Information Technology in Business

I. The Role of Information Technology in Business

LEARNING OBJECTIVE 1

Explain information technology’s role in business.

A. Brief History of Information Technology

B. Time and Place with Information Technology

C. Information Technology and Independence of Location

D. e-Business and e-Commerce

II. Managing Information

LEARNING OBJECTIVE 2

Understand how information is managed.

III. The Backbone of Knowledge: HarDware and Software

LEARNING OBJECTIVE 3

Describe various types of software and hardware.

A. Hardware

1. Wireless Information Appliances

2. Intranets, Extranets, Firewalls, and VPNs

3. Extranets

4. VPNs

B. Software

IV. Information Technology Challenges

LEARNING OBJECTIVE 4

Discuss challenges in information technology.

A. Hackers and Viruses

B. Governmental Security

C. Privacy

D. Stability

E. Reliability of Data

V. SUMMARY

LECTURE OUTLINE AND LECTURE NOTES

CHAPTER OPENING PROFILE

WINCHUCK RIVER STORE (TEXT PAGES 356-357)

After her divorce Karen Clark found she had few job skills. She had been out of the workforce for sixteen years, and her knowledge of technology was out of date. Clark began a small business selling rustic lodge and cabin décor on eBay from her home. The key to Clark’s success is her embrace of technology. Clark does not fear technology, but sees it as a tool for her business. Selling online allows her to control her business operations and maintain control.

|Lecture outline lecture notes |

| I. the Role of Information Technology in Business | |

|Learning objective 1 |PowerPoint 11-1 |

|Explain information technology’s role in business. (Text pages 358-361) |Chapter Title |

|A. Business constantly changes. |(Refers to text page 356) |

|1. You can’t compete if you are using outdated ways of operating. | |

|2. A key to success is the ability to adapt to change. |PowerPoint 11-2 |

|B. Brief History of Information Technology |Learning Objectives |

|1. DATA PROCESSING (DP) is the name for business technology in the 1970s; its primary purpose was to |(Refers to text page 357) |

|improve the flow of financial information. | |

|a. DATA are raw, unanalyzed, and unorganized facts and figures. | |

|b. INFORMATION is the processed and organized data that can be used for managerial decision making. |PowerPoint 11-3 |

|c. Data processing was used to support an existing business through improving the flow of financial |The Role of Information Technology in |

|information. |Business |

|2. In the 1980s, business technology became known as information systems (IS). |(Refers to text pages 358-361) |

|a. INFORMATION SYSTEMS (IS) is the name for business technology in the 1980s. | |

|i. The role of technology changed from supporting the business to doing business. | |

|ii. It includes technology such as ATMs and voice mail. | |

|b. As business used technology more, it became more dependent on it. | |

|3. Until the late 1980s business technology was a matter of using new technology on old methods. |TEXT REFERENCE |

|a. Then business shifted to using new technology on new methods. |Real World Business Apps |

|b. Information technology (IT) is the name for business technology in the 1990s. |(Box in text on page 359) |

|c. Technology became the way of doing business, rather than just helping with business functions. |Jose Diaz owns a banner and sign |

|C. Time and Place with Information Technology |printing business and has seen his |

|1. Time and place have always been at the center of business. |profits drop over the past two years. |

|2. Earlier, businesses decided when and where customers did business with them. |Diaz creates all his designs by hand |

|3. Today IT allows businesses to deliver products and services whenever and wherever it is convenient|and does not use any technology. He |

|for the customer. |fears that using a computer will have |

|4. The text uses the entertainment industry to illustrate the changes created by new technologies. |a negative impact on his creativity, |

|5. Internet communications using shared documents allows contributors to work on a common document |but also admits he does not know where|

|without meetings. |to start. |

|D. Information Technology and Independence of Location | |

|1. IT breaks time and location barriers, creating organizations and services that are independent of | |

|location. | |

|2. NASDAQ and Eurex (Europe), electronic stock exchanges without trading floors, allow buyers and | |

|sellers to make trades by computer. |Lecture link 11-1 |

|3. VIRTUALIZATION means accessibility through technology that allows business to be conducted |Digital Data: We’re |

|independent of location |Losing It |

|a. The technology lets you access people and information as if you were in an actual office. |Seventy-five percent of federal |

|b. Virtual communities are forming as people communicate over computer networks. |government records is in electronic |

|4. When companies increase their technological capabilities, it changes the way people do business. |form, and no one is sure how much of |

|a. E-mail is far faster than paper-based correspondence. |it will be readable in as little as 10|

|b. Instant messaging (IM) allows businesses to communicate in real time, for free, via computer. |years. (See complete lecture link on |

|c. The advantage to IM is that it is immediate, has no additional cost, and makes overseas |page 11.23 of this manual.) |

|communication easier and cheaper. | |

|E. E-Business and E-Commerce | |

|1. e-Business is any electronic business data exchange using any electronic device. | |

|2. e-Commerce is selling products or services online through e-business. | |

|3. E-Business involves more than just selling. | |

|a. The terms are different. |TEXT FIGURE 11.1 |

|b. E-Commerce results in a transaction. |How Far Have We Come? (Box in text on |

|c. E-Business does not always involve an exchange; it often simply involves information sharing. |page 360) |

|4. E-Business involves so much information that it can cause information overload. | |

|SELF Check Questions (Text page 364) | |

|What is data processing? How has technology changed from data processing to information technology? | |

|How has instant messaging changed the way we do business? How has this technology affected you | |

|directly? | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |TEXT FIGURE 11.2 |

| |How Information Technology Is Changing|

| |Business (Box in text on page 362) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |lecture link 11-2 |

| |Why We Type This Way |

| |The modern office has a 19th century |

| |bottleneck—the computer keyboard. (See|

| |complete lecture link on page 11.24 of|

| |this manual.) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |PowerPoint 11-4 |

| |Time and Place with IT |

| |(Refers to text pages 361-364) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |bonus internet |

| |exercise 11-1 |

| |Online Education |

| |Can’t afford to go to M.I.T.? Try the |

| |free website. (See complete exercise |

| |on page 11.30 of this manual.) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |lecture link 11-3 |

| |Web Shopping Safety |

| |E-Commerce is exploding. Here are a |

| |few tips to shop safely. (See complete|

| |lecture link on page 11.24 of this |

| |manual.) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |Bonus Case 11-1 |

| |Rescuing Tulane |

| |Using electronic communication methods|

| |was an important part of how Tulane |

| |university president dealt with the |

| |Katrina crisis. (See complete case, |

| |discussion questions, and suggested |

| |answers on page 11.32 of this manual.)|

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| II. Managing Information | |

|Learning objective 2 |PowerPoint 11-5 |

|UNDERSTAND HOW INFORMATION IS MANAGED. (TEXT PAGES 364-366) |Managing Information |

|A. To find what we need, we often have to sift through mountains of information. |(Refers to text pages 364-366) |

|1. INFOGLUT is the phenomenon of information overload in business. | |

|2. There are ways to reduce infoglut. | |

|B. First, identify what is useful, depending on four characteristics: | |

|1. Quality: The information must be accurate and reliable. | |

|2. Completeness: There must be enough data to make a decision, but not too much to confuse the issue.| |

|3. Timeliness: | |

|a. Information must reach managers quickly. | |

|b. E-mail, instant messaging, and other technologies increase information timeliness. | |

|4. Relevance: Managers must know the questions to ask to get the answers they need. |TEXT REFERENCE |

|C. The proper management of information can be the core of a business (text example: Princess |Study Skills: |

|Cruises’ passenger database). |The Importance of Doing Your Own Work |

|1. People need to get easy-to-use, organized data when they need it, involving data storage. |(Box in text on page 365) |

|2. A DATA WAREHOUSE is an electronic storage place for data on a specific subject (such as sales) |An additional exercise and discussion |

|over a period of time. |is available on page 11.22 of this |

|3. DATA MINING is looking for hidden patterns in the data in a data warehouse and discovering |manual. |

|relationships among the data. | |

|4. Internet retail data mining is called shopping cart analysis, analyzing what items people buy | |

|together to make recommendations for them. | |

|SELF Check Questions (Text page 366) | |

|What are the four characteristics of useful data? | |

|What is data mining? | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |Bonus Case 11-2 |

| |Denver Health Systems |

| |Denver Health hospital uses a system |

| |of networked computers and a treatment|

| |database to improve patient care. (See|

| |complete case, discussion questions, |

| |and suggested answers on page 11.34 of|

| |this manual.) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| III. The Backbone of KNowledge: Hardware and Software | |

|Learning objective 3 | |

|DESCRIBE VARIOUS TYPES OF SOFTWARE AND HARDWARE. (TEXT PAGES 366-374) | |

|A. Hardware | |

|1. What is powerful today in computer hardware may be obsolete by the time this chapter is covered. |lecture link 11-4 |

|2. Hardware includes computers, pagers, cell phones, printers, scanners, fax machines, PDAs, iPods, |Revising Moore’s Law |

|and so forth. |In the mid-1970s Gordon Moore, former |

|a. A new development allows merging of older technologies with new ones, such as networking computers|chairman of Intel Corporation, |

|to a copy machine. |predicted that the capacity of |

|b. All-in-one devices such as Treos and iPhones combine a wireless phone, MP3 player, fax, and e-mail|computer chips would double every year|

|technologies. |or so. (See complete lecture link on |

|c. Hardware is very useful—as long as it works. |page 11.25 of this manual.) |

|i. IBM is developing an approach called SMASH: simple, many, and self-healing. | |

|ii. They hope to build computers made from many small components that can monitor their own | |

|performance and solve problems. | |

|3. Wireless information appliances | |

|a. Internet appliances, such as PDAs, Blackberries, and smart phones, are designed to connect people | |

|to the Internet and to e-mail. |PowerPoint 11-6 |

|b. Standardization of wireless technology has made computing more portable. |The Backbone of Knowledge: Hardware |

|c. WIRELESS NETWORKING refers to the ability of a computer or device to transport signals through the|and Software (Refers to text pages |

|air. |366-369) |

|d. WIRELESS FIDELITY (WI-FI) is the technology used to obtain an Internet connection without having | |

|to connect to a phone line or cable line. | |

|e. Wireless local-area networks allow users with laptops to connect to the Web in many locations. | |

|4. Intranets, extranets, firewalls, and VPNs | |

|a. An INTRANET is a companywide network closed to public access, which uses Internet-type technology.| |

|b. To prevent unauthorized access by outsiders, companies use a firewall. |lecture link 11-5 |

|c. A FIREWALL can consist of hardware or software; it prevents outsiders from accessing information |John Atanasoff’s Computer |

|the user does not want others to see. |Dr. John V. Atanasoff built the first |

|d. Firewalls are not foolproof, but are one way individuals and computers can protect themselves. |digital computer over half a century |

|e. Some companies use intranets only to publish information for employees. |ago, but his contribution to computing|

|f. Others use intranets for time-saving applications, such as filing out forms to eliminate |was nearly lost to history. (See |

|paperwork. |complete lecture link on page 11.26 of|

|5. An EXTRANET is a semiprivate network that uses Internet technology and allows more than one |this manual.) |

|company to access the same information or allows people on different servers to collaborate. | |

|a. One of the most common uses of extranets is to extend an intranet to outside customers, such as | |

|suppliers. | |

|b. Because an extranet is a semiprivate network, outsiders cannot access the network easily. |TEXT REFERENCE |

|c. Since it does use public lines, hackers can gain unauthorized access. |Thinking Critically: |

|i. HACKERS are people who unlawfully break into computer systems. |It May Change Everything, But It |

|ii. One solution is to use dedicated lines, but this is expensive and limits use to computers |Doesn’t Cure All |

|directly connected to those lines. |(Box in text on page 367) |

|iii. This solution is expensive and limits use of computers. |Low-tech methods—box cutters and brute|

|iv. A virtual private network (VPN) is another solution. |force—helped the 9/11 hijackers bring |

|6. A VIRTUAL PRIVATE NETWORK (VPN) is a private data network that creates secure connections, or |down the World Trade Center. But it |

|“tunnels,” over regular Internet lines. |was access to information that was the|

|a. Companies no longer need to own leased lines, but can use the public lines securely. |critical element for the terrorists’ |

|b. VPNs provide secure sharing of public resources for data. |success. |

|c. Users log into a portal, an entry point into a website. | |

|d. Portals identify users and allow them access to areas of the intranet. | |

|B. Software | |

|1. Software is the product that tells your computer what to do. | |

|a. It is important to find the right software to do the job before finding the right hardware. | |

|b. Some programs are easy to use; other programs are more sophisticated, with more functions. |PowerPoint 11-7 |

|c. A business person must decide what functions he or she wants performed, then choose the |Hardware (Refers to text pages |

|appropriate software. |370-374) |

|2. Businesspeople most frequently use software for seven major purposes: | |

|a. writing (word processors); | |

|b. manipulating numbers (spreadsheets); | |

|c. filing and retrieving data (databases) | |

|d. presenting information visually (graphics); | |

|e. communicating (e-mail and instant messaging); | |

|f. accounting; | |

|g. Internet and intranet use. | |

|3. Many functions have been combined in one kind of program called integrated software or suites. | |

|4. Most, but not all, software is distributed commercially through suppliers. | |

|a. SHAREWARE is software that is copyrighted but distributed to potential customers free of charge; | |

|users pay a fee if the program meets their needs. | |

|b. PUBLIC DOMAIN SOFTWARE (FREEWARE) is software that is free for the taking. | |

|SELF Check Questions (Text page 374) | |

|Differentiate between hardware and software. | |

|What is a VPN? What is the difference between an intranet and an extranet? | |

|What do businesspeople use software for? Provide an example of each. | |

|What is the difference between freeware and shareware? |TEXT FIGURE 11.3 |

| |How Has the Internet Changed |

| |Business?(Box in text on page 379) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |TEXT REFERENCE |

| |Career Development: |

| |Make Good Career Planning Habits a |

| |Life Skill |

| |(Box in text on page 372) |

| |An additional exercise and discussion |

| |is available on page 11.21 of this |

| |manual. |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |TEXT FIGURE 11.4 |

| |Types of Popular Computer Software |

| |(Box in text on page 373) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |bonus internet |

| |exercise 11-2 |

| |Spam Statistics |

| |A growing problem with electronic |

| |communication is spam, unwanted e-mail|

| |messages. (See complete exercise on |

| |page 11.31 of this manual.) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |lecture link 11-6 |

| |E-Mail Never Goes Away |

| |When it comes to the Inter-net, |

| |nothing is ever really forgotten and |

| |everything leaves a trail. (See |

| |complete lecture link on page 11.27 of|

| |this manual.) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |lecture link 11-7 |

| |E-Mail Rules |

| |Writing an e-mail is not like writing |

| |a letter—some suggestions for better |

| |electronic communication. (See |

| |complete lecture link on page 11.27 of|

| |this manual.) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| IV. Information Technology Challenges | |

|Learning objective 4 | |

|DISCUSS CHALLENGES IN INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY. (TEXT PAGES 374-379) | |

|A. Technology can also create challenges. | |

|1. In 2006 more than 9 million people experienced identity theft, raising security concerns. | |

|2. Also of concern is the type of content available on the Internet—adult content, harassment, and |PowerPoint 11-8 |

|spam messages. |Information Technology Challenges |

|3. As businesses and government attempt to track Internet usage, privacy is becoming a critical |(Refers to text pages 374-375) |

|problem | |

|4. Stability glitches can cost a business millions of dollars. | |

|B. Hackers and Viruses | |

|1. Computers are susceptible to hackers. | |

|2. In 2007, hackers broke into computers at TJX and stole millions of customer credit card numbers. | |

|3. Computers today are interconnected, making security more difficult than in the days of mainframe | |

|computers. | |

|4. Viruses are programming codes inserted into other programming to cause unexpected events. | |

|a. Viruses are spread by downloading infected code over the Internet or by sharing an infected disk. |lecture link 11-8 |

|b. Some viruses are playful, but some can erase data or crash a hard drive. |Password Overload |

|c. Software programs such as Norton’s AntiVirus “inoculate” the computer so that it doesn’t catch a |Passwords protect information, but too|

|known virus. |many passwords can lead to decreased |

|d. It is important to keep your antivirus protection program up-to-date and practice “safe |security. (See complete lecture link |

|computing.” |on page 11.28 of this manual.) |

|C. Government Security | |

|1. After September 11, 2001 security officers are most concerned about cyberterrorism. | |

|2. An electronic attack on critical computers could cripple the Internet. | |

|3. Security requires cooperation between government and businesses, because 85% of affected computers| |

|are in the private sector. | |

|4. Many companies are reluctant to share information with the government for fear the public will | |

|lose faith in the business when they hear about security breaches. | |

|5. Others believe providing this kind of information is a breach of privacy. | |

|6. To encourage the sharing of information, Congress passed the Critical Infrastructure Information | |

|Act of 2002 that makes critical infrastructure information exempt from disclosure. | |

|D. Privacy | |

|1. Your e-mail is no more private than a postcard. |TEXT FIGURE 11.5 |

|a. More than a fourth of U.S. companies scan employee e-mail regularly and legally. |Protect Your Computer From Viruses |

|b. Employers search for trade secrets being passed, harassing messages, and conflicts of interest. |(Box in text on page 376) |

|c. Most e-mail travels over the Internet in unencrypted plain text. | |

|d. An encryption is a secret code given to information when it is passing through the Internet. | |

|e. An unencrypted piece of data means anyone can see it, and it is less secure. | |

|f. Some e-mail systems can encrypt messages to keep them private. | |

|2. A major problem with privacy has developed as more and more personal information is stored in | |

|computers, and people are able to access that data legally and illegally. | |

|a. The Internet allows Web surfers to access all sorts of information about you. | |

|b. Websites such as allow individuals to post personal information about themselves - | |

|sometimes too personal. | |

|3. Websites have gotten downright nosy by secretly tracking users’ movements online. | |

|a. Web surfers seem willing to swap personal details for free access to online information. | |

|b. Websites often send cookies to your computer that stay on your hard drive. | |

|c. Cookies are pieces of information, such as registration data or user preferences, sent by a | |

|website over the Internet to a Web browser that the browser software is expected to save and send | |

|back to the server whenever the user returns to that website. | |

|d. These often simply contain your name and password. | |

|e. Others track your movements around the Web and then blend that information with their databases | |

|and tailor the ads you receive accordingly. | |

|E. Stability | |

|1. Instability in technology also has a significant impact on business. | |

|2. The text uses the example of Hershey and the disruptions to its Halloween candy delivery caused by| |

|a computer system failure. | |

|3. The blame for such problems is a combination of computer error, human error, malfunctioning | |

|software, and overly complex systems. | |

|F. Reliability of Data | |

|When evaluating data on the Internet, consider: | |

|1. Accuracy: how reliable and free from error is the information? | |

|2. Authority: what is the authority or expertise of the site’s creator? |PowerPoint 11-9 |

|3. Objectivity: is the information presented with minimum bias? |Government Security |

|4. Current: is the content up-to-date? |(Refers to text pages 375-378) |

|5. Coverage: are the topics explored in depth? | |

|SELF Check Questions (Text page 379) | |

|What are some of the challenges facing information technology today and in the future? | |

|What kinds of risks might one face when using the Internet? | |

| |TEXT REFERENCE |

| |Ethical Challenge: |

| |Cyber Ethics |

| |(Box in text on page 377) |

| |Employees waste an average of 1.7 |

| |hours per day surfing the Internet and|

| |replying to personal e-mails. Business|

| |losses from this unproductive time can|

| |add up to $759 billion a year. |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |lecture link 11-9 |

| |Cyberthieves Are Winning |

| |In one massive data theft, identity |

| |thieves stole over 94 million records.|

| |(See complete lecture link on page |

| |11.29 of this manual.) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |Bonus Case 11-3 |

| |Cell Phone Privacy |

| |Data brokers can legally sell |

| |customers’ cell phone information. |

| |(See complete case, discussion |

| |questions, and suggested answers on |

| |page 11.36 of this manual.) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |PowerPoint 11-10 |

| |Stability (Refers to text pages |

| |378-379) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |TEXT REFERENCE |

| |Career Spotlight: |

| |So, You Want to Be in … Computer |

| |Information Systems |

| |(Box in text on page 378) |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| | |

| |TEXT REFERENCE |

| |Real World Business |

| |(Box in text on page 380) |

| |Jose Diaz hired an IT specialist to |

| |evaluate his company’s technology |

| |needs. Now he uses hardware and |

| |software to handle the creative and |

| |financial aspects of the business. He |

| |feels that technology has made him |

| |more efficient and lets him accept |

| |more orders. |

| | |

| V. SUMMARY | |

career and study skills notes

Career Development Box:

MAKE GOOD CAREER PLANNING HABITS A LIFE SKILL (TEXT PAGE 372)

Instructor’s Notes for Text Box Eleven:(Objectives to consider and implement to increase students’ knowledge, usage, and understanding of the concepts).

A successful interview, a well written résumé, and good etiquette habits are a real positive for any and all students. To refresh your career assessment and implementation, here is a reminder of what you will need to do to stay on course regarding establishing good career skills. Use the BORD method. Balance, Organization, Routine and Discipline (BORD) will help you maintain the process no matter how your job, school, personal life or professional life might be going (sometimes some areas are going well, sometimes not). Using this method, you can look at the process the same way every time, and expect an outcome that meets your needs.

When you BALANCE all your responsibilities in a series of priorities, you have a healthy approach to accomplishing your goals and objectives. You stand a better chance of achieving a high level of success. However, being able to correctly balance all your responsibilities requires that you become extremely ORGANIZED to assure that you stay on course. When you do this on a regular basis, it becomes a ROUTINE.

Student Exercises:

HELP STUDENTS WITH THE BASIC PRIORITIZING SKILLS. HAVE THEM DISCUSS THEIR OWN PRIORITIZING PRACTICES AND DISCUSS THE GOOD HABITS AS WELL AS THOSE THAT MAY NEED IMPROVEMENT.

Study Skills Box:

Importance of Doing Your Own Work (Text page 365)

Instructor’s Notes for Text Box Eleven:(Objectives to consider and implement to increase students’ knowledge, usage, and understanding of the concepts).

Previously, we discussed study partners. One of the dangers of spending considerable time with a study partner is that over time, you may find yourselves sharing homework and other work, which may lead you to becoming dependent on sharing work, rather than producing your own. Over time, you may be questioned on the validity of your own work, and if you are suspected of cheating or using another’s work, you can be suspended or expelled from school. Students who use others’ work will find that their own learning experience is diminished. While students can buy pre-written term papers over the Internet from a variety of sources, stating that you are “busy” or “tired” or “don’t have time” is no excuse for what you are doing: plagiarizing. Plagiarism is cheating. By plagiarizing, you jeopardize your education – many colleges and universities have honor codes whereby students can be expelled for plagiarizing another’s work. There is never a justification for plagiarism. Falling into the habit of plagiarizing or cheating will do you no good in the long run. In your job, you can be fired for doing so. Your reputation, once ruined, is almost impossible to salvage. The purported “saving of time” is never worth a ruined reputation, whether in school or on the job.

Student Exercises:

IN THIS EXERCISE, HAVE STUDENTS MAKE TWO LISTS: 1) THE REASONS TO CHEAT ON THEIR WORK, AND 2) THE POTENTIAL CONSEQUENCES IF THEY RELY ON CHEATING. INCLUDE THE IMPLICATIONS OF CHEATING IN THEIR FUTURE PROFESSIONAL LIVES, PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS, AND OTHER AREAS LIKE COMPETITION IN SPORTS, GAMES, ETC. HAVE THE STUDENTS THEN NOTICE HOW THEY FEEL WHEN THEY THOUGHT CHEATING WAS GOING TO BE A HELPFUL BENEFIT AND HOW MUCH IT COMPLICATES THEIR LIVES BOTH IN THE SHORT- AND LONG-TERM. IF TIME ALLOWS, EXPLAIN WHAT PLAGIARISM IS AND WHY IT SHOULD BE CONSIDERED “CHARACTER ASSASSINATION” BY ONE’S OWN HAND. DISCUSS THE FACT THAT BY PLAGIARIZING, A STUDENT IS SHOWING A LACK OF RESPECT TO THE LEARNING CULTURE OF HIS SCHOOL, AND IS DOING HIMSELF NO FAVORS FOR HIS FUTURE.

lecture links

lecture link 11-1

DIGITAL DATA: WE’RE LOSING IT

Parents today have many options to capture images of their offspring—35mm and digital cameras, videotape, etc. But by the time these children turn 30, sunlight may have faded most of their color childhood photos, and on the off chance that the tiny VHS-C videotapes featuring their many firsts survive decades of heat and humidity, there probably won’t be a machine to play them back on.

Home videos and snapshots aren’t all that are at risk. Librarians and archivists warn we’re losing vast amounts of important scientific and historical material because of disintegration or obsolescence. Already, up to 20% of the data collected on Jet Propulsion Laboratory computers during NASA’s 1976 Viking mission to Mars is gone. Also at risk are 4,000 reels of census data stored in a format so obscure that archivists doubt they’ll be able to recover it. Some 75% of federal government records are in electronic form, and no one is sure how much of it will be readable in as little as 10 years. “The more technologically advanced we get, the more fragile we become,” says Abby Smith of the Council on Library and Information Resources.

For years, computer scientists said the ones and zeros of digital data would stick around forever. They were wrong. Tests by the National Media Lab, a Minnesota-based government and industry consortium, found that magnetic tapes might last only a decade, depending on storage conditions. The fate of floppy disks, videotape, and hard drives is just as bleak. Even the CD-ROM, once touted as indestructible, is proving vulnerable to stray magnetic fields, oxidation, humidity, and material decay. The fragility of electronic media isn’t the only problem. Much of the hardware and software configurations needed to tease intelligible information from preserved disks and tapes are disappearing in the name of progress. “Technology is moving too quickly,” says Charlie Mayn, who runs the Special Media Preservation lab at the National Archives.

He speaks from experience. In the 1980s, the Archives transferred some 200,000 documents and images onto optical disks, which are now in danger of becoming indecipherable because the system archivists used is no longer on the market. “Any technology can go the way of eight-track and Betamax,” says Smith, whose own dissertation is trapped on an obsolete 5½-inch floppy. “Information doesn’t have much of a chance, unless you keep a museum of tape players and PCs around.” That may not be such a farfetched idea. Mayn’s temperature-controlled lab in the bowels of the National Archives houses many machines once used to record history.

Unfortunately, migration isn’t a perfect solution. “Sometimes not all the data makes the trip,” says Smith. Recently the Food and Drug Administration said that some pharmaceutical companies were finding errors as they transferred drug-testing data from one operating system to another. In some instances, the errors resulted in blood-pressure numbers that were randomly off by up to eight digits.

So what’s to be done? A good way to start is to separate the inconsequential from the historic, and to save in simple formats. Also, backup important data on another media, and don’t trust “permanent” storage media.[i]

lecture link 11-2

WHY WE TYPE THIS WAY

The modern office is likely to be equipped with personal computers linked through local area networks to each other, to the Internet, and to a host of specialized equipment, from laser printers to scanners to databases storing millions of customer records. Within this state-of-the-art system is an 18th century bottleneck—the computer keyboard.

The computer keyboard is simply a transplanted typewriter keyboard, the same keyboard that has been used since the 1870s. The first practical modern typewriter was patented in 1868 by Christopher Sholes, who invented the device with partners S. W. Soule and G. Glidden.

When Sholes invented the first typewriter, keys were arranged alphabetically (vestiges of this arrangement can be seen on the second row of keys—D F G H J K L). Printing bars were mechanically pushed against the paper by the pressure on the keys. Typists soon became proficient enough to cause jams as they typed faster than the mechanical bars could move.

Typewriter manufacturers went back to the drawing board and designed a new keyboard to slow typists down to speeds within the limits of the crude mechanism. The resulting keyboard is referred to as “QWERTY,” named for the first six keys of the top row. Keys were placed awkwardly to force slower typing. The “A”, for instance, one of the most frequently used keys, was placed under a typist’s left-hand little finger, the weakest finger on the hand. “E” requires an awkward reach using the middle finger of the left hand. Results were encouraging—typing speeds declined.

Today, mechanical keys have been replaced by electronic ones, but the keyboard arrangement has remained unchanged. While the arrangement of keys is familiar, it is far from efficient. In the 1930s, Washington State University Professor August Dvorak designed a better keyboard that groups the most frequently used letters on the home row and eliminates many awkward reaches. The Dvorak system is faster to learn, easier to type, less tiring, and less likely to cause errors than QWERTY. Using it increases typing speed by more than 20%. Yet the system never caught on—typists did not want to learn a new system when their typewriters all used QWERTY, and manufacturers did not want to produce Dvorak typewriters as long as typists used QWERTY.

lecture link 11-3

WEB SHOPPING SAFETY

E-Commerce is exploding. Whether you’re ordering a book from or downloading a tune from iTunes, online shopping is easy and convenient. But this convenience comes with a price. You don’t get to examine an item closely, and entering your credit-card number on an unknown site can take some courage.

According to Lauren Weinstein, co-founder of People for Internet Responsibility, “With the Internet, you don’t know if that flashy website you’re looking at is a multinational organization or some kid in a garage somewhere.” Even official seals of approval from TRUSTe, VeriSign, and the Better Business Bureau are no guarantee that you’re dealing with a reputable company. Those symbols can easily be reproduced, and they may not connect you as they should to the official sites of the certifying organization.

Scammers aren’t the only problem. Many high-volume brick-and-mortar retailers that operate online impose different policies for Web purchases than they do for purchases in the physical store. For example, you have fewer protections shopping at than at a Circuit city store.

A few tips to make online shopping safer:

1. Find the gotchas. A site’s “terms and conditions” detail the existing protections—for the retailer, that is. You might discover that you must abide by rules of a distant state, where you agree to go if you sue. At , the purchaser agrees to assume the risk of loss or damage to merchandise when the shipping firm picks it up, not after delivery. When Consumer Reports tested Internet shopping sites, nearly every one, including and , disclaimed “implied warranties,” unwritten assurances that products will work properly and last a reasonable amount of time.

2. Check return policies. Some sites charge restocking fees as high as 25%, and others don’t accept returns of opened merchandise. Consumer Reports found some smaller sites that wouldn’t even take returns of some defective products. Also, if you return items that came with free shipping, you probably will have to pay the cost for the return postage. Some retailers deduct the original free shipping charges from your refund or charge you for shipping costs even if the product is defective.

3. Guard your privacy and security. Read a site’s privacy policy. Some sites sell your customer data, which means you’ll get tons of spam. One suggestion is to set up an e-mail account exclusively for buying online. Most ISPs will let you set up multiple accounts. If not, services such as Hotmail and Yahoo! offer free e-mail service. For security, make sure that you see a security icon (such as a closed padlock) when you open the Web page. This indicates a secure connection for transmitting financial data, but doesn’t guarantee that the site is legitimate.

4. Pay with the right plastic. When you pay by credit card, your liability for unauthorized purchase is capped at $50. Credit cards also let you dispute charges for items that arrive broken or not as ordered. Debit cards may not cover fraudulent charges if you don’t act fast enough. Another suggestion is to investigate use of a “virtual” card number. Card issuers such as Citibank offer disposable numbers, which limit how much retailers can charge your account.

5. Don’t do business with a site if it doesn’t list the owner’s name, address, or phone number, or if it is full of spelling errors.

6. Use shopping-comparison sites such as and for ratings and user feedback on Web retailers.[ii]

lecture link 11-4

REVISING MOORE’S LAW

Sixty years after transistors were invented, the tiny on-off switches are starting to show their age. The devices have been shrunk so much that the day is approaching when it will be physically impossible to make them even smaller.

In the mid-1970s the chairman of Intel Corporation, Gordon E. Moore, predicted that the capacity of computer chips would double every year or so. This has since been called “Moore’s Law.” The million-dollar vacuum tube computers that awed people in the 1950s couldn’t keep up with a pocket calculator today. In fact, a greeting card that plays “Happy Birthday” contains more computing power than existed before 1950.

The transistor was invented by scientists William Shockley, John Bradeen, and Walter Brattain to amplify voices in telephones for a Bell Labs project, for which they later shared the Nobel Prize in physics. Transistors’ ever-decreasing size and low power consumption made them an ideal candidate to replace the bulky vacuum tubes then used to amplify electrical signals. Transistors eventually found their way into portable radios and other electronics devices and became the foundation of microprocessors, memory chips, and other semiconductor devices.

The pace of innovation gained further momentum after the invention of the integrated circuit in the late 1950s. The integrated circuit was invented by Texas Instruments’ Jack Kilby and future Intel co-founder Robert Noyce.

The number of transistors on microprocessors—the brains of computers—has leaped from just several thousand in the 1970s to nearly a billion today. Although Moore has qualified his capacity-doubling prediction in the last decade, he thinks the transistor is going to be around for a long time. “There have been ideas about how people are going to replace it,” he says, “but I don’t see anything coming along that would really replace the transistor.”

The density of transistors, however, is reaching the physical limits of the technology. Once chip makers can’t squeeze any more transistors into the same-sized slice of silicon, the dramatic performance gains and cost reductions could suddenly slow. One problem has been trying to prevent too much heat from escaping from thinner and thinner components. Chip companies are avidly looking for new materials and other ways to improve performance.

One solution has been pioneered by Intel and IBM. Their solution involves replacing the silicon dioxide used for more than 40 years as an insulator. Today, these silicon slivers have been shaved too thin, creating too much heat. The Intel/IBM solution is to replace the silicon with various metals in layers to create the “gate” that turns the transistor on and off. Other companies are looking for novel ways to prevent electricity leakage, improving efficiency. But no effective replacement is currently available. [iii]

lecture link 11-5

JOHN ATANASOFF’S COMPUTER

Dr. John Vincent Atanasoff built the first digital computer over half a century ago, but his contribution to computing was nearly lost to history. Atanasoff worked on his machine during the 1930s at Iowa State University. After hours of work one night in 1937, he found that he was stumped by a basic problem of electronic design. In exhaustion, Atanasoff drove 170 miles over the state line to a roadhouse in Illinois. (“There wasn’t any place to get a drink in Iowa,” he recalls.) In the Illinois tavern, he saw things from a new perspective and solved some of the thorny problems that had plagued him. The computer would be a digital device, unlike the analog devices that were then in use. It would use vacuum tubes and have an on-off configuration. The computer would also have memory and be based on the base-two number system. Finally, it would have a “jogging” function to refresh the computer memory and prevent loss of information.

With his assistant, Clifford Berry, Atanasoff finally built his machine—the “ABC” (Atanasoff Berry Calculator). Atanasoff signed over his rights to the invention to the Iowa State College Research Foundation in exchange for a $5,330 grant, assuming that the college would patent the invention. World War II intervened, however, and no one followed up. Later, personnel in charge apparently did not realize the significance of the device, and no patent was ever obtained.

Meanwhile, Drs. John Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert of the Moore School of Electrical Engineering at University of Pennsylvania were working on a computing machine for the U.S. Army. ENIAC, the machine they developed, was completed in 1946 and has been widely referred to as the first modern computer. They applied for and received two patents, one for ENIAC and one for the “jogging” memory function they used. Mauchly and Eckert assigned their patents to the Sperry Rand Corporation, for which they later went to work. Sperry collected royalties from other computer companies for all computers using the technology developed in ENIAC, which, over the years, has been estimated to total over $1 billion.

It was not until 1967 that another computer company, Control Data Corporation, found an obscure reference to Atanasoff’s machine. CDC, along with several other companies, sued and won release from the royalties, largely on the basis of Dr. Atanasoff’s testimony. The court ruled that the patents had wrongly been issued and that the original theory was Dr. Atanasoff’s. However, neither Iowa State nor Atanasoff has received any financial reward from the decision.

lecture link 11-6

E-MAIL NEVER GOES AWAY

When it comes to the Internet, nothing is ever really forgotten and everything leaves a trail. This can be good or bad for business. These data trails can be used by companies to discover who has been stealing their trade secrets—or to bust you if you are the thief. They can show who is working and who is goofing off. They can tell vendors who their online customers are and allow them to make better decisions and more money. This information is extraordinarily valuable, and there are laws that require companies to produce it, and do it right now.

In the pre-Enron, pre-WorldCom, pre-Tyco days, the legal rules for retaining communication records said only that a company had to be consistent. A company couldn’t, for example, keep all e-mails except those having to do with a hostile takeover or a case under litigation. If the company’s policy was to erase all old e-mails once a year or once a month, that was okay, as long as the policy was in writing and was strictly followed. Enron, for example, wiped its e-mail slate clean every 72 hours, which is hardly a surprise.

Today the rules have changed. Public and many private companies have to keep a copy of written communication of every type (letters, e-mails, even Internet instant messages) for up to seven years. These copies have to be kept in a form that allows their authenticity to be verified, whatever that means. Not only that, but companies must keep a second copy of every message in a different location in case of fire or natural disaster. The second copies must be on nonerasable storage media, such as optical disks. And if the SEC asks you to provide a copy of any given document or every given document, you have until close of business today to do it.

If the organization is a health care organization, an insurance company, or even a human resources department, the rules are even stricter. If a client asks for a list of every person or organization who has shared his or her medical records, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) requires that the organization provide that list - on the spot.

Companies that aren’t public, don’t engage in health care, or have no human resources department aren’t off the hook, because these requirements are becoming the accepted standards for all companies. If companies still dump e-mail every 72 hours and end up in court, they are effectively guilty as charged. Currently penalties for noncompliance are mild, but will get stronger in the future, right up to sending people to jail. New SEC regulations, for example, hold the CEO personally responsible for record retention, meaning he or she, not some nerd in the computer room, will be doing time. Then there are the civil penalties that will come from the inevitable lawsuits.

Every hospital and clinic in America is vulnerable, because they are all in violation. Most companies don’t have the technology to comply with laws already on the books, much less the even stricter ones likely to follow. Faced with the huge costs of complying with the SEC regulations, many companies might be tempted to just take the fine—except for that little part about the CEO going to jail.[iv]

lecture link 11-7

E-MAIL RULES

The most-used Internet application by volume is e-mail. Although e-mail has become a necessary part of our modern lives, it is often misused.

In your early education, you were taught how to write a letter. You probably learned how to write business and casual headings and salutations, state your purpose, make a request, ask for a response, and wrap it up with “Sincerely yours.”

But an e-mail is not a letter, and the days of graceful formal communication are fading away. Short is in, “yours truly” is out. Some guidelines:

Keep It Short. Short e-mails get attention. If you receive an e-mail that’s several pages long, you have to make some decisions. Do I have time to handle this now? Is it important enough to come back to? If the answer is “no,” that e-mail won’t be read, no matter how carefully written. Supporting material can be sent as an attachment, but give the reader a clear, concise message in the e-mail body.

Keep It in Context. Our inboxes are flooded with dozens of legitimate messages each day, not to mention the mountains of spam that may or may not get through spam filters. When you send a message to someone you don’t usually communicate with, include some mention of your identity. “I met you at the conference last week” or “Jim suggested I contact you regarding this issue.” If you are responding to an earlier message, include the previous thread. Nothing is as confusing as an e-mail saying, “What do you mean?” or “Not really” when you have no idea what you’re supposed to understand.

Give It a Subject. The subject line is there for a reason. It tells your recipients what you want to communicate. Some very important e-mails get overlooked with blank subject lines or topics like “Important” or “RE: RE: RE: RE: RE:” If the topic changes, change the subject line. Remember that on the recipients’ screens, your subject competes with a large number of others for their attention.

Keep the Thread. Some e-mail users routinely trim everything out of the body of the e-mail except their replies. Don’t do this. For example, if you are responding to a request for an opinion, don’t just say “I agree” and cut out the thread. Let your reader browse through the background for your response. A slightly longer e-mail isn’t going to bog down the server—the thousands of spam messages are doing that just fine.

Make Your Requests Clear. You should set your requests apart from the rest of the message by trimming them down to one sentence or series of bullet points. Close-ended questions (yes or no) are more readily answered. Open-ended questions can get long and involved, and reduce the likelihood that you’ll get a reply.

Don’t Be Afraid of Deadlines. If you need the information by Friday, let the reader know. Then if they see that they can’t meet the timetable, they can let you know in time for you to find another source. If you’ve requested something that has not been delivered, it is acceptable to send a cordially-worded reminder. But just one. Daily reminders suggest to recipients that they’re being bossed around. They may be too busy, away on vacation, or actually working on your last request.

Remember to Say “Thank You.” Not only is it polite, but it also lets the sender know you’ve received the message and gives the subject closure. Remember, you’ll probably need their good will at some time in the future.

lecture link 11-8

PASSWORD OVERLOAD

Using a password can protect information and improve security. Using multiple passwords, paradoxically, can make data less secure.

PricewaterhouseCoopers, a consulting firm, conducted a study for the British Department of Trade and Industry to estimate the cost of security breaches from computer viruses, spyware, hacker attacks, and equipment theft. They found that these breaches cost British industry $18 billion in 2005.

One concern for security is the increasing number of user IDs/passwords that employees must deal with. The study found that employees have to remember three different user IDs/passwords on average. Two percent had to recall ten different IDs.

The more IDs and passwords that users have to remember, the more likely the business is to have unauthorized access. The human memory is not programmed to remember this many numbers, letters, and combinations. Users are more likely to choose passwords that are personally memorable—pet names, birthdays, hometowns—terms that are easier for hackers to guess.[v]

lecture link 11-9

CYBERTHIEVES ARE WINNING

The loss or theft of personal data such as credit card and Social Security numbers soared to unprecedented levels in 2007. That trend isn’t expected to turn around anytime soon as hackers stay a step ahead of security and laptops disappear with sensitive information. And while companies, government agencies, schools, and other institutions are spending more to protect ever-increasing volumes of data with more sophisticated firewalls and encryption, the investment often is too little too late.

Linda Foley founded the San Diego-based Identity Theft Resource Center after becoming an identity theft victim herself. Foley’s group, which tracks security and data breaches, found a nearly fourfold increase from 2006 to 2007.

Another group, , estimates more than 162 million records were compromised in 2007, both in the U.S. and overseas. (Identity Theft Resource tracks only U.S. transactions.) estimated that 94 million records were exposed in a theft of credit card data at TJX Cos., the owner of discount stores including T.J. Maxx and Marshalls. The TJX breach accounts for more than half the security lapses reported by both tracking companies.

The TJX breach is believed to have started when hackers intercepted wireless transfers of customer information at two Marshalls stores in Miami—an entry point that led the hackers to eventually break into TJX’s central databases. TJX has said that before the breach, which was revealed in January 2007, it invested “millions of dollars on computer security, and believes our security was comparable to many major retailers.” With wireless data transmission more common, hackers increasingly are targeting this conduit as a major vulnerability.

and the Identity Theft Resource Center are the only groups, government included, maintaining databases on breaches and trends each year. They have been keeping track for only a handful of years, and methods of learning about breaches are still evolving.

Both groups say that many breaches may be missing from their lists, because they largely count incidents reported in news media that they consider credible. Media coverage has risen in part because of the growing number of states requiring businesses and institutions to publicly disclose data losses. Thirty-seven states, plus Washington D.C., now have such requirements. [vi]

Bonus Internet exercises[vii]

Bonus Internet Exercise 11-1

ONLINE EDUCATION

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is one of several elite schools that are now putting their course materials online. The MIT initiative, called OpenCourseWare, makes virtually all the school’s courses available online for free.

Go to the M.I.T. OpenCourseWare website (). Choose one of the classes available, open the course’s web page, and research the course.

1. Go to the course syllabus and summarize the course description.

2. What are the requirements for the course?

3. What text is used for the course? Also list any suggested readings.

4. Do you think you would learn as much through an online course as you would through a live lecture course? Why or why not?

Bonus Internet Exercise 11-2

SPAM STATISTICS

A growing problem with electronic communication over the Internet is spam, unwanted e-mail messages. The percentage of spam for most consumers is over 75%. In late 2007 the Internet security firm Postini found that 87% of e-mail messages were spam.

Go to Postini’s website () and find the statistics in the online resource center. (Sometimes the web address for a location changes. You might need to search to find the exact location mentioned.)

1. How many e-mail messages were processed in the last 24 hours? What percentage of these messages was spam?

2. How do spammers get your e-mail addresses?

3. Postini’s resource center also tracks the number of messages that contain viruses, malicious worms, and Trojan horses. In the last 24 hours, what percentage of e-mail messages were virus infected?

4. Do you think that spam is a real problem for organizations? Why or why not? Will spam change American business reliance on e-mail communication in the future?

Bonus cases

Bonus case 11-1

RESCUING TULANE

Hurricane Katrina swept through New Orleans in August 2005, flooding 80% of the city and two-thirds of the Tulane campus. School president Scott Cowen rode out the storm on an air mattress in the weight room of the school’s Rec Center and woke up to see water surging across the campus. Cowen’s escape from his flooded campus required, in order, a commandeered boat, a hot-wired golf car, a “borrowed” dump truck, and a helicopter donated by a rich alum. He and his executive team, along with their families and pets, set up shop in a Houston hotel to begin the task of planning Tulane’s comeback.

Most crises that beset an organization affect only one part. A trucking strike may delay one component of a product, but there should be alternative distribution methods available. Katrina was an assault on all fronts at once. Tulane had no functioning IT infrastructure, no way to communicate with its 12,500 students and 6,000 employees, no way to even assess the damage. Some of the staff had no homes, clothes, or news of relatives.

Cowen put in place a triage system. There were a million things to consider, but Cowen started the daily meeting by focusing on the top five things that really needed doing that day. The first order of business was to retrieve the school’s IT files from the 14th floor of a downtown New Orleans building with massive flooding, no working elevators, and chaotic surroundings. A group of Tulane employees, escorted by police officers, spent hours lugging the disks down dark stairways.

The school’s first priority was to figure out how to pay staffers and faculty, many of whom had been displaced and needed the money right away. “If we didn’t make payroll, everyone would have thought we were gone,” said Cowen.

Finding the missing employees was the next step, and for that, Cowen reached out to alumnus David Filo, cofounder of Yahoo!, for help. Filo donated manpower and web-hosting resources and created a makeshift website to locate and communicate with displaced workers.

To reopen classes, the school had to figure out how to attract students to a ruined city. To meet the housing shortage, Cowen leased an Israeli-based cruise ship to use as a dorm. Realizing that professors wouldn’t come back if they didn’t have schools for their own kids, Cowen budgeted $1.5 million to charter a local school for the children of Tulane faculty.

Gradually, crisis management segued into strategic planning. The school would have to focus its resources on its core mission and reduce commitments to other areas. In November, the school laid off 243 full-time staffers, including tenured faculty. Virtually every area was affected, including the fund-raising department and the medical school, whose faculty and staff were cut by 30%.

Then Cowen announced the school’s Renewal Plan. Tulane would more narrowly focus on the undergraduate school, which Cowen believed to be the school’s main strength. Entry into many doctoral programs was suspended. Tulane pledged to focus its efforts in “areas where it has attained, or has the potential to achieve, world-class excellence … and suspend admission to those programs that do not meet these criteria.” Cowen presented the plan to Tulane’s board of trustees, asking them to approve or reject the plan as a whole. It passed unanimously.

In January, 2006, the campus reopened. Cowen greeted returning students to campus accompanied by the Liberty Brass Band. His bold strategic plan seems to have worked. Almost 92% of undergraduates returned for the spring 2006 semester.[viii]

discussion questions for BONUS case 11-1

1. FROM THE DISASTER, TULANE HAS NOW IDENTIFIED A NEW WAY OF DOING BUSINESS. WHAT HAPPENED IN THIS EVALUATION PROCESS THAT CHANGED THE COURSE OF HOW THE SCHOOL CURRENTLY FUNCTIONS?

2. How is crisis management similar to strategic management? How is it different?

3. How was communication technology used to begin the process of contacting its students and employees?

4. How was Cowen able to think of the needs of others during this tumultuous series of events? What does that say about his leadership skills?

answers to discussion questions for BONUS case 11-1

1. FROM THE DISASTER, TULANE HAS NOW IDENTIFIED A NEW WAY OF DOING BUSINESS. WHAT HAPPENED IN THIS EVALUATION PROCESS THAT CHANGED THE COURSE OF HOW THE SCHOOL CURRENTLY FUNCTIONS?

Cowen was able to look at his total operation for what it is and how each part contributes to the core business mission and vision. As he made this evaluation, Cowen was then better able to place the greatest emphasis on the school’s core mission and to let go of the other components that he did not think were essential to the college under these new conditions.

2. How is crisis management similar to strategic management? How is it different?

Crisis management is an intensive version of strategic planning in that the timelines and potential outcomes are far greater and impactful in the short term. It relies on a keen sense of how decision making has to be more exact in the process. Normal strategic planning has a greater set of circumstances to consider and allows for more adjusting from the long term planning as way to keep on course.

3. How was communication technology used to begin the process of contacting its students and employees?

The first order of business was to contact students and employees. Retrieval of IT files was the first order of business to begin the rebuilding process. Communication with the Tulane family was reestablished in this manner.

4. How was Cowen able to think of the needs of others during this tumultuous series of events? What does that say about his leadership skills?

Cowen was in touch with how disasters affect individuals who have fewer resources. He took that into consideration as he made thoughtful choices regarding how he would redevelop his school in this short period of decision making. Cowen exhibited tremendous leadership skills as he pulled the necessary resources together to keep his staff and students connected. He understood how much the staff needed students to return to school and how much the students needed to be reconnected to the staff through their experiences at Tulane University.

Bonus case 11-2

DENVER HEALTH SYSTEMS

If you ever have the misfortune to suffer a health crisis known as diabetic ketoacidosis, a critical state of severe high blood sugar, Denver Health hospital is one of the best places in the country to get care. But it’s not the doctors who will prove so invaluable, it’s the networked computers sitting in each room. The computers know every prescription and treatment a diabetic patient has received at the hospital or one of its clinics, and can tell the doctor or nurse precisely how to treat the disease—the blood tests, insulin, and balance of electrolytes the patient desperately needs. The hospital recently studied the effectiveness of such standardized, computer-aided treatment, and concluded that the length of patient stays had been reduced by 35%.

Denver Health offers a prime example of how technology can heal America’s ailing health-care system. The community health-care network, with a 500-bed hospital and nine family-health centers in Denver’s lower-income neighborhoods, doesn’t turn anyone away. More than 40% of its patients don’t have insurance and can’t pay for their care, which costs the institution almost $300 million annually. The hospital has responded to that challenge over the last decade by embracing efficiency-improving, high-tech systems, like electronic medical records and billing systems. Since 1997 it has spent $259 million (out of a $420 million annual operating budget) on IT, putting a computer in each office and treatment room, so doctors and nurses can see a patient’s lifetime medical history and get quick access to medical references. Such widespread computerized care places Denver Health on the front lines of America’s drive to drag health care into the high-tech age.

Like many public-health institutions in the 1990s, Denver Health was on rocky financial footing. Longtime Denver Health physician Patricia Gabow took over as CEO in 1992, and though she describes herself as computer illiterate, she recognized that a prescription of high technology might be just what the doctor ordered. The hospital instituted a billing system that automatically checked state records to see if a patient had Medicaid or private insurance, which instantly saved millions annually. It also began scanning paper medical records and making them available on hospital computers.

Inspired by early success, the hospital got more ambitious. In 1999 it was one of the first hospitals to buy, from German technology company Siemens, a system called Lifetime Clinical Records, which provides online access to all the details of a patient’s checkups and treatment in the Denver Health system. Three years later the hospital began cautiously rolling out Computerized Physician Order Entry (CPOE), which put computers in each treatment room and turned them into the nexus of patient care. Instead of scribbling illegibly onto a notepad, doctors typed prescriptions and treatment orders directly into the computer. For ailments like diabetic ketoacidosis, they also created standard protocols so nurses or residents could treat patients quickly and efficiently.

Other health-care institutions have rejected or postponed such changes, often because doctors don’t have the time to invest in learning the new technology. Denver Health overcame bureaucratic obstacles by appointing a high-ranking doctor or nurse as “clinician champion” in each department, in charge of introducing the system. The hospital also moved slowly. It introduced CPOE to the intensive-care unit and worked to perfect the system there for 18 months before moving it to surgery and, more recently, to the rest of the hospital and its clinics.

discussion questions for BONUS case 11-2

1. DO YOU THINK THAT A COMPUTERIZED TREATMENT SYSTEM SUCH AS THE ONE AT DENVER HEALTH WOULD LIMIT A PHYSICIAN’S ABILITY TO DIAGNOSE AND TREAT EACH PATIENT AS AN INDIVIDUAL? WHY OR WHY NOT?

2. What dangers do you see in using a system such as CPOE from a patient’s point of view?

3. What specific advantages do you see in using networked computers (CPOE) in hospitals?

4. What issues could you foresee arising from physician resistance to computerized systems like CPOE?

answers to discussion questions for BONUS case 11-2

1. DO YOU THINK THAT A COMPUTERIZED TREATMENT SYSTEM SUCH AS THE ONE AT DENVER HEALTH WOULD LIMIT A PHYSICIAN’S ABILITY TO DIAGNOSE AND TREAT EACH PATIENT AS AN INDIVIDUAL? WHY OR WHY NOT?

Probably not. The system would improve efficiency in obtaining patient information and would have no effect on a physician’s diagnostic skills, other than giving the doctor needed information quickly, which could only improve outcomes.

2. What dangers do you see in using a system such as CPOE from a patient’s point of view?

Confidentiality would have to be a priority. How secure is the interconnected network? Can others access confidential patient information? Other than this, there would be little danger to patients. The computerized system would only aid in communication of vital information. The danger would be in not implementing the system, slowing the response times for critical-need patients.

3. What specific advantages do you see in using networked computers (CPOE) in hospitals?

The first advantage would be speed of obtaining data. Others could include improved efficiency of communication. The infamous illegibility of physician handwriting would cease to be an issue. Increased productivity of health care professionals would save money as well as patient lives.

4. What issues could you foresee arising from physician resistance to computerized systems like CPOE?

Some physicians see their profession as being “hands on” and personal with their patients. They may feel that new technology removes the human factor. Also some are used to technology being handled by technicians and staff and may feel that using technology would be beneath their professional status.

Bonus case 11-3

CELL PHONE PRIVACY

In his unsuccessful 2004 campaign for President, General Wesley Clark campaigned as a strong supporter of national security. But he soon discovered a breach in his personal security. A resourceful blogger, hoping to call attention to the black market in phone records, purchased the records of 100 cell phone calls that Clark had made, no questions asked. The query cost $89.95.

Clark is not the only one who has had their private phone calls revealed. To test one of the online services, , the FBI paid the company $160 to buy the records for an agent’s cell phone. They received the list within three hours.

The tiny cell phone has become a mainstream tool. About 65% of the U.S. population owns at least one cell phone. But few safeguards are in place to protect customers’ information. Online cell phone information sites can obtain information about who your physician is, whether you are seeing a psychiatrist, how often you are calling that special “friend,” and what companies you do business with. Such records could also be used by divorce attorneys and by criminals, such as stalkers or abusive spouses.

Data brokers who sell cell phone records probably get them using one of three techniques. They might have someone inside the cell phone carrier who sells the data. The brokers also use “pretexting,” in which the data broker or investigator pretends to be the cell phone account holder and persuades the carrier’s employees to release the information. Finally, brokers can try to get access to consumer accounts online. Telephone companies are now encouraging their customers to manage their accounts over the Internet. The companies will typically set up the online service in advance, waiting to be activated by the user. If the data broker can figure out how to activate online accounts in the name of a real customer before that customer does, the call records are there for the taking.

The latest of these wireless phones have Internet access, digital cameras, and precision satellite location tracking. This leads to another area of concern—the use of the location tracking feature to watch a user’s movements. One technology allows rental-car companies to track their cars with GPS. Another application lets a manager track how workers use company-issued cell phones. Privacy advocates worry about the overall ability to gather vast databases tracking the movements of virtually every wireless phone user, even over long periods. Law enforcement agencies view this as a potential treasure trove. The potential for individuals to abuse the tracking technology is also real. In a recent case, a man was arrested for stalking after using a GPS/cellular system planted under the hood of his ex-girlfriend’s car.[ix]

discussion questions for BONUS case 11-3

1. SHOULD CELL PHONE DATA BROKERS BE ABLE TO SELL USERS’ RECORDS? WHY OR WHY NOT?

2. Does this practice violate your privacy? Explain.

3. Are the data brokers’ actions legal? Ethical? Why?

answers to discussion questions for BONUS case 11-3

1. SHOULD CELL PHONE DATA BROKERS BE ABLE TO SELL USERS’ RECORDS? WHY OR WHY NOT?

Most cell phone users will shout “No.” However, the legal foundation is less clear.

2. Does this practice violate your privacy? Explain.

Probably. What price would students be willing to pay to protect privacy?

3. Are the data brokers’ actions legal? Ethical? Why?

Legal, technically. Ethically, probably not. How do students define “ethical” in this situation?

Endnotes

-----------------------

[i] Source: Arlyn Tobias Gajilan, “History: We’re Losing It,” Newsweek, July 12, 1999; Fred Moore, “Digital Data’s Future—You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet!” Computer Technology Review, October 1, 2000; and Charles Arthur, “The End of History;” The Independent, June 30, 2003.

[ii] Source: “Web Shopping: 4 Ways to Protect Yourself,” Consumer Reports, May 2006; “One in Four Credit Reports Contain Serious Mistakes,” The Associated Press, The Clarion-Ledger, June 20, 2004; “Prevent Identity Theft by Avoiding These Seven Common Mistakes,” , May 17, 2007; “CR Investigates: The End of Privacy?” Consumer Reports, June 2006; “CR Investigates: Your Privacy for Sale,” Consumer Reports, June 2006; and Identity Theft Center, , February 14, 2007.

[iii] Source: Joran Robertson, “Chip-Shrinking May Be Nearing Its Limits,” Yahoo News/Associated Press, December 15, 2007.

[iv] Source: Robert X. Cringely, “What’s Next: Data Disasters,” Inc. Magazine, November 2003, page 47.

[v] Source: “Password Overload Hurts Security, Survey Finds,” Reuters/, April 25, 2006.

[vi] Sources: Mark Jewell, “Computer Breaches Hit All-Time High in 2007,” The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, December 31, 2007; and Byron Acohido, “Cyberthieves Stole 1.3 Million Names,” USA Today, August 24, 2007.

[vii] The Internet is a dynamic, changing information source. Web links noted in this manual were checked at the time of publication, but content may change over time. Please review the website before recommending it to your students.

[viii] Sources: Jennifer Reingold, “The Storm After the Storm,” Fast Company, April 2006; Shannon Mortland, “Tulane Leader Looks to Regroup after Katrina,” Crain’s Cleveland Business, September 19, 2005; Tommy Santora, “Interview with Scott Cowen, President of Tulane,” New Orleans CityBusiness, January 9, 2006.

[ix] Sources: Lauren Weinstein, “Tiny Cell Phone or Big Brother?” Associate Press, cited by , January 6, 2003; Jonathan Krim, “Online Data Gets Personal: Cell Phone Records for Sale, The Washington Post, July 8, 2005; Bob Sullivan, “Can We Stop The Sale Of Cell Phone Records?” January 17, 2006, ; Frank Main, “Your Phone Records Are For Sale,” , January 5, 2006; Kristina Dell, “The Spy in Your Pocket,” Time, March 27, 2006; Paul Carrier, “State to Ban Sale of Phone Records,” Portland Press Herald, April 1, 2006; and Tom Sowa, “Measure Protects Phone Records: Bill Makes Web Sale of Cell Data a Crime,” The Spokesman-Review, Februw, February 7, 2006.

-----------------------

11

Chapter

►

►

►

►

►

►

►

►

................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download