Reference no: EM133524988 , Length: word count:2500

Leveraging IT for Business Advantage

Assessment - Research Proposal

Students will be expected to write a research proposal on a specific topic in Information Technology. A student will be required to conduct research in regards to their assigned topic and present his/her idea or question and expected outcomes with clarity and definition.

LO 1. Critically evaluate how technology can enable an organisation's core business processes and support the strategic goals.

LO 2. Analyse and comprehend the issues that arise with the acquisition and adoption of technology and recommend possible solutions.

LO 3. Critically evaluate the ways in which information technology can contribute to organisational innovation, efficiency and overall corporate performance.

LO 4. Critically analyse and evaluate the key issues, challenges and opportunities associated with the latest developments in Information Systems.

Assignment 1 Research Proposal

Objectives

This assessment item relates to the unit learning outcomes as in the unit descriptor. This assessment is designed to improve student learning skills and to give students experience in researching the literature on a topic relevant to the Unit of Study subject matter, critically analysing current academic papers then presenting idea or question and expected outcomes with clarity and definition in a referenced written report.

Instructions

For this component you will write a research proposal on a particular topic. The topic you select must be directly relevant to IT in Business. Your topic must include a specific information technology and a specific business application, e.g., AI For fraud detection.

All students must have a different topic. Students can choose to write about the same technology, but the approach and the thrust of each paper must be different. For instance, you could look at cloud computing from a security viewpoint, or from an environment impact viewpoint, or from the perspective of a manager trying to reduce their hardware costs. There will be many perspectives to look at each technology and its relation to Business IT.

To ensure this uniqueness, each student must email their topic and title to their tutor within the first two weeks. Your tutor will respond with an approval or with a message that you will either need to choose a different technology or to change the thrust of your paper. Once it has been approved you should begin by working towards the first deliverable.

Note: It is important to realize, that you must have prior approval for a topic before you can submit. If you submit something for assessment without approval for the specific topic, it will not be graded. Once you have a topic approved, you cannot change it without consent from your subject lecturer.

The Key elements of the research proposal

The following elements must be included in your research proposal:
1. Introduction or background to the research problem or issue, including an identification of the gap in the current research
2. Research question and, if possible, a thesis statement answering the question
3. Justification for the proposal research, i.e., why the research is needed
4. Preliminary literature review covering what others have already done in the area
5. Theoretical framework to be used in the proposed research
6. Statement of the contribution of the research to the general area
7. Proposed research methodology
8. Research plan and outline
9. Timetable of proposed research
10. List of references used in preparing the proposal

List of Research topics
Research topics sourced from Lecture 2

1. Application of digital business models by:
• Financial institutions
• On-line retail business
• Government agencies for business advantage

2. How businesses can leverage disruptive technologies for competitive advantage. Choose a particular business field.

3. Social media as a driving force for democratisation and how business can take advantage of it for competitive advantage.

4. Use of social media for collaboration, marketing, management, human resources, productivity. Focus on a business field or industry.

5. Social media features that businesses can leverage to their advantage. Focus on a business field or industry.

6. Ways in which a business can leverage online communities for competitive advantage. Focus on a business field or industry.

7. What is the network effect, and how can a business leverage network effect for competitive advantage? Focus on a business field or industry.

8. Ways in which a business can leverage enterprise mashup technology for competitive advantage. Focus on a business field or industry.

9. Ways in which a business can use social monitoring services to improve its competitive advantage. Focus on a business field or industry.

Research topics sourced from Lecture 3

10. Research the advantages that cloud computing technology has over the traditional infrastructure model.

11. Explain the three main cloud delivery models. Select one model and research how a particular business can leverage it for business advantage.

12. Explain the four main cloud deployment model. Select one deployment model and research how a particular business or industry can leverage it for business advantage.

13. Select a business that uses cloud computing technologies and research some of the main issues and challenges it faces such as cloud computing security and Ethical issues arising from the use of cloud computing.

Research topics sourced from Lecture 4

14. Research the main advantages that enterprise systems have over traditional types of information systems.

15. Select a business type or category and research how it can leverage supply chain management system for business advantage.

16. Select a business type or category and research how it can leverage a customer relationship management system for business advantage.

17. Select a business type or category and research how it can leverage an enterprise resource planning system for business advantage.

Research topics sourced from Lecture 5

18. Select a business in the retail industry. Research how retail industry drives e-commerce in the chosen business in terms of how it conducts business-to-business, business-to- consumer and business-to-employee transactions.

19. Select an online retail business. Research its sell-side and buy-side ecommerce transaction activities and how it leverages various ecommerce technologies for competitive advantage.

20. Select a small to medium size business. Research how it overcomes its e-commerce challenges of cyber security, competition, order-fulfillment, customer experience, website development and visibility and so on.

21. Select a business that utilises e-commerce. Research how it is leveraging mobile- commerce (M-Commerce) to enhance its e-commerce activities and become more competitive.

22. Social commerce refers to e-commerce transactions delivered via social media. Select a business that utilises e-commerce and research ways in which social commerce is enhancing its e-commerce activities and making it more competitive.

23. Select a business that uses e-commerce and social commerce. Research some of the security threats and challenges it faces and how it overcomes them.

Research topics sourced from Lecture 6

24. Select a government that you are familiar with. Research the types of cyber threats and attacks it has encountered, the consequences of those threats and attacks, the sources of those and the subsequent cybersecurity measures it took to overcome them.

25. Select a health care system that you are familiar with. Research the types of cyber
threats and attacks it has encountered, the consequences of those threats and attacks, the sources of those and the subsequent cybersecurity measures it took to overcome them.

26. Select an education system that you are familiar with. Research the types of cyber threats and attacks it has encountered, the consequences of those threats and attacks, the sources of those and the subsequent cybersecurity measures it took to overcome them.

27. Research a number of organisations that have experienced cyberattacks. Identify the type according to whether it is one of the following crimeware (Spyware, adware, malware or ransomware) and identify the attack vectors (the weak points in the system that allowed the attack to occur.)

28. Cyberattacks can be carried out against critical infrastructure such as government facilities, emergency services, water and wastewater, transportation, health care services

etc. Research a government you are familiar with and study how such cyberattacks had a negative impact on national security, economic security, health care security and so on.