Management Information System Project Essay

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT First of all, I am thankful to God, because without him nothing would be possible. Without him, I would not have the strength and vigor to complete this project. I am also thankful to the lecturer, Mrs. Merlene Senior, for giving us this project to do and challenging us with it, and using it to help us increase our knowledge and to understand Management Information System to a further dept. INTRODUCTION Juici Patties started in 1980, by Jukie Chin, as a cottage industry. It was manufactured in his mother’s kitchen and sold in the family’s small grocery store. The demand for Chin’s product soon started to grow and grow steadily each day, which then lead him to establish the first Juici Patties Store in May Pen, Clarendon. The staff included one baker, a cashier, and Juckie, playing more than role. Juici’s men grew to include over fifty products comprising of different types of patties (chicken, shrimp, lobster, cheese and many more), soups ( red peas, chicken, beef, many more), porridges( peanut, cornmeal harmony, and etc.), and traditional Jamaican Breakfast dishes ( ackee n saltfish, green bananas, dumplings, stew chicken, liver, callaloo, many more). Juici became one of the most popular restaurants in Jamaica, because it offered Jamaicans â€Å"Homemade traditional dishes in comfortable and clean surroundings. This is reflected in their mission statement, which is â€Å"We are committed to providing excellent service by serving authentic Jamaican food at affordable prices in clean and comfortable surroundings.† The company itself has grown over the years from a single store in May Pen, Clarendon to having another manufacturing plant in Clarendon Park, Clarendon. This plant sat on 22 acres of land and had a retail outlet with a drive thru, a 24hr public restroom, furniture and welding manufacturing section (which made furniture for the different Juici outlets). The company also went on to acquire another manufacturing plant in Canada. This plant is HACCP (Hazard analysis and critical control points) certified and services Juici’s North American market. Its development has also included the use of MIS and/or Enterprise Applications used in its business techniques and practices in its day to day operations to improve its business processes for the benefit of its customers, staff and shareholders and communities in which it operates. This project will state the type of MIS or enterprise application currently in use by Juici, how it benefits them and also gives recommendations of the use of types and other changes Juici can make to further improve their system and increase profits even more. This project will also give some brief information about Juici such as what type of organization it, the organizational structure, and who the competition is/are. In order to expand, Jukie formed partnership with four of his closest friends, in various combinations. Juici then became a franchise (A franchise, according to http://business-law.freeadvice.com, is a franchise business is a business in which the owners, or franchisers, sell the rights to their business logo and model to third parties, called franchisees). After this Juici Patties spread to locations such as Kingston and St. Andrew and St. James. In 2001, it further spread to Falmouth, Trelawney and increasing the total number of outlets at the time to 34 and making Juici Patties the only chain of restaurant, at the time, to have its services in all fourteen parishes of Jamaica. There is a total of 50 stores islandwide, a few international outlets in North America, and a manufacturing plant in Canada. (Barness, 2005) – Founder of Juici Patties, Jukie Chin. NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES Juici started with only 3 employees (a baker, a cashier, and Juckie) and now has an excess of over 1500 employees islandwide. Juici is considered to have a strong family bond as all or most of the early employees literally grew up with Juckie and stayed with the company for many years, especially in Clarendon, where it all started. The positions now available at Juici range from Accountant to Human Resource Manager to Food Server to even furniture maker (in the wood work department). Juici offers his employees a comfortable work environment and good benefits and remuneration packages. COMPETITORS Juici Patties can be seen as one of the biggest patty companies in Jamaica with its main competition being Tastee Patties. This other patty phenomenal entity was established in the 1960’s by Vincent Chang. Tastee Patties is also seen as one of the top patty distributers in Jamaica and can be found in numerous locations islandwide and internally (North America). Tastee currently employees over 800 individuals nationwide and also offers its employees a family oriented, comfortable, and secure work environment. Tastee also sources the beef that is used to make their delicious patties, via their own slaughter houses. Tastee, like Juici, also offers a variety of products such as patties (beef, chicken, shrimp, etc.), soups, porridges, and traditional Jamaican dishes such as ackee and saltfish and green banana and dumpling. Tastee Patties Logo MANAGEMENT STRUCTURE Branch Offices: Floor Manager: Manages the staff that gives services to customers, and allocates the duties of opening and closing the restaurant. The floor manager also makes sure the employees follow the food safety laws and regulations and looks after the staff which makes the work force stronger and more profitable. Kitchen Manager: Manages the staff that works in the kitchen and the kitchen is seen as the most important part of the business as this is where the products are made that attracts the customers. Restaurant Manager: The head of the floor manager, kitchen manager and all employees in the outlet he/she is assigned to. This person also takes all counter reports from frontline employees and checks and sends it to the head office. Frontline Employees: Takes the orders and serve and deal with the customers and at the end of the day count per product sale amount and total amount of sales. Juici Patties current MIS/ Enterprise Application in use are: Paper-Based System: Advantages of a paper-based system- * Easy handling: As paper is physical by nature and therefore tangible and visible, a person who need not have any knowledge of computers to handle and work with paper-based documents. Such documents can be stored systematically in files, folders, cabinets etc. * Reproduction: You can copy a document by using a photocopier machine. * Recognized and required by law: Paper-based document originals are recognized by law as being ‘official’ and can be produced as evidence in court. In fact, the law may even require you to have certain documents only in paper format for them to be considered valid. Disadvantages of having a paper-based system- * Storage space: As paper is by nature physical, it takes up a lot of storage space. With its limited resources, a small business may not be able to afford to rent or purchase storage space onsite or offsite. * Recurring cost of supplies: If you store most of your documents in paper form, you need to keep purchasing several packs of blank paper every month for varying needs: photocopying, printing, fax paper, writing pads, invoice books, accounting books etc. Add to it the cost of other stationery items and you begin to wonder if there is a better alternative to the paper-based system of managing documents. * Limited mobility: No doubt you can courier or fax a paper-based document, but how can it match up to email or sending it as an attachment to an instant message? * Editing messy: Editing a typed or handwritten document will leave marks on paper. Also, the only way to preserve the pre-edited copy is to make a photocopy before editing it. This process has to be repeated every time you edit or revise the document. All it does is add more copies to your paper archive and leave the original document in bad shape. * Collaboration difficult: If your firm’s departmental heads in different corners of the office want to collaborate on a paper document, an assistant will first have to make copies of the document and distribute them. Then each head will have to make notes. To be able to see each other’s notes, they will need to gather anyway for a meeting before they finalize the action plan. Compare this with an electronic document management system where you can simply share the document (grant access to it) with your departmental heads; each of them can add their notes and save the document. The document can then be seen by all with everyone’s notes on it. A face-to-face meeting is not required, thereby saving the time of your busy senior executives. * Vulnerable to damage: As paper is exposed to wear and tear through frequent handling, exposure to adverse weather conditions etc., a document management system that is purely paper-based is not a stable one. In the event of a disaster, you could lose your documents as they may not be backed up. Documents that are not in digital form cannot be backed up online. Supply chain management (SCM) Supply chain management (SCM) is the combination of art and science that goes into improving the way a company (such as Juici Patties) finds the raw components( beef) it needs to make a product or service ( patty) and deliver it to customers. The following are five basic components of SCM. * Plan—this is the strategic portion of SCM. Companies need a strategy for managing all the resources that go toward meeting customer demand for their product or service. A big piece of SCM planning is developing a set of metrics to monitor the supply chain so that it is efficient, costs less and delivers high quality and value to customers. * Source—next, companies must choose suppliers to deliver the goods and services they need to create their product. Therefore, supply chain managers must develop a set of pricing, delivery and payment processes with suppliers and create metrics for monitoring and improving the relationships. And then, SCM managers can put together processes for managing their goods and services inventory, including receiving and verifying shipments, transferring them to the manufacturing facilities and authorizing supplier payments. * Make—this is the manufacturing step. Supply chain managers schedule the activities necessary for production, testing, packaging and preparation for delivery. This is the most metric-intensive portion of the supply chain—one where companies are able to measure quality levels, production output and worker productivity. * Deliver—this is the part that many SCM insiders refer to as logistics, where companies coordinate the receipt of orders from customers, develop a network of warehouses, pick carriers to get products to customers and set up an invoicing system to receive payments. * Return—this can be a problematic part of the supply chain for many companies. Supply chain planners have to create a responsive and flexible network for receiving defective and excess products back from their customers and supporting customers who have problems with delivered products. RESULTS Under their current system, Juici Patties has: * JUICI Patties has pumped more than US$60,000 (J$5.3 million) into â€Å"greening† its Clarendon operations, positioning itself to reap financial gains over the medium to long term while at the same time helping to realize environmental sustainability. (Barness, 2005) * They installed a water treatment plant — the recycled water from which is used to maintain their plants and lawns — but they have also installed two biodigesters, a solar system and two windmills. * Juici Patties currently has distributors in the Cayman Islands, Turks and Caicos, Dominica, and St. Lucia. * Juici Patties acquired a manufacturing plant in Ontario, Canada. No Juici retail store is present in Canada, but Juici beef, chicken, vegetable and shrimp patties are available in some of Canada’s major supermarket chains and convenience stores. * Juici Patties has a number of community programmes such as Juici Patties Elderly Soup Feeding Programme. * Juici Patties has a sponsorship programme, where they sponsor community sports competitions such as Juici Patties Clarendon Senior Netball League. (Juici Patties) RECOMMENDATIONS Keeping in mind the need to maximize profits (a main objective for any business) in today’s day and age, the best way to do this is to utilize the best technology that is available, the following are recommended: * Enterprise Management System * Network: Internet/Intranet/ Extranet/ LAN * Application Technology: Client/Server, Web-Enabled applications * Security: Firewall Servers and Proxy Server. * Use ERP Is Juici Patties an Enterprise? Juici Patties can be considered an enterprise, as it is a large business community, operating over 50 outlets islandwide and internationally. It is a corporate entity and includes a group of people with a common goal with the resources to retain this goal. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) ERP, according to www. tmcnet,com, is an organization’s management system which uses a software application to incorporate all facets of the business, and automate and facilitate the flow of data between critical back-office functions, which may include financing, distribution, accounting, inventory management, sales, marketing, planning, human resources, manufacturing, and other operating units. ERP software comes in many forms, including supply chain management, manufacturing, distribution, warehouse management, retail management, and point-of-sale software. What Every Enterprise (Juici Patties) Needs? * Management of Data – for information communication * Event monitoring, updating, control * ERP * EDI (Electronic Data Interchange)- consists of direct computer-to-computer transmission among multiple firms of data in a machine readable, structured format. * AMS (Attendance Monitoring System) – is required for personal planning of the employees in the organization. It also helps in availability and scheduling. * DMS (Document Management System).- This system helps in keeping important document for viewing at later times. For the purpose of transaction handling this system some time have a facility of document modification, by giving text-editing facility. * CMS (Communication Management Systems). – The ERP uses CMS as a tool for all its communication needs of recording an event. This system is used for tracking the important resource for action. (Wolf, 2011) ERP Software * ERP software is a family of software modules that support the business activities involved in these vital back-office processes. For example, ERP software for a Juici Patties’ manufacturing company will typically track the status of sales, inventory, shipping, and invoicing, as well as forecasting raw material and human resource requirements. * Enterprise Applications/ Packages/ Suites/ Systems connects all of the information, which flows through a company to a single integrated set of systems. * This is implemented in modules, which can be integrated. * ERP may work with a wide variety of databases, hardware, and operating systems. * Leading Vendors of ERP are SAP, Oracle. * Originally. ERP packages were targeted at the manufacturing industry. * Their goal is to integrate information across the company and eliminate complex links between computer systems. * The architecture is client/server and uses OO methodology for design and development of whole system. * Key advantage of ERP is that it provides an integrated solution for all the requirements of the business. (Wolf, 2011) * It takes care of organizational hierarchy of authorities * Basically ERP solutions are based on Unix and Windows NT platform. A typical ERP solution has following modules: * Marketing, Distribution and sales * Manufacturing process * Accounting and finance * Personal management * Planning and control * Purchase and inventory The modules are designed for following purposes: – * Data capture from transactions * Data transaction validation * Analysis * Updating and reporting of accounting ERP Benefits: * ERP offers lots of benefits to the implementing organization. * It helps for a manager to make decision at the right time. * This is possible when entire organization is sharing information and interprets in same perspectives. * The benefits of ERP can be classified in two categories: – * Tangible benefits (Those which can be measured in one form or other) * Intangible benefits (Difficult to measure in absolute terms) The Risks of ERP: * Tied to a single vendor * Flexibility limited by options offered by the vendor * May inappropriately force generic processes * May inappropriately force org. structure changes * Complexity – particularly regarding mapping and standardizing processes across the organization CONCLUSION Juici Patties is one the biggest and most popular patty companies in Jamaica employing over 2000 individuals in over 50 outlets islandwide and overseas (North America). Juici Patties was the first company to have outlets in all fourteen parishes and one of few fast food restaurants produces the ingredients ( beef from cattle at their slaughter houses) to make their product (patty). Juici Patties current paper based and Supply Chain Management CMS worked well for many years and benefitted Juici in many ways, however with a new system or collaboration such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction, and in the long run profits will have an even more rise. The ERP system will: * Improve the quality and efficiency of Juici Patties. By keeping a Juici’s internal business process running smoothly, ERP can lead to better outputs that will benefit the company such as customer service, and manufacturing. (Wolf, 2011) * Provide support to upper level management to provide them with critical decision making information. This decision support will allow the upper level management to make managerial choices that will enhance the business down the road. * Create a more agile company that can better adapt to situations and changes. ERP makes Juici Patties more flexible and less rigidly structured in an effort to allow the different parts of this organization to become more cohesive, in turn, enhancing the business both internally and externally. (Wolf, 2011) * Pepsi-Cola Jamaica Bottling Co., Ltd., and Juici Patties chain signed a deal that would see Pepsi serving as the preferred carbonated beverage supplier at Juici Patties stores across the island. (Juici patties and Pepsi sign supply deal, 2002) REFERENCES Barness, P. N. (2005, July 27). Jukie Chin Expands Empire. The Gleaner. Juici Patties. (n.d.). Retrieved from juicipatties.com: http://www.juicipatties.com/index.php?main=1 Wolf, T. (2011, May 10). What is ERP Software? TMC News. Turban, E.. et al. (2006), Information Technology for Management, Transforming Organization in the Digital Economy (5th ed). Upper Saddle River, New Jersey. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Oklobdzija, Vojin G.,(2008). 2nd Ed. Digital systems and applications., CRC Press Computer Engineering Series; Publication: Boca Raton, FL CRC Press. Juici patties and Pepsi sign supply deal. (2002, February 3). The Sunday Gleaner.