Primis ebooks

Running Head: PRIMIS SYSTEM

PRIMIS SYSTEM

Primis System At Mc-Graw Hill Company Your Name Course title Instructor Name [Pick the date]

Introduction

The McGraw-Hill Company had started and implemented most innovative project in the academic publishing industry for benefitting the students and professors. The technology, business environment, economic conditions are changing drastically in the modern world for example students need to go to library to find information on a particular topic but now Kindle device is being used for finding information from the same place without visiting library. The changes in the technology, business processes had made the existing information in the traditional text books outdated. Even though textbooks are being revised regularly they may not contain updated information. To solve such issues the Mc-Graw Hill developed Primis system which enables the professors to design the contents of the text book for a particular course. Generally faculty selected the course contents from the core textbooks of a particular subject. The issues which such systems are outdated syllabus, could not select latest case studies, many textbooks have to be referred by the student. The Primis systems helps the professors to customize the text book by selecting course contents from different text books, databases and place an order for the customized text book. The Mc-Graw Hill will publish the text books according to requirements of professors of a particular university. The important steps in traditional system development life cycle are: probem identification, system analysis, system design, system development and system maintenance (O'Brien & Marakas, 2011).

The Mc-Graw Hill had adopted systems approach for developing the Primis system. Primis means first information system where customized publishing are done on demand basis. The present study is to understand the Primis System and how Mc-Graw Hill had used the concepts of management information systems to design the Primis system. The four phases of Primis system: system analysis, system design, system development and system maintenance are studied and analyzed in this paper.

System Analysis

1Q. What kinds of questions might Mc-Graw Hill have asked as part of determining the feasibility of the Primis idea?

A: The information technologies, including internet-based iformation systems are playing a vital role and expanding role in business (Mcleod & Schell, 2008). The Primis project had started with uncertainty because the idea for the company as well as for the academic publishing industry. In 1988 the Mc-Graw had observed facts like 30 percent of the students do not purchase all the required textbooks, course contents are changing regularly. The following questions had been raised by Mc-Graw Hill for determining the feasibility of Primis idea:

1Q. Do we have enough funds to invest in research for creating custom published books?

2Q. Doe existing technology supports the new idea?

3Q. How to pay royalties for the authors?

4Q. Will customized printing increases the price of the product?

5Q. How to gather perfect requirements from the professors?

6Q. How to update the databases?

7Q. Do our vendors support for the new idea?

8Q. How to deliver the products to the customers?

9Q. What are the opportunities for custom publish textbooks?

10Q. Should we change the existing business process?

11Q. Will the employees, distributors support the idea of custom publish textbooks?

12. How to maintain quality, pricing and deliver the product in time to students.

13Q. Updating the system with new content may become costly and leads to complexity in payment of royalty to authors?

14Q. Competition from new entrants into custom published text books industry.

2Q. How well did the systems approach work for the initial stages of the Primis system?

A: The Mc-Graw Hill had effectively implemented the systems approach. First the company had identified the problem i.e. professors and students are facing difficulty the complete course content in one text book. The purchasing of many text books for one course is difficult for students. In the next stage the company had conducted the feasibility study whether the new idea of custom publish text books brings benefits to students and faculty. Hence the systems approach has given best inputs during the initial stages of Primis system.

3Q. What could the team have done differently in the preliminary stages? How might this have affected the end result?

A: The project teams should identify the software, hardware and database resources for effective implementation of the project (O'Brien & Marakas, 2011)The team should have conducted a survey to know the purchase intentions of students for custom published text books. The customization should be available only for text books which have more demand. The team should gather the course content generally for the universities rather than only for specific universities. The team should have estimated the honesty issues regarding billing issues. The team should have anticipated the issues related to printing and collecting the bill. It would be better for Mc-Graw to collect advance before starting the actual production. The company should not provide a sample copy to the customers. Now the company is experiencing lot of demand for custom published eBooks rather than print books. The team had not anticipated the demand for eBooks. If this is anticipated then the Primus project could have completed within six months saving funds, time and other resources.

4Q. Would you have implemented the system, armed with the information the team had at the time? Why or Why not?

A: I would have implemented the system because project had started for solving an issue related to academic books. It is true that students are not getting the complete course content in one text book and it is costly to purchase all the reference books. Hence the Primis idea is best to improve the existing academic system.

System Design

5Q. “Process engineering” is the design of business process to achieve competitive advantage in cost, quality, speed, and service. Which of these advantages were driving the development of the Primis System for McGraw-Hill?

A: The quality and service are the primary driving forces for the idea of Primis system. The Mc-Graw Hill cannot expect cost advantages for customized text books. The target market size gets decreased as the customization increases. The speed of delivery can be slow due to many important steps while brining the final published text books. The phases like proof reading, validity of the content, accuracy, discussion with faculty, implementing changes may consume lot of time. The Primis team should collect the course content from professors at least six months before the process of customization or publication process.

6Q. What types of system design tools do you think Mc-Graw Hill used to develop the system’s functional requirements and technical specifications?

A: The Mc-Graw Hill had conducted feasibility analysis and communicated the system requirements with its major vendors like Kodak, Sun Microsystems and also developed alternate system solutions. The Primis team had collected database from authors, and course content details from professors. The software was procured from vendors for appropriate file formats to store the data. The company could have purchased latest software for storing and retrieving the databases.

7Q. Business customers must perceive products/ services are solutions to their problems. How did the Primis system design keep this objective in mind?

A: The major objective of Primis system is to provide customized published text books for the target students. The company had collected the course contents from professors for including the right content for a specific course. Since there is no existing industry standard for custom-published books, the company had developed a new system. The functional design was developed by discussions with internal team members and the technical design was developed through discussion with software vendors.

8Q. The Primis team knew that technology would change in the short and long run, affecting the design of the system. How did the team with the knowledge of this inevitable and uncertainty?

A: The technology definitely changes from time to time. Therefore the company had separated the ISBN database, royalty fee, backend databases so that customization can be done without disturbing the existing text book course contents. The company updates the database separately according to the course or subject. Once the requirement is collected then new text book is customized as the inputs of the professors. Additionally the Primis system reduces the uncertainty of demand by printing the text books according to the demand. The traditional publishing organizations which print core text books may become outdated in due course but custom published text books are supplied on demand.

Systems Development

9Q. Would prototyping have helped the Primis team? Why or Why not?

A: The Company had taken 18 months time from the identification of problem to actual system implementation. The system development life cycle would have been less than a year if there is a prototype. The company had started its project with lot of uncertainty since it is innovative and consumed lot of time at every stage of the system life cycle. However if Mc-Graw Hill had developed a prototype then the system would have completed very early. In management information system, the initial prototype should be developed for completing the projects because as the time goes on there is a chance that competitors might launch the similar project in advance.

10Q. What role should end users have played in the development of the system?

A: The end users should involve in every stage of the system development life cycle. They should provide inputs for software developers for designing the best system. The technical team should have learned from the initial stages of how the Primis system works. The company could have saved the time which is spent for training if the end users like sales force teams, technical support team are involved from the initial stage of Primis system development.

11Q. What change management techniques did Mc-Graw Hill use to increase the chances of success of for the system?

A: The Company had migrated from traditional publishing system to Primis system which is aimed to publish customized text books. The company had trained the employees, sales force teams, technical teams and educated the vendors about Primis system. The company had selected the vendors based on the suggestion by its employees so that they feel they are involved in the development of new system.

12Q. Why was it important to consider the relationship of Primis to back-end systems at Mc-Graw-Hill?

A: The back-end systems play a primary role in implementing the new system. Earlier the employees in the back-end process used traditional methods for publishing text books. But know they have to develop custom-published text books which are completely different from the existing system. Hence it is important for the Primis system to establish relationship with back end database. The Mc-Graw Hill is having largest PDF database which is in digital format. The new Primis system uses the existing database for custom publish text books. The Sun Microsystems was selected for migrating the data from legacy system to Primis system.

13Q. If you were the project manager for Primis, what would have done differently? Explain your response.

A: First I would have developed the prototype for the new Primis system. I agree that the Mc-Graw Hill had followed the steps of System Development Life Cycle but it consumed lot of time for developing the system. Once feasibility study is conducted than I would have implemented rapid application development (RAD) methodology for developing the Primis system and completed in six months. Since the problem is perfectly identified than the solution through Primis system will bring profits to the organization.

I would have involved all the employees in different stages of Primis system development. I would have also invested lot of funds for advertising the Primis system in target markets.

Maintenance

14Q. If you were professor considering adoption of a custom textbook for your students, which form would you choose: black& white print or color eBook? Support your answer.

A: The Primis system had started eBooks from the year 2000 onwards and the price of eBooks is 33 percent less than printed text books. The eBooks are similar to printed text books in all aspects. The customers can download and read them from the computer or take a print copy for personal use.

If I am professor I would choose color eBook because they are more attractive and easy to read and understand than black and white eBooks. The graphs, images, charts are easy to understand in colored eBook than black and white eBook. Even I am having the experience of purchasing colored eBooks and got very much satisfied. But at the same time I would not suggest my student to take print copies of eBooks because it is costly and they can take black and white print copy for personal use. It is also unethical to distribute the eBooks and it also violates copy rights issue.

15Q. Part of system maintenance managing the growing volume of content in the Primis database. If you were managing this content, what criteria might you use for determining what gets added? Since many print textbooks are revised every few years, how would this process affect contents in the Primis database?

A: First I would separate the database according to the courses and the broad area of the subject. For example in business management education the database can be divided into four broad categories like marketing, finance, operation& production and human resource management. Again in each area the databases can be divided into different categories for example in marketing the consumer behavior, product management, services marketing, advertising and supply chain subjects. The case studies in each subject are also stored in various categories. In this way the database can be divided under different themes. I would have used classification numbers for each type of content based on the broad subject area.

A separate team would be recruited for updating the data by checking the validity of the content. At least one professor in each subject area would be consulted before updating any data. The revision of text books enhances the performance of Primis system and further provides a competitive advantage for the organization. The basic objective of Primis system is to provide custom published text books and also to update the database continuously. This Primis system also helps in payment of royalties for the authors appropriately.

Conclusion

The management information systems play an important role in modernization of organizations and also enhance the performance of the organizations. In the given case Primis system had solved the problem of student community by providing custom publish text books. It had brought revolutionary changes in the academic publishing industry. The Mc-Graw Hill had communicated its commitment for student customer satisfaction with its innovative project. The Primis system had achieved success only because of effective system development life cycle process and support of latest technology.

References

Mcleod, R., & Schell, G. P. (2008). Management Information Systems (10 ed.). USA: Pearson Education Inc.

O'Brien, J., & Marakas, G. M. (2011). Management Information System (10 ed.). USA: McGraw Hill Publishers.