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Assignment : Professional issues in IT

Introduction
This assignment requires you to demonstrate knowledge and skills you have acquired throughout the course of this unit by producing a fully referenced, academic report that addresses the tasks given below. In order to complete the assignment, you will need to choose an appropriate IT organisation to research.

Choosing an appropriate organisation (referred to as YourOrg in these notes)
Step 1 : Research global companies that currently exist. The top IT companies are leading innovation in consulting, outsourcing, technology and services across the world. With the growing focus on automation and technology, there has been a consistent boom as far as the IT sector is concerned. Things like cloud computing, privacy, online security etc are the IT services being served to clients by the best software companies in the world. The list of top IT companies include; Infosys, Microsoft, IBM, Oracle, Accenture, HPE, & SAP. The majority of these IT companies operate in US and Asia which contribute to one-third of the overall global business worldwide. You do not necessarily have to include a company that is the top 10 globally.

Step 2 : Research and select an international business within the IT industry to use for this assignment.

Step 3 : Ensure the main activities of your organisation (YourOrg) enable you to:

  • Identify the social, ethical and professional issues identified as essential to the IT profession that have been problems within the organisation (YourOrg) and the standards used to overcome any problems.
  •  Identify a clear project management lifecycle and associated techniques that can be analysed and evaluated
  • Be able to discuss the deployment of a software application, analysing the potential risks and problems that have occurred when a software application has been deployed within YourOrg.
  • Understand risks and the management within an IT project, including risk management techniques and strategies.
  • Give a clear insight into the organisation’s IT Service Management (ITSM) and identify management techniques to achieve the organisations objectives. Identify the ITSM focus and what standards were employed.
  • Identify software quality policies and procedures that exist in the organisation, using software quality management metrics.

Researching YourOrg. You can use web resources to enable you to understand the context in which YourOrg operates. Do not limit yourself, however, to web-based sources of information. You should also use academic, industry and other sources.
Research and make notes on the following:

  • Current information and knowledge of professional issues in IT
  • Current challenges within professional issues in IT

Example: Infosys
Infosys is an Indian Multi National Company that provides IT solution to its client through business process consulting, software development and business process outsourcing services.

Infosys had around 200,000 employees by the end of March 2017 and its headquarters are located in Bengaluru, Karnataka, India. The company is also known for its high gender diversity as it has around 36% of women workforce all across the world.
Infosys was the second largest Indian IT company by 2017 and is ranked as the 10th IT company in the world in terms of revenue.

Out of its total workforce, more than 75% are software professionals, 15-20% are working in its Business process mapping arm and the remaining are engaged in technical support and sales projects. It was India’s first IT company which was able to cross annual revenue of US$100 million in the year 2000, US$1 billion in 2004 and US$10.21 billion in 2017.
The website is www.infosys.com.

Do NOT use Infosys as the YourOrg company for your assignment. This is just an example. You must choose a company yourself.
Once you have chosen a suitable company you would need to check to make sure you can find out about all the different requirements listed in step 3 above.

Assignment notes
You should produce a single 4000 word academic report that covers the questions laid out below. You must also include a 200 word overview of YourOrg and a bibliography/ references section, neither of which are included in your word count.
 

Task 1 – 15 Marks
Ethics within the IT industry is very subjective. Organisations are becoming more aware of the serious impact ethical or unethical behaviour can have, not only internally with their workforce but also externally (e.g. market share, legal ramifications).
You need to be able to identify the social, ethical and professional issues identified as essential to the IT profession that have been problems within (YourOrg) and the standards used to overcome any problems.
Using the lecture notes and any other notes you have studied/researched in this PIIT unit,

  1. Identify the ethical framework that YourOrg uses.
  2. Give a description of their organisational code of ethics, including both the aims and constraints sections.
  3.  Investigate how this is applied internationally for YourOrg.
  4. Explain any standards YourOrg employs in applying their ethical framework.
  5. Produce an alternative ethical framework that you think would work just as well as the one they have in place, or that would be more suitable.

 

Task 2 – 15 Marks
For every project YourOrg has undertaken there will have been a business case prepared which is all about the organisation making a decision on whether the proposed project is viable. In large projects, the business case is often a 3-part development process which culminates in a Full Business Case. Various plans will have been drawn up e.g. a draft project plan, at this stage.

  1. Identify a large project that YourOrg has undertaken and describe the project.
  2. Using a recognised project management lifecycle model e.g Prince 2, identify how YourOrg’s project you have identified fits into each phase of this lifecycle.
  3. Draw a diagram of this lifecycle identifying those phases that are the most important.
  4. Explain in detail how YourOrg used these phases when they undertook development of this project.

 

Task 3 – 15 Marks
Software deployment is an overview term within the IT industry to encompass any processes that result in software systems utilisation from beginning to end. A formal software deployment strategy should have been generated before the time of deployment, ideally during the planning approach, that ties both parties to a proactive approach.
ITIL (the Information Technology Infrastructure Library), responsible for many IT related best practise approaches, has released a deployment management framework.

  1. Identify which approach to software deployment that YourOrg has taken.
  2. Explain why it has chosen to deploy its software in this way.
  3. Discuss how YourOrg has approached any problems it encountered.
  4. Outline how they managed the risks commonly associated with software deployment, for example type of release, documentation and training.

 

Task 4 – 15 Marks
There are many approaches to managing risk within a project that allow you to understand risks, analyse them and how to manage them, including risk management techniques and strategies.

  1. Focus on a particular project that YourOrg has undertaken and describe the project in detail.
  2. Create a detailed Risk Plan for this project. You are expected to apply tools and techniques introduced in the PIIT unit and to include all the phases of the specificapproach you have chosen.
  3. Identify any international standards that have been used.

 

Task 5 – 15 Marks
IT Service Management (ITSM) is customer focused and as such overlaps with an organisation’s business service management approach. ITSM provides IT services from the perspective of the client and their business needs.

  1. Identify a client to whom YourOrg has provided such a service and provide a detailed description of this service.
  2. Give a clear explanation into YourOrg’s IT Service Management (ITSM) for this client.
  3. Evaluate the management techniques used to achieve the organisations objectives.
  4. Identify the ITSM focus and what international standards and frameworks were employed.

 

Task 6 – 15 Marks
Software quality definitions vary and one overriding definition is hard to reach. Because of this it is defined in other ways – conformance to requirements and fitness for purpose are two of the most common. For software to be reliable it must fulfil its intended purpose and be measurable (metrics).
Quality factors are the result of industry attempting to measure software quality. Software can be broken down into manageable and measurable ‘quality factors’- both technical and human.

  1. Define the concept of software quality.
  2. Identify the software quality policies and procedures that exist in YourOrg.
  3. Show how software quality is measured using software quality management metrics.
  4. Discuss the advantages/ disadvantages of the method of measuring software quality that YourOrg employs.

 

Task 7 – 10 Marks LO1
Evaluate the learning that you have undertaken in order to complete this assignment, using the Gibbs reflective cycle (1988) model. Based upon your learning, you should reflect on each element of the model in order to produce an action plan, examining what you would do if this happened again.

 


Guidance
Consult with your tutor if you are uncertain about any aspect of the assignment.
You should apply theory to YourOrg at all stages. In other words, you must provide
information and knowledge based on what you have researched about the organisation, and analysed through the application of relevant literature. It is not enough to just describe the YourOrg organisation and cite links to a website.
 

Submission requirements

  • The word count for the word-processed report is 4000 words. You must also include a 200 word overview of YourOrg and a bibliography/ references section, neither of which are included in your word count of 4000 words.
  • All references and citations must use the Harvard Style.
  • You must submit a paper copy and digital copy (on CD, USB flash drive or similarly acceptable medium).


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The Microsoft Organization

 Overview

Microsoft is a well-known organization for its good performance consistently. It has been in existence for many years, which makes many people gain more trust on it. The various companies in the past used its products in the past and it becomes hard to change. It is also one of the reasons why it remains on top and many people's choice. However, the performance is key because if it produces bad quality products, it could have gone low or even liquidate. The organization has its headquarters situated in the United States. The company operates in different ...

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