Description
Part 1
Part 2
Conducting research and creating a supporting research report serves two important purposes with respect to your project:
- It explains your technological choices in terms of business benefits and risks. This explanation is critical for executive approval.
- It either reinforces or improves your plan—but only if you apply the results of your research to a new draft of your plan. In the industry, project managers develop their plans iteratively by changing them as they conduct more research and identify better or cheaper alternatives. This iterative approach is especially relevant to IT projects because new technologies are being developed and retired at a very quick pace.
For this assignment, you will compile research and create a supporting research report. Then, based on your research, you will identify and explain the rationale for three improvements to the project plan you submitted last week.
Compile additional research on your project’s industry, recommended technology vendors, and the categories presented in the supporting research report. You may want to include the Gartner Group and Forrester Research in your list of organizations to research.
Complete the Supporting Research Report template.
Create a second draft of your project plan. Highlight in yellow at least three changes you made to the network, database, and/or cloud solutions within the second draft based on the in-depth research you conducted this week and explain why you made the changes.
Explanation & Answer
Attached. Please let me know if you have any questions or need revisions.
Part 1
To find unbiased and high quality sources, I used peer reviewed sources. Peer reviewed articles
are valid for research considering they are based on expert knowledge of researchers in the
discipline. There is no falsification of findings and the sources integrate multiple opinions.
Theoretically, there is no bias or pre-conceived notions about a subject in peer reviewed journals.
When selecting websites, I used informational resources sponsored by educational agencies or
governmental bodies with .edu or .gov in their URL. If I encountered a resource with .com in the
URL, I used the TRAAP method to evaluate its credibility. What is the Timeliness of the source?
Is the information updated and timely for my topic? What is the Relevance of the source for my
informational needs? What is the Authority for the source? Does the author have any reputation
in the field I am researching? What is the Accuracy of the data, statistics, and bibliographical
references cited in the source? Lastly, what is the Purpose of the information? Since webpages
made the bulk of my sources, I evaluated sources based on authors, date of publication, statistics
used, source documentation, claims, tones, and fake news. With the TRAAP method, I feel
confident that I can weed out sources with bias.
Attached. Please let me know if you have any questions or need revisions.
BSA/425 v1.3
Supporting Research Report
Supporting Research Report for:
Project name: United Financial Services Cloud-Based CRM
Purpose of project: To implement cloud-based Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
solution to generate more leads, increase sales, improve customer service, reduce the cost of
sales for the organization, and increase revenue.
•
Executive Summary
United Financial Services
•
Industry Background
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software has been in existence for many years.
However, it has gained popularity in the recent past in mainstream business. There are immense
benefits businesses can gain from CRM software considering its main objectives is organizing
customer data with the objective of improving customer experience, generating sales,
personalizing customer interactions. In the past, CRM required on premise solutions. However,
cloud technology has evolved allowing businesses to use the technology to cater for CRM needs
(Chen, Wu, Chu, Lin, & Chuang, 2018). Although businesses have in the past developed their
own CRM solutions, there are significant costs associated with such an approach. Cloud-based
CRM has become prevalent in business today owing to its accessibility and adaptability to
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Supporting Research Report
BSA/425 v1.3
Page 2 of 7
changing business needs. With cloud-based CRM, United Financial Services (UFS) would store
customer data on the cloud, meaning it would be accessible via the Internet from anywhere. The
implication is that the company would not need to worry about data management, storage, or
licensing multiple devices (Chen, Wu, Chu, Lin, & Chuang, 2018). The bulk of the company’s
needs will be fulfilled by the CRM provider allowing UFS access to an easy solution. One
advantage of cloud-based CRM is that the system would adapt to UFS’ changing business needs.
It is a cost-effective solution, accessible, and secure. Moreover, UFS would have unlimited
storage, integration with social media, automations, among other features imperative for the
company’s business.
•
Technology Trends
There are numerous trends in CRM that UFS should look out for. Businesses today are using
data in customer management, sales, internal operations, and logistics, among others. Although
this data is valuable, UFS must find a way to sift through it to identify trends that would help its
business processes. UFS’s current system is fragmented, making it impossible to consolidate all
its data to achieve a real-time view of the business. Using a cloud-based data solutions, UFS can
unit all its data streams and use the information to identify ways to target best customers and
reduce costs incurred generating new leads. Using cloud computing, UFS can integrate its data.
Integration can allow the company to deliver targeted and personalized experiences for all its
customers (Miyachi, 2018). The process would combine the history of customer transactions and
allow UFS to deepen its customer relationship. Cloud-based CRM would allow UFS to analyze
data. Moreover, another use of CRM is data visualization that woul...
