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Presents the outcome of Air Products ICON decentralization projects. New issues are explored, including the challenges of having a decentralized MIS staff, global network, client/server architecture, new data center issues, outsourcing, a new highly strategic customer interface, object-oriented programming (OOPS), and the future of the MIS organization. A rewritten version of two earlier cases.

Describes the industry context that has resulted in the development of efficient consumer response (ECR) within the grocery industry and its adoption by H.E. Butt Grocery Co.

Managers and management theorists spent the majority of this century building and perfecting the hierarchy; however, if we believe the press, they now appear to be engaged in destroying it. While many proclaim the dawning of the "Information Age" organization and the fading of the hierarchical organization as a trend of the 1990s, the roots of these changes can be traced to the 1950s. This note provides organization design frameworks and concepts for the design of the Information Age organization.

The co-evolution of technology, work, and the workforce over the past 30 years has dramatically influenced our concept of organizations and the industries within which they compete. No longer simply a tool to support "back-office" transactions, IT has become a strategic part of most businesses, enabling the redefinition of markets and industries and the strategies and designs of firms competing within them. But to achieve these information age benefits, companies must adopt information age technology architectures. Organizations must radically transform outdated IT architectures and the IT organizations required to support them. This technological transformation is every bit as daunting as the organizational transformation. This note describes general frameworks and concepts that managers can use to analyze their existing IT architecture and to define and manage the IT architecture required to support the information processing requirements of the Information Age organization.

Reengineering was introduced at CIGNA Corp. in 1988. CIGNA entered a second wave reengineering effort through a major project at CIGNA P&C, one of CIGNA's larger businesses. P&C was in financial crisis and as a result brought in a new executive team in 1991 to head the transformation effort. This case analyzes the phases of P&C transformation, P&C's business process redesign, their use of information technology in the form of client/server architecture to support the strategy, and the use of the balanced scorecard to drive transformation. Presents the progress of P&C's effort as of January 1995--marking the end of Phase I (analysis and design) and looking forward to Phase 2 (implementation).

Provides students with a basic understanding of the technology and technical terminology for computer hardware and software.

Discusses the two stages of an organization's reengineering effort--the design and implementation. While the design phase needs to be revolutionary, an organization must assess whether the appropriate path to implementation should be evolutionary or revolutionary. Discussions are based on a two-year study of reengineering efforts at over 40 companies by the authors.

Provides an overview of the basic technologies that comprise the communications infrastructure of a firm. Network architecture, wide area networks, local area networks, communication media, network protocols, and basic principles of data transmission over networks are covered.

The merchandising manager of a supermarket chain leads an effort to reorganize the process of buying and delivering products from manufacturers to their warehouse for further distribution to stores. The company is an early mover in implementing efficient consumer response.

ToyWorld, a fast growing retailer, was revitalizing its information technology (IT) infrastructure and called in AT&T to help plan for the future. Five strategic alternatives for use of information and communications technology were identified through value chain analysis and use of proprietary AT&T methodology. While two could be implemented by ToyWorld action alone, two would require external cooperation, and one represented an entirely new (but related) line of business.

In 1993, BP Exploration Operating Co. Ltd., the $13 billion division of British Petroleum Co. that explores for and produces oil and gas, outsourced all its information technology operations in an effort to cut costs, gain more flexible and higher quality IT resources, and refocus the IT department on activities that directly improve the overall business. BP Exploration took a different path to outsourcing than most companies have taken. The company sought a solution that would allow it both to buy IT services from multiple suppliers and to have the pieces delivered as if they came from a single supplier. To that end, three contractors were hired and required to work together to deliver a single seamless IT service. This arrangement--multiple IT suppliers that act as one--is the cornerstone of the company's outsourcing strategy. The IT department has final accountability for IT services, but it is not mired in the operations. Only by relinquishing operations could IT employees begin to focus on doing business instead of running the business.

Executives pondering which parts of their information technology (IT) function should be outsourced and which should be kept in-house usually ask themselves, Does the particular IT operation provide a strategic advantage or is it a commodity that doesn't differentiate us from our competitors? If it is a strategic service, they keep it in-house. If it is a commodity--especially one that a supplier claims it can provide inexpensively--they outsource it. If only the decision were that simple. Between 1991 and 1993, the authors studied 40 U.S. and European companies that had grappled with the issue of outsourcing IT. Their conclusion: The strategic-versus-commodity approach usually led to disappointments. Instead, the authors argue, a company's overarching objective should be to maximize flexibility and control so that it can pursue different options as it learns more or as its circumstances change. The way to accomplish that goal is to maximize competition. Managers should not make a onetime decision whether to outsource. They should create an environment in which potential suppliers--external as well as internal--are constantly battling to provide IT services.

The evolution of Procter & Gamble's development of efficient consumer response (ECR) involved a series of trials, a resolve to distribute diapers on the basis of product movement, a conscious effort to move to a new means of distribution across all lines, a first cut at a new system, and finally, the development of the existing mix of integrated IT systems linking the value chain from factory to shelf.

In the late 1990s, Rolm realized significant losses and needed to significantly reduce its costs and redesign its logistics process.

Describes the conceptualization and implementation of a totally new organization structure built around projects, knowledge, and personal development. The organization is fluid with almost no formal controls. Physical work space is fundamentally changed and almost all paper is eliminated by extensive use of computerized information systems. However, unexpected early losses threaten the radical organizational transformation.

A condensed version of Oticon A/S: "Cogitate Incognito" ("Think the Unthinkable"; Oticon A/S Company Motto) & Oticon A/S: Project 330. In this case the presentations of the company, its products, competitive position, and use of information technology have been significantly reduced.

The ability to gather, arrange, and manipulate information with computers has given business people new tools for managing. But data processing tools have done more than simply enable executives to do the same tasks better. They have changed the very concepts of what a business is and what managing means. To manage in the future, executives will need an information system integrated with strategy, rather than individual tools that so far have been used largely to record the past. The executive's tool kit has four kinds of diagnostic information: foundation information, productivity information, competence information, and resource-allocation information. The sources of the information are so diverse, and sifting through and interpreting it for a specific business are so difficult, that even small companies will need help from data specialists.

Campbell Soup, like most food manufacturers, faced grocery chain and wholesale demand for its goods driven by Campbell's own promotional pricing structure rather than retail consumer demand. Former policies to encourage overstock created huge swings in production and inventory levels. Campbell's introduced continuous product replenishment (CPR) under which they would manage inventory for their customers, enabled by electronic data interchange to link supply to actual demand. Implementing this channel shift required a restructuring of relationships with its customers and a radical restructuring of its promotional policies.

Baxter Healthcare is heir to the fabled ASAP ordering system, one of the best-known examples of the use of technology to provide strategic marketing advantage. By 1994, the proprietary ASAP system is well established. Baxter is beginning to launch On-Call EDI, which is an open platform, multiple vendor (including Kodak, Bergen Brunswick & Boise Cascade) system to help hospitals order. The case focuses on whether Baxter is meeting the new needs of the customer in a way which will help them compete, or whether they are giving away the keys to the kingdom by opening up their strategic advantage to others, including their competition.

Describes the redesign and rollout of the new order-fulfillment process for a flagship product at Pacific Bell. Pacific Bell is one of the Regional Bell Operating Companies comprised of seven regional business units. Rather than implement the new process, roles, and information technology proposed by the original design team, each regional business unit implemented those pieces that most quickly resulted in performance improvements and would not require lengthy negotiations with labor unions. Focuses on managing radical change programs in a decentralized organization.