Excelling in CRM!

Salesforce.com offers an overwhelming range of CRM applications augmented with services and several other forums and customer support. Unfortunately I don't have Flash player installed in my PC so I probably missed the exciting slide shows on the website.

As I surfed through this website I came across this really cool software by the name of Salesforce CRM Ideas. This is one type among many tools of Salesforce CRM. Distinction about this application is that it allows the company to connect with their consumers. And is a very unique connection: the company can now obtain valuable feedback from their consumers and incorporate their suggestions in improving their product. This is CRM at its best!

Salesforce.com gives details about multitude of services! Each one is better and of superior purpose. For instance, it offers the the platform of Integration. This is actually a link to Force.com and as the name suggests it has many integration ERS that can help the company join their IT capabilities in the best of ways.

A good thing of this website is that it offers success stories. This serves as a good evidence backing its claims of providing the best CRM systems.

Also this website allows access to its clients to an interface through which they can remain connected. So it is like a CRM selling company doing CRM too!!

HOME ASSIGNMENT

Chapter 07: Telecommunications, the Internet, and Wireless Technology

MIS IN ACTION (page no 335)

Q1: Describe some RFID applications that might pose a threat to privacy. What information does RFID enable them to track?

Answer:

In layman terms, RFID is a tracking device. This system is placed in a very tiny, portable device known as a tag and attached discretely to things. When activated it provides identification or location information or any other specifics about the tagged product, depending upon the programming done.

The feasibility of using RFID systems over bar codes for products is immense. While bar codes have historically been the primary means of tracking products, RFID systems are rapidly becoming the preferred technology for keeping tabs on people, pets, products, and even vehicles. One reason for this is because the read/write capability of an active RFID system enables the use of interactive applications. Also, the tags can be read from a distance and through a variety of substances such as snow, fog, ice, or paint, where bar codes have proved useless.

The website describes the notoriety of the RFID systems. The main use of this technology has been to identify and understand the behavior of consumers and the motives behind their purchases. Products embedded with RFID tags can continuously transmit information ranging from an electronic product code (EPC) identifier, to information about the item itself, such as consumption status or product freshness. Data processing systems read and compile this information, and can even link the product information with a specific consumer. This composite information is vastly superior—and more invasive—than any data that could be obtained from scanning bar codes. RFID systems enable tagged objects to speak to electronic readers over the course of a product's lifetime—from production to disposal—providing retailers with an unblinking, in depth view of consumer attitudes and purchase behavior.

Such a detailed and unwarranted information regarding the users of tagged producers in considered a breech of privacy. RFID systems is integrated into several products. The information these devices provide question the ethics of gaining personal information without consent. Following are some such devices:

• Tracking apparel: Clothing retail items can be embedded with RFID tags. The implanted devices enables the retailer to track individuals and inventory their belongings by linking a consumer's name and credit card information with the serial number in an item of clothing.
• Tracking consumer packaged goods (CPGs): This is an innovative invention to develop "smart shelves", which allows for real-time tracking of inventory levels.
• Tracking tires: This is a radio frequency tire identification system for passenger and light truck tires. The RFID transponder is manufactured into the tire and stores tire identification information, which can be associated with the vehicle identification number (VIN). The tags could ultimately become tracking devices that can tell where and when a vehicle is traveling.
• Tracking currency: RFID tags as thin as a human hair can be embedded into the fibers bank notes. The tags would allow currency to record information about each transaction in which it is passed. Governments and law enforcement agencies hail the technology as a means of preventing money-laundering, black-market transactions, and even bribery demands for unmarked bills.
• Tracking patients and personnel: This system, all patients, visitors, and staff entering the hospital are issued a card embedded with an RFID chip. The card is read by sensors installed in the ceiling, which record exactly when a person enters and leaves the department.
• Payment systems: This system implements radio frequency (RF) in wireless payment systems. This can enable RFID communication between PCs, handheld computers, and other electronic devices.

(DISCLAIMER: The information for this answer has been quoted and used from the official RFID systems website : http://epic.org/privacy/rfid/)

Q2. How do these applications threaten personal privacy? How serious is this threat?

Answer:
RIFD tags have the powerful intelligence of reading RFID tags attached to any retail product or cards in the wallet. The breach to consumer privacy is the biggest threat. Retailers can easily can complete consumer profiles, information about their lifestyles, they places they visit and activities they do. And all of this is done without the consent of the consumer! This is a violation of the fundamental human right: the right to live! Privacy is defined as the choice of being left alone. It is the freedom of not being known to others.

There is growing recognition that the same RFID application which is employed ostensibly to prevent counterfeiting or the theft of cash or goods could also be used to track an individual’s spending habits, preferences and even physical movements.

The potential for RFID to be used to target individuals - not just to check stock levels or ensure baggage does not get lost in transit - is made more serious by the issue of access. Not only will the deployer of an RFID tag, such as a retailer, be able to access the information contained in a tag, but anyone with the right equipment will also be able to do so.

From a privacy standpoint, the current simplicity of the tag’s response, which does not differentiate between requests based on origin or identity, is a flaw. Thieves could use the tags to locate the whereabouts of valuables and interested persons could obtain access to another’s medical records or passport details, or trace another’s spending habits or physical movements.

(DISCLAIMER: The information for this answer has been quoted and used from the website http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/2005/04/04/209248/rfid-a-threat-to-privacy.htm)

Q3: Should these RFID applications be deployed? Why or why not? Justify your answer.

This is a very controversial issue. Like any other technology, it has its own pros and cons. The benefits of using this technology results in better business operation efficienvy and profitablity. Due to it's pontential of breaching privacy the use must be defined and contained by certain norms and guidelines. These guidelines can be veiwed by accessing this link: http://epic.org/privacy/rfid/rfid_gdlnes-070904.pdf If these guidelines are ethically followed then there is no harm in using RFID systems. Bodies to regulate the use must be established, and penalties for misuse must be set. Then only the use of RFID systems can lead to a sound social and economic advancement.

The World's TOP 10 Brands!

Has your favorite brand made the TOP 10 list of 2008?! Find out now!! Also, you can find out more about each brand by clicking on its picture.

The following is a survey conducted by Millward Brown's BrandZ index. The survey assigned values to various brands based on their financial strength and consumer sentiment.

1. Google

Google, with a brand value of $66.434 billion, is the world's most powerful brand. The global search engine giant was started as a research project in January 1996 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, two Ph.D students at Stanford University, California. Google Inc was incorporated on September 7, 1998, at a friend's garage in Menlo Park, California. The company, known for its innovations and stupendous growth rate, went public on August 19, 2004.Page and Brin's search engine was originally called BackRub. The name 'Google' originated from 'googol,' which refers to the number represented by a 1 followed by one-hundred zeros.Eric E. Schmidt is the CEO of Google, while co-founder Sergey Brin and Larry page are Technology President and Products President, respectively. The company is listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange under the symbol GOOG. 'Google' is now a verb, having found its way into the dictionary. It means 'to use the Google search engine to obtain information on the Internet.'

2. GE

General Electric's brand value has been estimated at $61.880 billion, making it the world's second most powerful brand. GE is a giant US multinational, with headquarters in Fairfield, Connecticut, engaged in technology and services industries. It is the world's second largest company in terms of market capitalisation.The famous inventor Thomas Alva Edison opened a new laboratory in Menlo Park, New Jersey in 1876, where the incandescent electric lamp was invented. By 1890, Edison formed the Edison General Electric Company. In 1879, Elihu Thomson and Edwin J. Houston formed the Thomson-Houston Electric Company to rival Edison's firm. However, in 1892, both the companies merged to give birth to the General Electric Company.GE slowly began to diversify its operations. Today its businesses span information technology, financial services, industrial technology, aviation, healthcare, oil and gas, films and entertainment, theme parks, locomotives, insurance, etc. In India, too, GE's enjoys widespread presence.Jeffrey Immelt is GE's chairman & CEO; while Keith Sherin is the CFO, and Robert Wright is GE vice chairman.

3. Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation is the world's largest software company, with global annual revenue of over $44.28 billion. With a brand value of $54.951 billion, it also is the planet's third most powerful brand.Bill Gates, the world's richest man, is the executive chairman of the software giant which he co-founded along with Paul Allen in 1975. On June 25, 1981, the company was incorporated on August 12, 1981, IBM introduced its personal computer with Microsoft's 16-bit operating system, MS-DOS 1.0. On Feb 26, 1986, Microsoft moved to corporate campus in Redmond, Washington, and on March 13, 1986, Microsoft stock went public. On May 22, 1990, Microsoft launched Windows 3.0.On November 20, 1985, Microsoft released its first retail version of Microsoft Windows, originally a graphical extension for its MS-DOS operating system.Gates is equally admired for his insight and criticised for his business tactics. Steve Ballmer is the company's CEO, while Ray Ozzie is chief software architect. Microsoft employs 76,000 people across 102 countries.

4. Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola's brand value has been estimated at $44.134 billion, making it the world's foruth most powerful brand. Coca-Cola, a carbonated soft drink, was intended as a patent medicine when it was invented in 1885 by Dr. John Stith Pemberton in Covington, Georgia. It was then called Pemberton's French Wine Coca.Pemberton's partner and bookkeeper, Frank M Robinson, suggested the name and penned the now famous trademark 'Coca-Cola' in his unique script. Coca-Cola was bought over by businessman Asa Griggs Candler in 1887 and incorporated it as the Coca Cola Company in 1892. Griggs made the brand a force to reckon with through his marketing strategies. Coca-Cola was sold in bottles for the first time on March 12, 1894.In 1919, a group of investors headed by Ernest Woodruff and W C Bradley purchased The Coca-Cola Company for $25 million. Coca-Cola is also the world's best known brand.E Neville Isdell is the company's chairman and chief executive officer.

5. China Mobile

China Mobile is the world's 5th most powerful brand with a value of $41.214 billion. China Mobile Communications Corporation, also known as China Mobile or CMCC, is China's largest mobile phone operator.It is the world's largest mobile phone operator ranked by number of subscribers, with over 296 million customers. By turnover it is second to Vodafone, which owns 3.3% of the China Mobile. A state-owned enterprise, it was spun off from former monopoly China Telecom in 2000, and now has a 65% share of the highly competitive Chinese mobile market. China Mobile is the largest company registered in Hong Kong.Wang Jianzhou is the telecom major's chairman and CEO.

6. Marlboro

Marlboro's brand value has been estimated at $39.166 billion, making it the 6th most powerful brand. Marlboro, made by Altria, is the world's best selling cigarette brand. It is famous for its billboard advertisements and magazine ads of the Marlboro Man.Philip Morris, a London-based cigarette manufacturer, created a New York subsidiary in 1902 to sell several of its cigarette brands, including Marlboro. Marlboro then suddenly faltered badly in the market till the 1950s, when it made a rollicking comeback following the introduction of a new cowboy image for the brand. Sales skyrocketed by 5,000%. Marlboro with a filtered tip was launched in 1955.The brand is named after Great Marlborough Street, the location of its original London factory. Richmond, Virginia, is now the location of the largest Marlboro cigarette manufacturing plant. Altria CEO & chairman is Louis Camilleri.

7. Wal-Mart

The world's 7th most powerful brand, Wal-Mart, is estimated to be worth $36.880 billion.Wal-Mart Stores is an American public corporation and the world's largest retailer. It is the largest private employer, the largest grocery retailer, and the largest toy seller in the United States.It was founded by Sam Walton, who opened his first Wal-Mart discount store in Rogers, Arkansas, in 1962. The company was incorporated on October 31, 1969, and listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 1972. Sam Walton died on April 5, 1992 at the age of 74. His widow Helen R Walton, daughter Alice L Walton, and sons Jim C Walton, John T Walton and S Robson Walton, each with a personal wealth of $20.5 billion, have all been ranked among the richest Americans by Forbes.H Lee Scott is Wal-Mart CEO, while S Robson Walton, is the retail giant's chairman.

8. Citi
Citi is the world's 8th most powerful brand with an estimated value of $33.706 billion. Citigroup Inc was formed following the $140 billion merger of Citicorp and Travelers Group on April 7, 1998 to create the world's largest financial services organisation. The company employs almost 300,000 people around the world.Travelers was founded in 1864 in Hartford, Connecticut. It dealt in insurance and is noted for many industry firsts: the first automobile policy, the first commercial airline policy, and the first policy for space travel. In the 1990s, it went through a series of mergers and acquisitions. It was bought by Primerica in 1993, but the resulting company retained the Travelers name. In 1995, it became The Travelers Group. It bought Aetna's property and casualty business in 1996.Citicorp was the descendant of First National City Bank, founded in New York City. It was one of the oldest banks in the United States (founded in 1812), and had the largest international branch presence of any United States headquartered bank. In the 1960s and 1970s, chairman Walter Wriston led the bank into sovereign debt and loan syndication. It was Writsen who led the technology of ATM cards before the the banks. He also spearheaded the name change to Citibank in the late 1970s.Charles Prince is the company's chairman & CEO.

9. IBM

International Business Machines Corporation, also called IBM or 'Big Blue', is a multinational computer technology corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, USA.Till 2006 it was the world's largest computer company, but has now ceded the top spot to Hewlett-Packard. With over 350,000 employees worldwide, IBM is the largest information technology employer in the world.The company which became IBM was founded in 1888 as Herman Hollerith and the Tabulating Machine Company. It was incorporated as Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation (CTR) on June 15, 1911, and was listed on the New York Stock Exchange in 1916. IBM adopted its current name in 1924, where it became a Fortune 500 company.Samuel J Palmisano is IBM chairman & CEO.

10. Toyota
Toyota with an estimated brand value of $33.427 billion is the 10th most powerful brand in the world. Toyota Motor Corporation is a Japanese multinational corporation and the world's largest auto company that manufactures automobiles, trucks, buses, and robots. The headquarters of Toyota are located in Toyota, Aichi, Japan. It is the world's eighth largest company by revenue of $179 billion as of 2006.The company was founded in 1937 by Kiichiro Toyoda as a spinoff from his father's company Toyota Industries to create automobiles. It created, first as a department of Toyota Industries, its first product Type A engine in 1934 and its first passenger car in 1936. Toyota Motor Co. was established as an independent company in 1937. Although the founding family name is Toyoda, the company name was changed in order to signify the separation of the founders' work life from home life, to simplify the pronunciation, and to give the company a happy beginning. Toyota is considered luckier than Toyoda in Japan.Katsuaki Watanabe is Toyota's president and CEO, while Fujio Cho is chairman. Shoichiro Toyoda is the company's honorary chairman; Hiroshi Okuda is senior advisor; and Katsuhiro Nakagawa is vice chairman.

PRESIDENT 2.0-Obama harnessed the grass-roots power of the Web to get elected. How will he use that power now?

Technology has truly revolutionalized the way of how things shold be done. It is not just limited to development of electronic gadgets and Web spaces; it is also about managing information in a economic, political and social way.

This is an article published in "Newsweek" published on Nov 22, 2008 tells such a story. It explains how the cutting edge technology and computer infrastructure facilitated in campaigning, building up strong voters for the now elect-president Obama.

The style in which this article has been written is quite interesting and makes one want to read on till the end. After reading about Web 2.0 and other MIS topics this article was easily understandable and provides a good understanding about the application of IT in real world.

You can read the article by following the link:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/170347

IF- by Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or being hated, don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master,

If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breath a word about your loss;I

f you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!

Sometimes there are certain things we encounter in our childhood which leave us with marks; both positive and negative. These marks shape how we grow up to be. Shape our lives, guide our futures. This is poem is one among many which were part of my 8th grade syllabus, but this one I remember to date. It is among those things in my life that have left a desirable mark in my being. The poem itself explains how it could have still been the first to come to my mind when someone mentioned the word ''poem'' to me.