INTRODUCTION
Information Technology has revolutionised the development of business around the globe. It offers a high level of communication which helps businesses improve their networking skills and marketing experience. It also allows the organisations to access information about their competitors in order to rejuvenate their competitive advantages and cultivate a differentiation.
Nicholas Carr, an American writer, argued that IT no longer gives a competitive outline to companies and that investing in IT solutions into management solutions has to change severely in order to gain differentiation. He also identifies that Information Technology is no longer considered strategic because its power, availability and accessibility has greatly developed. And hence, if companies intend to gain a competitive advantage over others, they have to do something or possess something that others don’t.
This essay discusses Nicholas Carr’s provocative article “IT doesn’t matter” and also arguments and criticisms that rose from scientists and other IT consultants. It also illustrates how companies who have implemented similar Enterprise Resource Planning systems facilitate a competitive advantage and provide differentiation. Industry examples where two companies have applied the same SAP solution, i.e. SAP warehouse management is used in order to improve their business processes and efficiency in stock management. This solution helped increase their sales and customer service.
ARGUMENTS AND CRITICISMS
Nicholas Carr, in his article says that Information Technology is commoditised, has become ubiquitous and hence has lost its strategic value. He also compares Information Technology to be all over the place like railroads and electricity. What is the problem with this argument? In my opinion this argument is not very well structured. I do agree with Tom DeMarco, an Analyst, who counter-argues that Carr shows these entities in the form of a graph and in the IT graph he...