Next Steps in e-Business

STRATEGY

White paper

Saurabh Sardesai

Date: 6/18/2009

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Saurabh Sardesai Strategy Consultant, e-business

Table of content

1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY.............................................................................................2
1.1 E-BUSINESS......................................................................................................... .........................2
1.2 E-BUSINESS 2.0.................................................................................................. ..........................3
2 UNDERSTANDING SCOPE OF E-BUSINESS..................................................................3
2.1 OVERVIEW.............................................................................................................. .....................3
2.2 AS-IS E-BUSINESS................................................................................................................ ..........3
2.3 HIGH LEVEL REQUIREMENTS ................................................................................................... ...........4
2.4 METHODOLOGY FOR E-BUSINESS LONG TERM STRATEGY................................................................ ..................4
2.5 BALANCE OF TECHNOLOGY........................................................................................ ..........................6
3 IMPLEMENTATION APPROACH..................................................................................6
3.1 E-BUSINESS STRATEGY .................................................................................................. ...................6
3.2 PROPOSED STRATEGY SOLUTION........................................................................................... ...............10
4 EXECUTION APPROACH.........................................................................................12

1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

1.1 E-BUSINESS

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E-business is defined as a business that operates over the internet, and provides services to other businesses
and individuals. An e-Business platform is known for delivering technology solutions that add value to the
customer. E-Business is also servicing customers, employees and other stakeholders through the World Wide
Web.

1.2 E-BUSINESS 2.0

Today, major corporations are rethinking their businesses in terms of the Internet and its new culture and
capabilities. Web 2.0 has been an enabler of the concept of E-Business 2.0. E-Business 2.0 is doing business
in an interactive and collaborative way. This has fostered new businesses, technology offerings, and social
structures. Thus E-Business 2.0 is the E-Business where Web 2.0 is the key factor in creating value, and has
an external focus.

2 UNDERSTANDING SCOPE OF E-BUSINESS

2.1 OVERVIEW

Many international organizations and large multi-nationals have an existing e-Business platform for its
external clients. They desire to provide enhanced service to its external clients and want to define the scope
of an initiative and long term strategy for e-Business.

There are 3 phases of this strategy

1. Definition and Business case
2. Design and Organization preparedness
3. Development, implementation, change management and maintenance

This paper covers phase 1 of the long term strategy, defining a business case and quantifying the e-Business
drivers. We also define a strategy for managerial support to this initiative. At the end of this paper we
propose a strategic long term solution for e-Business for large international companies.

Companies wish to analyze their changing business environment and the requirements of their clients and
other stakeholders. They also want to evaluate the changing technology landscape and do a risk analysis.
The quest is to create an overall business strategy for e-Business.

Companies have a clear vision of the short term strategy for e-Business. For the long term strategy, they
seek insights for a roadmap for strategic initiatives and industry best practices. They also need to analyze the
governance of the e-Business strategy

2.2 AS-IS E-BUSINESS

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This section provides high level overview of as-is e-Business of multi-nationals

They use secure websites that offers clients access to information and services. It offers access to
information on e-Business and transactions. Companies planning to develop new features for straight-
through processing and improvement of end-user experience wish to build on their e-business experience to
create an e-Business platform that meets its long term strategy.

Current e-Business Strategies

1. Focus on external clients as ‘drivers’
2. Managing the client experience: Incremental progress and Rapid deployment
3. Guidance from regional partners
4. Balancing the quest for new with commitments to existing technology
5. Use of Client Connection as a short term strategy, while ascertaining long term strategies

2.3 HIGH LEVEL REQUIREMENTS

Listed below are high level requirements expected from the proposed strategy solution

a. Review of existing e-Business Strategy

b. Long Term e-Business strategy scope definition

c. Long Term e-Business strategy business case

d. Strategic assessment of role of e-Business in the over all business

e. Evaluation of requirements of existing and potential e-Business users

f. Assessment of current company technology landscape and emerging trends

g. Evaluation of experience of other organizations which have embarked on similar initiatives

h. Presentation of the proposed e-Business strategy

2.4 METHODOLOGY FOR E-BUSINESS LONG TERM STRATEGY

This section provides high level overview of the to-be e-Business of any multi-national. The scope is to
define the future long term strategy. The to-be e-Business platform will be based on the strategy formulated
by the following

1. An independent assessment of company’s existing short term business strategy

2. What the company has done till date with e-Business

3. Recommendations for improving the company’s existing e-Business

4. A Business case for long term strategy for e-business

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5. A report for long term strategy that includes

a. A clear definition of e-Business in the company’s context

b. Strategic assessment of the role e-Business will play in the company’s overall business

c. Requirements of current and potential users of e-Business and value added by this

d. An evaluation of the current technology of the company, emerging trends and

recommendations

e. Assessment of the technical preparedness of the external clients

f. A report on the Long term vision of ALL the options for e-Business initiatives as provided here
The 3 recommended options are :

i. Employing the best possible solutions

ii. Employing minimum solutions needed to move business forward

iii. A workable hybrid of the above two options

Please see point 6 below.

6. A holistic and realistic assessment of the options available for company’s e-Business for the long term
future, which includes

a. Metrics which the company may use for impact analysis of the e-Business initiative

b. Risk Analysis and/or SWOT analysis and the mitigation techniques

c. Skills, resource and budget that the company has to consider to successfully implement the
e-Business projects that may follow this initiative

d. Preparedness and Key issues to successfully implement the next steps for e-Business

e. Roadmap for achieving the each of the strategic options for e-Business to move forward in
the long term

f. Suggest suitable technology options, while sustaining the fundamental technology matrix of
the company

7. Better the client and partner confidence and minimize disruptions to the e-Business service.

8. A Presentation that will enable wider acceptance of the e-Business initiative with other company
stakeholders

9. A Visual Discussion artifact that will help illustrate the strategy business case

Out of Scope Requirements

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Ensuring that out of scope requirements are considered well while formulating the company’s e-Business
strategy is very imperative, so that the strategy can be committed to requirements that form the foundation
of the company’s e-business

2.5 BALANCE OF TECHNOLOGY

Companies have made significant commitment to their existing technology infrastructure in terms of work
and resources. They are open to considering new technology options, which maintain a balance with the
current technology infrastructure. They may not consider changing the basic foundation of their technology
infrastructure. There however should be no constraints because of this. We thus understand that the
proposed strategy solution has to be defined with this in mind. The proposed solution, while suggesting new
technology options, will ensure that synergy is created with the existing technology infrastructure of World
Bank, while the basic foundation remains.

3 IMPLEMENTATION APPROACH

The process of long term strategy formulation for effective e-Business is complex and needs to address
several dimensions within its overall scope, and, thus, a combination of approaches and tools are required.
We believe that the e-Business strategy solution is not just a technology solution but also a change in
business paradigm.

3.1 E-BUSINESS STRATEGY

Strategy involves making long-term plans that are clear and well thought out, rather than working on the
problems when they arise. Strategy involves having clear vision and setting up management objective and
expectations. We recommend a strategy for company to have a collaborative ‘Alliance Hub’, with external
stakeholders of e-Business as ‘Strategic Partners’. Thus the external stakeholders of e-Business will move
from being just the key drivers to being strategic partners of the company. We believe that successful
implementation of this strategy is the key business success.

We do not advocate a massive technology facelift, but believe this should be done in a pragmatic and phased
manner using iterative cycles, maintaining a balance with the existing technology. The detailed proposed
strategy and roadmap is given in the next section ‘Proposed Strategy Solution’.

This section gives the roadmap towards implementation of strategy solution in a planned manner.

ROADMAP FO R STRATEGY IMPLEMENTATIO N

• ESTABLISH A LONG TERM E-BUSINESS STRATEGY PROCESS

The company has to establish the strategic perspective of long term e-Business strategy. This process
must be a continuously evolving process that is also a learning process. These attributes are in-built
in the e-Business strategy process that we propose.

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• INITIATING THE STRATEGY LIFE CYCLE ANALYSIS

This comprises of evaluation of existing corporate e-Business strategy and recommendations to

improve the existing short term strategy.

Some of the issues we address are as follows:

 What are the purpose and the main stimulus prompting the need for e-Business planning,
and what are the key business drivers to be addressed?

 What aspects of the current e-Business and technical environment, and what issues,
constraints, underlying problems and risks are likely to affect the conduct and outcome of the
process?

 What is the current IT landscape of the company and how can the long term e-Business
strategy add value and synergy to it?
 What should be the scope of planning, and where should planning be focused—on the
corporate organization as a whole, at strategic business unit level or on specific core business
processes?
 How can the e-Business strategy process be effectively integrated with business strategy?
 What are the expectations and objectives to be met, and what deliverables are required?

 How can the organization build on its previous experience of e-Business strategy formulation
and planning?
 What are the most effective critical success approaches, and which techniques achieve the
best results
 What resources, from which areas of the business, fulfilling which roles and responsibilities,
and with which skills, should ideally be involved in the process and are they available? What
training will be required?

 How long will the e-Business strategy process take and what will it cost?

• IMPROVE THE SHORT TERM STRATEGY

The strategy life cycle analysis will facilitate the improvement of the existing e-Business strategy. The
improvements in the short term will be done, keeping in view the proposed long term strategy of the
company for e-Business

• DEFINE SCOPE FOR LONG TERM STRATEGY

Defining the scope of the long term strategy involves the some of the following and this list is by no
means exhaustive.

 Studying the requirements of the current and potential e-Business external client base
 Establishing long term success criteria for the company’s e-Business
 Analyzing process enrichment of current and potential future applications
 Establishing process effectiveness criteria that add value to the business

 Identifying a value-added portfolio of applications/services that will have a strategic impact

on the organization and increase its performance

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 Predicting future technology trends, evaluating alternatives and avoiding problem areas
 Enhancing management understanding and knowledge of the long term e-Business
strategy
 Studying the technical infrastructures of key external clients and solutions to overcome any
issues, specifically for clients who are in the developing countries

 Analyze the e-Business experience of organizations similar to yours

 Business impact of the long term e-Business initiative
 Impact of potential risks and strategies to mitigate them
 Analyze e-Business industry best practices and governance issues in e-Business
 Identify a portfolio of skills that will be required over the lifetime

• EVALUATION OF TECHNOLOGY LANDSCAPE

The technology evaluation of the company’s e-Business initiative is significant towards the realization
of the long term strategy. The company must evaluate current and future technology and trends
towards this end. This helps identify more efficient use of resources, develop more effective general
IT strategy, and produce more sustainable e-Business opportunities. This will help the company
evaluate future technology options, while not changing its fundamental technology foundation.

This assessment includes

 Current IT portfolio
 Key next steps and milestones
 Estimated requirements
 Anticipated regulatory pathway
 Technology synergies
 Value proposition
 Competitive positioning

• DEFINE BUSINESS CASE

The next step is to define a business case to the relevant stakeholder for the long term e-Business
strategy of the company. The Business case will include, among other things the following
 Problem Statement
 Current challenges in e-Business
 Current e-Business scenario
 Current trends in e-business technology
 Current and long term potential external users
 Current IT infrastructure
 Future IT infrastructure (long term)
 Proposed strategy solutions
 Critical success factors
 Advantages of the proposed solutions
 Recommended strategy

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 Executive Summary

• E-BUSINESS STRATEGY REPORT

An e-business strategy report must be prepared and presented to the relevant stakeholders. This
report will cover all the issues including the deliverables. Besides these issues, also present
information that enables realization of e-business strategy, and is critical to the strategy. Present a
summary of the Report and a visual discussion section.

• MONITOR E-BUSINESS STRATEGY

The long term e-business strategy will have to be monitored constantly by the company to ensure
successful implementing. This is a continuous process and criteria will have to be set for monitoring
the progress of the strategy over the long term.

• E-BUSINESS STRATEGY ROADMAP

Figure 1 : CTR e-Business Strategy Road Map

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3.2 PROPOSED STRATEGY SOLUTION

We propose to present the following long term e-Business Strategies, in addition to the points mentioned
above.

 ALLIANCE HUB

The company’s e-business should be viewed as a strategic ‘Alliance Hub’ between the company,
external clients and all other stakeholders. This will enable the company to share e-Business best
practices and industry standards across its alliance members in collaborative, community way. The
information and services to external clients can be provided in a mutual mode with real time
feedback from the end users of the e-Business platform. The Alliance Hub will incorporate the
features of Web 2.0 that enable business networking and association. The e-Business website has to
be viewed as strategic hub of all the e-Business stakeholders. The customer contact can be
automated and real time dashboards can be implemented to make the Alliance Hub user friendly. The
Hub will be based on principles of e-Business 2.0

The Alliance Hub will seek to create one common Web platform that enables external stakeholders
share information, execute transactions, and collaborate on strategic and operational issues. Not only
should this common platform facilitate new partnerships, but it should enable the company to better
match services with demand

 EXTERNAL CLIENTS AS STRATEGIC PARTNERS

The external clients of the company’s e-Business should be viewed as ‘Strategic Partners’, rather than
just key business drivers. The Strategic Partnership programme provides a platform to external
clients to directly contribute to the development of e-Business solutions in response to industry
challenges and priorities, in addition to the hub of networking opportunities. One of the most
important aspects of the partnership is that it enables the external stakeholders to develop an
understanding of the business needs and drivers that prompted the existing e-Business strategy
process. This is required in order to ‘sell’ the new e-Business strategy to external clients and the
resulting strategic partnership will assist in achieving e-Business objectives and resolving key
problems. The external clients of CTR e-Business thus have to be treated as an ‘extended arm’ of
the organization.

 E-BUSINESS LEADERSHIP AND EXCELLENCE CENTER

The e-Business Leadership and Excellence center will be a premier show case demonstrating the
partnership with the company’s external and internal stakeholders. This center will be a multi-
channel integrator of industry best practices and a blue-print for business intelligence of the
company’s long term e-Business initiative. This will enable the company to deepen it’s presence
among the stakeholders and make e-Business an interactive and collaborative experience.

E-Business is never finished and new developments continuously arise. The Center for Leadership
and Excellence will help establish a ‘Maturity Model’ for its long term e-business strategy.

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 ORGANIZATION ASPECTS OF E-BUSINESS

Any successful implementation of an e-Business is dependant on 4 key areas. These key areas have
to be addressed in the long term strategy.

1. Management and Organization

 Vision and Strategy

 Leadership and commitment

 Governance and organization alignment

2. Processes and Procedures

 E-Business Processes

 E-business integration

 Content Management

3. People and Culture

 Competencies

 Culture

 Communication

4. IT & Infrastructure

 IT Strategy and vision

 IT Architecture and Infrastructure

 Business and IT alignment

 PROPOSED RECOMMENDATION

 Integrate e-Business goals and objectives on all levels of strategic and operational planning

 Make ownership of e-Business transparent to the whole organization and external

stakeholders

 Build sponsorship and involvement at internal and external stakeholder level

 Bridge the gap between IT unit and the e-Business unit

 Integrate e-Business in multi-channel strategies

 Continuously measure e-Business performance and take corrective action where needed

 PROPOSED E-BUSINESS MODEL

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Alliance Hub
Strategic
Strategic
Partners
Context
(External clients)

E-Business
E-Business Value Governance
E-Business
Drivers
performance

E-Business
IT Capability infrastructure
IT Performance
flexibility

Figure 2: e-Business Proposed model

4 EXECUTION APPROACH

The company must develop its own project and product management methodology. It must be a synthesis of
industry standard approaches to software development methodology and pragmatism gained from practical
experience of project work. The intention is to provide a systematic approach to e-Business project
development, which remains flexible enough to accommodate the legitimate variation encountered in real-
world. It has to be designed hand-in-hand to provide an integrated delivery mechanism rather than simply a
methodology and a technology in isolation

Some of the key benefits include:

1. Ensuring that far-sighted risk management and quality assurance are built into the process
2. Linking business strategy and technical implementation
3. Transparency and traceability of the concept

Contact the Author

Saurabh Sardesai, MMS, MBA

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Strategy Consultant, e-Business

Saurabh_sardesai@yahoo.com

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