MIS Post-Graduation

Joe Piscetta

I picked up my second major of MIS because I thought I needed something to differentiate me from every other Finance major in the business school. I knew that I liked computers and that I was pretty good with them; well, at least better with them than some of my friends. What I didn’t know was what MIS even was. Looking back now, I am very glad that I decided to take on the double major. I probably got the job that I got because of my MIS major. This summer after graduation, I will begin working for BearingPoint in their Enterprise Resource Planning division as a consultant. There will be a lot of traveling involved and I really am not sure what I got myself into. I could be doing anything from looking at trends in the technology market to doing due diligence for the company. With due diligence I would be helping the firm and its investors learn the profitability and marketability of its products and services. It is important to know how big the margins will be for the new product/service as well as how big the target market is before you invest all your money in it. Another key factor in determining the product/service’s value is whether or not it is unique; how easily can the product/service differentiate itself from a similar product/service of a competitor’s.

I actually will be in the Oracle practice of BearingPoint so I am sure I will get very familiar with PeopleSoft and ERP systems in general. ERP systems attempt to integrate all data and processes of an organization into a unified system. A typical ERP system will use multiple components of computer software and hardware to achieve the integration. I know that ERP has now shown itself to be a worthwhile investment for many companies and that these organizations are also looking to extract even more value from their existing ERP systems. Shifts in corporate structure and new compliance requirements are driving the need for improved access to information and cost savings. In order to realize greater return on investment from ERP systems, the actual ERP applications have to be specifically tailored to more effectively support adaptive business processes and help drive growth. What I will be attempting to do is strategically align the firm’s technology assets with their business processes. The outcome of this is that it will reduce their total cost of ownership and improve responsiveness, quality and return on investment. As Joe stated in his blog, “SOA is not just a phase; it is a movement and a base on which to build information structures for business and the internet.” I learned that BearingPoint and my position utilize their experience with service-oriented architecture and also business process management to help accelerate the creation of agile, flexible systems to better address today’s marketplace and operational demands.

I will be attempting to sell to people and companies that whether you are upgrading your current ERP system or implementing a new one, it can help you unite people, process and strategy easily. It also will help you create flexible technology solutions as well as deploy timely and much more accurate information across the entire enterprise. A successful ERP solution helps a company gain several key factors in their industry. By achieving process innovations that facilitate greater integration and help your company focus organizational attention on prioritized demands your company will receive greater operational efficiency. An effective ERP system will also display a faster time to benefit for the company. By having an industry-tailored application from BearingPoint, it speeds their time of delivery and it reduces project risk to help the company get their process and system up and running faster. With agile IT architecture, applications can respond faster and more effectively to changes in business process coming within the organization or from the marketplace; this gives the company improved business responsiveness. ERP solutions can also help reduce IT expenditures. Effective reuse of IT assets helps realize sustainable cost reductions from your IT function and makes resources available to deploy toward growth initiatives. We learned in class that ERP applications can also extract information from your pre-existing data warehouses; this in turn, has led to DBMS technology becoming more of a commodity recently. All in all, I believe that the industry I will be working in is going to continue to grow, and as long as I can show companies the benefits of ERP solutions I will be able to maintain a job for several years.