Management issues regarding e-commerce and the internet: 20 critical questions managers should ask before plunging into e-commerce!

The drivers for electronic commerce are both technological (under the tremendous pressure of innovation) and business oriented. The authors have found technological issues drive most industrialists, with the business drivers being vague. However both technology and business drivers should play an important part. As Cathy Benko (Deloitte consulting) had said, “for more than two centuries the industrial business model has used a single linear approach to change, predict what customers will want, design resources and organize people to serve those wants, then implement according to management’s plan and design. Today this model of Predict-design-implement is no longer viable- in fact, it is dead.” [ 11 This paper will identify managerial issues regarding ecommerce and the Internet. Chan and Swatmann [2] noted that management involvement is imperative for the success of electronic commerce implementation. The size and popularity of the lntemet have grown enormously during the past few years and continue to grow at phenomenal rates. The risk of entering ecommerce is many and it is important that the issues are understood. This paper has identified the issues, which need to be considered and 20 key questions, which need to be addressed before entering into ecommerce

The ethics of electronic monitoring within the workplace.

This paper shows that electronic monitoring of employees’ use of e-mail and the World Wide Web can be beneficial to a company and even to its employees. However, the use of monitoring and the resulting intrusion into personal privacy can also have adverse affects. Ideally, monitoring should only be used to increase the efficiency of the organisation. This would lead to a far-relaxed attitude to be monitored within the work place. It is difficult for companies to obtain the right balance between private and work-related Internet use. A solution to this problem is to contract an independent outside party to undertake the monitoring process. This paper suggests guidelines for establishing an agreed electronic monitoring policy which should enable increased productivity from better use of electronic facilities yet still be acceptable to employees. The greater acceptability of independent monitoring and the more relaxed atmosphere of a not too restrictive policy on email and Internet use will increase the overall company morale which, in turn, will produce a happier, more productive environment that will benefit both employees and managers alike