E-commerce Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words - 1

E-commerce - Essay Example Clear communication channels and escalation matrix should also be defined. The core team must prepare a methodology and time frame to transfer existing data to the new system. A final launch date should be adhered to or changed depending on project progress. The leadership team must pay special attention to securing staff buy in, so that the new system when launched is embraced by the users. In implementing this strategy various organizational, management and technical issues will need to be addressed. This is discussed below. Organizational Issues In order that a life insurance company moves from a brick and mortar business to an automated environment, strategic leadership is very important. The leadership team may need to evaluate: "Strategy to deal with channel conflict Prevent erosion of margins Assess type of products suitable for web distribution Techniques to strengthen customer relationships and gain new customers online" (Bloor Research). This entails huge investment in IT infrastructure. The leadership team will need to decide the payment method for this investment. One option is to outsource or share costs with a provider while the other is to take costs out of existing operations. For example Allstate Insurance, a US based insurer "restructured its workforce to support a move towards a multi-channel sales strategy encompassing the Internet, call centers and agents. It eliminated thousands of non-agent positions and converted captive agents into independent contractors. These changes reportedly will save the company $600m. Allstate has also reportedly reorganized and consolidated some of its operations to save costs" (Insurance Journal). The life insurance company needs to decide the areas to... This essay evaluates the strategy for a life insurance company to transform from a brick and mortar business to an e enterprise. The researcher focuses on the discussion of the issue of converting a life insurance company to an e-enterprise, that requires not only huge monetary investment, but also investment in keeping the energy and tempo of the employees high so that project implementation is successful. If e launch is successful, some parts of the traditional set up can be replaced by more modern processes. It will turn the insurance company from a mammoth organization to a lean firm. Reduce processing time and control cost, e –commerce and e – business solutions hold great appeal for an insurance company. Josefowicz aptly notes that a life insurance company can â€Å"maintain a small group of e-business experts to provide guidance, consistency and best practices on the five key areas of strategy, education, usability, security and standardization†. The resea rcher states that this will help the company reduce the risk of: re-inventing the wheel for each new initiative, supporting cross-purpose initiatives, lack of training, which leads to lack of adoption and user frustration, divergent interfaces, which increases training expense, and reduces adoption, expensive, unnecessary integration of divergent systems, lack of interoperability, expensive and time-consuming post facto integration. The researcher then concluds that it's competence, clear direction and enthusiasm, that can surely make the project a success.