COM4022 - Technology in Business

Objectives:

On successful completion of the module, students will be able to:
Understand the commercial and business context for technology;
Understand a variety of organisational delivery styles;
Understand the governance and regulation issues related to technology in business;
Have an awareness of how to build a business case for a project and manage the stakeholders involvement in it;
Utilise knowledge to problem solve a business issue and deliver a pitch linked to this.

Content:

Software development occurs within a business context, and from the design stage onward consideration of a range of commercial, legal, and technological constraints are required. These requirements have driven organisational changes in the working culture (structures and methods of businesses). In this module students explore the drivers for a technology project:

- reducing cost (staffing, Back Office, technology);
- increasing profit (new sales opportunities, increase conversion rates, new markets);
- costs of new technology (capital, operating)
- building a business case for technology: requirements, solution selection, procurement, implementation, and cost benefit analysis.
- delivery styles: Agile, Waterfall organisations, Collaboration, KanBan and Scrum.
- regulation and compliance with technology projects.
- governance and regulation (including General Data Protection Regulation), stakeholder management, and event storming.

Learning and Teaching Information:

A mixture of mini-lectures, seminars and problem-based learning is used to deliver student-led engagement with the main module content. The knowledge of the individual elements is demonstrated through the development of business plans and there is developmental workshop support both for evaluating and balancing the various elements and also in developing and delivering a pitch.

Workshops
Hours: 36
Intended Group Size: Cohort

Guided independent study
Hours: 164

Further details relating to assessment
Directed activities: these consist of weekly tasks that must be completed and submitted for inspection at timetabled sessions each week. The assessment will be assessed on a pass/fail basis with a pass requiring at least 75% of all weekly tasks to be completed successfully. A pass will lead to the full award of 10% towards the final module mark. A fail in directed activities will contribute 0% to the final mark.

Component A: Pitch based on business problem (20%).

Component B: Pitch and plan based on business problem (60%). The pitch presentation will be followed by 10 minutes of questions. The Project Plan (1,500 words) should inform the pitch and be tested through the questions. This should be scheduled in Week 4 of Semester 2, before the commencement of COM4044 Team Project.

Integrated assessment: This is a 3-week project which occurs in the second half of Semester 2 and assesses their performance at the programme-level. It carries a single mark which applies to the Integrated Assessment component of this module along with COM4012 and COM4982.

Exam: When the module is delivered by an overseas franchise partner the final pitch and project plan may be replaced with a 2-hour open book exam. In this exam students are permitted to bring notes and texts into the exam room. They are then presented with an unseen scenario in which they must apply concepts from the course. For example, this could be to outline a project plan in response to a business problem that is presented.

Assessment:

001 Pitch; 5mins; during semester 1 20%
002 Viva & project plan; mid-semester 2 60%
003 Directed activites; throughout semester 2; pass/fail 10%
004 Intergrated assessment; end of semester 2 10%

Fact File

Module Coordinator - Jim Diokou
Level - 4
Credit Value - 20
Pre-Requisites - NONE
Semester(s) Offered - 4YL

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