Introduction
Any modern club, even without the consideration of specific services and specialized directions in club’s operations, represents a complex system of functional links. The congruence in the work of such links can be seen as directly related to the success of such venue’s existence. In that regard, gaining a competitive advantage in the light of increasing competition can be seen as a significant step, which on the one hand, should address the issue of competition, and on the other hand, might help increase the efficiency of the club’s working process. One of the options of gaining competitive advantage can be seen through the implementation of information technology and information management system. In that regard, this paper analyzes the possibility and the strategy of implementing information technology in a club, based on the case of Club IT, a downtown music venue managed and owned by Ruben Keys and Lisa Tejada.
Analysis
Club IT’s Mission and Primary Clientele
The mission of Club IT, as stated by the owners, is in offering live music, DJ’s, dance space and refreshments (Club IT, 2009). In that regard, it can be seen that the mission does not differ for many other night clubs with other themes. Nevertheless, it can be assumed that the inclusion of IT attachment to the club’s name is an indication of a certain lifestyle, and a certain category of clientele, which should be more apparent as soon as the club implements its IT integration.
The current clientele can be described as people who love music of various types, with no preference to certain style. The clientele’s main purpose of visiting club IT is music and hanging out, where the assortment of menus consists only of snacks. Additionally, these people love to dance, and taking such attributes in consideration the clientele is young audience between 21 and 28 years of age, with students being most of them.
Club IT’s Information Resources
Analyzing the current informational resources of Club IT, it can be seen that the informational portal of the club serves merely as an electronic board, offering little interaction or taking advantage of the information system to the full extent. In that regard, it can be seen that the information is implemented in the form of a simple database, in which the users have the access to the information, and the database is merely serving to eliminate data redundancy, isolation, and inconsistency (Rainer, Turban, & Potter, 2009). In achieving such purposes, it can be seen that the personal information page is merely a replacement of personal profile of the company, gathering different types of information in one place, e.g. financial, personal, contacts, etc, in one place. Accordingly, the sales, budget and other tabs in the club’s intranet informational resources merely serve in providing information, without any other options, with the extensive information being in the form of an attached Excel file. The same can be stated regarding other, apparently interactive, elements, which are implemented through merely providing a download link for a file, rather than providing a web form, which can be filled and stored online.
Thus, it can be stated that the company’s current implementation of the informational resources through a database management, which implementation is a mere replacement of the paper work storage, and a bulletin board.
Competitive Advantage Strategies
The proposed strategy for gaining competitive advantage can be seen through the implementation of innovations in the work of the club. The significance of such strategy is in the fact that it might combine other strategic purposes such as the orientation toward customers and increasing operational effectiveness. In pursuing innovations the company should implement informational technologies, for both customers and employees in a way that provides a two-way interaction between the users of the system and the club. In that regard, such interaction can be implemented for customers on the website of the company and in the club as well.
The interaction can be seen through providing the customers with the possibility to reserve a place in the club, vote for the music that should be played, and register as Club IT member. Additionally, the information system inside the club can be seen through providing each table with a wireless sensor menu, through which the customer not only would be able to order, increasing the operational effectiveness of the club’s processes through instant calculations of the bills and minimizing the routes of the waitresses, but also will provide orientation toward the customer, where the customers will be a part of the shows, providing ratings for the songs played, ordering them and composing playlists for the DJ. The information that will be used in such implementation will be gathered from the customers in real time, rather than being pre-collected.
Conclusion
It can be concluded the current information technology implementation in Club IT is lacking and does not correspond to the orientation toward IT, implied for the club’s name. The website of the company and the company’s intranet informational resources, serve merely as informational dashboards, without making use of the technology. The recommended strategy will be through pursuing innovation, which will gain the company a competitive advantage, through the orientation toward the customer and increasing the operational effectiveness.
References
Club IT. (2009). Web.
Rainer, R. K., Turban, E., & Potter, R. E. (2009). Introduction to information systems (2nd ed.). Hoboken, NJ: J. Wiley.