Sample Essay On Sas Institute

Reg.No.

Introduction to the company

SAS Institute was incorporated in 1976 by Barr, Helwig, Goodnight, and Sall. Initially, SAS was a project financed by National Institute of Health through North Carolina State University. SAS Institute is a company involved with the development of software (SAS) for advanced business analytics, data management, business intelligence, and predictive analytics. SAS stands for Statistical Analysis System. The software has the capability of mining, altering, managing, and retrieving data from many sources and statistical analysis on it (SAS Institute, 2015).

System analysis of this business system

The inputs to the business at SAS Institute is the ideas of people. The company employs people with skills and experience in software development like programmers. The anticipated expectations of a client is conceptualized and the programmers do the programming in such a way that the resulting software performs what the clients want. The input is ideas and the output is a software.

The main components

The main components of this system is human resources (like programmers, scientists, statisticians, human resources, management and so forth), equipment (like computers, storage devices), and the clients.

The main processes

Being a software development company, the main processes at SAS are requirement gathering and analysis, system analysis, system design, coding, testing, and implementation (Aggarwal and Singh, 2006).
The first phase, requirement gathering and analysis, involves collecting data and views on how customers expect the software to perform. Customer interviews and surveys are methods used to capture client’s requirements. So much communication takes place in this phase that it involves the project team, stakeholders, and end users. It can also include gathering data on what the clients do and the challenges they encounter so that a solution is sought. It is a brainstorming stage. A feasibility analysis can be carried out in this stage.
The second phase is system analysis. In this stage, the system is broken down into smaller parts. The reason being to make it easier and more manageable for the project managers, developers, testers, designers, and other professionals who might be involved in some work on the software later on.
The third step is system design. This is where logical design is done by the system analyst for the designers. From the logical design the designer gets a basic idea on how to design the software. The designer and the system analyst work together in this stage to design the software design. Through the guidance of the system analyst the designer comes up with the best possible software design.
Fourth step is coding. Most of the work involved in this stage is coding. It involves many people, mostly programmers, assigned to do the job. The process is subdivided into several tasks and each task is given to a coder to work on it so that the process becomes faster.
The fifth stage is testing. Quality analysts here receives ready software and test it. Various test cases are executed to make sure that the software is free of errors.
The sixth stage is implementation. It is the final stage in the development of software. The software is run on systems of clients. It would be considered ready for launching only if it runs smoothly on their systems without any error. Otherwise, it goes back to the quality department for more testing and if it is found to be with errors, it is forwarded to the coders to come up with a new code that is error free.

Elements of the environment

Elements of the environment are climate, natural vegetation, water, and soil.
Interfaces
There are various types of interfaces including user interface, software interface, and hardware interface. User interface include menu of a computer system, keyboard, and mouse while software interface include codes and language that the applications utilize to communicate to each other. Hardware interfaces include plugs, sockets, and wires that the hardware system used to communicate with each other (Bhambri and Kamra, 2008).

Organization subsystems

One of the subsystem is a small group of employees working together but still part of the larger organization system (Kokemuller and Media, 2015). This can include employees working together to develop codes for the software. The other subsystem could be a group of employees working on the quality department and whose main job is to test the quality of the software developed. A department such as that of marketing, R&D, and human resources can be treated as a subsystem.

Feedback loops

Feedback loops are effective means of gathering and disseminating information within and outside an organization (Auster, Wylie, and Valente, 2005). One feedback loop is that of the project manager –team feedback loop. Another feedback loop could be that of manager-manager feedback loop. For example, manager of department concerned with development of odes vs manager of department concerned with quality assurance. Other types of feedback loops common at SAS Institute include Manager-community feedback and manager-subordinate feedback loop.

Website Information of SAS Institute

The website of SAS Institute contains a lot of information useful to various parties. While some information is useful to individuals, other information is useful for organizations. The company’s website contains a page with information for products and solutions as well as support and training. Individuals and organizations who wish to buy their products can check from the web page of the company. The company also has another page for industries they offer support for. From their list, the company offer solutions to almost any industry. Any organization can check whether they fall within the list of the industries targeted in the products and solutions or support and training. There is a page for customer experience where organizations and individuals can confirm from others their experience with the company. The customer experience stories are neatly organized and categorized by company, industry, business topic, country, partner, and all customer stories. SAS Institute also works with partners and they have dedicate a page for partners in their website. Organizations who wish to partner with the company or organizations who wish to know the partners of the company would find all information in this page. There is also a page dedicated to basic information pertaining to the company. This page is the starting point of learning about the company. An individual or organization can find this page also very useful. Individuals who are looking for employment opportunities or graduates seeking internship can find relevant information on the careers page. The company’s website also has a page dedicated to events. Individuals as corporates learn about upcoming activities like conferences, forums, and webinars. Someone looking for the location or contacts of the company would just go to the contacts page where contact information, office listings, and map is presented.
The company’s website is simple and neat. It also contain almost any kind of information a potential client, employee, or researcher would wish to know. There is a summary page where someone can obtain quick facts about the company’s financial status, employees, and customers. One who wish to find some information has an option of searching since there is a search tab. Suggesting an improvement to their website is rather difficult. Perhaps it is because it is their field and they lead by example.

SAS Institute and Social Media

The company is present in all the major social media sites including Facebook, LinkedIn, Google plus, and tweeter. The company’s purpose is well represented in social media. What they do and the kind of industries they serve is clearly represented. Given that these social media platforms have wide publicity, there is a very high chance organizations or individual who require the services and support of the company would be reached. The company also features in more than one language thus increasing its ability to reach out to many potential customers, employees and partners. Other critical information found on the company’s social media page (Facebook) include contacts, location, about the company, events, videos, and photos. Unlike in its own website, the social media platform offers an opportunity to individuals and organizations to interact with the company’s management in an informal environment. It is through such interactions that the company can obtain critical information that can help to improve its services and products, or even find new markets, partners, and employees.

References

Aggarwal, K.K.and Singh, Y. 2006. Software Engineering. New Delhi: New Age Internal
Austere, E., Wylie, K. &Valente, M. 2005. Strategic Organizational Change. New York, NY: Palgrave MacMillan.
Bhambri, P. & Kamra, A.2008. Computer Peripherals and Interfaces. Pune: Technical Publications Pune
Kokemuller, N. & Media, D. 2015. What Are Organizational Subsystems? [Online]. Available at: http://smallbusiness.chron.com/organizational-subsystems-41735.html [accessed 08 April 2015]
SAS Institute. 2015. SAS Institute Company Information [online] Available at: http://www.sas.com/en_us/company-information.html#stats [accessed 08 April 2015]