COMP9732 Enterprise Cloud Systems GE: Cloud Based Payroll Systems

You need to prepare a written report to guide enterprise management and sustainability of implemented cloud solutions. The report should cover the following areas:

• Business case feasibility and proposed solution

• Implemented solution and migration roadmap (can include demo, proposed architecture and required changes)

• Review of cost and time for implemented solution

• Required skills to sustain and support the implemented solution, future considerations, conclusion and final reflections

Requirements

• Demonstrate an ability to write business documents to justify a technical solution

• Demonstrate an understanding of the inherent requirements of business process and planning to the development of enterprise cloud systems

• Understand the nature and use of service-oriented architectures

• Understand how the various components of internet-distributed applications can be assembled into a coherent application

Outcomes:

• Demonstrate you understand how the various components of internet-distributed applications can be assembled into a coherent application

• Critically assess the technologies that support the building and deployment of enterprise cloud applications

Introduction 

In internet, cloud computing supports to enroll the devices and allow them to be accessed automatically. The cloud implementation’s main target is to enable the clients to experience highly sophisticated and convenient method of resolving the solutions in the organizations. Following report’s main focus is the payroll system that is developed with the help of Microsoft azure framework, where the processes are updated and real time. It is found that cloud implementation has the capacity of decreasing or lowering the expenses related to manual payroll systems and easing the process of data accessing.

The cloud technology and implementation is trending, thus it is the future, which will help the users to access various applications, data and information of all type. It is believed that the cloud computing technology will continue to grow and dominate all the fields. With the increasing demands it is required to learn the strategies for managing the cloud implementations. Hence, this report aims to guide the enterprise management and sustainability of the implemented cloud solutions. The areas to be covered in this report are, proposed solution, business case feasibility, cost and time, required skills and the overall reflections. However, it aims to understand the architectures and frameworks used for the development of enterprise cloud applications and to assess the technologies which supports the enterprise cloud application building and development. On the other hand, how various components of internet-distributed applications could be assembled into a coherent application is demonstrated.

Background

The previous assignments have worked on representing that, the cloud implementation has helped the clients to resolve various business problems in the day-to-day working, with the help of automated processes. Moreover, the cloud implementation also saves a lot of time which i

This report’s objective is to exhibit the capability of presenting a business document with justification; to understand the requirements of the business process and plan for developing the enterprise cloud systems; to understand the service-oriented architecture’s usage and characteristics; and to understand how different components of the internet-distributed applications could be assembled into a coherent application. However, it also will cover the business case feasibility and proposed solution; the solution that is implemented with a migration roadmap; cost and time review of the implemented solution; necessary skills for sustaining and supporting the implemented solution; future considerations and the final reflections.

2. Business Case Feasibility and Proposed Solution

The feasibility study helps to add depth to the business case where it researches the problems of the business in-depth, identifies the requirements for a solution and determines whether the alternative solutions could meet the stated requirements or not. Thus, all the above mentioned factors help in the development of business improvement strategies. Also, they are beneficial to determine whether the new strategy will succeed in the long run or not (Hofstrand, 2009).

The core elements of feasibility study are (Cleverism, 2016):

1. Technical feasibility
2. Market feasibility
3. Commercial feasibility
4. Overall risk assessment
5. Feasibility of purchasing an existing business

The above elements are evaluated.

The business case feasibility is evaluated base on the following steps (Cleverism, 2016):

Step 1: Preliminary analysis is conducted.

The planned ideas are outlined which shows lot of scope, then the market space and action's commercial viability is examined, which determines that the proposed solution can benefit various organizations and ease the payroll related issues. This new idea is unique and can be a strength rather than a weakness for the organization. It benefits the organization in terms of time, cost, production and data access.

However, there is a risk as the unauthorized individual can access the data and can use it for his or her benefit. But, is possible to work on improving data security.

Step 2: Project scope is outlined and current analysis is conducted.

The feasibility study's objective is to check whether the scope of the cloud based payroll system will benefit the organizations or not. Because, the manual payroll system requires data to be entered manually for generating the necessary reports, then it is also time consuming, it is even prone to operational errors, contain challenges to retrieve the required information and needs paper work. On the other hand, the manual payroll system is paper dependent, unsafe and costly. Thus, the intension or the objective here is to determine whether, the proposed solution can overcomes the drawbacks of manual system or not (IMPLEMENTATION OF A HYBRID CLOUD APPROACH FOR SECURE AUTHORIZED DEDUPLICATION, 2017).

Step 3: Compare the proposed system with the existing services.

When the proposed cloud based payroll system is compared with the manual system that exists in the organization, the cloud based payroll system provides automatic system. As determined earlier, the manual payroll system requires data to be entered manually for generating the necessary reports, it consumes more time, it is prone to operational errors, it contain challenges to retrieve the required information, it needs paper work, it is unsafe and costly. But, the cloud based payroll system has the benefits such as, it easily accesses the information, provides automatic updates, it doesn’t need backup, it offers easy reporting facilities, it has improved the transparency, and offers easy integration with other systems. However, as data being stored in cloud, if the system lacks security measures then it is possible to face issues like, theft of employee information or any other confidential information.

Step 4: Examine market conditions.

The organizations are the targeted market here, to ease their everyday activities. The immense benefits of cloud based payroll system can be accepted by the market and its demand can also increase (Implementation of Cloud integrated IoT as Garbage collection system, 2017).

Step 5: Understand financial costs.

Though, it might cost more to switch to a new payroll system, it benefits the organization for a long term.

Step 6: Finally, review and analyze the data.

There are security concerns. The market is trending and wishes to opt the easy facilities. There will be huge competition in terms of data security in the market. There will also be competition in achieving the competitive advantage. With the implementation of the proposed cloud based payroll system, the business situation changes drastically. Firstly, time, cost and production face positive impact. To support the implemented solution, it is required that the organizations should invest on the services like, Platform-as-a-service (PaaS), Infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) and Software-as-a-service (SaaS) to use the cloud based payroll system.

Therefore, the concept of cloud solution for the payroll system and choosing right services among the suggested services by the different cloud service providers are assessed. The study demonstrates the advantages which the organization will enjoy with the cloud based payroll system’s implementation. Hence, it is observed that, the cloud based payroll system will help the organization in effectively managing their payroll system (Hillsberg, 2018).

The manual payroll system is upgraded to automatic payroll system i.e., in the proposed solution the current payroll system is redesigned to improve the infrastructure of the business, with cloud based payroll system. The concept of cloud solution requires various services such as PaaS, IaaS and SaaS.

The objective of the proposed solution is to overcome the drawbacks of manual system. The proposed cloud based payroll system is compared with the manual system. The resultant shows that, the cloud based payroll system provides automatic system which eases various tasks. Whereas, the manual payroll system requires data to be entered manually for generating the necessary reports, it consumes more time, it is prone to operational errors, it contain challenges to retrieve the required information, it needs paper work, it is unsafe and costly. But, the cloud based payroll system has the benefits such as, it easily accesses the information, provides automatic updates, it doesn’t need backup, it offers easy reporting facilities, it has improved the transparency, and offers easy integration with other systems. Moreover, due to manual system, in the human resource payroll system, all data should be entered manually by the HR in order to generate operational reports. Since these systems are integrated into organizational servers which are running other applications, data retrieval has been a major problem. Current payroll systems are still making use of papers in order to consolidate data accurately. This in many cases results to waste of time as well as data errors which makes entire process costly. 

The manual payroll system requires data to be entered manually for generating the necessary reports, then it is also time consuming, it is even prone to operational errors, contain challenges to retrieve the required information and needs paper work. Moreover, the manual payroll system is unsecure, paper dependent and costly.

Further, with the analysis of the current manuals payroll system the following drawbacks are determined:

• The current systems are not robust and convenient as they do not provide real-time data streaming when required. Though organizations have been advocating for payroll automation, it has been overtaken by current technology.
• Any organization that runs on embedded HRMS for the employee payment processing could be referred as technology resistant.
• With the embedded system, there is no possibility that the employees can access all the required data. For instance, number of days worked in a month, bonuses to be paid, remaining leave days, and so on.
• High consumption of time.
• The infrequent delay because of several reasons effect the employees’ efficiency along with the organization’s performance. Even, always the employees are not seen satisfied because of the salary processing delays or due to the wrong payroll processing.
• There is difficulty when the required information is being retrieved.

The organization are prioritizing payroll system, as it boosts productivity (How are companies preparing for the payroll of the future?, 2017).

Implemented Solution and Migration Roadmap

The manual payroll system is planned to be migrated to the cloud based payroll system. It follows the below mentioned steps to migrate from one to the other system:

1. A clear statement to move to cloud based solution
2. It needs the staff to be trained.
3. It requires choosing the right and trusted service provider:There are plenty of cloud service providers in the market, it is essential to select the best suited and trusted provider.
4. It needs planning and assessing the financial conditions of the organization, before migrating
5. It requires migration tools.
6. It requires choosing the appropriate storage options based on the needs of the organization:There are several options available from various cloud service providers. But, they differs based on the cost, durability, latency, availability and other factors. Thus, compare these factors before selection the right service provider.

Review of Cost and Time for Implemented Solution

While reviewing the cost and time for the implemented solution the following points were determined:

• Consistently, the cloud suppliers use, "pay-as-you-go" delineate. This could incite surprising working costs if the executives aren’t comfortable with the cloud based models.
• The promoters view that the scattered figuring helps to maintain the relationship with a strategic distance or limit the early costs for the IT foundation.
• From different cloud service providers, plenty of options are available, which varies based on cost, durability, latency, availability and other factors.

Skills Required for Sustaining and Supporting the Implemented Solution

Required skills for sustaining and supporting the implemented solution are listed below:

• Cloud computing knowledge such as:

1. Programming skills
2. Database skills
3. Information security
4. Quality Assurance
5. Linux
6. DevOps

• Then for supporting the implemented solution, the organization must invest on the services such as, PaaS, IaaS and SaaS to use the cloud based payroll system.

If PaaS, IaaS and SaaS services are contracted, then the organization will not need any other type of software for supporting the management of the implemented solution (i.e., cloud based payroll system). Because, Platform-as-a-service is referred to the application that helps the users in the development, testing, running and maintaining the applications conveniently. Then, Infrastructure-as-a-service is the application that helps the users with virtualized resources that are needed for cloud computing, over the internet. Whereas, Software-as-a-service is referred as the application which the third parties host and distributes it to the users, based on their demands.

Future Considerations

The future considerations for the cloud based payroll system are:

1. Security and Confidentiality i.e., the cloud payroll system could be manipulated with the unauthorized access of an individual for their personal benefits. This is a serious issues which results in loss of personal data to the individuals who are unknown and cannot be trusted.
2. Challenges of slow internet, which increases difficulty to retrieve the data.
3. Internet connection requirements and additional expense
4. Platform maintenance challenge

Conclusion

This is a report is a guide for managing the enterprise and for sustaining the implemented cloud solutions. The areas covered in this report are, the business case feasibility, proposed solution, the solution that is implemented with a migration roadmap, cost and time review of the implemented solution, necessary skills for sustaining and supporting the implemented solution and the overall reflections.

related to cloud. The aim here is to understand the architectures and frameworks used for the development of enterprise cloud applications and to assess the technologies which supports the enterprise cloud application building and development. This report’s purpose is to demonstrate the capability of presenting a business document with justification; to understand the requirements of the business process and plan for developing the enterprise cloud systems; to understand the service-oriented architecture’s usage and characteristics; and to understand how different components of the internet-distributed applications could be assembled into a coherent application. How various components of internet-distributed applications could be assembled into a coherent application is demonstrated.

Therefore, the report successfully covers the business case feasibility and proposed solution; the solution that is implemented with a migration roadmap; cost and time review of the implemented solution; necessary skills for sustaining and supporting the implemented solution; future considerations and the final reflections.

Final Reflections

The major reflection of this report is that, the cloud based payroll system helps to offer scalable, robust and flexible means for supporting the activities of various organizations. Then, it has increased the transparency, real-time data is accessible from anywhere, eased integration, and provides security along with confidentiality. If the system lacks security measures then it is possible to face issues like, theft of employee information or any other confidential information.

The other reflections include that, the cloud implementation has helped the clients to resolve various business problems in the day-to-day working, with the help of automated processes. Moreover, the cloud implementation ensures saving a lot of time which is being wasted with manual process.

References

Cleverism. (2016). How to Conduct a Feasibility Study the Right Way. [online] Available at: https://www.cleverism.com/conduct-feasibility-study-right-way/ [Accessed 25 Oct. 2018].

Hillsberg, A. (2018). Why Switch to Cloud-Based Payroll Processing?. [online] Financesonline.com. Available at: https://financesonline.com/why-switch-to-cloud-based-payroll-processing/ [Accessed 25 Oct. 2018].

Hofstrand, D. (2009). What is a Feasibility Study?. [online] Extension.iastate.edu. Available at: https://www.extension.iastate.edu/agdm/wholefarm/html/c5-65.html [Accessed 25 Oct. 2018].

How are companies preparing for the payroll of the future?. (2017). Global Payroll Survey. [online] Available at: https://assets.ey.com/content/dam/ey-sites/ey-com/global/topics/tax/tax-pdfs/ey-2017-global-payroll-survey.pdf [Accessed 25 Oct. 2018].

IMPLEMENTATION OF A HYBRID CLOUD APPROACH FOR SECURE AUTHORIZED DEDUPLICATION. (2017). International Journal of Recent Trends in Engineering and Research, 3(10), pp.24-32.

Implementation of Cloud integrated IoT as Garbage collection system. (2017). International Journal of Recent Trends in Engineering and Research, 3(4), pp.374-378.