NEP2 TASK 1 CHOOSING A VENDOR
NEP2 TASK 1 CHOOSING A VENDOR
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NEP2 — TASK 1: CHOOSING A VENDOR
IT SOURCING AND DEVELOPMENT IN A GLOBAL ECONOMY — C929
PRFA — NEP2
COMPETENCIES
4056.1.1: : IT Sourcing Stakeholders and Elements
The graduate determines which stakeholders, documents, tools, or skills are necessary to ensure successful sourcing and support of global IT
projects.
4056.2.1: : Solutions Development and Operating Strategies
The graduate proposes appropriate sourcing and operational strategies for global IT projects.
4056.3.1: : Ethics, Regulations, and Multiculturalism
The graduate explains how an adherence to ethics, an understanding of regulations, and a sensitivity to multiculturalism can contribute to the
success of global IT projects.
INTRODUCTION
Many information technology (IT) companies and IT departments have decided to outsource projects overseas to gain competitive advantages both
domestically and globally. For this project, you will be choosing between two vendors bidding for an IT project for a U.S. company.
SCENARIO
You are the senior director of information technology at Endothon Inc. (Endothon), a U.S.-based company located in Atlanta, Georgia. Your company
makes aircraft seats and accessories for private and small commercial aircraft. You have five manufacturing plants in the United States. Your
company has recently expanded into western Europe due to long-term contracts with Airbus, Dassault, and Bombardier in France and the United
Task Overview Submissions Evaluation Report
Kingdom. This newly acquired business in western Europe required the company to purchase three manufacturing plants in western Europe. Also,
you currently have long-term contracts with Boeing, Cessna, and Grumman in the United States.
The CEO and the board of directors at Endothon have indicated they want a new enterprise resource planning (ERP) system for their company, and
they would like it to be compatible with their customers’ systems. All of Endothon’s customers have Systems, Applications, & Products in Data
Processing (SAP) provide their ERP systems. They want the ERP to be configured and implemented in the next 10 months. Realizing this is an
aggressive schedule, they have authorized you to outsource the development of the ERP system to either an inshore or offshore company to contract
for the necessary resources to accomplish this project. Your team will be involved in this endeavor so that they will eventually learn the system.
However, the initial configuration, implementation, maintenance, and support will have to be serviced by your selected vendor and transitioned to
your team two years after initial implementation. As the senior director, you have already determined that the cost to implement this project with a
domestic contractor or within the company is prohibitive. To achieve the aggressive timeline and the budget, you must find a lower-cost resource
capability offshore. You have issued a request for proposal (RFP) and have gone through a selection process to the point that you now have the final
two competing vendors. The budget for this project is $10,000,000.
The SAP ERP system you are going to be implementing will have a number of modules that represent core business processes and areas. You will
focus on three major modules within the SAP ERP system:
1. Financial Accounting and Controlling (FICO) Module: This includes procurement and payments for international contracts. It also includes the
recording of financial transactions and the assurance of the correct payments for the correct performance. Transfer pricing (monetary
exchange rates), tracking, and posting are continually managed by this system.
2. Human Resources Management System (HRMS) Module: All personnel data, including personal information, work history, medical records,
training history, salary information, and organizational placement are contained in this system.
3. Sales and Distribution (SD) Module: The eight manufacturing plants are automated and tracked through this module. This includes the
proprietary designs and components of the various products. Product design information is transmitted in encrypted form from the
headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, to the various plants on a continual basis. This includes customer data, shipping and receiving information,
and inventory loads.
As the senior director of information technology at Endothon, you are tasked with selecting a vendor based on these two final proposals and then
suggesting modifications to the winning vendor’s proposal to align to the company’s needs.
REQUIREMENTS
Your submission must be your original work. No more than a combined total of 30% of the submission and no more than a 10% match to any one
individual source can be directly quoted or closely paraphrased from sources, even if cited correctly. An originality report is provided when you
submit your task that can be used as a guide.
You must use the rubric to direct the creation of your submission because it provides detailed criteria that will be used to evaluate your work. Each
requirement below may be evaluated by more than one rubric aspect. The rubric aspect titles may contain hyperlinks to relevant portions of the
course.
A. Summarize Endothon’s outsourcing needs and expectations for the outsourcing vendor, based on the attached “Sourcing Plan Case Study” and
“Request for Proposal.”
B. Identify the project sponsor, stakeholders, and steering committee based on information in the Endothon corporate profile, using the attached
“Sourcing Plan Case Study.”
C. Summarize the strengths and weaknesses of the proposal from Bullzai Ltd. (Bullzai), noting any gaps in the vendor’s response to requirements
specified in the attached “Request for Proposal.”
Note: Use the “Bullzai_Response to Request for Proposal” attached.
D. Summarize the strengths and weaknesses of the proposal from Synesthor Ltd. (Synesthor), noting any gaps in the vendor’s response to
requirements specified in the attached “Request for Proposal.”
Note: Use the “Synesthor_Response to Request for Proposal” attached.
E. Identify which vendor you want to award the outsourcing contract to, justifying why that vendor was chosen.
F. Recommend modifications to the chosen vendor’s bid, amending key weaknesses and oversights in the selected vendor’s response to the RFP (i.e.,
the “Synesthor_Response to Request for Proposal” or the “Bullzai_Response to Request for Proposal” attachment) and justifying how the
recommended modifications will benefit your company.
G. Summarize how a problem-solving negotiation strategy could be used to renegotiate the weaknesses and oversights identified in part F.
H. Recommend training to mitigate misunderstandings in cultural communication that may arise between Endothon and the chosen outsourcing
vendor.
I. Explain technical and security challenges related to the country where your chosen vendor is located, including IT security, physical security, and
the protection of intellectual property.
J. Explain how Encryption and Export Administration Regulations (EAR), Category 5, Parts 1 and 2 apply to communications between your company
and your chosen vendor.
K. Acknowledge sources, using APA-formatted in-text citations and references, for content that is quoted, paraphrased, or summarized.
L. Demonstrate professional communication in the content and presentation of your submission.
File Restrictions
File name may contain only letters, numbers, spaces, and these symbols: ! -_. * ‘ ( )
File size limit: 200 MB
File types allowed: doc, docx, rtf, xls, xlsx, ppt, pptx, odt, pdf, csv, txt, qt, mov, mpg, avi, mp3, wav, mp4, wma, flv, asf, mpeg, wmv, m4v, svg, tif, tiff, jpeg, jpg, gif,
png, zip, rar, tar, 7z
RUBRIC
A:OUTSOURCING NEEDS
B:PROJECT STAKEHOLDERS
NOT EVIDENT
A submission summarizing the company’s
outsourcing needs is not provided.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission summarizes the company’s
outsourcing needs but does not use details
from the attachments to support the exis‐
tence of those needs. Or the submission does
not summarize what is expected of an out‐
sourcing vendor or does not use the attach‐
ments to support the existence of those ex‐
pectations. Or the submitted information
contains inaccuracies.
COMPETENT
The submission accurately summarizes the
company’s outsourcing needs and includes
what is expected of the outsourcing vendor,
using details from the attachments to support
the existence of those needs and expectations.
NOT EVIDENT
A submission identifying the project sponsor,
stakeholders, and steering committee is not
provided.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission identifies the project sponsor,
stakeholders, and steering committee, but
some of the identified persons are not based
on information in the Endothon “Sourcing
Plan Case Study.”
COMPETENT
The submission identifies the project sponsor,
stakeholders, and steering committee based
on information in the Endothon “Sourcing Plan
Case Study.”
C:BULLZAI’S PROPOSAL
D:SYNESTHOR’S PROPOSAL
E:OUTSOURCING PROPOSAL
F:PROPOSAL MODIFICATIONS
NOT EVIDENT
A submission summarizing Bullzai’s proposal
is not provided.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission summarizes Bullzai’s propos‐
al, but it does not address both strengths and
weaknesses of the proposal, or it does not
note gaps in the vendor’s response to require‐
ments specified in the attached “Request for
Proposal,” or the submitted information con‐
tains inaccuracies.
COMPETENT
The submission accurately summarizes
Bullzai’s proposal, addressing both strengths
and weaknesses of the proposal and noting
gaps in the vendor’s response to requirements
specified in the attached “Request for
Proposal.”
NOT EVIDENT
A submission summarizing Synesthor’s pro‐
posal is not provided.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission summarizes Synesthor’s pro‐
posal, but it does not address both strengths
and weaknesses of the proposal, or it does
not note gaps in the vendor’s response to the
requirements specified in the attached “Re‐
quest for Proposal,” or the submitted informa‐
tion contains inaccuracies.
COMPETENT
The submission accurately summarizes
Synesthor’s proposal, addressing both
strengths and weaknesses of the proposal and
noting gaps in the vendor’s response to re‐
quirements specified in the attached “Request
for Proposal.”
NOT EVIDENT
A submission identifying the selected vendor
is not provided.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission identifies the selected ven‐
dor, but it does not provide specific informa‐
tion from the selected vendor’s response to
the RFP that justifies why that vendor was
chosen, or the submitted information in‐
cludes inaccuracies.
COMPETENT
The submission accurately identifies the se‐
lected vendor, and it provides specific informa‐
tion from the selected vendor’s response to
the RFP that justifies why that vendor was
chosen.
G:NEGOTIATION STRATEGY
H:CULTURAL ISSUES
NOT EVIDENT
A submission recommending proposal modifi‐
cations is not provided.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission recommends proposal modifi‐
cations, but it does not cite key weaknesses
and oversights in the vendor’s response to the
RFP. Or the justification of how the recom‐
mended modifications will benefit the compa‐
ny is not based on the response to the RFP or
contains inaccuracies.
COMPETENT
The submission recommends proposal modifi‐
cations, cites key weaknesses and oversights
in the vendor’s response to the RFP, and accu‐
rately justifies how the recommended modifi‐
cations will benefit the company, using details
from the response to the RFP.
NOT EVIDENT
The submission does not summarize how a
problem-solving negotiation strategy could
be used to renegotiate the weaknesses and
oversights identified in part F.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission summarizes how a problemsolving negotiation strategy could be used to
renegotiate the weaknesses and oversights
identified in part F, but it inaccurately cites
identified weaknesses or oversights in part F,
or it does not demonstrate a clear under‐
standing of a problem-solving negotiation
strategy.
COMPETENT
The submission explains how a problem-solv‐
ing negotiation strategy could be used to rene‐
gotiate the weaknesses and oversights identi‐
fied in part F, and it accurately cites identified
weaknesses or oversights in part F and
demonstrates a clear understanding of a prob‐
lem-solving negotiation strategy.
NOT EVIDENT
A submission recommending training to miti‐
gate misunderstandings in cultural communi‐
cation that may arise between Endothon and
the chosen vendor is not provided.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission recommends training to miti‐
gate misunderstandings in cultural communi‐
cation that may arise between Endothon and
the chosen vendor, but the recommended
trainings would be ineffective in mitigating
misunderstandings, or the identified cultural
issues are not likely to occur or they are
inaccurate.
COMPETENT
The submission recommends effective training
to mitigate possible misunderstandings in cul‐
tural communication that may arise between
Endothon and the chosen vendor.
I:SECURITY CHALLENGES
J:EAR CONCERNS
K:SOURCES
L:PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATION
NOT EVIDENT
A submission explaining technical and securi‐
ty challenges related to the country where
the chosen vendor is located is not provided.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission explains some technical and
security challenges related to the country
where the chosen vendor is located, but it
does not accurately include possible chal‐
lenges in each of these areas: IT security,
physical security, and the protection of intel‐
lectual property.
COMPETENT
The submission accurately explains technical
and security challenges related to the country
where the chosen vendor is located, including
possible challenges in IT security, physical se‐
curity, and the protection of intellectual
property.
NOT EVIDENT
A submission explaining how EAR (Category
5, Parts 1 and 2) applies to communications
between the company and the chosen vendor
is not provided.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission offers a limited explanation of
how EAR (Category 5, Parts 1 and 2) applies
to communications between the company
and the chosen vendor, or the explanation in‐
accurately addresses EAR regulations.
COMPETENT
The submission offers a thorough explanation
of how EAR (Category 5, Parts 1 and 2) applies
to communications between the company and
the chosen vendor, and the explanation accu‐
rately addresses EAR regulations.
NOT EVIDENT
The submission does not include both in-text
citations and a reference list for sources that
are quoted, paraphrased, or summarized.
APPROACHING COMPETENCE
The submission includes in-text citations for
sources that are quoted, paraphrased, or
summarized and a reference list; however, the
citations or reference list is incomplete or
inaccurate.
COMPETENT
The submission includes in-text citations for
sources that are properly quoted, para‐
phrased, or summarized and a reference list
that accurately identifies the author, date, ti‐
tle, and source location as available. Or the
candidate does not use sources.
NOT EVIDENT APPROACHING COMPETENCE COMPETENT
SUPPORTING DOCUMENTS
NEP2_Task1Attach_Bullzai_Response to Request for Proposal.docx
NEP2_Task1Attach_Request for Proposal.docx
NEP2_Task1Attach_Sourcing Plan Case Study.docx
NEP2_Task1Attach_Synesthor_Response to Request for Proposal.docx
Content is unstructured, is disjointed, or con‐
tains pervasive errors in mechanics, usage, or
grammar. Vocabulary or tone is unprofession‐
al or distracts from the topic.
Content is poorly organized, is difficult to fol‐
low, or contains errors in mechanics, usage, or
grammar that cause confusion. Terminology is
misused or ineffective.
Content reflects attention to detail, is orga‐
nized, and focuses on the main ideas as pre‐
scribed in the task or chosen by the candidate.
Terminology is pertinent, is used correctly, and
effectively conveys the intended meaning.
Mechanics, usage, and grammar promote ac‐
curate interpretation and understanding.
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