Data protection vulnerabilities

Data protection vulnerabilities are important issues for the health industry, and the best mitigation approach must be developed such that data privacy can be quickly implemented. Today, health providers are working even more on new technology to communicate with patients quickly electronically and capture necessary data. The infrastructure of the organization and the increased quality function for better efficiency and usability for patients’ healthcare professionals (Wang, 2018). Because of the growing data violation and its substantial effect on patient data, the healthcare industry works against the Health Insurance Portability and Transparency Act (HIPAA), which allows organizations to defend PHI from unauthorized access and to mitigate without fail the broader impacts of data violation. IT protection is a significant concern for the health teams and the primary priority is on the HIPAA enforcement scheme, whereby major issues are reduced and risks are contained. The risk of violations of policy and procedures is reduced by HIPAA and better approaches are sought in many respects to handle PHI patients. HIPAA. HIPAA is created to protect patient data from the uncertain challenges of all health providers complying with HIPAA and reduce data protection concerns in several areas. It is most important to focus on the HIPAA guidelines and to establish the best stand to protect data from abuses and reduce suspicious incidents. Healthcare practitioners will mitigate the major obstacles presented by data breaches when conforming to HIPAA and safeguard data without fail against malicious accidents. Technology, including the recording and preservation of patient records, has been integrated into their everyday operations. Technology, however, cannot be best tailored to medical records, and other essential details may be lost or privacy abused by the organization unless steps are taken. This paper addresses the vulnerability to the database of data and alternative alternatives for healthcare facilities. The alternative to such infringements is to use sufficient security networks to prevent the danger of data infringement (Puljak, 2020).

References
Puljak, L., Mladinić, A., Iphofen, R., & Koporc, Z. (2020). Before and after enforcement of GDPR: Personal data protection requests received by Croatian Personal Data Protection Agency from academic and research institutions. Biochemia Medica, 30(3), 1–8. https://doi.org/10.11613/BM.2020.030201
Wang, X., Luo, Y., Jiang, Y., Wu, W., & Yu, Q. (2018). Probabilistic optimal projection partition KD-Tree k -anonymity for data publishing privacy protection. Intelligent Data Analysis, 22(6), 1415–1437. https://doi.org/10.3233/IDA-173589

Praveen Balu – Wednesday, 28 October 2020, 7:17 PM
Number of replies: 2
Fortification of the patient data is the most crucial part of all healthcare specialist’s scope of the procedure. The frequent data breaches emphasize the healthcare worker’s training to protect the data. Data breaches from stealing, loss, illegal access, inappropriate revelation, and hacking instances concerning individual health data remain to rise every year. With the increased usage of health data technology by health organizations, data loss and data theft comprise the most critical data breaches categories. HIPAA guidelines and pieces of knowledge get employed to enhance healthcare data safety procedures. Organizations discovered to get something done too slightly to expand their systems and data security at the probability of substantial supervisory charges. Healthcare data security has been very crucial with the increased cyberattacks on the healthcare associations. Cybercriminals have also been using enhanced, complicated tools and procedures in order to attack the healthcare organization. (Liu, Musen, & Chou, 2015)
The healthcare organization’s data security risks are pretty insistent since it contains sensitive information and confidential patient information. It can have serious consequences such as financial harm or psychological harm when the patient’s information is stolen, lost, or even disclosed improperly. In spite of the consequences of the security of persistent data, healthcare suppliers need to come up with easy contact with patient data for appropriate distributing and efficient health care. Understanding confidentiality and security are crucial to lowering human blunders and negligence, which is frequently the root of several confidentiality breaches. Developments in technology give way to the implementation of programmed and significant healthcare communication structures. Additionally, internet usage improves these structures’ information interaction but raises threat due to various systems and heterogonous workers engaged. It will be a factor in the face of incorporating secure and confidentiality protecting systems. Therefore, a structure with high-level security and exceptional safety approaches is necessary to safeguard alongside possible breaches that will grant the patients and make the quality better on the whole. (Arain, Tarraf, & Ahmad, 2019)
References
Arain, M. A., Tarraf, R., & Ahmad, A. (2019). Assessing staff awareness and effectiveness of educational training on IT security and privacy in a large healthcare organization. Journal of multidisciplinary healthcare, 12, 73–81. https://doi.org/10.2147/JMDH.S183275.
Liu, V., Musen, M. A., & Chou, T. (2015). Data breaches of protected health information in the united states. JAMA, 313(14),1471–1473. doi:10.1001/jama.2015.2252.

Sagarika Chukka – Sunday, 25 October 2020, 9:18 PM
Number of replies: 2
Could Data breaches be the reason for HIPPA Violations? With multi-layered cyber security defense, still we see lot of data breaches are still going all the time. After most of the investigations on the breaches, it has seen the main reasons aren’t the results of HIPAA violation but also includes OCR Breach along with it. There are many challenges in the healthcare domain to maintain data security because of the unanticipated emergency. It has seen most of the violation has been done during the emergency situations. As we clearly know shared information across the environment clearly helps in emergency situations but at the same time highly vulnerable for different types of cyber-attacks (Wickramage, 2017). Despite all of this, maintenance and analysis of logs are highly important in determining the root causes of violation of EHR systems during emergency. As per the analysis (Davis, 2019), it has been seen an increase of breaches within two years compromising million patient records from the last two years. The best example is “Dominion national” compromising patient’s data of 2.96 million. The breach was discovered after 9 years of unauthorized access. Data of individual ‘s vison and dental benefits has seen compromised for former and current members.
The main reasons of healthcare breaches are seen while investigation on health care records of the patients without asking their permission. Failure in performing organization- wide risk analysis, Lacking in management of security risks, Failure to HIPPA- Complainant Business Associate Agreement, Insufficient Access Controls, Nott able to use appropriate encryption in safeguarding phi on portable devices, Exceeding the deadline of breach notification, Improper access to patient’s Health records and finally disclosing of PHI to third parties without taking permission from patients (HIPAA Journal, 2019).
In order to prevent breaches in health care domain, it is necessary to follow the measure in implementing depending on size, capability and complexity of an organization. Employees must be given training and must give access privilege according to the standards, necessary audits and enforcement must be practiced. It is always good practice to follow encryption or any security true in an organization in avoiding any circumstances.
References:
Davis, J. (2019, July 23). The 10 Biggest Healthcare Data Breaches of 2019, So Far. HealthITSecurity; HealthITSecurity. https://healthitsecurity.com/news/the-10-biggest-healthcare-data-breaches-of-2019-so-far
HIPAA Journal. (2019, April 26). The Most Common HIPAA Violations You Should Be Aware Of. HIPAA Journal. https://www.hipaajournal.com/common-hipaa-violations/
Wickramage, C., Fidge, C., Sahama, T., & Wong, R. (2017). Challenges for Log Based Detection of Privacy Violations during Healthcare Emergencies. GLOBECOM 2017 – 2017 IEEE Global Communications Conference, 1–6. https://doi.org/10.1109/GLOCOM.2017.8254433
Anil MF replies
Prathap Jadeni – Saturday, 24 October 2020, 8:17 PM
Number of replies: 2

Part – 1
The following are the benefits of establishing solid financial acumen in a company;
(i)The establishment of solid financial acumen will enable the company to earn more profits. It will help the company to make informed decisions to invest in the projects that will bring more profit to the company and this is achieved through the help of professionals in the financial sector
(ii)Establishment of solid financial acumen will enable the company to analyze the cost it is incurring and look for a way of reducing the costs. The reduction in the cost or expense incurred by the company will make the company to save on expenses which is beneficial to business (Daff, 2019).
Where financial acumen was not supported as an organizational hallmark is that the employees did not understand their roles in the organization when it comes to the profit making of the organization and there was a reduced internal control which may sometimes lead to losses in the organizations. For example, there was no proper checks and balances on the cash receipts by the organization.
The organization where financial acumen was well established is that every employee understood his roles in the organization and worked towards the achievement of the goals of the organization by trying to minimize cost and increase the profits being made by the company. Financial acumen is the understanding of what drives the expenses that a given business incurs and the profits it gets from its operations. It is very important to understand financial acumen and establish a solid one since it will help the company to manage its cost and increase its profits thus enabling the company to survive and be competitive in the market.
Understanding of financial acumen in an organization and its establishment is very important since it will enable both the management and the employees to play their roles perfectly leading to the growth of the company and if not taking care of can cause negative effects to the company (Irtaimeh, 2018).
Part – 2
The rationale for SOX – The need to polish the financial market led to the creation of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in 1934. Over time, SEC has continued creating legislation that promotes transparency and tightens the standards of reporting. Following a failure in the financial market in 2002, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act was created in the same year. Since then, through financial system transformation, the act has influenced several USA businesses.
Provision for SOX – Mostly, the highly valued provisions of Sarbanes-Oxley are referred by sections, and the major ones include; Section 802, Section 404, and section 302. These provisional sections can send corporate officers to prison if they certify financial statements falsely. In this light, these provisions have enhanced transparency and equality.
Enforcement for SOX – The Act has ensured the enforcement of security and compliance controls in Section 906 of the Act, compliance and data protection, and audit and compliances. These enforcements have ensured safety in the USA financial market (Walker, 2019).

References:
Daff, L. (2019). Chief financial officers’ perceptions of their roles inside nonprofit organizations. Financial Accountability & Management.
Irtaimeh, H. J. (2018). Impact of Strategic Leadership Competencies on Enhancing Core Competencies in Organizations: Applied Study on AlManaseer Group for Industrial & Trading. Modern Applied Science, 12(11), 169-180.
Herath, S. K., & Walker, S. A. (2019). How effective is Sarbanes-Oxley in the accounting profession–Is it accomplishing its Original Objectives?. The Business & Management Review, 10(2), 98-107.
Shiva Thati – Tuesday, 20 October 2020, 4:32 AM
Number of replies: 2

Financial acuity
Financial acuity includes how well a person can assess the likely situation and come up with a strategy to make that situation more likely. When a person has strong acuity, he or she can work independently to arrive at an appropriate course of action, which means he or she does not have to rely on outside forces to guide decisions. A person’s skill level in managing uncertainty in his or her personal life, life in the workplace, in workgroup settings, or in a variety of other settings is affected by the uncertainty and the amount of risk in the job. Some people make more progress with their work in one environment than another. That is because they have experienced the greatest risk in one environment, but also because they have less personal risk in others (Garcia, 2017).
Financial conditions are a very useful concept. Business needs are different for each sector and there is a link between these. The key point is that business needs vary from sector to sector, industry to industry. The concept of market needs implies what will be required by individual consumers. It is a very important concept that is a necessary prerequisite to the analysis of a specific firm’s performance in achieving its objectives.
A more difficult challenge was predicting changes in family size. His business was changing and he had to understand how the population changed. The process of forecasting the economy was called economics. In a sense, Keynesianism is an extension of economics because he views the use of economic theory to predict behavior as normative. The term economics is derived from the Greek words for “matter” and “economics.” By the 20th century, however, economic philosophy has developed to the point where we can apply these terms to everything from politics to business to health care, and to everything in between (Garcia, 2017).
The professional creation course focuses on financial risk management and the ability to protect investments from failure. This course has been developed over the years and is based on the concepts of liquidity, credit, collateral, equity capital, business and economic development, and business and professional risk. The professional development and creation courses have evolved over time in order to deliver the right balance of knowledge and skills to meet our current and future needs and concerns.
Sarbanes- Oxley act
The Sarbanes–Oxley Act of 2002, also known as the “Public Company Accounting Reform and Investor Protection Act” and “Accounting Reform Act of 2002.” These obligations resulted in “the public accounting profession’s highest statutory standard for financial reporting.”
Many companies have responded to the Sarbanes–Oxley Act of 2002 with a generalization, “all” must be alike and compliance is easy. Some companies have even introduced templates for “clean” auditing to implement this compliance approach. Compliance initiatives are not limited to audit firms but range from a small departmental to a multinational enterprise. Most companies today will hire an external auditor to “audit” their operations. The purpose of an external auditor is to help the audit committee or other internal audit group identifies significant areas of risk and recommend, modify, or correct those areas. For example, an external auditor might recommend that the auditor should investigate the audit process if internal controls are not working effectively or adequately. Corporate Internal Control over Financial Reporting: Includes all systems of internal control to ensure that the financial statements are prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. Exhibit 1-13 summarizes the various components of an internal control environment, which can form the basis for establishing an effective control environment for the business. The controls to control risk are usually expressed in terms of the specific internal controls applied and in some companies, as well. A control environment will include, but is not limited to: A project team, the project sponsor, key stakeholders, and other individuals who will participate in the decision-making process. For this process to succeed, the appropriate mix of individuals and expertise, skills, and abilities from all the relevant sources is needed to reach a decision. 3-6 illustrates a decision-making example for a product development project. The product development environment includes but is not limited to: The scope statement, WBS, WBS dictionary, and the associated deliverables (Chhaochharia, 2017).
References
Garcia, A. L. (2017). Variability in acuity in acute care. JONA: The Journal of Nursing Administration, 47(10), 476-483.
Chhaochharia, V., Grinstein, Y., Grullon, G., & Michaely, R. (2017). Product market competition and internal governance: Evidence from the Sarbanes–Oxley Act. Management Science, 63(5), 1405-1424.
Hemanth Gadde – Saturday, 24 October 2020, 10:17 AM
Number of replies: 3

Financial Acumen:
At the point when workers are not for an organization to be effective, something that I accept so firmly, intuition all through the organization. Couldn’t care less in case you’re in fund, showcasing, or HR – we need to comprehend what profits for the organization prepared in budgetary sharpness, poor business choices are made an organization’s budgetary message must be predictable among financial specialists, the executives, and staff. Fund is the language of the business, and it empowers individuals to impart how they will profit for their business. Money keenness negligible alludes to the abilities which are required on better decisions and better choices with respect to budgetary issues better. Such are the most part obtained through learning and even by truly picking up involvement in from the organizations. These abilities are fundamental for positive development and activity of organizations particularly with regards to managing rivalries, the executives of organization accounts, figuring the cost-viability of acquainting another item with the market. A standout among st the most widely recognized proof of absence of these abilities is the point at which an association emerge even with basic minutes prompting breakdown and when there are powerless or conflicting budget summaries in a similar association (Ragas, 2019).
Various articles posted by different writers assume instrumental jobs in the comprehension of this issue. The various money related keenness presents a similar comprehension of it from alternate points of view. For instance, edifies on the shifted and critical budgetary keenness abilities that need to run fruitful benefit arranged associations must have. These incorporate the money related capacities which are gone for understanding the education ideas which incorporate planning and others. Business abilities is another type of monetary astuteness which is gone for individual to effectively work the executive’s costs and keep up high characteristics of ventures to make high esteem in regards to benefits. At long last, the worldwide aptitudes which help an individual to break down neighborhood, local and global markets and to comprehend inclines on the planet showcase. Instructions to relate the monetary acumen obtained to execution a business is one thing that has turned into an issue for some individuals. An individual has the significant abilities in the top administration; however, the exhibition of his/her association is as yet poor. (“Connecting Financial Acumen to Business Performance gives a superior comprehension of how such aptitudes and thoughts can change over into the attractive execution to continue the organization. A standout among the hugest issues that this article brings to our comprehension is that there exist factors which impact the exhibition of an ability. One is persistent learning. This encourages unfortunate casualties to comprehend their obligation better. Another factor is the professional training which opens the exploited people to the upsides and downsides of budgetary administration, and subsequently they figure out how to more readily manage issues emerging. Having the option to do something and settle on a fruitful choice on it has been huge for business-situated associations. One of the ways is principally from the market point of view where the administration realizes what the clients need and when they need it with the goal that they give merchandise on interest. An organization with amazing money related sharpness likewise has a superior and irrefutable record of fiscal summaries which encourages them know the bearing of the business to change in accordance with the circumstances on the off chance that they are poor. Business acumen as a rule, are additionally significant in lessening rivalry. This is on the grounds that the thoughts that individuals from the administration have could be transformed into huge revelations to improve the task of the business (Bayton, 2020).
Sarbanes Oxley Act:
Sarbanes-Oxley is an Act which has the duty of investigating the bookkeeping and of open organizations and financial specialist security. The arrangements of this Act do not make a difference to each organization or everyone but rather apply for the most part to the open organizations. This implies the privately owned businesses and even philanthropy commitments do get influenced by this is one of the necessities is access to the open organizations records to take into account a review that is gone for dissecting the degree of straightforwardness, responsibility, and data of such sorts as given by the Act. There are additionally punishments which are forced on administrators who endeavor to adjust fiscal summaries to accommodate their thoughts. The principle purpose behind this implementation is with the goal that decisions might be executed under the Act that is given. This, along these lines, helps in the reclamation of financial specialist confidences in the organizations (Howard, 2018).

References:
Bayton, R. J. (2020). Business and Finance Education for Christian Church Leaders: A Qualitative Study (Doctoral dissertation, Northcentral University).
Ragas, M. (2019). Defining ‘Business Acumen’: A Delphi Study of Corporate Communications Leaders. Public Relations Journal, 13(1).
Withers, M., Kim, J. Y. R., & Howard, M. (2018). The evolution of the board interlock network following Sarbanes-Oxley. Social Networks, 52, 56-67.
Mounika MF replies
Alekhya Madadi – Sunday, October 25, 2020, 5:56 PM
Number of replies: 3

Summary of Financial Acumen articles
Spreading Financial Acumen One Day at a Time.
Financial acumen entails understanding drivers of profitability, growth, and cash flow in addition to primary performance measures and the financial statements of an organization. Financial acumen has been a source of consternation for business. They consider business acumen as a necessity, however, they struggle to implement and embed it across the organization. There are various advantages that companies generate from implementing financial acumen. It boosts the decision-making capabilities of employees and leaders. It also contributes to high profitability, revenue growth, and market share of an organization due to good decision-making potentials and strong financial insights in staff. It also initiates cost efficiency due to the effective utilization of scarce organizational resources and better employees’ satisfaction. It’s considered as one of the primary components that initiate an organization to attain its strategic priorities (Butchey, n.d).
The Illiterate Executive: An Executive’s Handbook for Mastering Financial Acumen
The article defines financial acumen as the ability of an individual to evaluate the impact of an organization’s decisions on financial statements and well-being in the long-run. It states that an individual with financial acumen should be able to evaluate the impact of organizational decisions. For an organization to be successful, employees must know the source of the company’s revenue. Therefore, management should create financial acumen throughout the organization. It also states that when employees are not trained in financial acumen, poor business decisions are often made within the company (Cook, 2016). Financial acumen provides various advantages to the organization. It initiates better decision making due to strong financial insights from the staff. This contributes to profitability, high sales, and an increase in market share. Financial acumen initiates organizations to attain their strategic goals.
Linking Financial Acumen to Business Performance.
Financial acumen is a complex concept and to initiate value creation in an organization, one must understand and manage multiple financial indicators on aspects like products, market, regulations, or stakeholders. Besides, financial acumen can be evaluated across three aspects; financial, global, and business quality skills. Financial skills involve strengthening the primary concepts and metrics in finance, streaming processes, and compliance. On the other hand, business quality skills sharpen the ability of an individual to maintain order in the organization and to work effectively through proper resources management. Global skills mainly involve analyzing concepts like the global market, product trends, competition, and regulations (Vorbach, n.d).
Benefits of Solid financial acumen
There are various benefits of establishing a solid financial acumen in an organization. First, it initiates better employee performance. Employees with strong financial insight often perform better. Financial acumen also results in high sales and profitability. This is because of better decision making and interaction between the employees and customers. Besides, financial acumen enables all employees regardless of their department to understand how an organization generates income and its decision-making process. A solid financial acumen also helps an organization to attain its strategic priorities due to better decision making and employee’s performance.
My personal experience relates to where financial acumen was part of the organization culture. I once worked in a consulting firm where all employees had the necessary information to advise any client regardless of the department. We were continuously trained on aspects to consider during consultancy and all of us knew how the company generated its income.
Part 2; SOX
Rationale
SOX was passed in the US in 2002 to protect investors and the public from fraudulent practices and accounting errors in organizations. It was also created to enhance the accuracy of corporate disclosures and close loopholes that initiated companies to defraud shareholders. The passing of the act was influenced by the prolonged period of corporate scandal which resulted in the loss of investors’ confidence.
Provisions
SOX has eleven sections; two of the particular note are 302 which relates to financial reports Corporate Responsibility. It requires the top management like the CEO or the CFO to individually certify all the financial reports and statements that are submitted to the SEC. The other second important provision is the 404 which focuses on the “Management assessment of internal controls.” It requires organizations to possess annual audits of its internal controls that must be performed by an external audit firm (Nazarova, & Mysiuk, 2018). Other provisions entail penalties for document alterations; 802, protection of whistleblowers; 806, attempts to commit fraud, and disclosures in periodic reports.
Enforcement
SOX creates sweeping auditing and financial regulations for public organizations. It is enforced by the Securities and Exchange Commission. It requires the SEC to define how public corporations are to adhere to the Law.
Importance of the act to US business people
SOX helps businesses to be more disciplined, therefore reducing the number of mistakes made. It also helps business people adequately examine their internal control, identify accounting errors, and gain a better understanding of the operations. It also helps in cutting costs and increasing productivity.
References
Butchey, D. Spreading Financial Acumen One Day at a Time. Retrieved from http://eds.b.ebscohost.com
Cook, B. (2016). The Illiterate Executive: An Executive’s Handbook for Mastering Financial Acumen. FriesenPress. Retrieved from http://eds.b.ebscohost.com
Nazarova, K., & Mysiuk, V. (2018). SOX compliance-audit. Економіка та держава, (3), 29-32. Retrieved from http://eds.b.ebscohost.com
Vorbach, P. Linking Financial Acumen to Business Performance. Retrieved from http://eds.b.ebscohost.com
Avinash Koyathi – Wednesday, October 21, 2020, 9:01 PM
Number of replies: 1

PART 1
FINANCIAL ACUMEN

1. Review of Three Articles on Financial Acuity:
   Financial acuity applies principles of financial management to ensure that the decisions being made are economically sound. The skills that are needed to make effective decisions and make better judgments are possible because of financial acuity as it concerns financial issues in the industry. These skills play a great role in the management of an organization’s finances, it also helps in the positive growth and efficient operations of companies. It establishes the cost-effective approaches to introduce a fresh product in the market. When an organization or company is facing a lack of financial acuity/ acumen, then it makes it challenging for the organization to make responsible decisions that would help the company in getting through critical times. Different articles by multiple authors help a researcher in gaining more knowledge about financial acuity. One of the articles is called “The Importance of Financial Acumen in Staff” which indicates that the understanding of what makes finances for the organization is essential for every employee and also for the company’s success. One of the reasons behind the failure of the company’s agenda and poor decision making is connected to poor training of employees in financial acuity. The skill of financial acuity is known to provide integrity as everyone uses the same stick for measurement and the consistency of a company’s financial message within investors, staff, etc is also beneficial for the company’s own sake. The author believes that finance in a business is a language that enables staff and investors to communicate how the money will be made for the company/ business (McGarvie, 2007). Another article on this issue is “The Power of Financial Acumen” which is of the view that the training related to financial acumen must be given to employees in a plant. It is necessary as no one can perform well in a plant/ company without applying knowledge of financial acuity in his decision-making and also because a company through its management, can gain a long-term advantage by spreading the financial knowledge it has. The need to gain knowledge regarding finance acumen is evident as several courses are available not only for employees working in a power generation plant but also for people in multiple workforces (Hynes, 2006). The third article is “Why It’s Critical to Have Sound Financial Acumen?”, in this article the author enumerated the importance of financial statements and called the knowledge of financial acuity as an essential tool towards the maintenance and growth of a company. The author indicated the difference between cash flow and profit and named three financial statements that give an insight into business operations. These include an income statement, a balance sheet, and a statement of cash flow (Martel, 2019).
2. The Benefits of Establishing Solid Financial Acumen in a Company:
   There are several advantages associated with the understanding and establishment of financial acumen in a company as it makes every employee comprehend the money-making strategies of a company and answers all questions related to the financial decision-making process. Any person with years of experience will fail in decision making if he does not know financial acuity. Training lessons based on an understanding of a company’s financial health and relationships between financial acuity and other concepts would help a person in getting a perspective about expenses and profitability in a company. The better a company’s employees and staff of every level will be aware of financial acumen, the better understanding of strategies that would lead a company’s decision to success will be possible. For the betterment of my company, I would make the learning of financial acumen a mandatory step for all of the staff. The absence of financial acuity at any place will have drastic effects on the financial decisions of the company which would drive the business into depths of loss. As I know the benefits of establishing solid financial acumen in a company, I would make sure that every employee must know what makes the money for the company. Apart from this, special staff training related to sales and customer service will be provided as it is important in better understanding of each other. Financial acuity training will be fruitful for the workers as it will build more confidence in communicating in financial terms with each other. This will bring efficiency to work.

PART 2
SARBANES-OXLEY (SOX)
Importance of Sarbanes Oxley in American Businesses:
A law was passed by the U.S. Congress known as The Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, whose rationale was to protect investors from fraudulent financial reporting done by corporations. This law also provided strict reforms to regulate existing security and imposed new penalties on felons. The involvement of publicly traded companies such as Enron Corporation and Tyco International plc etc in financial scandals led to the enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 as this high-level fraud shattered the confidence of investors and dissolved trust in corporate financial statements. The legislation of SOX is a lengthy and complex document but its three major provisions are often mentioned by their section numbers. These include Section 302, Section 404, and Section 802. Sarbanes-Oxley Act is enforced by The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The importance this act has on American businesses is evident since it has influenced public businesses by modifying their financial systems. SOX has brought about changes in businesses by incurring company costs that are directly linked to the legislation. It has strengthened the control environment of the company and weak links, improved the documentation protocols, caused an increase in audit committee involvement, exploited convergence opportunities, caused standardization of processes, and reduced all sorts of complexities.

REFERENCES
Hynes, J. M. (2006). The Power of Financial Acumen. Retrieved from https://www.power-eng.com/2006/04/01/the-power-of-financial-acumen/#gref
Martel, A. (2019). Why It’s Critical to Have Sound Financial Acumen? Retrieved from https://www.uwcped.org/news/62
McGarvie, (2007). The Importance of Financial Acumen in Staff. Retrieved from https://www.icaew.com/technical/business-and-management/leadership-personal-development-and-hr/leadership/importance-of-financial-acumen-in-staff
Kamala Vellanki – Tuesday, October 27, 2020, 2:56 AM
Number of replies: 3

Part 1: Review of Articles on Financial Acumen
Article 1:Robb and Woodyard (2011) explain the data collected over time through organizational analysis reveals that the relationship between financial knowledge among managers and the success of a company are closely intertwined. When the financial behavior of a business is healthy, it is more likely to perform better in a competitive or global environment. The researchers have collected data from Financial Industry Regulatory Authority and other studies to find out the role of financial knowledge among managers and the eventual success that they achieve. The researchers found that the demographic and other variables have a strong role to play in the financial behavior that is showcased by the managers in a given organization. The researchers also found that financial knowledge contributes towards employee satisfaction levels as they are more inclined to take the right call and meet their objectives.
Article 2:In his research, Ragas (2019) associated financial acumen to business acumen and finds that the leaders who have the sufficient knowledge about finance management are more successful in their endeavors. Finance management is also discussed from the perspective of marketing strategies and communication skills. The researcher found that the knowledge of finances assists with the application of the right marketing strategies in accordance with the budget. With finance knowledge and capability to answer questions, managers and leaders are made capable to decide the future of business with their decision-making capabilities. Finance acumen also allows improved communication skills and public relations as it gives confidence to the person since his claims are based on numbers and statistics. The researcher describes business and finance acumen and how it has evolved considerably over the past few years.
Article 3:Femi, Michael and Abosede (2016), have taken a completely different approach to illustrate the importance of financial acumen. While majority of the researches focus on the significance of financial acumen in for profit companies, the researchers explore the idea of financial acumen in not for profit institutions. As managers of these associations increase their financial acumen, it was noted that they are better in managing the money and the donations that are received and putting them in the right direction to achieve the maximum benefits for the society and the community both. The researchers also found that the basics of financial acumen are important for a manager in these institutions as well since the allocation of funds and the ROI from the investment in the strategies has to be calculated from the current and futuristic perspective both.

Part 2: Advantages of Financial Acumen
Based on the information attained from the analysis of the different researches conducted, it was noted that the advantages of financial acumen are extensive in nature. They skill of management and understanding of the numbers can actually give a high amount of confidence in the decisions that are taken and gives profitable results to the stakeholders of the company. The integration of a financial acumen through training and development of employees develops an organizational culture wherein the employees understand that the surety of the decisions taken should be achieved through proper financial calculations. It can actually increase employee satisfaction levels and improve the ratio of their sales and revenue targets (Ragas, 2019).
In my personal experience, the company in which I worked previously, all employees were sent reports and the conclusions drawn from them. These reports assisted in giving the right answers to the customers and thus helped in profits and achievement of the goals. The financial acumen and knowledge of the employees was given predominance and we were expected to work based on the information attained from data derived in the past.
Part 3: Understanding the Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) Act
According to Jahmani and Dowling (2011), the Sarbanes Oxley Act was a repercussion of the high number of fraud cases that were being recorded in the US market. As the competition starts increasing in an industry or when the ambitions of a business are too high, they tend to make the wrong decisions and plan towards deceit to gain higher market share and revenue. The same was the case with some organizations like WorldCom in the last 1990s. The Act made it important for companies to disclose their financial statements and share them with the banks and investors before taking any credit.
The act has made it possible for investors to take informed decisions and it also benefits the stakeholders of a company. Sarbanes Oxley Act changed the finance and accounting departments and demanded companies to showcase the audit reports of their balance sheets on a regular basis. Any organization that is now found to be misrepresenting itself or sharing false information regarding its finances can be closed down and the leadership would have to face civil and criminal proceedings and charges. The regulations are made strict to reduce the impact of falsehood on the economy and the finances of the investors.
References:
Femi, O. T., Michael, O. B. and Abosede, A. V. (2016). Comparative Analysis of Strategic Financial Management Practices in Faith-Based and Community-Interest Organizations. Journal of Financial Studies and Research. DOI: 10.5171/2016.381395
Jahmani, Y. and Dowling, W. A. (2011). The Impact of Sarbanes-Oxley Act. Journal of Business and Economics Research, 6(10).DOI:10.19030/JBER.V6I10.2479
Ragas, M. (2019). Defining ‘Business Acumen’: A Delphi Study of Corporate Communication Leaders. Public Relations Journal, 13(1).
Robb, C. A. and Woodyard, A. S. (2011). Financial Knowledge and Best Practice Behavior. Journal of Financial Counselling and Planning, 22(1).
Omar MIS replies
Subhasree Neela – Wednesday, October 28, 2020, 5:12 AM
Number of replies: 0

Before knowing about the Data, Information, and Knowledge relationship, let us know regarding these terms.
Data: Data can be portrayed as a collection of facts, figures, or discrete articles out of context.
Information: The processed form of data is called Information. (Hewitt, 2019)
Knowledge: Knowledge is the developed phase of information and data.
The relationship between them:
The main terms for understanding the big idea of knowledge management, organizational learning, and scholarly resources are data, information, and knowledge. Individuals are confused frequently between these words so let us understand their relationship through the example below: Let’s take a better case of understanding the concept. It’s Data at the point where you notice a person has blood pressure. (Li Landström, Fast-Berglund & Almström, 2019) When the patient’s BP is tracked, and we know it is hypertension, so it’s Information. As we can come to a significant conclusion from it, the readings become the data. Because of heredity, the patient has hypertension. Depending on his knowledge the doctor gives this output. This was an absolute instance of clear comprehension of the relationship.
Why do organizations have information deficiency problems and how to overcome it?
If an organization or company comes across any information, it’s hard for them to choose if it would be useful to them in the future; the relevant data affects an association’s choices made. For example, certain particular data may be suspected by a financial professional but it’s not important that the data is absolutely accurate. It is the place on the market where the information deficiency problem takes place. There’s no abundant indicator of significant information.
To overcome this issue, the organization will look forward to gathering as much information as can reasonably be required, and then smooth out data progress to make it easy to acquire the information needed. Expand the number of sources to make more data possible. Periodically check your records, and update it wherever possible.
Reference
Hewitt, S. M. (2019). Data, Information, and Knowledge. The Journal of Histochemistry and Cytochemistry : Official Journal of the Histochemistry Society, 67(4), 227–228. https://doi.org/10.1369/0022155419836995
Li, D., Landström, A., Fast-Berglund, Å., & Almström, P. (2019). Human-Centred Dissemination of Data, Information and Knowledge in Industry 4.0. Procedia CIRP, 84, 380–386. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procir.2019.04.261

Stenmark, D. (2001). The relationship between information and knowledge. Retrieved from URLhttps://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/8c8d/c68dd0854bba591847a74f2935d94e
Siva Kesineni – Wednesday, October 28, 2020, 6:18 AM
Number of replies: 0

Data
Data is the package of elements that carries the elements of unorganized information through the inputs (Liew, 2007). Although, the data is irrelevant to support decision making as all the elements are unorganized. Data carries information without a purpose and can be a source to an organization as a collection of facts stored. It is a discrete set of information, objective facts about an event, or any structured records (Liew, 2007).
Information:
Information is a set of refined elements of data put into a context that gives information about valuable resources which helps to analyze and summarize the information stored. Information stretches out the meaning and forms the basis for knowledge (Kelley, 2002). Information can display and communicate through numerical tables, graphical charts, or spoken language.
Knowledge:
Knowledge is defined as an organized set of information with meaningful links. Moreover, Knowledge is the body of information, experience, and techniques to meaningful links which can be converted to analyze the information in mind to get a clear picture of that information.

2. Why do organizations have an information deficiency problem? Suggest ways on how to overcome the information deficiency problem.
   Despite several attempts, most of the organization still exploit the use of Information Technology.
   Today many businesses function on unstructured data systems and extensively served huge losses also this pandemic due to poor disaster recovery plans (Tiwana, 2001). Apart from that, they cannot quantify information which will become helpful in the future. Even if they knew, many businesses stored information in such a form, it cannot be presented to measure any satisfactions or decisions to make.
   Information nowadays plays a vital success in any business. In order to process information more knowledgeable the business firstly need to store the data and process the information with the requirements. The IT market nowadays has plenty of data miming systems like Data pine, MicroStrategy, SAS business Intelligence, etc., which offers services according to the requirement of the business. This tool will help to analyze and summarize the overall business plan but also help in decision making and “Business Intelligence” for the successful conduct of business (Admin, 2016).

References:
Anthony Liew. (2007, June 2). Journal of knowledge management practice, www.tlainc.com/articl134.htm. https://www.tlainc.com/articl134.htm
Knowledge Nirvana – Achieving The Competitive Advantage Through Enterprise Content Management and Optimizing Team Collaboration; by Juris Kelley, 2002, Xulon Press
Admin. (2016, April 6). Creative views and effective visualization. Creative Views and Effective visualization |. https://www.cvev.org/difference-between-data-information-and-knowledge.html
Omar ISI replies
Venkata Sai Janapati – Thursday, October 29, 2020, 6:40 PM
Number of replies: 1
Network connection between the systems plays a key role in company’s success. Because that is how the employees can interact with each other and share data and processes. This helps the business improve their productivity and efficiency. There are mainly 2 ways for network connectivity, LAN-Local Area Network and WAN-Wide Area Network. LAN is mainly used when the company is small and confined to a floor or a building, if the company has multiple offices in different places then WAN is used. Below are the ways in which these networks can contribute to success of the business.

1. For small companies’ LAN set up can create an atmosphere of collaboration between the employees, where they can share ideas, data and help each other. It increases the productivity because there is no need of physical interaction as everything can be done on the computer.
2. These networks connections are very adaptable, as in every company employee changes teams and departments, new hires come on board frequently. So, the LAN ensures that even though the employees move teams they are connected with each other through their machines.
3. More users and devices can be added, computers and printers can be moved to any area in the building and user information can be modified for existing devices without much effort.
4. In large companies’ employees can still be connected to their colleagues who work in a different building or at a different place. The company performance is directly impacted by this because 2 teams can work from 2 different places and still get the work done.
   So, the network plays a crucial role in the company’s success.
   References:
   Coeletta Teske (2020), What is LAN? : https://www.lifewire.com/what-is-lan-4684071
   Business Writer (2018), Networking Basics: https://www.business.com/articles/local-area-network-wi-fi-networking-basics/
   Sanju Gunna – Tuesday, October 27, 2020, 7:53 PM
   Number of replies: 5
   DISCUSSION – 2
   In today’s digital world, communication is the key that keeps us all together and computer networking plays an important role in many businesses. Computer networking is a bunch of integrated computers connected through communication channels to one another to transmit and exchange data between them. The data transmitted through wired ethernet cables or wireless radio waves can be audio, video, images and text. Networking enhances seamless communication, ensures maximum efficiency and resource sharing on receiver end which include computer servers, mobile phones, tablets etc. There are various reasons why networking plays an integral part in the business and enhances seamless communication.
   Cut back costs – networking helps in cost reduction. With efficient use of resources and resource pooling, costs can be cut down. In Information technology, hardware is the costliest resource and with the help of networking, employees can share information among themselves, copiers and printers can be used commonly, and can backup storages which will eliminate the need to buy single hardware resource for each employee. In traditional desktops, there was need for frequent software installations which includes time and cost. But now only software updates, performance tracking, Wi-Fi are needed which reduces the overall costs. Next, improves storage capacity and volume. The number of storage servers needed can be optimized based on the usage. Networking pools the data to a central data storage server which can be accessible by all the employees in the network. This will increase the efficiency and use of storage, resources based on the needs. Another use case is ease of communication, networking helps in connecting people across the world using internet and share information in real time. With the help of internet, the new technologies and advancements are shared across the world in no time. This helped in mobilization and increase in globalization. Networking plays an important role in business growth by connecting different departments of the business together to contribute to the overall growth of the business. Sharing ideas and making important decisions is made much easier with the help of advancement in computer networking.

References:
1) Carmen, S. (2019). Why is Computer Networking Important? Importance of computer networking, Retrieved October 27,2020, from http://www.digitaldividecouncil.com/why-is-computer-networking-important/
2) DeLanerolle, T. (2016). Why is IT Computer Networking Important for Businesses? Retrieved October 27,2020, from https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/why-computer-networking-important-businesses-thyagi-delanerolle