Question

Crowdsourcing is not only used for relatively simple tasks such as designing a Web site or designing a case for a smartphone. Today, it is increasingly being used in more complex designs as well. Precyse Technologies provides supply-chain products and solutions that assist organizations in tracking their inventories using RFID technology. It was having difficulty improving the performance and battery life of a particular RFID device; there were not adequate internal resources to tackle the problem. So, Precyse asked InnoCentive, a crowdsourcing provider, for assistance, believing that crowdsourcing would provide quick access to a worldwide talent pool and a higher return on investment (ROI). Ultimately, the company received more than 300 ideas from global experts for solving its problem. It narrowed the pool down to three finalists, from which a winner was chosen. The whole process took approximately four months, and Precyse estimated that it saved the company $250,000. 1. What are some typical applications of crowdsourcing? 2. What are some advantages of crowdsourcing? 3. How could crowdsourcing reduce the systems design cost and are there certain problems you would not want to use crowdsourcing to solve?

Answer 1

1) SOME APPLICATIONS OF CROWD SOURCING ARE;

- MARKETING STRATEGY; There is finalizing of marketing strategies by firms and this is based on the crowd sourcing ideas.

- THOUGHT LEADERSHIP; There has been catering to crowdsourcing for high level thought leadership by many firms and this is done in various fields such as Human resources.

- DESIGNING; Designing is very common for crowdsourcing and this is seen where a bunch of talent pool is being used for the purpose of designing websites,applications and as well as other prototypes.

SOME OF THE ADVANTAGES OF CROWDSOURCING ARE;

- An individual can actually save lots of costs,this is because they don't need to hire a permanent resource and this resource can be quite expensive.

- Another advantage of crowdsourcing is that one can actually get services and idea from pool of professionals that are far talented across the world.

- It also play a role in obtaining of ideas from a group of people and this can go a way in shortening the resolution process, therefore saving time.

CROWDSOURCING HELPS IN GETTING IDEAS AND SERVICES FROM A WIDER POOL OF PROFESSIONALS THAT ARE TALENTED,So;

Lots of time are being saved when there is actually a large talent pool.

This then translates into shorter span in the system design process and it also results in the saving of costs.

However,a firm don't necessarily need to hire permanent resources for critical inputs I'm the design process and this also results in saving of costs s well.