Analyzed and Presented by: Emily Sweeney

SHFL Entertainment’s

ShuffleMaster.com Incorporated: A Knowledge Management Program Case Study

Given by Carol Hildebrand

Business: “Gaming Supply:”“Utility Products”“Proprietary Table Games” “Electronic Table Systems”“Electronic Gaming Machines”

Type: Publicly Traded (SEC filings)“Approx. 805 employees “(10-K)

Website: shufflemaster.com

Introduction

From company site.

Basement-built company (1982), but it is now international.“future success and growth are truly a result of your own efforts and

achievements” (incentive-based, but lacking necessary knowledge sharing tones, like those discussed earlier by classmates)

“Being on our team means sharing in our vision” “bright, energetic, talented people” and “valuing diversity and

celebrating strengths” (individual knowledge heavy)“technology-averse sales force”

and avoid being “…slowed or distracted by an unwanted technology implementation” (Hildebrand)

Culture

From company site unless otherwise noted.

“Prior to 2005, the company had been relying on a fragmented sales and order processing infrastructure that was making it difficult for company employees to find integrated and reliable business information.”

There was a “lag” so that employees weren’t getting current information

“Microsoft's customer relationship management system…didn't talk to the company's Great Plains enterprise resource planning system”

“When we were growing, little attention was paid to integrating our systems” (President and COO via Hildebrand)

Impact

From Hildebrand.

Need: “quickly collect, analyze and respond to sales and other information—in one place”

Assets: Salespeople – “saw revenues grow to $113 million in 2005, up by 33%

from 2004”“order processing and service team”and “administrative assistants”“resources of a midsize company, including IT budget”“a 16-person staff [for the IT director heading the improvement]”

Identified Need and Assets

From Hildebrand.

Step 1: “initially experimented with SharePoint Services”

Step 2: “to pull together a proof-of-concept for an internal central repository of information”

Step 3: “retained Phoenix-based InterZnet to help build the portal”

End Result: “a portal [“Radar”]…that pulls data on demand…into an SQL report database that contains every customized report built by the IT group.”

Designed and Implemented Intervention

*Named after the M*A*S*H character From Hildebrand.

Salespeople

Customer Relationship Management

Software (CRM)

Sales and Fulfillment Staff

Planning System

Administrative Assistants

Portal

IT Staff

Continued…

Created From Hildebrand’s Description.

Use of Quantitative “Baseline Goals”:

“Grow revenue and earnings by 30% annually.” “Increase international revenue to 50% of total by 2009, up from 23% in

2005.” “Increase number of daily portal users from 130 in April 2006 to 350 by year-

end.”

Use of Qualitative Study:“the iterative approach” (so called by an InterZnet executive)

– checking back with employees on the portal use

Evaluated

From Hildebrand.

Successes:“get user buy-in,”“evangelism”/”educating users on what’s available.”“the iterative approach”

Improvements:Follow through making Radar “more interactive” and figuring out “how to

maintain content that is no longer solely created by the IT department.”Look at the culture’s (i.e. the salespeople’s) technology problem and over-

focus on the salespeopleConsider streamline technology fixes, not “layering software”Companies are usually recommended to check with the employees before

making the technology – do they even want it?

Lessons Learned

From Hildebrand and others as noted in audio.

Beatrix. (12/18/2012). [Picture of Dealing a Card]. Retrieved from: http://www.playfreebingoonline.org/enjoy-online-casino-games-for-free/

Cardshark Online. [Picture of Card Machine]. (3 November 2009). Casino Equipment: ShuffleMaster one2six Automatic Shuffler. Retrieved from: http://cardshark-online.blogspot.com/2009/11/casino-equipment-shufflemaster-one2six.html

Churchill, R. (4 June 2012). [Picture of Employees]. Review-Journal. Retrieved from: http://www.reviewjournal.com/business/casinos-gaming/shuffle-master-says-profits-surge-23-percent

Hildebrand, C. (2006-07-06). Shuffle Master Puts its Money on a Portal. Baseline. Retrieved from: http://www.baselinemag.com/c/a/Projects-Integration/Shuffle-Master-Puts-its-Money-on-a-Portal/

Mezher, T., Abdul-Malak, M.A., Khaled, M., and El-Khatib, I. (2009). Building a Knowledge Management System in a Design Firm: The Case of XYZ Structural Department. Journal of Cases on Information Technology, 11(3).

[Picture of Cards]. Genting Casino. Retrieved from: http://www.gentingcasinos.co.uk/casino/westcliff/

[Picture of Card Symbols]. Winner Strategies Poker. Retrieved from: http://strategies.minnim.org/poker-card-hand-rankings.html

[Picture of Casino]. Play Party Casino Games. Retrieved from: http://www.wackyowl.com

[Picture of Radar]. WhateverHappened to “Radar” O’Reilly?. Retrieved from: http://ludicdespair.blogspot.com/2012/05/whatever-happened-to-radar-oreilly.html

SHFL Entertainment. Retrieved from: http://www.shufflemaster.com/

SHFL Entertainment Inc. 8-K. (3/4/13). Retrieved from: http://shufflemaster.q4cdn.com/863d1914-ef0b-4721-abfa-799cf78c8f3b.pdf?noexit=true

SHFL Entertainment Inc. 10-K. (10/31/12). Retrieved from: http://shufflemaster.q4cdn.com/3407f3a4-b9b5-49d2-9af0-211b3a5f6dff.pdf?noexit=true

Tynjala, J. [Picture of Cards]. Addressing color blindness in game design. Retrieved from: http://joshblog.net/2010/02/18/addressing-color-blindness-in-game-design/

Works Cited