Today’s world would be a very different place without Information Systems (IS) and Information Technology (IT). People are connected globally by computerized networks so businesses and other organizations have the population of the entire world at their fingertips. Data in the form of information is the ‘product” that is managed with IS and IT. Because of the huge volume of data available, organizational goals must be focused so time and technology will not be wasted. Data can be filtered so it can be sent to the appropriate person at the right time and to the right place. This essay offers a short historical overview and discussion on the challenges of organizing and managing information systems and the technology that makes the systems run.
(IT, IS, IM, Information System, Information Technology, Information Management, computers, networks)
Project Evaluation: Information Systems and Information Technology
Kugel wrote in 2007 “All business is local” when he was describing location intelligence.1 He could just as well have been commenting on organizational Systems Management (SM). With the continued innovations in Information Systems (IS) and Information Technology (IT) all business is local. In a few seconds a business meeting can start in NYC with participants talking in real time to each other from Istanbul, Moscow and Cairo. Data can pass from the one participant’s computer to all the others in seconds.
The main reason Information Management is so important is that the appropriate data needs to be easily shared in a timely way. The form of the data can be ideas, solid scientific research, or a surveyor’s measurements of a piece of land. The data might be the cataloguing of millions of tiny screws, washers and nails that are being purchased or sold. Information can come in many shapes and forms. The number of the pieces of information being shared globally even at this very moment is incredibly large. For organizations, whether local, regional or global, sorting, filing and getting the right data to the appropriate person is a complex activity. Managing information efficiently is necessary in order to finish a project or deliver an order on time.
IS and IT have been defined below. Some positive and negative issues surrounding IS have been discussed. The thesis of this essay is that the ability of a business to manage its Information System (IS) and Information Technology (IT) can make or break that business in today’s world. The complexity and the necessity of a solid Information Systems analysis has been discussed in order to prove the thesis.
Information Systems and Information Technology
Brief Historical Overview
Hershauer reminds us that,
Information systems of the sixties focused on specific transaction-processing systems within an organization. In the seventies, integration of functional systems was stressed. In the eighties, IT platforms focused on integrated databases and communication systems for geographically-dispersed organization. The nineties will . . . need IS that supports executive decisions for complex and varied operation within a global economy.2
At end of the decade of the 1990s businesses were the main focus of new ideas for using computer capacity and new networking capacities. These progressively more efficient and practical trends were used in businesses and gave a whole new approach to using computers. Paramaswaran and Whinston have pointed out that “Many of the new trends (in the 90s) emphasized organizational computing, in diverse domains like enterprise resource systems, customer relationship management, and electronic commerce.”3
Augustyniak, Finley, Aguero, Monroe, and Arsenault noted,
In the new millennium, the ability to unify information and processes has caused a paradigm shift in information management, fueling an explosion in the business marketplace. Data that formerly were collected and managed within the confines of a management information systems department now reside in Web-based management systems, where end-users and nontechnical managers can directly access, create , modify, and implement them.4
The new millennium exploded when younger people and academics took over setting trends in social networking. For example, social networks like Twitter, Facebook and Wikipedia have become part of daily life. From the end of the 20th century into the beginning of the 21rst century the biggest change has been the move from top-down (corporate style) to bottom-up (starting at the grassroots before moving into business uses and moving up the hierarchy).
Use for IS and IT
Blogging is a simple example of a new use for the computer which has been taken and adapted to businesses and corporations. A blog is a way for companies to keep in touch with customers by offering tips on product-use plus all the new product information when products come onto the market.
Daily communications between employees can be speeded up with a good network between departments and branches of a company. Paramaswaran and Whinston have noted that “Online communities hold the promise of substantial network effects for businesses” by creating “a business eco-system of customers and partner firms.”5 Product loyalties can be nurtured. Customers can be made to feel a part of the company’s online community; or they can actually be a part of a company’s online community.
Amazon.com has been able to make customers part of their web pages by giving them space to rate books and leave book reviews. In businesses employees can quickly and efficiently get information to (and from) human resources, accounts payable or payroll even if the departments are hundreds of miles apart.
For every success like Amazon.com in making their customers part of the company, there are many failures. Research about customers’ income, spending habits, and interests can be collected and analyzed but can be misused. Employees may use networking to send jokes all day or flame people they don’t like. There are challenges to overcome to make business ‘social’ networking succeed in raising company profits.
Information technology used in a business needs to keep up with the systems used for sharing and storing data. When businesses gather customer information, called data mining, the amount of data is large so a layer of filtering is necessary in order to gather only the relevant data.
IT has become flexible enough to meet the needs of individual businesses from law firms to frozen food distributors. Lawyers can gain recognition from using the social networking strategy. In the case of a frozen food distributor, networking technologies from warehouse to truck to grocery store have been developed to make sure there is little loss of product and to keep track of inventory.
The process of sharing large amounts of information takes both human input and good technology. The business owner needs to make certain requirements very clearly defined in order for the process to run smoothly; the project specifications and the job descriptions of the IS team are two of the most important requirments. IT mangers must be confident of their capabilities and also be willing to tweak the system when necessary. Each business has its own unique challenges for IT managers; they have to know how to keep the system flexible in order to meet new demands.
Information Systems Analysis
A good information system is a big investment in time and money. In order to make sure that the investment was a good one an analysis of the companies’ IS needs to be carried out periodically. The supervisors involved along the process of information-sharing should be a part of the analysis team. The five members of an analysis team should include “(a) the business owner, (b) the data steward, (c) the data modeler, (d) the data analyst, and the business intelligence analyst.”6
Not only that the executive in charge must take into account more than the ‘bottom line;’ that is how much profit will be at the end of the fiscal year. Strategic planning must be included so employees and technology “produce a product or service with value in the global economy.”7 Different system models are appropriate for each business depending on characteristics such as the goal, the time frame, the distance factor and actions used to reach the project goal. Each system model is more complex than that but taking time to make the system model work for the business instead of the employees working to keep up with the systems model is the goal.
During an IS analysis it is important to identify what IT is necessary to ‘fill in the gaps’ according to Baylor Business Review.8 Not only must the IT analysis team look at what is available but they must also identify what is missing. The needs of a business change and it may be that technology changes faster. The IT analysis team including the IT manager must communicate well in order to focus on exactly what is needed to keep the business running efficiently and what new technology or techniques are available.
Often it seems to be the case that new technology can make the business run more smoothly and more efficiently in ways most owners and the process managers do not know about. That is an important duty of the IT manager: keeping the rest of the users in the loop in order to access their needs so that new IT can be designed or purchased as it becomes available.
McManus and Harper offered data from research of 42 IS software design companies which showed that 65% of project failures were due to “management causal factors” and 35% due to “technical causal factors.”9 Their analysis confirms the necessity of sharing knowledge, both business and technical throughout the management organization and constant communication (feedback) from the stakeholders.10 Their most important recommendation was to always have a contingency plan because an error means there is no ‘do over.’11
Conclusions
Business, government, non-governmental and academic organizations all have one thing in common and that is they need IS and IT to continue to operate and to gain success. There is no end to the amount of data available in our world culture which seems committed to information and knowledge. The appropriate management of IS and IT is essential. Information systems are not only computers but the system also includes the people that maintain the computer networks and those that download the data.
Most end users probably have little idea and really don’t care how the information they need gets to them as long as it is there exactly when they need it. And that is the main function of IS and IT: to get data in the form of the right information to the right person at the right time. This essay has only hinted at the complex nature of Information Management success and challenges with IS and IT. One general fact became clear throughout the research; communication in the form of sharing ideas and feedback is essential to success.
IS and IT are here to stay.
End Notes
1. Kugel, All Business is Local, Business Finance, title
2. Hershauer, Info systems managers in a global economy. Business Perspectives, para 1
3. Paramaswaran & Whinston, Research issues in social computing. Journal of the Association for Information Systems, para. 1
4. Augustyniak, Finley, Aguero, Monroe, & Arsenault, The information professional’s role in creating business management systems. Information Outlook, para. 2
5. Paramaswaran & Whinston, Research issues in social computing. Journal of the Association for Information Systems, 4.2 Network Effects, para. 1
6. Bowman, Information Systems Analysis. Business systems management, para. 12
7. Hershauer, Info systems managers in a global economy. Business Perspectives, para. 9
8. Building bridges. Baylor Business Review, subtitle
9. McManus & Wood-Harper, Understanding the sources of information systems project failure. Management Services, para.4
10. McManus & Wood-Harper, Understanding the sources of information systems project failure. Management Services, para 5
11. McManus & Wood-Harper, Understanding the sources of information systems project failure. Management Services, para 7
Works Cited
Augustyniak R, Finley A, Aguero D, Monroe B, & Arsenault B. The Information professional’s role in creating business management systems. Information Outlook, 2005 Sept: 9(9): 12+ Accessed from www.questia.com
Bowman D. Information systems analysis. Bowman’s information management checklist. Business systems management. 2009 accessed from http://www.information-management-architect.com/information-systems-analysis.html
Building bridges. Baylor Business Review, 2006 Fall: 25(1): 48 accessed from www.questia.com
Hershauer JC. Information systems managers in a global economy. Business Perspectives, 1990 Fall: 4(1): 9+ Accessed from www.questia.com
Kugel RD. All business is local. Business Finance, 2007 Dec:13(12): 30+ Accessed from www.questia.com
McManus J. Wood-Harper T. Understanding the sources of information systems project failure. Management Services, 2007 Autumn: 51(3): 38+ Accessed from www.questia.com
Parameswaran M, Whinston AB. Research issues in social computing. Journal of the Association for Information Systems. 2007; 8(6): 136+ Accessed from www.questia.com
