Chapter 1 THE INFORMATION AGE IN WHICH YOU LIVE Changing the Face of Business

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Chapter 1THE INFORMATION AGE IN WHICH YOU
LIVEChanging the Face of Business
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What is a system?
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What is an Information System?

• A set of interrelated components that collect,
  manipulate, and disseminate data and information
  and provide a feedback mechanism to meet an
  objective.

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Introduction Continued

• As a Formal Definition
• Management information systems (MIS) deals with
  the planning for, development, management, and
  use of information technology tools to help
  people perform all tasks related to information
  processing and management.

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Introduction

• Today we live in an Information age
• Where knowledge is power.
• Businesses are using information to gain and
  sustain a competitive advantage.
• Once you finish your program, you will enter the
  marketplace as a knowledge worker.
• Knowledge worker works with and produces
  information as a product.
• A knowledge worker outnumbers all other types
  of workers by a 4-to-1 margin.

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Introduction Continued

• Where does MIS fit in today's information age
  and why is it so important?
• Because it deals with the coordination and use of
  3 important organizational resources
• Information
• Information Technology and
• People

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For a business to be successful today, it has to
understand and operate in dynamic, fast-paced and
changing economic environment. What does todays
economic environment entail? The E.Conomy The
Now Economy The Global Economy The Arriving
Digital Economy
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The E.conomy
Todays Economic Environment

• Distance Learning
• Telephone service representative working from home

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The E.conomy
Todays Economic Environment

• Figure 1.1
• Telecommuting Canadian Statistics
• page 6

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The Now Economy
Todays Economic Environment

• Characterized by the immediate access customers
  have to the ordering of products and services.
• M-commerce electronic commerce conducted over a
  wireless device such as a cell phone or personal
  digital assistant. Case study

Team Work
I Want It!(p.8)
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The Global Economy
Todays Economic Environment

• Global economy one in which customers,
  businesses, suppliers, distributors, and
  manufacturers all operate without regard to
  physical and geographical boundaries.
• Transnational firms produce and sell products
  and services in countries all over the world.

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The Global Economy
Todays Economic Environment

• Figure 1.2 Total Import and Export Figures, 1998
  to 2000 (millions of Canadian dollars)
  page 9

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The Arriving Digital Economy
Todays Economic Environment

• Digital economy marked by the electronic
  movement of all types of information including
  physiological information such as
• Voice recognition
• Speech synthesization
• Biometrics
• Holograms

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Information as a Key Resource

1. Information is one of the three components of
   MIS.
2. Information leads to knowledge and knowledge is
   power.
3. Knowledge comes from having timely access to
   information and knowing what to do with it.

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• There are three aspects to information
• Data V.S. Information.
• Personal dimensions of information.
• Organizations dimensions of information.

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Data versus Information

• Data
• Raw facts, such as an employees name and number
  of hours worked in a week, inventory part
  numbers, or sales orders.
• Information
• A collection of facts organized in such a way
  that they have additional value beyond the value
  of the facts themselves

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Personal Dimensions of Information
Figure 1.3 Personal Dimensions of
Information page 10
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Organizational Dimensions of Information

• For your own business or while working in a
  company, you need to consider the various
  organizational dimensions of information,
  including
• Information flows
• Information granularity and
• What information describes.

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Organizational Dimensions of Information

• Figure 1.4
• An Organization, Its Information Flows, and
  Information Granularity
• page 12

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Organizational Dimensions of Information
Granularity

• Information granularity refers to the extent of
  detail within the information.

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Organizational Dimensions of InformationWhat
information describes

• What the information describes can include
• Internal information specific operational
  aspects of the organization.
• External information the environment
  surrounding the organization.
• Objective information something that is known.
• Subjective information something that is
  unknown.

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People as a Key Resource

• People
• Set goals
• Carry out tasks
• Make decisions
• Serve customer
• Provide a stable and reliable technology
  environment.

• When it comes to you (the people) there are two
  important issues to be aware of
• Information and technology literacy.
• You ethical responsibilities.

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Information and Technology Literacy

• The single most important resource in any
  organization is its people.
• To be more precise, the most valuable asset to
  the organization is your mind.

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Information and Technology Literacy

• A Technology-literate knowledge worker is a
  person who knows how and when to apply
  technology.
• HOW is knowing what technology to buy and how to
  exploit it benefits.
• When is knowing the right time to apply
  technology.

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Information and Technology Literacy

• Information-literate knowledge workers
• Define what information they need.
• Know how and where to obtain information.
• Understand the information.
• Act appropriately based on the information to
  help the organization achieve the greatest
  advantage.

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Your Ethical Responsibilities

• Ethics the principals and standards that guide
  our behavior toward other people.
• Ethics are different from laws as they are a
  matter of personal interpretation.
• Ethics have a right and wrong outcome according
  to different people.

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Which ones are ethical / legal or not?

• Consider
• Copying software you purchased, making copies for
  your friends and charging them for the copies.
• This is not ethical nor legal.
• Making extra backup copies.
• It is ethical but only legal to make one backup
  copy.
• Giving out the phone numbers of your friends and
  relatives without their permission to a provider
  of some sort.
• Not ethical.

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Your Ethical Responsibilities
Figure 1.5 Acting Ethically and Legally page 16
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Your Ethical Responsibilities
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IT as a Key Resource
Information Technology is any computer-based tool
that people use to work with information and
support the information and information
processing needs of an organization.
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• There are two basic categories of technology
• Hardware physical devices that make up a
  computer.
• Software set of instructions that the hardware
  executes to carry out a specific task.

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Key Technology Categories

• Hardware categories
• Input devices
• Output devices
• Storage devices
• Central processing unit
• Random access memory
• Telecommunications devices
• Connecting devices

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Key Technology Categories

• Software categories
• Application software
• Operating system software
• Utility software
• (See Figure 1.6 on page 19 for a complete
  overview of software categories.)

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Decentralized Computing and Shared Information

• Figure 1.7
• Decentralized Computing and Shared Information
• page 21

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Roles and Goals of Information Technology
Roles and Goals of IT relates to the reasons you
wish to buy, create, implement, use, and
integrate IT into your business strategy.
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Roles and Goals of IT

1. Increase employee productivity
2. Enhance decision making
3. Improve team collaboration
4. Create business partnerships and alliances
5. Enable global reach
6. Facilitate organizational transformation

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1 - Increase Employee Productivity
Roles and Goals of IT

• Online transaction processing (OLTP)
• Transaction processing system (TPS)
• Customer-integrated system (CIS)

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1 - Increase Employee Productivity
Roles and Goals of IT

• Figure 1.9
• Transaction Processing and Customer-Integrated
  Systems
• page 24

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2 - Enhance Decision Making
Roles and Goals of IT

• Online analytical processing (OLAP)
• Artificial intelligence
• Neural network
• Executive information system (EIS)

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2 - Enhance Decision Making
Roles and Goals of IT

• Figure 1.10
• Drilling Down with an Executive Information
  System
• page 25

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3 - Improve Team Collaboration
Roles and Goals of IT

• Collaboration system designed specifically to
  improve the performance of teams by supporting
  the sharing and flow of information.
• Groupware software components that supports the
  collaborative efforts of a team.

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4 - Create Business Partnerships and Alliances
Roles and Goals of IT

• Interorganizational system (IOS)
• Electronic data interchange (EDI)

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5 - Enable Global Reach
Roles and Goals of IT
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6 - Facilitate Organizational Transformation
Roles and Goals of IT

• Organizational transformation is necessary to
  respond to the ever-changing needs (and wants) of
  todays marketplace.
• Blockbuster now provides movies on a pay-per-view
  rental basis through cable.

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Closing Case Study One You and Your Information

• Information travels with you and is captured and
  stored by a number of organizations.
• Trust and accuracy of information is important.
• Do you trust organizations to maintain accurate
  information about you?