Corporate Problem Solving - Essay Example

Can anything be done about the wide variety and large amount of information that comes to many corporate planners on a daily basis' Most corporate planners get so much information that they can hardly manage their workloads. Yet, to make the business a success, they must make effective and throughough decisions, using up-to-date information (Hansen, 1995). As John Naisbitt pointed out on the first page of his best-seller Megatrends, "Although we continue to think we live in an industrial society, we have in fact changed to an economy based on the creation and distribution of information.

" (Thierauf, 1987). This "megashift" as defined by Naisbitt is "an explosive transformation from an industrial to an information society." (Thierauf, 1987). This shift is affecting all companies around the world, and especially in the United States. Therefore, to help problem-solving issues in business, the corporate planning should actually be focusing on problem finding: "future information in the form of problems and related opportunities should be evaluated and resolved in the present as it affects the business organization tomorrow.

" (Thierauf, 1987). What are some things that the business can do to help make this change and thus solve this problem' Two items need to taken into consideration when analyzing this issue and solving the information overload problem affecting many businesses. First, a change in environmental factors would help contribute to the defeat of the problem(Mitchell, 1954). Corporate planning is at the center of a business organization's decision making process and therefore the corporate planners contribute to the business' future on an almost daily basis(Hansen, 1995).

Therefore, the organization needs to coordinate its notion with the outside business world. This means that the business needs to take a close look at the markets and always keep the information about the markets in mind when making decisions. This means taking a close look at how: "the organization operates, current knowledge of its customers and competitors, availability of capital, capabilities of available personnel, and sources of supply. Increasing prices of purchased materials, rising labor costs, and foreign competition signal the need for some type of management information system (MIS) that describes the organization's economic environment and coordinates the external environment with the internal factors to provide corporate planning information.

" (Thierauf, 1987). The next important item that can assist the business with this problem solving issue is to change internal environmental factors as well. The business needs to address changes that are happening and will happen in the future, and that are affecting the entire business world. Today, this revolves increasingly around technology, as businesses are expected to stay on the cutting edge of technology and technological trends. For most organizations, the hope of making an initial investment in technology creates the hopeful end result of saving money.

In the business world, the old slogan is still the rule: "Time is money." Therefore, if the initial problem is time, as stated before, then the business could use certain types of technologies to help organized and cut back on the workload. While this would require an initial investment on the part of the company, it would also provide a