Informational Management and Decision-Making - Essay Example

Running Head: informational management Informational Management of the of the Informational Management Decision-making involves more than just assembling data and selecting the best result. If formal data set against some standard f choice were the only thing required then managers would not be needed. Informal information is a company store f knowledge and experience they use as a foundation for how they process formal information. It is informal because it is extremely unlikely that even the managers themselves could present their gut feelings in a formal way. It is also informal because much f it has been and still is accumulated in an informal and often accidental way. Conversations, telephone calls, snippets from television, newspaper articles and so on. The sources f useful information are unlimited. (TUSHMAN 1978, 613-24; SCHNEIDER 1988, 143-53) The company grapevine is perhaps the best-known and most reliable informal information system. These information flows cannot be ignored: they are potent and effective, and they are the basis f most really good decision-making. Generally, MIS deals with information that is systematically and routinely collected in accordance with a well-defined set f rules. MIS plays a major role in a company's informational process. Information that has major managerial planning significance is sometimes collected at golf courses. Such information is not part f MIS, how ever, one- shot market research data collected to gauge the potential f a new product does not come with in the scope f an MIS by our definition because although such information may be very systematically collected it is not collected on a regular basis. (SMITH 1991, 60-85; O'REILLY 1980, 684-96) Normally, the information provided by an MIS helps the managers to make planning and control decisions. Now, we will see, what is planning and control. Every organization in order to function must perform, certain operations. For Example, a car manufacturer has to perform certain manufacturing activities, a wholesaler has to provide water to its area f jurisdiction. All these are operations that need to be done. Besides, these operations, an organization must make plans for them. In other words it must decide on how many and what type f cars to make next month or what commissions to offer retailers or what pumping stations to install in the next five years. Also an organization must control the operations in the light f the plans and targets developed in the planning process. The car manufacturer must know if manufacturing operations are in line with the targets and if not, he must make decisions to correct the deviation or revise his plans. Similarly the wholesaler will want to know the impacts that his commissions have had on sales and make decisions to correct adverse trends. The municipal corporation will need to control the tendering process and contractors who will execute the pumping station plans. Often there are elaborate systems for information that assists operations. For example, the car manufacturer will have a system for providing information to the workers on the shop floor about the job that needs to be done on a particular batch f material. There may be route sheets, which accompany the rate materials and components in their movement through various machines. MIS has all the ingredients that are employed in providing information support to manager to making planning and control decisions. Managers often use historical data on an organization's activities as well as current status data to make planning and control decisions. Such data comes from a database, which is contained in files maintained by the organization. This database is an essential component f an MIS. Manual procedures that are used to collect and process information and computer hardware are obvious ingredients f an MIS. MIS sub serves managerial function, collects stores, evaluates information systematically and routinely, supports planning and control decisions, and includes files, hardware, and software and operations research models. Effective management information systems are needed by all business organization because f the increased complexity and rate f change f today's business environment. For Example, Marketing manager need information about sales performance and trends, financial manger returns, production managers needs information analyzing resources requirement and worker productivity and personnel manager require information concerning employee compensation and professional development. Effective management information systems must be developed to provide modern managers with the specific marketing, financial, production and personnel information products they require to support their decision making responsibilities. (LANG 1997, 11-23) An MIS provides the following advantages: It Facilitates planning: MIS improves the quality f plants by providing relevant information for sound decision - making. Due to increase in the size and complexity f organizations, managers have lost personal contact with the scene f operations. Minimizes information overload: MIS change the larger amount f data in to summarized form and there by avoids the confusion which may arise when managers are flooded with detailed facts. Encourages Decentralization: Decentralization f authority is possibly when there is a system for monitoring operations at lower levels. MIS is successfully used for measuring performance and making necessary change in the organizational plans and procedures. Informational management f a company The following proposal summary has been prepared by the Information Technology (IT) team describing a new information system required by our Advanced Services Network Consulting Engineers (NCEs). The information provided has been summarized and is intended to provide an overview f the proposed project. (SCHWENK 1986, 298-310) Within our organization we have a group f Network Consulting Engineers (NCEs) that provide Planning, Design, Implementation, and Operational (PDIO) services to contracted enterprise and service provider clients. On a number f recent occasions, it has come to light that one NCE is struggling with a design or planning issue that has already been addressed by another NCE. And in some cases, the solutions provided to our clients were not consistent between the NCEs. It has been determined a new system is needed that will provide an orderly and organized data repository that would be available to all NCEs. This system needs to provide an easy method for the NCEs to access and leverage previously defined design solutions. This system will provide several key benefits to the NCE team: NCE will be able to search for data related to the solution being considered NCE will save time in that we will not "reinvent the wheel" NCE provided solutions will be more standardized Using the same solution repeatedly simplifies supporting our solutions Allows our NCEs to be able to provide backup to one another With standard solutions we increase the probability that we will continually improve the solution User Requirements The IT team spent time interviewing and observing the NCE team using the current information systems. The team discovered that the current systems lacked the flexibility and access to meet the needs f the NCEs. In addition the processes to back up an effective workflow are absent. Through this analysis the following key user requirements were identified. These requirements were considered in the selection f the proposed information system. The proposed information system provides for the following: A flexible "form" for data entry A sophisticated search methodology Accessible via a web browser Simple administrative capabilities Capability to "revise" data base entries Backup and archiving capability Maintains statistics f hits to database records Business Requirements The IT team assembled and reviewed all data and documentation available on the current processes and tools in use by the NCE team today. In doing so we discovered some specific deficiencies that can be addressed in the proposed solution. At this time, we have neither formal procedures nor tools for cataloging and storing NCE design solutions for future reference. This means the NCEs are duplicating some f their efforts. This duplication f effort is causing an increase in solution design time and support costs as well as losing best practices information among NCEs. (THOMAS 1990, 286-306; O'REILLY 1982, 756-71) To mitigate these issues the following business requirements have been designed into the proposed information system: A data base to store design solutions as they are completed and implemented The ability for the NCE to perform keyword solutions agains the data base to identify previously developed and implemented solutions. A web based application to access the database. Functionality that includes adding new solutions, modifying existing solutions, collaboration on designs in progress, and the ability to delete obsolete designs Information System Process Flow The proposed system will be accessed via a secure web site with a login and password. As the site is for corporate communication, the servers can reside within the network and with external access provided through VPN, also making the site more secure. Once the NCEs log on to the site, they will be able to enter or access design information entries and supporting documentation. Access to the system will also be given to project managers and higher management so they can keep abreast f the progress f various solutions based on the information the NCEs enter into the system. Also, through the site the NCEs will have the ability to enter specific and detailed solution architectures including the specific hardware, connectivity, network topologies, and backbone appliances used in their solutions. This will further enhance the database by creating a knowledge base to be shared by other NCEs, TAC, and management. By using metatags and keywords associated to the entry, the database can be queried for specific solutions to be brought up for reference. As NCEs continue to enter solutions into the system, the growth f the database will yield more information and will result in a very extensive library f solutions. Following is a slide that depicts the business functionality f the system. The system will run in a Microsoft SQL Server 2000 data base environment. This environment will include two Dell Power Edge servers running Windows Server 2003 as the operating system. The two servers will be clustered to allow fault tolerant redundancy and will run in an active passive environment. The primary server will handle all database requests from the web servers. Should it fail, the second server will be configured to recognize the failure and switch to active mode, processing database requests until the primary server is restored to service. The data disk storage for these servers will be housed externally in a mirrored array that is raid configured with a hot spare drive to protect against failure. The external storage array will be backed up incrementally nightly in the event a reload in required. Each server will have an internal drive to house the operating system and other system files. This drive will be mirrored by another drive to protect against failure f a system drive. (GINSBERG 1992, 37-53) The web servers will be configured in the same manner as the database servers. They will contain internal mirrored system drives to protect against drive failure. This type f configuration will provide redundancy against a server failure. Our web servers will reside in a DMZ (demilitarized zone) and will be load balanced and scalable. The load balancing will occur in a round robin fashion. If a server fails, the load balancer will detect this loss f the server and drop it out f the round robin. This set up also provides easy scalability. Should the load on the server farm become intensive, we can simply add another server to take some f the load. Network Design The network portion f the proposed solution will consist f firewalls, routers, switches, load balancers, and content engines (used here as reverse-caching appliances). This combination f equipment will provide us with security, performance, and scalability. Our database server will sit inside our internal network to protect our data from unauthorized access. Our web servers will sit in our DMZ and will access the database server through an internal firewall. Access to the web servers from the internet will come through an outside or shield router and an external firewall, which is attached to a T1 data line provided by out Internet Service Provider. Directly behind the external firewall in the DMZ, we will place a load balancer. This device will do server load balancing (SLB) for the web servers. The content engines will be placed behind the load balancer as well. (MARTINS 1999, 652-61; AUSTER 1994, 601-18) The load balancer will direct HTTP requests for static content to the content engines. The content engines will serve up content directly when a request is made for an object it has stored in cache memory. If the object requested is not in the cache engine, it will make an HTTP request to the webservers through the load balancer. The load balancer will receive HTTP requests for non-static content directly from the clients and will load balance the request to the best available server. System Software The web services are provided by the Microsoft SharePoint Server Portal 2003 and will be deployed as a content managed extranet application. Administration f this product is minimal, once each database is created and the content management is handled by an overall coordinator with each NCE a contributor to the document and knowledge base content. The overall aesthetic f the website is highly customizable and will accept Java and ASP.net programming to give full functionality to the site. The database connectivity is handled by ODBC to SQL and can be threaded to an active web application within the portal. Individual or group portals can easily be created and are customizable by the NCEs. The portal can serve as a web based file server for those who are on the road and need easy access to a highly functional file server without traversing the corporate network. (DOLLINGER 1984, 351-68) Documents are version controlled and access is controlled via the coordinator using standard Windows security settings. Documents can be read, checked out, or published, depending on the access level f the individual logging in to the site. Our clients who access the system from the internet will be required to use a VPN client for that access. Our users will be required to authenticate to our system with a user id and password. The VPN client will also encrypt the data sent and received from the user to protect it from unauthorized access. The other requirement on the client will be Internet Explorer browser 5.0 or above. Proposal Conclusion The IT Team believes this design supports our business requirements as previously described. It also provides all the technical specifications stated at the beginning f this proposal. We have addressed security, availability, and performance. This design is only as complex as need be to meet the user and business requirements. The design leverages some f the existing NCE and network capabilities and can be deployed in a planned and non-disruptive manner. Based on the evidence presented, we are asking the company's executive committee to approve funding for this information system project. The IT Team believes there are both short and long term advantages to implementing this information system for the NCE team. References AUSTER, E. and C333, C. W. (1994). 'How senior managers acquire and use information in environmental scanning'. Information Processing & Management, 30, 5, 607-18. DAFT, R. L. and LENGEL, R. H. (1986). 'Organizational information requirements, media richness, and structural design'. Management Science, 32, 554-71. DOLLINGER, M. J. (1984). 'Environmental boundary spanning and information processing effects on organizational performance'. Academy f Management Journal, 27, 351-68. GINSBERG, A. and VENKATRAMAN, N. (1992). 'Investing in new information technology: the role f competitive posture and issue diagnosis'. Strategic Management Journal, 13, 37-53. KUVAAS, B. (1998). 'Strategic Issue Diagnosis: the Roles f Organizational Scanning, Information Processing Structure f Top Management Teams, and Managers' Cognitive Complexity'. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. Bergen: Department f Strategy and Management, Norwegian School f Economics and Business Administration. LANG, J. R., CALATONE, R. J. and GUDMUNDSON, D. (1997). 'Small firm information seeking as a response to environmental threats and opportunities'. Journal f Small Business Management, 35, 1, 11-23. MARTINS, L. L. and KAMBIL, A. (1999). 'Looking back and thinking ahead: effects f prior success on managers' interpretations f new information technologies'. Academy f Management Journal, 42, 6, 652-61. O'REILLY, C. A. (1980). 'Individuals and information overload in organizations: is more necessarily better'. Academy f Management Journal, 23, 684-96. O'REILLY, C. A. (1982). 'Variations in decision makers' use f information sources: the impact f quality and accessibility f information'. Academy f Management Journal, 25, 756-71. SCHNEIDER, S. (1988). 'Information overload: causes and consequences'. Human Systems Management, 7, 2, 143-53. SCHWENK, C. R. (1986). 'Information, cognitive biases, and commitment to a course f action'. Academy f Management Review, 11, 298-310. SMITH, K. G., GRIMM, C. M., GANNON, M. J. and CHEN, M. (1991). 'Organizational information processing, competitive responses, and performance in the U.S. domestic airline industry'. Academy f Management Journal, 34, 60-85. THOMAS, J. B. and McDANIEL, R. R. (1990). 'Interpreting strategic issues: effects f strategy and the information-processing structure f top management teams'. Academy f Management Journal, 33, 286-306. TUSHMAN, M. L. and NADLER, D. A. (1978). 'Information processing as an integrating concept in organizational design'. Academy f Management Review, 3, 613-24. Read More