Management Information System

Management Information System (MIS) is the study of people, technology, organizations, and the relationships among them. MIS professionals help firms realize maximum benefit from investment in personnel, equipment, and business processes. MIS is a people-oriented field with an emphasis on service through technology. If you have an interest in technology and have the desire

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How Information Systems Are Transforming Business

You can see the results of this large-scale spending around you every day by observing how people conduct business. Changes in technology and new innova­tive business models have transformed social life and business practices. More than 269 million Americans have mobile phones (81 percent of the population), and 230 million of these people access

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What’s New in Management Information Systems?

Plenty. In fact, there’s a whole new world of doing business using new tech­nologies for managing and organizing. What makes the MIS field the most exciting area of study in schools of business is the continuous change in tech­nology, management, and business processes. Five changes are of paramount importance. IT Innovations. A continuing stream

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Can You Run the Company with Your iPhone?

Can you run the company just by using your iPhone? Perhaps not entirely, but there are many business functions today that can be performed using an iPhone, iPad, or Android mobile device. Smartphones and tablets have become all-in-one tools that help managers and employees work more efficiently, packing a powerful, networked computer into a

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Globalization Challenges and Opportunities: A Flattened World

In 1492, Columbus reaffirmed what astronomers were long saying: the world was round and the seas could be safely sailed. As it turned out, the world was populated by peoples and languages living in isolation from one another, with great disparities in economic and scientific development. The world trade that ensued after Columbus’s voyages

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The Emerging Digital Firm

All of the changes we have just described, coupled with equally significant orga­nizational redesign, have created the conditions for a fully digital firm. A digital firm can be defined along several dimensions. A digital firm is one in which nearly all of the organization’s significant business relationships with customers, suppliers, and employees are digitally

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Strategic Business Objectives of Information Systems

What makes information systems so essential today? Why are businesses invest­ing so much in information systems and technologies? In the United States, more than 25 million business and financial managers, and 36 million professional workers in the labor force rely on information systems to conduct business. Information systems are essential for conducting day-to-day business

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What Is an Information System?

An information system can be defined technically as a set of interrelated components that collect (or retrieve), process, store, and distribute information to support decision making and control in an organization. In addition to sup­porting decision making, coordination, and control, information systems may also help managers and workers analyze problems, visualize complex subjects, and

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Dimensions of Information Systems

To fully understand information systems, you must understand the broader orga­nization, management, and information technology dimensions of systems (see Figure 1.5) and their power to provide solutions to challenges and problems in the business environment. We refer to this broader understanding of informa­tion systems, which encompasses an understanding of the management and organizational dimensions

It Isn’t Just Technology: A Business Perspective on Information Systems

Managers and business firms invest in information technology and systems because they provide real economic value to the business. The decision to build or maintain an information system assumes that the returns on this investment will be superior to other investments in buildings, machines, or other assets. These superior returns will be expressed as

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Complementary Assets of Information Systems: Organizational Capital and the Right Business Model

Awareness of the organizational and managerial dimensions of information systems can help us understand why some firms achieve better results from their informa­tion systems than others. Studies of returns from information technology invest­ments show that there is considerable variation in the returns firms receive (see Figure 1.8). Some firms invest a great deal and

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Theoretical Approach of Information Systems

The study of information systems is a multidisciplinary field. No single theory or perspective dominates. Figure 1.9 illustrates the major disciplines that con­tribute problems, issues, and solutions in the study of information systems. In general, the field can be divided into technical and behavioral approaches. Information systems are sociotechnical systems. Though they are composed

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Did Information Systems Cause Deutsche Bank to Stumble?

Deutsche Bank AG, founded in 1870, is one of the world’s top financial companies, with 2,425 branches worldwide. It offers a range of financial products and services, including retail and commercial banking, foreign exchange, and services for mergers and acquisitions. The bank provides products for mortgages, consumer finance, credit cards, life insurance, and corporate

Business Processes and Information Systems

In order to operate, businesses must deal with many different pieces of infor­mation about suppliers, customers, employees, invoices, and payments, and of course their products and services. They must organize work activities that use this information to operate efficiently and enhance the overall performance of the firm. Information systems make it possible for firms

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Business Processes

Business processes, which we introduced in Chapter 1, refer to the manner in which work is organized, coordinated, and focused to produce a valuable product or service. Business processes are the collection of activities required to produce a product or service. These activities are supported by flows of mate­rial, information, and knowledge among the

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How Information Technology Improves Business Processes

Exactly how do information systems improve business processes? Information systems automate many steps in business processes that were formerly per­formed manually, such as checking a client’s credit or generating an invoice and shipping order. But today, information technology can do much more. New technology can actually change the flow of information, making it possible

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Information Systems for Different Management Groups

A business firm has systems to support different groups or levels of manage­ment. These systems include transaction processing systems and systems for business intelligence. 1. Transaction Processing Systems Operational managers need systems that keep track of the elementary activi­ties and transactions of the organization, such as sales, receipts, cash deposits, payroll, credit decisions, and

Information Systems for Linking the Enterprise

Reviewing all the different types of systems we have just described, you might wonder how a business can manage all the information in these different sys­tems. You might also wonder how costly it is to maintain so many different systems. And you might wonder how all these different systems can share in­formation and how

Information Systems for E-business, E-commerce, and E-government

The systems and technologies we have just described are transforming firms’ relationships with customers, employees, suppliers, and logistic partners into digital relationships using networks and the Internet. So much business is now enabled by or based upon digital networks that we use the terms electronic busi­ness and electronic commerce frequently throughout this text. Electronic

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Information systems for collaboration and social business

With all these systems and information, you might wonder how it is possible to make sense of them. How do people working in firms pull it all together, work toward common goals, and coordinate plans and actions? In addition to the types of systems we have just described, businesses need special systems to support

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