Information and strategic planning Flashcards
Today’s Business Challenges
- Intense competition and environmental changes
- Increase of amount of knowledge that affect your business -> Knowledge Management
- Fast change of business environment: Time-based competition
Information in today’s organization
- Increasing dependence on information and the systems that deliver this information
- Increasing vulnerabilities and a wide spectrum of threats
- Scale and cost of the current and future investments in information and information systems
- Potential for technologies to dramatically change organizations and business practices, create new opportunities and reduce costs
Information Types and Sources
- Structured information*– presented in reports, tables and graphs
- Unstructured information– delivered verbally or on an ad-hoc basis
- Formal information– part of established reporting and communication
- Informal information– ad-hoc communication such as conversations or e-mail
information types table
Using information to support processes
Operating processes
1. understand markets and customers
2. develop vision and strategy
3. design product and services
4. market and sell
5. produce and deliver products and services
6. produce and deliver for service organisations
7. invoice and service customers
Management processes
8. develop and manage human resources
9. manage information resources and technology
10. manage financial and physical resources
11. manage environmental, health and safety issues
12. manage external relationships
13. manage improvement and change
Using information to create value
- manage risks (market, financial, legal, operational)
- create new reality: new products, new services, new business ideas
- reduce costs: transactions and processes
(figure)
three strands of business information management
- Information Resources
- People Resources
- Technology Resources
information resources
elements
- data
- information
- knowledge
related concepts
- information quality
- transformation process
- system theory
- information types
- records management
- information lifecycles
- information lifecycle
- information orientation
people resources
elements
- software applications
- systems software
- technology infrastructure
- hardware
- telecommunications
related concepts
- the productivity paradox
- e-commerce and e-business
- informatics
technology resources
elements
- employees
- customers
- suppliers
- government
related concepts
- information orientation
- perception of information quality
- responsibilities, structure and organisation
culture
- skills development
- developing strategies
- legal constraints
Historical Development of Information Systems
- Era I
- 50s-60s: data processing
- 60s-70s: mangement reporting
- Era II (70s-80s): decision support
- Era III (80s-90s): end-user support
- Era IV (90s-today): inter-networked information systems
Use of Information Systems in Businesses
- strategic: executive information systems
- tactical: management information systems, decision support systems
- operational: transaction processing systems, process control systems
Information Characteristics at Each Level
table
Computer program vs. information system
- A computer program runs some instructions to perform a specific task when executed by a computer.
- An information system is used by people to perform certain processes by using computer programs to create, organize, use and distribute information.
IS
a group of components that interact to produce information
Components of an IS
- hardware
- software
- data
- processes
- people
scope of processes
table
need for continuous strategic planning
- Ever-changing internal and external factors necessitating resource allocations
- Need for subsystem coordination
- Expectations of different stakeholders (owners, customers, employees, …)
The IS Strategy Process
5 stages answer 5 questions:
1. ‘Where are we now?’ – the situation analysis.
2. ‘Where do we want to be?’ – the vision and
objectives.
3. ‘How are we going to get there?’ – the strategy.
4. ‘How do we introduce the changes?’ – the
implementation of the strategy.
5. ‘How are we doing?’ – the monitoring and control of strategy’.
Strategic Relevance of IS
- A strategic system alters the way an organization does business
- Some systems offer a company a clear competitive advantage: higher profits or increased market share
- Most systems enable a company to be an effective competitor
- Rapid diffusion of technological change makes it difficult to maintain a competitive advantage
- Hence, strategic development of IS is
- a dynamic capability of an organization
- not a static attribute
IS strategy activities
- IS strategies have been usefully grouped into four different types of services by Ward and Peppard (2002):
- Strategy and planning services
- Applications development services
- Application and technical management
services - Technology, delivery and maintenance
services
Strategy and planning services
- input to business startegy
- creation of IS strategy
- new technology evaluation
- management of applications portfolio
- selection of standard platforms for technology infrastructure
- capacity planning
Applications development services
- portfolio and project management
- systems analysis and design
- systems development
- software and hardware acquisition
- managing external resources including outsourcing
Technical user support services
- help-desk
- training
- access control (passwords)
- end-user computing advice
- hardware installation
- hardware maintanenance
- software installation
- software maintenance
- network maintenance
