essay

1. Discuss the five core disciplines of a learning organisation.

The five disciplines of learning organizations are as follows:

• Shared Vision
• Team Learning
• Systems Thinking
• Mental Models
• Personal Mastery

1. Building a Shared vision

In learning organizations, the vision should be created through interaction with the employees
in the enterprise. Many leaders have personal visions that lack transferring them to a shared
vision.

The only way to create a shared vision is by compromising the organization’s and individual’s
visions. People who do not share the same vision might not contribute as much to the
organization.

The effect of sharing the same vision is that employees do tasks because they want to do so
instead of they are told to do so. It changes the relationship with the company, and it turns its
performances in a learning mechanism.

2. Systems Thinking

Instead of focusing on individual issues, systems thinking reflect the observational process of an
entire system. Managers have to understand that every action and consequence is correlated
with another.
Many times it happens that managers focus on individual actions, and therefore, forget about
seeing the big picture.

When the correlation is understood, it enables us to see interrelationships and patterns of

change in particular situations. Managers will be able to determine cause and effect.

3. Mental Models

According to Peter Senge, the employees must identify the values of the company and what the
business is all about.
A correct understanding of who we are will enable us to visualize where to go and how to
develop further. The organization has to be flexible in accepting changes to new mental models
and a new image of the company.

The most successful companies are those who can learn and adapt to new models to become
faster than its competitors.

4. Team Learning

To accomplish excellent functional team dynamics, team-learning is a primary importance. It is

the discipline by which personal mastery and shared vision are brought together.

It is crucial for the workforce to consider its colleagues as team members instead of rivals. It is
the first step to set up dialogues wherein people dare to be vulnerable and express their
real personality. The working environment should be safe where honest mistakes are forgiven.
Otherwise, no learning can be experienced.
5. Personal Mastery

Personal mastery occurs when an individual has a clear vision of a goal, combined with an
accurate perception of reality. The gap between the vision and reality drives the employee to
practice all necessary related activities to realize the vision.

This creative tension depends on a clear understanding of current reality. For this reason, for
personal mastery and the related discipline of a shared vision, looking at, and sharing the truth
is a crucial fundamental.

However, employees could believe they lack the competencies to achieve their goals. A vicious
circle might have established and could be difficult to remove. According to Peter Senge, we
should train our subconscious mind because it can handle more complex problems quicker than
what our consciousness can.
When people believe in their own powerlessness, it will hold them back from realizing their
vision. For this reason, we should train the subconscious mind to tackle the stress and problems
in reality.
Application of the Five Disciplines of Learning Organizations

Applying the five disciplines of learning organizations can be challenging for many
organizations. It would be more attractable to only focus on one or a few of these disciplines.
However, the utilization of all disciples is critical since all disciplines are interlinked.

For instance, when an organization starts to build a Shared Vision with its team, an important
aspect is to have better conversations with its team members (Team Learning).

In addition, if an organization starts to work on System Thinking to identify common problems,

its employees need to understand the Mental Models. Since all disciplines are linked to
another, it does not matter where to start.

It does not mean that the organization has to focus on all disciplines at the same time. By
focusing more narrowly on one or two disciplines and work to the others will gain competitive
advantages for the organization.

On the other hand, the five disciplines of learning organizations focus on long-term growth for
both internal and external the organization. Typical events within the organization are the
discussion about urgent tasks that could affect the operations.

The real threat in this scenario is the focus of the small event because the organization has to
focus on the long-term growing process that keeps it competitive.

Another example is the desire from management that the team is pulling in the same direction.
According to Chris Argyris, a former professor at Harvard Business School, most organization
rewards those who follow senior’s management views.
Employees who ask questions or stir the view into another direction may be penalized. As
described, management should focus on Building a Shared Vision via strategic planning.
Thus, transferring management vision into a shared vision by compromising both the
organization’s and individual’s vision.

2. List the characteristics of knowledge (attributes)

Characteristics of knowledge.
 Knowledge involves human interaction, expression and communication with reality.
 Knowledge has attributes of significance.
 Knowledge is a dynamic concept. It changes its character and content with time. It becomes obsolete
over a period of time.
 Knowledge has an economic value. Therefore, it is used for creating competitive advantage.
 Knowledge is built out of perception, skills, training, common sense and experience gathered in
working, interaction, observation and analysis of the
data and information.
 Knowledge is also termed as actionable information.

3. What is Knowledge network? .

The KM cycle developed for the organisation operates on the network platform.
KM network platform has two components, Computer Network and the people from the organisation
and outside.
In knowledge network, people share information, knowledge and experiences to develop new
knowledge and new knowledge assets. Charles Savage, author of Fifth Generation Management, first
brought out the term ‘Knowledge Networking’. It is a product of two concepts—knowledge, a strategic
resource, and networking, a human act of building relationships.

4. What are the Purpose of knowledge management system

Knowledge Management System is defined as the process to manage knowledge in the
organisation in steps, beginning with ‘identification, validation, creation, acquisition, codification
and transfer, measurement, and creation of intellectual capital and conversion of some into
intellectual property to meet the business strategy requirements and its implementation
The purpose of KMS is to support decision
making personnel and stake holders in the organisation with the online ready access to the
organisation’s knowledge resources. It has two phases, development and management.
 Fig. KMSD Cycle and Dynamically Changing Business Environment

5. What is SWOT ANALYSIS?

SWOT analysis, compare organisation’s knowledge with that of competition, and proceed to find the
knowledge gap and identify new knowledge needs to meet competition challenges. Knowledge so
created would offer sustainable competitive advantage, as the organisation would have lead advantage
over competition. Hence, knowledge is a strategic resource useful for building knowledge strategy.

SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats, and so a SWOT analysis is
a technique for assessing these four aspects of your business. SWOT Analysis is a simple tool that can
help you to analyze what your company does best right now, and to devise a successful strategy for
the future.

6. What are the objectives of training programme

Creating meaningful, relatable and effective training objectives is important for the overall success of
the employees who participate. Several reasons to give added attention to your training objectives
include the following:

 Give purpose to the course or program and lead the training design process
 Allow employees to understand what they need to do to succeed
 Set goals for trainees to achieve in steps toward a larger outcome, such as mastering technical
skills
 Support business goals through the completion of training objectives
 Provide trainers with a clear method of measuring trainees' progress through the program

7. What is the Importance of knowledge transfer partnership(KTP)

It’s the process of imparting important information from one part of your business (or person) to
another. And it's critical to your business's success because, when done effectively, it increases the
efficiency and productivity of your organization.

Knowledge transfer is a culture based process. It is informal and invisible. Formal knowledge transfer is
another basic process by which documents, data or other types of knowledge resources are captured
and stored in formats in the media that allows retrieval when needed.

Knowledge transferring is the process of moving knowledge to needy locations, individuals, groups,
teams and inter-organizational units, and intra-organizations. Intra and inter-organizational knowledge
transfers are essentially communication processes. The knowledge transfer methodology is decided by
the character of the knowledge. If it is tacit then socialization supported by multimedia technology is the
best choice. If knowledge is explicit and coded, knowledge transfer would be best achieved through
network, groupware, database technology, and web and internet platforms.

Flow of Knowledge Transfer

8. Give brief note on the prominent ways and mechanism of knowledge transfer
Knowledge transfer is done in a number of ways. Some prominent ways and mechanisms of knowledge
transfer are:

• Working together Internal consultants, personnel transfer, on-the-job training, hand holding,
Informal visits and chats, mentoring.
• Communicating through formal channels E-mail, fax, telephone, video conferencing, E-manuals,
posting on knowledge portal.
• Creation of socialising opportunities Form communities of practice and interest, conduct
workshops and seminars, get together.
• Codifying knowledge for ease of transfer Make Rules, Policies, Build protocol, procedures,
models, programmes etc.
• Use data management technologies Develop knowledge bases, data warehouses, knowledge
repositories.

9. List the driving force behind knowledge management.

The driving forces behind KM are
• Globalisation of business: Bigger markets
• International competition: Threat to business
• Sophisticated customers: Demanding number of requirements together
• Sophisticated competitors: Develops products in innovative way in short cycle
• Sophisticated suppliers: Offering higher value but, at the same time, cost effective
data and information.
 Knowledge is also termed as actionable information.
 10. Define expert system.

Expert system is a computer based information system that emulates the decision making ability of a
human expert. The expert system extends the application of computers from the conventional
mathematical computations to the application. Expert system uses reasoning to render advice, make
recommendations or diagnose problems. But it lacks common sense which needs in some decision
making.

Benefits of Expert Systems

 Expert systems were among the first truly successful forms of Artificial Intelligence (AI).

 It reduces the dependencies upon one expert.

 It eliminates errors and reduces inconsistencies.
 It provides improved customer service.
 It holds and maintains significant level of information
 It can serve multiple users simultaneously.

11. What is organizational learning? Why is organizational learning important?

Organizational Learning
Organizational Learning in the context of Knowledge management can be defined as “the process of
responding proactively to a rapidly changing external environment”. It can also be defined as a process
of improving organizational actions through better knowledge and understanding.
The key objective of Organizational Learning is to purposefully construct structures and strategies so as
to enhance and maximize organizational learning to bring about tangible benefits

12. Write a short note on workplace knowledge

Workplace knowledge is a system that helps people in an organization share, access, and update
business knowledge and information. An effective workplace knowledge system reduces the costs of
inefficiency by making company knowledge more available, accessible, and accurate.
Workplace knowledge is the key asset to the organizations well-built knowledge bases.
Workplace knowledge becomes strong with the continuous encouragement, support for teamwork, and
a proper knowledge management system. Workplace knowledge increases productivity, improves the
organization’s knowledge base, nurtures teamwork, and creates trust relationships between the
management and the employees

13. . Explain data modelling with example.

Data modelling is about representing the real world set of data structures or entities and their
relationships in the form of data models, required for a database creation. Data model is a visual
representation of the database.
It consists of types and phases, like conceptual data modelling, logical data modelling, physical
data modelling, enterprise data modelling, relational data modelling and dimensional data modelling. It
provides tabular picture of an entity by its attributes and relationship structure.
For example, data model of a product would be product, unique key for identity and its various
attributes.
The product has relationship with customer, production unit and processes. Product model shows these
relations by ER diagrams. Let us take an example of an organisation which sells a product to a customer.
• Customer data model Customer name, customer code, address, type of business, credit limit,
Customer rating, type of customer
• Product data model Product name, product code, product model, application, and price
• Customer – Product Relation Model

14. Explain knowledge management cycle with a diagram.

The term knowledge management is an approach to improving organisational outcomes and
organisational learning by introducing into the organisation a range of specific processes and practices
for identifying and capturing knowledge, know how, expertise and other intellectual capital, and for
making such knowledge assets available for transfer and reuse across the organisation.
Knowledge management is the explicit and systematic management of vital knowledge—and its
associated processes of identification, validation, creation, aggregation, organisation, share, use and
exploitation—in pursuit of business objectives. The Knowledge Management Cycle is shown in Figure
3.6. It continuously goes through eight steps. The steps in the management cycle are create, aggregate,
store, share, use, validate for vitality, enrich or replace.

1. Write a short note on knowledge management system life cyce.

KMS lifecycle (KMSLC) is similar to Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC). KMS lifecycle deals with
Identifying the requirements of knowledge and making a business case for such system. It essentially
finds the problems, challenges, and issues in business and the knowledge required to solve them. It also
addresses the justification of KMS by identifying the benefits of such system. Then, it looks into the
organisation required to build such system. KMS lifecycle focuses on strategic planning and justification
for KMS development and the processes for building it. SDLC contains the following steps—‘Need for the
system, Requirement
study, Feasibility study, Building RDD and SRS, High level logical design and architecture, Coding, Testing,
User training, Implementation, and Maintenance. KMSLC runs on similar lines as shown in Figure 4.10.

15. What is knowledge transfer

Knowledge transferring is the process of moving knowledge to needy locations, individuals, groups,
teams and inter-organisational units, and intra-organisations. Intra and inter-organisational knowledge
transfers are essentially communication processes. The knowledge transfer methodology is decided by
the character of the knowledge. If it is tacit then socialisation supported by multimedia technology is the
best choice. If knowledge is explicit and coded, knowledge transfer would be best achieved through
network, groupware, database technology, and web and internet platforms.
Knowledge transfer involves a practical problem of transferring knowledge from one part of the
organisation to another (or all other) part(s) of the organisation. Knowledge transfer seeks to organise,
distribute and ensure its availability for current and future users, as and when requisitioned by them. It
is considered to be more than just a communication problem. It is also just not a knowledge network
problem of management.
Knowledge transfer is more complex because:
• Knowledge resides in organisational members, tools, tasks, and their sub-networks,
• Much of the knowledge in the organisation is tacit or hard to articulate (Nonaka and Takeuchi) to
make it easily transferable.
 16. What is knowledge sharing.

Knowledge sharing is a process where an individual or an expert group interacts with recipients of
knowledge, primarily to expose knowledge to them for its merit from recipient’s point of view and
evaluate its use in their work.
For example, a work group might share its ideas in a meeting, where the merits of knowledge are
discussed and debated for pros and cons for its application or adoption. Here, sharing refers to the need
to expose others to the idea in order for it to be evaluated. Dissemination takes place once knowledge
has passed some minimum level of acceptance by value.
For efficient and effective sharing of knowledge, it must be ready in the form or frame for recipient
to understand, interpret and infer. The subsequent sub-processes, like dissemination, would then be
easier. Here, the form and frame of knowledge means it is fairly explicit, documented and coded.
Knowledge can be stored for distribution through network. Knowledge sharing can be supported by the
use of ICT, e.g., Groupware, online databases, data warehousing/knowledge repositories, intranets and
decision support tools. The strategy to adopt ICT appears to be one of the most followed managerial
practices within the organisations, but just the implementation of ICT does not ensure knowledge
sharing. Individuals generate knowledge and they have to be encouraged to share their knowledge; ICT
can just be a facilitator. Therefore, an investment in ICT that disregards the human dimension of the
knowledge sharing process will inevitably fail.

17. Explain knowledge asset.

Knowledge assets are of far greater value than any tangible asset, such as land and buildings, machinery,
and many other fixed assets reported in the books of accounts. They provide the organisation a
knowledge platform for creating sustainable competitive advantage. The nature of knowledge and
knowledge management has given rise to a range of different designs of knowledge management
systems that enable organisations to convert their knowledge into actionable information, and into IC &
IP. Such an implementation process is a comprehensive course of action that requires focus and
commitment throughout the organisation for achieving results. Yet, there is no universally accepted
framework or methodology for such process.
There are two types of knowledge assets:
• Explicit or formal assets like copyrights, patents, templates, publications, reports, archives, knowledge
products, etc.
• Tacit or informal assets that are rooted in human experience and include personal belief, perspective
and values. Created and stored in electronic media for access and use by the knowledge worker of the
organisation to create an economic value of significance. The advantage of knowledge asset is its impact
on efficiency and effectiveness of the knowledge worker in business operations and performance.
It impacts, enables better decision making in speed and accuracy, as KA is uniquely developed out of
experience of solving well defined business problems. It is tested and proven for solving such problems.
The problems may be operational or strategic. Its advantages are:
• Time saving is valuable as decision maker does not have to get into search mode to find the knowledge
and construct a method or model to solve the problem. KA is readily available.
• KA is available most reliably world over to authorised users, when needed by them in critical times.
Knowledge asset is created through a systematic process of knowledge generation: Identification-
Validation-Creation-Experience of application and Improving to level of value of significance. Once an
organisation experiences its value in competitive business management, it is considered an ‘asset’. KA
then gets the treatment like of any other physical asset. It is guarded, protected and declared as
knowledge to leverage upon, having competitive advantage. Its value goes up with its use over and over
again in the strategy of improving business performance.
Knowledge asset is the result of collaborative participation of the knowledge worker, customer, and
vendor or business partner, experts and specialists, academicians and regulators, such as industry
associations, federations and government bodies dealing with intellectual capital, registration and
protection.

18. .Explain distinguishing features of knowledge management system.[KMS]

The distinguishing features of KMS are:

• Scope
• Purpose: It has a clear purpose to exist and grow. It has a place in the organisation due to its
justified business case.
• Context :The system is required for knowledge creation, its organisation and its application in
solving business problems.
:The scope of KMS includes the management of knowledge and its enabling IT infrastructure.
• Processes :KMS detail processes are identification, creation, capturing, acquisition, selection,
valuation, structuring, formalisation, visualisation, transfer, distribution, retention, maintenance,
refinement, revision, evolution, accessing and retrieval.
• Participants: KMS users are knowledge workers with differing backgrounds and experiences.
• Use :KMS business use is made by communities, virtual organisations and societies to extract and
generate knowledge for business application.
• Design :KMS design is open to change with changing needs of the business. It is flexible and caters
to the needs and capabilities of the users of knowledge.
• Drivers: Business strategy, technology and competitive pressures are the drivers of KMS.

19. List down pros and cons of total quality management.

Advantages of TQM: Better Products at Lower Cost

TQM leads to better products manufactured at lower cost. The focus on using high quality
information to improve processes reduces waste and saves time, leading to reduced expenses that
can be passed along to clients in the form of lower prices. Companies that successfully implement
TQM are able to reduce variability, providing the consistency that customer’s value. This creates
customer loyalty and earns their continued business.

The emphasis on engagement at all levels leads to employee engagement, which reduces turnover
and saves money on training and mistakes due to inexperience.

Disadvantages of TQM: Requires Deep Commitment

One of the main disadvantages of TQM is the need for company-wide commitment to quality
improvement, and the difficulty of achieving this commitment. All levels of management must be on
board for the program to be truly successful. Any lack of effort or resources will undermine the
success of a TQM program, causing negative ripples throughout the company.

If management fails to fully implement a TQM program, its partial efforts are bound to fail. For
example, just limiting the initiative to personnel training without making use of statistical tools to
measure and evaluate process changes will create frustration and inadequate results. Training
programs must be taken full circle through evaluations and measured outcomes. One reason some
companies focus on training is because it is tangible and easy to show that something was done. But
unless training is followed up with ongoing coaching, the knowledge and skills it provides are unlikely
to stick.

20.Explain various branches of AI.

The Major Branches of Artificial Intelligence
Here are the major branches of Artificial Intelligence;

1. Experts Systems
2. Robotics
3. Machine Learning
4. Neural Network
5. Fuzzy Logic
6. Natural Language Processing
1. Expert Systems:
Expert Systems is an Artificial Intelligence (AI-based) system that learns and imitates a human being’s
decision-making ability.

Expert Systems do not use conventional programming to solve complex problems but instead uses
logical notations to achieve such an aim.

2. Robotics:
This is a very interesting branch of Artificial Intelligence that focuses on the design and development of
robots. Robotics deals with the designing, constructing, and operating of robots by incorporating both
science and engineering techniques.

3. Machine Learning:
Machine Learning is a highly demanding branch of Artificial Intelligence. It is the science that enables
machines and computer systems to process, analyze and interpret data with the aim of providing
solutions for real-life challenges.

4. Neural Network:[Write a short note on neural network]

Neural Network is a branch of Artificial Intelligence associated with the use of Neurology to incorporate
cognitive science in helping computer systems and machines to execute tasks. It is known as “Deep
Learning” because it involves making use of artificial brain neurons to solve complex problems.
Neural Network helps machines process how the human brain operates. This branch of AI also involves
implementing mathematical functions and statistical techniques to solve real-world problems. It is used
in fields such as risk analysis, market research, fraud detection, forecasting, and stock exchange
prediction.

Face verification algorithms on social media sites are a result of the implementation of Neural Network.
This wonderful branch of AI is also responsible for virtual assistant apps such as “Alexa and Siri”.
5. Fuzzy Logic:
This branch of AI is the technique of modifying and representing uncertain information by analyzing the
degree to which the hypothesis is true. Fuzzy Logic helps to offer a certain level of reasoning flexibility
when faced with uncertainties.

6. Natural Language Processing:

Communicating with someone who doesn’t understand your language can be very challenging and the
same can be said of humans trying to communicate with a computer system. A computer will find it
difficult to interpret words because it only understands the language of binary digits. This challenge has
led to the development of Natural Language Processing in computer science.

21. . Write a few lines on barriers related to people

Barriers Related to People

• Different languages :The language barrier is a problem when dealing with people from other
companies, either from the same country or from abroad. When dealing with international companies,
it is recognised that misunderstandings can result if people do not speak the same language with a
certain level of competence.
• Fear of penalty/fear of losing profile :The presentation of not clearly defined ideas (soft ideas) is
often considered to be a weakness, thus reducing the space for creative thinking and creation of
synergies to develop ideas.
• Idea robbery :This barrier describes the fear that the idea of an individual/employee could be
taken by another who would then get the acknowledgement and rewards. It implies the need for the
protection of proprietary knowledge among employees.
• Fostering established communication channels: Communication channels between colleagues
across different companies must be maintained and fostered, thus resulting in high efforts. Since the
establishment of good relationships is time consuming, means must somehow be provided to support
this task.

22. . Draw knowledge management activities tree.

11. Draw knowledge acquisition technique tree.

23. . List guideline questions to assess the impact of KMS(knowledge management system]

• Is KMS delivering identified and validated knowledge?

• How often and by whom this has been called for usage?
• Are various repositories properly linked to each other, saving time of knowledge processing?
• Is knowledge continuously being validated for currency?
• Is knowledge getting richer out of its experience by the users?
• Have users accepted new ways of collaborative working to save time and cost of processing?
• Is knowledge being shared without any inhibitions?
• To what extent has technology made an impact on users’ working? Are they satisfied with present
technology driving KMS?

 Is resistance to KMS receding owing to confidence it has created in the users as a useful tool for

decision making?
• Is KMS being maintained properly? Is it backed by a proper competent organisation of experts and
specialists in key knowledge areas?
• Is the management of the organisation actively looking into the system, and rewarding and recognising
the users and contributors to the system?

24. Give brief note on factors that organization learning depends on.

Organisation learning depends on many factors, as explained below:

• Organisation Culture Which enables, promotes, motivates learning and ensures provision of
learning resources and clearly defines learning expectations and outcome.
• Network :The scope and reach of network of CoPs, organisation knowledge, customers and people
in the organisation. The network is nurtured and maintained to enhance learning capacity
• Approach to Learning :The approach could be formal through plan and action, PDCA cycle.
The approach could be informal providing guidance on web search, CoPs, referring to a knowledge
content already developed.
• Technology :Technology is a driver to learn, hence the pace of learning depends on choice of
technology which enables collaboration, networking, transfer and sharing easily. If the simple
technology configuration is inexpensive, the returns are very high.
• Thinking Skills :The level of thinking skills make all the difference in pace and quality of
learning.
25. Explain role plays by HR in developing knowledge management system.

There are several roles that can be played by HR in developing knowledge management system.
First, HRM should help the organisation articulate the purpose of the knowledge management system.
Investing in a knowledge management initiative without a clear sense of purpose is like investing in an
expensive vehicle which one does not need

Second, as a knowledge facilitator, HRM must ensure alignment among the organisation’s mission,
statement of ethics and policies. These should all be directed toward creating an environment of sharing
and using knowledge with full understanding of the competitive consequences.
Third, HRM should also create the ‘ultimate employee experience’. That is, by transforming tacit
knowledge into explicit knowledge through education, the organisation must build employee skills,
competencies, and careers, creating ‘bench strength’.

Fourth, HRM must enable integration of effective knowledge sharing and usage into daily life. That is,
knowledge sharing must be expected, recognised, and rewarded. Often, the common pattern is to hoard
knowledge because it makes the individual more valuable and more difficult to replace

Fifth, HRM must relax controls and encourage behaviours that facilitate formal and informal interaction
among employees.

Sixth, as employees increasingly rely on technology to communicate, they lose opportunities to develop
the rich, multifaceted relationships that encourage the communication of tacit knowledge.

26 . Explain four stage cycle of individual learning.

Individual learning moves through the four stage cycle:

• Concrete Experience An individual learns out of hard core of experience by trial and error,
making mistakes and correcting them.
• Reflective Observation The same individual works with practical experience but then he gets into
reflection mode. The individual questions, thinks and, while applying practical knowledge, tries to
improve upon the learning made out of concrete experience
• Abstract Conceptualisation The individual, after becoming first activist and then reflector, goes
into conceptualisation phase. The individual tries to build theories around what has been learned and
recorded as knowledge. The individual becomes a theorist.
• Active Experimentation Having advanced into the theorist’s role, the individual ventures into
active experimentation of trying out new learning to confirm its validity with the intention of
improving it by further active experimentation.
 26. .Integrated KMS with extensive use of ICT provides a knowledge lever to managers go
make better decision .Justify.

Essay

27. Explain how information system evolved through years.

Evolution of Information System

An information system is a combination of processes, hardware, trained personnel, software,
infrastructure and standards that are designed to create, modify, store, manage and distribute
information to suggest new business strategies and new products. It leads to efficient work practices
and effective communication to make better decisions in an organization. There has been a significant
evolution of Information System function over the past few decades.
The evolution of Information System function can be summarized as follows:

1950 – 1960: Electronic Data Processing, Transaction Processing System

During this period, the role of IS was mostly to perform activities like transaction processing,
recordkeeping and accounting. IS was mainly used for electronic data processing (EDP).
EDP is described as the use of computers in recording, classifying, manipulating, and summarizing data.
It is also called information processing or automatic data processing.
Transaction Processing System (TPS) was the first computerized system developed to process business
data. TPS was mainly aimed at clerical staff of an organisation. The early TPS used batch processing data
which was accumulated over a period and all transactions were processed afterward.
TPS collects, stores, modifies and retrieves day-to-day transactions of an organization. Usually, TPS
computerize or automate an existing manual process to allow for faster processing, improved customer
service and reduced clerical costs. Examples of outputs from TPS are cash deposits, automatic teller
machine (ATM), payment order and accounting systems. TPS is also known as transaction processing or
real-time processing.
1960 to 1970: Management Information Systems
During this era, the role of IS evolved from TPS to Management Information Systems (MIS). MIS process
data into useful informative reports and provide managers with the tools to organize evaluate and
efficiently manage departments within an organization. MIS delivers information in the form of displays
and pre-specified reports to support business decision-making. Examples of output from MIS are cost
trend, sales analysis and production performance reporting systems.
Usually, MIS generates three basic types of information which are:
o Detailed information reports typically confirm transaction-processing activities.

o Summary information establishes data into a format that an individual can review quickly and easily.

o Exception information report information by filtering data that is an exception inventory report.

This period also marked the development when the focus of organizations shifted slowly from merely
automating basic business processes to consolidating the control within the data processing function.
1970 to 1980: Decision Support Systems
In this era, a major advancement was an introduction of the personal computers (PC). With the
introduction of PCs, there was the distribution of computing or processing power across the
organization. IS function associated strongly with management rather than a technical approach in an
organisation. The role focused on “interactive computer-based system” to aid decision-makers in solving
problems.
This new role of information systems to provide interactive ad-hoc support for the decision-making
process to managers and other business professionals is called Decision Support Systems (DSS). DSS
serve the planning, management and operations level of an organization usually senior management.
DSS uses data from both internal and/or external sources. Internal sources of data might include
inventory, sales, manufacturing or financial data from an organization’s database. External sources could
include pricing, interest rates, population or trends. Managers use DSS to manipulate the data to help
with decisions. Examples of DSS are projected revenue figures based on new product sales assumptions,
product pricing and risk analysis systems.
1980 to 1990: Executive Information Systems
This period gave rise to departmental computing due to many organisations purchasing their own
hardware and software to suit their departmental needs. Instead of waiting for indirect support of
centralized corporate service department, employees could use their own resources to support their job
requirements. This trend led to new challenges of data incompatibility, integrity and connectivity across
different departments. Further, top executives were neither using DSS nor MIS hence executive
information systems (EIS) or executive support systems (ESS) were developed.
EIS offers decision making facilities to executives through providing both internal and external
information relevant to meeting the strategic goals of the organization. These are sometimes considered
as a specific form of DSS. Examples of the EIS are systems for easy access to actions of all competitors,
economic developments to support strategic planning and analysis of business performance.
1990 to 2000: Knowledge Management Systems
During this era, the rapid growth of the intranets, extranets, internet and other interconnected global
networks dramatically changed the capabilities of IS in business. It became possible to circulate
knowledge to different parts of the world irrespective of time and space. This period also saw an
emergence of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. ERP is an organization-specific form of a
strategic information system that incorporates all components of an organisation including
manufacturing, sales, resource management, human resource planning and marketing.
Moreover, there was a breakthrough in the development and application of artificial intelligence (AI)
techniques to business information systems. Expert systems (ES) and knowledge management systems
(KMS) interconnected to each other.
Expert systems (ES) are a computer system that mimics the decision-making ability of human experts.
For example, systems making financial forecasts, diagnosing human illnesses and scheduling routes for
delivery vehicles. Knowledge management system (KMS) is an IT system that stores and retrieves
knowledge to support creation, organization and dissemination of business knowledge within the
enterprise. Examples of KMS are feedback database and helpdesk systems.
ES uses data from Knowledge Management Systems to generate desirable information system’s output
for example loan application approval system.
2000 – present: E-Business
The Internet and related technologies and applications changed the way businesses operate and people
work. Information systems functions in this period are still the same just like 50 years ago doing records
keeping, reporting management, transactions processing, support management and managing
processes of the organization. It is used to support business process, decision making and competitive
advantage.
The difference is greater connectivity across similar and dissimilar system components. There is great
network infrastructure, higher level of integration of functions across applications and powerful
machines with higher storage capacity. Many businesses use Internet technologies and web-enable
business processes to create innovative e-business applications. E-business is simply conducting
business process using the internet.
Stages in implementing an information system
The main goal within an organization when implementing an information system is to increase efficiency
in organization activity by means of IT For example: automatic information processing, adequate
information and document management.
The implementation stages of an information system include:

Problem analysis and specification design: The IT team analyses and defines the problem accurately.
However, the users have to describe their complete requirements or specifications. Therefore, the
involvement of the organization in providing complete and precise specifications for its needs are
essential
Design and implementation of the application: This stage is performed by the IT teams based on the
specifications required. This stages examines the “how to do” and “do it” by the IT team. This involves
the architecture design, choosing programming languages and environments, application
implementation and application testing.
System installation: This is performed within the organization as it takes into account the user feedback
and, if necessary, makes adjustments where it is required.
Maintenance: This stage comes after the system installation. It involves all the necessary operations in
order to ensure that there is an efficient exploitation of the system within the organization and performs
adjustments where it is required as well as developing the organization’s activity.

28. Briefly discuss the modelling and analysis techniques of business intelligence.
Business intelligence is a set of concepts, methods and processes to improve business decisions using
information from multiple sources and applying experience and assumptions to develop an accurate
understanding of business dynamics. It is a combination of methods and processes with tools to extract
information from various sources. It enables the gathering, management and analysis of data to produce
information which represents the new scenario. This information is distributed to people throughout the
organisation to improve strategic and tactical decisions to deal with the new situation effectively. Let us
take an example of military intelligence to understand the meaning of Business intelligence.
The power of business intelligence actually relies on the knowledge acquired through the analysis of
various reports taken using business intelligence reporting tools. Business intelligence reporting tools, or
OLAP Tools, provide different views of data by pivoting or rotating it across several dimensions. Business
intelligence tools are capable of displaying data in several formats, like tables, pivots, charts, query
results and reports.

Modelling and Analysis techniques for Business Intelligence

BI requires extensive use of modelling and analysis techniques. Let us briefly discuss what they are and
how they are used.
Business Modeling
A business model provides information in a graphical way, in diagrams, to the members of an
organisation to understand and communicate the business rules and processes effectively. Business
process modelling, process flow modelling and data flow modelling are sub-categories of business
modelling.
Data Modelling
Data modelling is about representing the real world set of data structures or entities and their
relationships in the form of data models, required for a database creation. Data model is a visual
representation of the database. It consists of types and phases, like conceptual data modelling, logical
data modelling, physical data modelling, enterprise data modelling, relational data modelling and
dimensional data modelling. It provides tabular picture of an entity by its attributes and relationship
structure.
For example, data model of a product would be product, unique key for identity and its various
attributes. The product has relationship with customer, production unit and processes. Product model
shows these relations by ER diagrams. Let us take an example of an organisation which sells a product to
a customer.
 ETL, An Implementation Process
Customer data model Customer name, customer code, address, type of business, credit limit, customer
rating, and type of customer
 Product data model Product name, product code, product model, application, price
 Customer – Product Relation Model

Dimensional Modeling
Dimensional model comprises of a fact table and many dimension tables, and is used for calculating
summarised data in different perspectives. A fact table contains various measures or facts, like sales
amount, production amount, etc., whereas a dimension table describes the particular entity, like time,
state, etc., based on which the required facts are measured. Let us take an example of ‘product returns’
from the customer, returned for various reasons.

The product returns is a fact table which shows quantity, reasons and value of return.
This information has four dimensions-customer segments, product group, factory where product is
manufactured and the process and technology used. Any alarming situation due to product returns
needs to be understood from these four dimensional perspectives. The BI of the organisation has
processes, methods and tools to access extract and transform the information in a meaningful context-
sensitive format to investigate the causes of return to take corrective action. The returns are measured
by these four dimensions.
ETL, an acronym for ‘Extraction, Transformation and Loading’, is a collection of application tools
associated with extracting data, transforming that data into business data and finally loading it into a
data warehouse.
ETL tools populate the data warehouse. The transformation involves several processes, like data
cleansing, data profiling, data type conversion, validating for referential integrity, performing
aggregation, if needed and de-normalisation and normalization of data.
OLAP
OLAP, an acronym for ‘Online Analytical Processing’, is a technique by which the data, sourced from a
data warehouse or data mart, is visualised and summarised to provide perspective multidimensional
view across multiple dimensions. Generally, OLAP refers to OLAP Tools (for example, Cognos, Business
Objects, etc.) that help to accomplish these tasks.. OLAP tools provide options to drill-down the data
from one hierarchy to another.
OLAP tools visualise data in an understandable format, like in the form of Scorecards and Dashboards,
with Key Performance Indicators enabling managers to monitor and take immediate action.

Data Mining
Data mining is a set of processes related to analysing and discovering useful, actionable knowledge from
data warehouse, data stores or data sets. This knowledge discovery suggests patterns or behaviours
within the data that lead to some strategic thinking leading to profitable business action. Data mining
generally requires large volumes of business data, including its meta data, to explore the knowledge.
Once the required amount of data has been accumulated from various sources, it is cleaned, validated
and prepared for storing it in the data warehouse or data mart.
BI reporting tools capture the required facts from the data to be used by the knowledge discovery
process. Data mining can be accomplished by utilising one or more of the traditional knowledge
discovery techniques, like Market Basket Analysis, Clustering, Memory Based Reasoning, Link Analysis,
Neural Networks, and so on.