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18 - Using Advanced Information Technology To Increase Performance
18 - Using Advanced Information Technology To Increase Performance
18 - Using Advanced Information Technology To Increase Performance
McGraw-Hill/Irwin
Contemporary Management, 5/e
Copyright © 2008 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Learning Objectives
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Learning Objectives
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Information and the Manager’s Job
• Data
– Raw, unsummarized, and unanalyzed facts.
• Information
– Data that are organized in a meaningful
fashion
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Attributes of Useful Information
Attributes
Quality The accuracy and reliability of available
information affects the quality of decisions that
managers make using the information.
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Factors Affecting the Usefulness of
Information
Figure 18.1
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What is Information Technology?
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What is Information Technology?
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What is Information Technology?
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Information and Decisions
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Information and Control
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Information and Coordination
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The Effects of Advancing IT
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The Effects of Advancing IT
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The Effects of Advancing IT
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IT and the Product Life Cycle
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A Product Life Cycle
• Embryonic stage
– Product has yet to gain widespread
acceptance
– Customers are unsure what a product has
to offer
• Growth stage
– Many consumers are buying the product for
the first time
– Demand increases rapidly
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A Product Life Cycle
• Mature stage
– Market peaks because most customers
have already bought the product
– Demand is typically replacement demand
• Decline stage
– Advancing IT leads to the development of a
more advanced product making the old one
obsolete
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A Product Life Cycle
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Types of Management Information
Systems
• Computer Networks
– Networking
• The exchange of information through a group or
network of interlinked computers
• Servers are powerful computers that relay
information to client computers connected on a
Local Area Network (LAN).
• Mainframes are large computers processing vast
amounts of information .
• The Internet is a world wide network of
computers.
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A Typical
Four-Tier
Information
System
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Six Computer-Based Management
Information Systems
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The Organizational Hierarchy
Drawbacks
• Can reduce timeliness of information
• Reduces quality of information
• Tall structure can make for an expensive
information system
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Types of Information Systems
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Types of Information Systems
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Types of Information Systems
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Types of Information Systems
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Expert Systems and
Artificial Intelligence
• Artificial Intelligence
– Behavior by a machine that, if performed by
a human being, would be called “intelligent”
– Already possible to write programs that can
solve problems and perform simple tasks
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Expert Systems and
Artificial Intelligence
• Expert Systems
– Most advanced management information
systems available
– System that employs human knowledge,
embedded in computer software, to solve
problems that ordinarily require human
expertise
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Enterprise Resource Planning
Systems
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Enterprise Resource Planning
Systems
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Types of Information Systems
• E-Commerce Systems
– Trade that takes place between companies,
and between companies and individual
customers, using IT and
the Internet
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Types of E-Commerce
Figure 18.5
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E-Commerce Systems
• Business-to-business (B2B)
– trade that takes place between companies
using IT and the Internet to link and
coordinate the value chains of different
companies
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E-Commerce Systems
• B2B marketplace
– Internet-based trading platform set up to
connect buyers and sellers in an industry
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Types of E-Commerce
• Business-to-
customer (B2C)
– trade that takes
place between a
company and
individual
customers using
IT and the Internet
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Strategic Alliances, B2B Network
Structures, and IT
• Strategic Alliances
– formal agreement that commits two or more
companies to exchange or share their
resources in order to produce and market a
product
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Strategic Alliances, B2B Network
Structures, and IT
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How Computer-Based Information Systems
Affect the Organizational Hierarchy
Figure 18.6
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The Impact and Limitations
of Information Systems
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Communication Flows at
Tel Co. and Soft Co.
• Boundaryless Organization
– composed of people linked by IT who rarely
see one another face-to-face
– functional experts who form an alliance with
an organization
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Boundaryless Organization
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Limitations of Information Systems
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Limitations of Information Systems
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Limitations of Information Systems
• To avoid problems:
– List major organization goals and the
information types require measure those goals.
– Audit the current system to verify that
information collected is accurate, reliable,
timely, and relevant.
– Investigate other sources of information
– Build support for the system with workers.
– Create formal training programs.
– Emphasize that face-to-face contact is
important.
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