Information Systems Today
Chapter 1: Managing in the digital world
Knowledge worker: professionals who are relatiely well educated and who create, modify,
and/or synthesize knowledge as a fundamental part of their jobs.
With the growth in the number of knowledge workers and with their rise in
importance and leadership, a knowledge society (or digital world) would emerge.
E-business: an organizaton that uses informaton technologies or systems to support
nearly eiery part of its business.
Digital divide: those with access to informaton systems haie great adiantages oier those
without access to informaton systems. It is one of the major ethical challenges facing society
today.
Informaton systems play a crucial role in iarious major issues societes face:
Globalizaton: the integraton of economies throughout the world, enabled by innoiaton
and technological process.
Globalizaton has opened up many opportunites, brought about by falling transportaton
and telecommunicaton costs. The tremendous decrease in communicaton costs has
increased the use of outsourcing (the moiing of business processes or tasks to another
company or another country). Organizatons haie to weigh the potental benefts (cost
saiings) and drawbacks (higher geopolitcal risk or less experienced workers) of outsourcing
to a partcular country.
Trends that can cause societal issues:
Demographic changes: changes in the structure of populatons such as related to age,
birth rates, and migraton.
Urbanizaton: the moiement of rural populatons to urban areas.
Shifs in economic power: changes in countries’ purchasing power and control oier
natural resources
Resource scarcity due to limited aiailability of fossil fuels and other natural
resources.
Climate change: large-scale and long-term regional and global changes in
temperatures and weather paterns.
Sustainable deielopment: deielopment that meets the needs of the present without
compromising the ability of future generatons to meet their own needs.
Fiie IT megatrends that shape the digital future:
Mobile: the moie toward mobile deiices.
- Apps: sofware programs designed to perform a partcular, well-defned functon.
- Consumerizaton of IT: many technological innoiatons are frst introduced in the
consumer marketplace before being used by organizaton, and businesses haie to
constantly eialuate how a wide iariety of new technologies might infuence their
ways of doing business.
Social media:
- Network effect: the noton that the ialue of a network increases with the
number of other users.
, The Internet of Things (IoT): a network of a broad range of physical objects that can
automatcally share data oier the Internet.
- Sensors: deiices that can detect, record, and report changes in the physical
eniironment.
- Smart home technologies (home automaton): technologies enabling the remote
monitoring and controlling of lightng, heatng, or home appliances.
- Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT): the use of IoT technologies in manufacturing.
Cloud Computng: much of the functonality preiiously ofered by applicatons
installed on each indiiidual computer is ofered by applicatons in the cloud, accessed
iia a web browser.
Big Data: extremely large and complex datasets, which are characterized as being of
high iolume, iariety, and ielocity.
Computer fuency: the ability to independently learn new technologies as they emerge and
assess their impact on one’ s work and life.
Informaton system (IS): the combinaton of people and informaton technology that create,
collect, process, store, and distribute useful data.
Informaton technology (IT): includes hardware, sofware, and telecommunicatons
networks.
Hardware: physical computer equipment.
Sofware: a program or set of programs that tell the computer to perform certain
tasks.
Telecommunicatons networks: a group of two or more computer systems linked
together with communicatons equipment.
Data: raw symbols, such as characters and numbers.
Data quality: completeness, accuracy, tmeliness, ialidity, and consistency.
Data can be formated, organized, or processed to be useful, they are transformed into
informaton.
Knowledge: the ability to understand informaton, form opinions, and make decisions or
predictons based on the informaton.
Types of informaton systems (see table 1.5):
Transacton processing system (TPS): process day-to-day business eient data at the
operatonal leiel of the organizaton.
Management informaton system: produce detailed informaton to help manage a
frm or part of a frm.
Decision support system: proiide analysis tools and access to databases in order to
support quanttatie decision making.
Intelligent system: emulate or enhance human capabilites.
Business intelligent system: analyze Big Data to beter understand iarious aspects of
a business.
Office automaton system (personal productiity sofware): support a wide range of
predefned day-to-day work actiites of indiiiduals and small groups.
Collaboraton system: enable people to communicate, collaborate, and coordinate
with each other.
Knowledge management system: enable the generaton, storage, sharing, and
management of knowledge assets.
Social sofware: facilitate collaboraton and knowledge sharing.
, Geographic informaton system: create, store, analyze, and manage geographically
referenced data.
Functonal area informaton system: support the actiites within a specifc
functonal area of the frm.
Customer relatonship management system: support interacton between the frm
and its customers.
Enterprise resource planning system: support and integrate all facets of the
business, including planning, manufacturing, sales, marketng, and so on.
Supply chain management system: support the coordinaton of suppliers, product or
seriice producton, and distributon.
Electronic commerce system: enable customers to buy goods and seriices from a
frm’ s website.
Mobile app: perform a partcular, well-defned functon, typically on a mobile deiice.
With internetworking (connectng host computers and their networks together to form eien
larger networks like the Internet) and systems integraton (connectng separate informaton
systems and data to improie business processes and decision making) it is difcult to say
that any giien informaton system fts into only one of these categories.
Giien the trend toward pushing people from the IS staf out into the iarious business units
of the frm and giien the need for people within each of the functonal areas of the business
to haie technology skills, there is clearly a need for people who understand both the
technology side and the business side of the organizaton.
The choices made in deieloping informaton systems can be strategic in their intent; they
are deieloped and are contnuously updated to help the company gain or sustain some
compettie adiantage.
Computer ethics: moral issues and standards of conduct as they pertain to the use of
informaton systems.
Informaton privacy: concerned with what informaton an indiiidual should haie to
reieal to others in the workplace or through other transactons.
Widely accepted fair informaton practces:
- Notce/awareness: proiiding informaton about what data are gathered, what the
data are used for, who will haie access to the data, whether proiision of the data
is required or ioluntary, and how confdentality will be ensured. (is typically
contained in data priiacy statements on a website).
- Choice/consent: proiiding optons about what will be done with the data,
consumers can opt in or opt out.
- Access/partcipaton: proiiding customers with means to access data collected
about them, check for accuracy, and request correcton of inaccuracies.
- Integrity/security: ensuring integrity of the data as well as implementng controls
against unauthorized access, disclosure, or destructon of data.
- Enforcement/redress: proiiding means to enforce these practces, and/or for
customers to receiie remedies.
Intellectual property (IP) (creatons of the mind that haie commercial ialue) and the
ability to easily download, copy, and share or distribute digital informaton.
, Chapter 2: Gaining competitive advantage through
information systems
Business processes: the actiites organizatons perform in order to reach their business
goals, including core actiites that transform inputs and produce outputs, and supportng
actiites that enable the core actiites to take place.
Organizatonal decision-making leiels:
Operatonal level: the routne, day-to-day business processes and interactons with
customers occur.
- Transacton: anything that occurs as part of a frm’ s daily business of which it
must keep a record.
- Structured decisions: those in which the procedures to follow for a giien
situaton can be specifed in adiance.
- Informaton systems are typically used to increase efficiency (the extent to which
goals are accomplished faster, at lower cost, or with relatiely litle tme and
efort).
Managerial level: functonal managers focus on monitoring and controlling
operatonal-leiel actiites and proiiding informaton to higher leiels of the
organizaton.
- Midleiel managers focus on efectiely utlizing and deploying organizatonal
resources to increase effectveness (the extent to which goals or tasks are
accomplished well).
- Semistructured decisions: some procedures to follow for a giien situaton can be
specifed in adiance, but not to the extent where a specifc recommendaton can
be made.
Executve/strategic level: managers focus on long-term strategic questons facing the
organizaton.
- Unstructured decisions: few or no procedures to follow for a giien situaton can
be specifed in adiance.
Functonal area informaton systems: designed to support the unique business processes of
specifc functonal areas. Three general ways the informaton system can proiide ialue:
Automatng: technology as a way to help complete a task within an organizaton
faster, more cheaply, and perhaps with greater accuracy and/or consistency.
Organizatonal learning: the ability of an organizaton to use past behaiior and data
to improie its business processes.
Support organizatonal strategy: a frm’ s plan to accomplish its mission and goals as
well as to gain or sustain compettie adiantage oier riials.
Strategic planning: form a iision of where the organizaton needs to head, coniert
that iision into measurable objecties and performance targets, and craf a strategy
to achieie the desired results.
Common organizatonal strategies organizatons use to positon themselies:
Low-cost leadership strategy: ofer the best prices in the industry.
Diferentaton strategy: try to proiide beter products or seriices than compettors.
Best-cost proiider strategy: middle-of-the-road, ofer products or seriices of
reasonably good quality at compettie prices.
