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Management Information Systems is a general name for the academic discipline covering the application of people, technologies, and procedures—collectively, the information system—to business problems. This field is directly linked to Management by objectives and to the monitoring of Key performance indicators. It can also help in processing specific information for decision making (for example analyse customer behavior).
Some confusions between MIS and IT In business, information systems support not only business processes and operations, but also decision-making and competitive strategies, which are the fields of MIS. As an area of study, MIS is sometimes referred to, in a restrictive sense, as information technology management. The study of information systems is usually a commerce and business administration discipline. It involves frequently software engineering, but also distinguishes itself by concentrating on the integration of computer systems with the aims of the organization. The area of study should not be confused with computer science which is more theoretical in nature and deals mainly with software creation, and not with computer engineering, which focuses more on the design of computer hardware. IT service management is a practitioner-focused discipline centering on the same general domain. Potential benefits of MIS investments Investing in information systems can pay off for a company in many ways. Historical development The role of business information systems has changed and expanded over the last four decades. In the incipient decade (1960s and '70s), “elecsystems” could be afforded by only the largest organizations. They were used to record and store bookkeeping data such as journal entries, specialized journals, and ledems” were used to generate a limited range of predefined reports, including income statements (they were called P & L’s back then), balance sheets and sales reports. They were trying to perform a decision making support role, but they were not up to the task. By the 1970s “decision support systems” were introduced. They were interactive in the sense that they allowed the user to choose between numerous options and configurations. Not only was the user allowed to customize outputs, they also could configure the programs to their specific needs. There was a cost though. As part of your mainframe leasing agreement, you typically had to pay to have an IBM system developer permanently on site. The main development in the 1980s was the introduction of decentralized computing. Instead of having one large mainframe computer for the entire enterprise, numerous PCs were spread around the organization. This meant that instead of submitting a job to the computer department for batch processing and waiting for the experts to perform the procedure, each user had their own computer that they could customize for their own purposes. Many poor souls fought with the vagaries of DOS protocols, BIOS functions, and DOS batch programming. As people became comfortable with their new skills, they discovered all the things their system was capable of. Computers, instead of creating a paperless society, as was expected, produced mountains of paper, most of it valueless. Mounds of reports were generated just because it was possible to do so. This information overload was mitigated somewhat in the 1980s with the introduction of “executive information systems”. They streamlined the process, giving the executive exactly what they wanted, and only what they wanted. The 1980s also saw the first commercial application of artificial intelligence techniques in the form of “expert systems”. These programs could give advice within a very limited subject area. The promise of decision making support, first attempted in management information systems back in the 1960s, had step-by-step, come to fruition. The 1990s saw the introduction of the Strategic information system. These systems used information technology to enable the concepts of business strategy developed by scholars like M. Porter, T Peters, J. Reise, C. Markides, and J. Barney in the 1980s. The sustainability of these applications has since been called into question by N. Carr, which Piccoli and Ives, among others, have countered. The role of business information systems had now expanded to include strategic support. The latest step was the commercialization of the Internet, and the growth of intranets and extranets at the turn of the century. Sources of information on MIS See also | ||||||||
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