Information Age

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Information Age

• Jason Chen, Ph.D.
• Professor of MIS
• School of Business
• Gonzaga University
• Spokane, WA 99258
• chen_at_gonzaga.edu

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Is Computer Age Over ?
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100 Years ago...

• Industrial Revolution changed the World

Today...

• Information
• Revolution!

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100 Years ago...

• Industrial Revolution changed the World

Today...

• Information
• Revolution!

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The Information Age vs. the Computer Age
The Computer Age Time-sharing
Computer 1960s
End of the computer age
Beginning of the information age
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Computer Age vs. Information Age

• Computer age refers to the love affair with
  hardware (and its speed of processing data)
• Information age refers to the trend toward
  treating information as a corporate resource that
  supplies executives with timely, accurate
  information for more effective decision making.

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What is Information ?

• DATA

INFORMATION
Information is refined data.
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Data vs. Information

• Users really want is
• Information
• What users can learn from the data
• how to satisfy their best customers
• how to allocate their resources most efficiently,
• how to minimize losses

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SYSTEM
INPUT
OUTPUT
PROCESS
FEEDBACK
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Dr. Chen, Information Age
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System Concepts
Environment
Control by Management
Feedback Signals
Feedback Signals
Control Signals
Control Signals
Input of Raw Materials
Output of Finished Products
Manufacturing Process
System Boundary
Other Systems
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FUNCTIONS OF AN INFORMATION SYSTEM
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Dr. Chen, Information Age
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Information and our Life

• Information (and energy) are at the core of
  everything around us.
• Our entire existence is a process of gathering,
  analyzing, understanding, and acting on the
  information.

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Information and Business

• Every business is a service business
• information confers competitive advantage
• Mass customization
• needs more information for custom-fit
• Information as product
• information broker, e.g., clothing database,
  purchasing habits etc.

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Information and Business

• Modern organizations are said to be drowning in
  data but starving for information.

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• Information is pivotal in todays business
  environment. Success is dependent on its early
  and decisive use. A lack of information is a sure
  sign for failure.
• The rapidly changing environment in which
  business operates demands ever more immediate
  access to data. (Devlin, 1997)

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• Many corporations are actively looking for new
  technologies that will assist them in becoming
  more profitable and competitive. Gaining
  competitive advantage requires that companies
  accelerate their decision making process so that
  they can respond quickly to change. One key to
  this accelerated decision making is having the
  right information, at the right time, easily
  accessible (e.g., with the right form). (Poe,
  1996)

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More Information ?

• More information is not profitable unless it is
  relevant information.
• Executives will need better information in the
  future if their companies are to be competitive.

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Information

• BAD information is WORSE than ...

NO information.
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Good and Bad News?

• The good news is that the future success of
  companies is through the astute use of
  appropriate information, then the future of
  IS/MIS will be the design of DSS (Decision
  support systems) that facilitate intelligent uses
  of appropriate information.

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• The bad news is that where DSS are available,
  they may not be providing enough support to the
  decision makers.
• ...
• Quality of the information

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Attributes of Information Quality

• We realize that a firm needs better information
  to survive and prosper. Therefore, high quality
  information products have to be provided to
  management.

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Attributes of Information Quality
Timeliness Currency Frequency Time Period
Time Dimension
Accuracy Relevance Completeness Conciseness Scope
performance
Clarity Detail Order Presentation Media
Form Dimension
Content Dimension
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The attributes of information quality are

• The Time Dimension
• The Content Dimension
• The Form Dimension

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The attributes of information quality are

• The Time Dimension
• The Content Dimension
• The Form Dimension

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Information and Decision Making

• Information can be defined as
• that which resolves uncertainty, and
• decision making as
• progressive resolution of uncertainty.

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• Since powerful behavior by any mechanism (or
  organism) depends on sequential decision making,
  it is clear that information is required not just
  to exist, but to survive, and even to prosper.

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INFORMATION SYSTEMS (MIS/IS)
ORGANIZATIONS
TECHNOLOGY
MANAGEMENT
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Dr. Chen, The Challenge of the Information
Systems Technology
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What is Information Systems?

• Information Systems (IS) are more than computer
  hardware and software.
• It is not just developing business applications
  programs
• Information Systems include
• Information Technology
• Management
• Organization
• Ultimately, IS are used as strategic tool to
  improve an organizations competitive advantage.

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How you can apply MIS ...

• To improve the information content of the data,
• to present the valuable information in a
  user-friendly, intuitive, and easy to understand
  way, and
• to empower knowledge workers of today and
  tomorrow.

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Objectives of the MIS

• Deliver the right information
• to the right people,
• at the right time,
• with the right form.
• Ultimately, MIS should improve the workers
  productivity.

• who has what information about whom and when,
  where, and how will all be decided in the process
  of building an information system.

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Roles of Information Systems
Automates
Innovates/ Transforms
Informates
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Operational Data vs. Informational Data

• Operational data focus on transaction functions
  such as bank card withdrawals and deposits
• operational system run a business in real time
  based on current data.
• Informational data is organized around subjects
  such as customer, vendor, and product. It focus
  on providing answers to problems posed by
  decision makers
• information systems support decision making based
  on point-in-time or historical data.

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Table 14-1 Comparison of Operational and
Informational Systems
Characteristic Operational Systems
Informational Systems Primary purpose Run the
business on a Support managerial
current bases
decision making Type of data Current
representation Historical or point-in-
of state of the business
time (snapshots) Primary users Clerks,
salespersons, Managers, business
administrators
analysts, customers Scope of usage
Narrow vs. simple Broad vs. complex
queries updates and
queries and analysis Design goal
Performance Ease of access
and use Examples SOP, reservation
sys. Sales trend analysis
patient registration
(IRS/DSS/ESS)
(EDP/TPS, IRS)
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Why the Information Gap?

• Information is not integrated.
• Most information systems are developed to support
  operation processing (transaction) not for
  information processing.
• Operation processing captures, stores, and
  manipulates data to support daily operations of
  the organization.
• Information processing is the analysis of
  summarized data or other forms of information to
  support decision making.

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A Solution to the Information Gap

• A solution to bridging the information gap is the
  data warehouses which consolidate and integrate
  information from many different sources and
  arrange it in a meaningful format for making
  accurate business decisions (Martin, 1997)

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Definitions

• Data Warehouse An integrated and consistent
  store of subject-oriented data that is obtained
  from a variety of sources and formatted into a
  meaningful context to support decision-making in
  an organization.
• Bill Inmon, the acknowledged father of the Data
  Warehouse, defines it as an integrated,
  subject-oriented, time-variant, non-volatile
  database that provides support for decision
  making.

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CONCLUSION

• There is no reason to expect an end to an
  information age.
• On the contrary, it is only reasonable to expect
  the rate of producing and consuming the
  information to grow.

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CONCLUSION

• Information System (IS) should be an
  organizational and management solution, based on
  information technology (IT), to a challenge posed
  by the environment.

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