Russell Ackoff’s article, Ackoff’s Management Misinformation Systems, relates five assumptions about information systems used to provide mass amounts of analyzed data to management to assist them in making adequate decisions (1967). Ackoff’s assumptions are that: “Management Needs More Information; Managers Need the Information They Want; Giving Managers The Information They Need Improves Their Decision Making; More Communication Means Better Performance;” and finally, “Managers Need Only to Understand How To Use an Information Systems” (1967). Although Ackoff wrote the article in 1967, he has pinpointed problems within organizations that still exist today, and organizations that do not evaluate their entire management information systems are likely not operating efficiently.
Ackoff’s first assumption that “Management Needs More Information” relates that the majority of management personnel receive information from management information systems that is not “relevant” to decisions that they are responsible for making (1967). I agree with this statement in some circumstances, but tend to disagree that this could be a blanket statement for all management information systems. Managers are responsible for identifying ideas that are beneficial and then they should delegate workers to gather data that is relevant to those ideas. If management is not receiving “relevant” data than they only have themselves to blame for not requesting data that is pertinent to their specific job duties or their business, or the information system they have in place is inadequate for their business, or the workers that input data or analyze the information are not doing their job correctly. In the first assumption Ackoff also contends that manager...
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...hers will heed Ackoff’s advice and evaluate the processes, policies, and tools they use to become efficient and succeed.
References
Ackoff, R. L. (1967). Management Misinformation Systems. Management Sciences. 14 (4).
Li, C., Peters, G. F., Richardson, V.J., & Weidenmier Watson, M. (2012). The Consequences of Information Technology Control Weaknesses on Management Information Systems: The Case of Sarbanes-Oxley Internal Control Reports. MIS Quarterly, 36(1), 179-204.
Nowduri, S., & Al-Dossary, S. (2012). Management Information Systems and Its Support to Sustainable Small and Medium Enterprises. International Journal Of Business & Management, 7(19), 125-131. EBSCO Host. January 23, 2014.
Ross, J. W., Beath, C. M., & Quaadgras, A. (2013). You May Not Need Big Data After All. Harvard Business Review, 91(12), 90-98. EBSCO Host. January 23, 2014.
A management information system (MIS) is an information collection and analysis system that facilitates access to program and participant information."(mays.tamu.edu, 2013) This system is usually computerized. Businesses use MIS at all levels of operation to collect, process and store data. Management uses this data in the form of information needed to carry out the daily operations of the business. Everyone who works in business, from someone who pays the bills to the person who makes employment decisions, uses MIS. In fact, many (if not most) companies concentrate on the alignment of MIS with business goals to achieve competitive advantage over other companies. "The major components of the MIS are the database, the model base, and the user interface. The database is used to store important data, the model base has the required statistical models in order to analyze the large amounts of data, and the user interface allows the user of the software to navigate through it and use it with ease."(mays.tamu.edu, 2013)
MidSouth Chamber of Commerce is an organization that rely heavily on their information systems. Lassiter, Hedges and Kovecki who has no information technology background were taken into computing operations. Introducing a new system is not an easy task until an organization has senior IT professionals and backup plans. In the end, it was the lack of proper management and lacked intimate knowledge of information systems made them depend on outside persons to make decisions that caused all these problems.
Weber, E. (1986). Systems to think with: A response to "A Vision for Decision Support Systems". Journal of Management Information Systems, 2(4), 85-97. Retrieved from Business Source Premier database.
Laudon, KC & Laudon, JP 2010, Management Information Systems: Managing the digital firm, 11th Global edn, Pearson Education, Inc, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey.
Davenport, Thomas H., Paul Barth, and Randy Bean. "How Big Data Is Different." MIT Sloan Management Review. N.p., 30 July 2012. Web. 18 Mar. 2014. .
Turning to the issues related to information handling, the definition of the information management should be mentioned. According to Hinton’s perspective (2006, p.57) the information management is “the conscious process of gathering information”. A brief overview of the presumable information sources in a high-technology company can help to outline the situation. T...
Haag, S. & Cummings, M. (2008). Management information systems for the information age (Laureate Education, Inc., custom ed.). Boston: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.
Management information systems can be used as a support to managers to provide a competitive advantage. The system must support the goals of the organization. Most organizations are structured along functional lines, and the typical systems are identified as follows:
Next, the management information systems are business functions like accounting and human resources, which moves information about people, products, and processes across the company which facilitates decision making and problem solving (Baltzan, p.14) Electronic communications such as Facebook and Twitter have provided many new tools to ...
Therefore, the benefits of good management information are huge for any organization. Information becomes part of the chain of added value. An information management value chain increases the usefulness of information to users permitting them to make better decisions. The value of the MIS in the organization corresponds to the better profits coming from the better decisions the system permits (Cisco and Strong, 1999). Below schematic shows the process and different elements of information value chain (Phillips,
Laudon, K. C., & Laudon, J. P. (2011). Essentials of Management Information Systems. Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Ackoff identifies five assumptions commonly made by designers of management information systems (MIS). With these assumptions, Ackoff argues that these assumptions are in most cases not justified cases, and often lead to major deficiencies in the resulting systems, i.e. "Management Misinformation Systems." To overcome these assumptions and the deficiencies which result from them, Ackoff recommends that management information system should be imbedded in a management control system.
Asemi observe that Management Information System (MIS) is one of the information systems that is computer based. Besides, Asemi defines MIS as “an organizational method of providing past, present and project information related to internal operations and external intelligences. It supports the planning, control and operation functions of an organization by furnishing uniform information in the proper time frame to assist the decision makers,” (2011). The aim of MIS is to satisfy the general information need of the entire manager in an organization. Before the advent of computers, the process of decision-making was one that was full of built-in advantages and ad hoc methods. Computers technologies have changed the landscape of the decision-making process completely by making the process less demanding and easy to undertake. The reason for this situation is that information technology has made access to information more automated, efficient, effective, timely, and less ambiguous. Consequently, the ordinary t...
The more information we keep, the more management is required to keep all the information organised. Information needs to be organised so that people can obtain value from it. As with Management, exploitation is also a cost of storing all available information.
Laudon C. & J. Laudon (2003: 5th edition) Essentials of Management Information Systems. London: Prentice Hall International Limited