Selling the Plan

Because most of the expenses in an MIS budget are not as apparent as other departmental budgets, senior managers often cut the MIS budget when they need to control financial costs - without realizing the impact on end-user departments. To avoid these arbitrary cuts, MIS managers face the difficult task of justifying their budget increases. This column describes how MIS managers can save their budgets from unnecessary cuts by promoting MIS expenses as capital investments and by planning for future costs.     

The New ATTIS and NTI Approach to Integrating Voice and Data

Abstract

Because most of the expenses in an MIS budget are not as apparent as other departmental budgets, senior managers often cut the MIS budget when they need to control financial costs – without realizing the impact on end-user departments. To avoid these arbitrary cuts, MIS managers face the difficult task of justifying their budget increases. This column describes how MIS managers can save their budgets from unnecessary cuts by promoting MIS expenses as capital investments and by planning for future costs.     

System development effectiveness: An agency theory perspective

Agency theory can be used to explain the effectiveness of system development methods. As the cost of computing decreases and end user computing technology becomes feasible, end-user departments are developing their own application systems. Agency theory suggests that end-users will desire greater autonomy over their computing in order to avoid the agency costs that arise in traditional MIS development. This study provides empirical support for the proposition that user development allows end-user departments to minimize the agency costs resulting from the work of the MIS department. Data were collected from 162 users of 59 different applications in 30 organizations. The results indicate that user development is more effective than MIS development. Among user-developed application systems, departmental applications are more effective than corporate applications.     

Budgets, Blood, and Turnips

Although the need for new systems (instead of constant maintenance of older systems) is often quite apparent to the MIS department, their advantages are not so readily realized by senior management -which sees only costs and risks instead of benefits. As a result, MIS managers must prove the costs and benefits of such projects. This column examines the difficulty of measuring the costs and benefits of four generations of systems -batch, online, DBMS based, and maintenance motivated - and explains why MIS managers should not only rewrite old systems but turn their attention toward the development of new and innovative systems.     

基于SOA架构的校园OA系统的设计与实现

针对目前国内许多高校各部门的应用系统相对独立,并且部门之间的数据交换往往需要人工处理的特点,设计了一个基于SOA架构的校园OA系统,该系统采用WebService接口对高校各部门应用系统进行无缝连接,实现各部门日常办公的相互协作、公文自动流转、信息关联查询以及统一管理的功能。在实际应用中,取得了较好的效果,对国内各高校的数字化校园建设具有一定的借鉴意义。     

Client Satisfaction: The Yardstick for Measuring MIS Success

An MIS department is essentially a service organization whose central mission is to meet the needs of its customers, or clients. Effective communication is essential to the fulfillment of this mission. This article describes mechanisms and procedures that MIS departments can use to discover clients' needs, inform clients about MIS services, and notify clients of actions taken to resolve reported problems, thereby increasing client satisfaction.     

Client Satisfaction: The Yardstick for Measuring MIS Success

An MIS department is essentially a service organization whose central mission is to meet the needs of its customers, or clients. Effective communication is essential to the fulfillment of this mission. This article describes mechanisms and procedures that MIS departments can use to discover clients' needs, inform clients about MIS services, and notify clients of actions taken to resolve reported problems, thereby increasing client satisfaction.     

Beyond Transactional Systems

Although most organizations realize the need to shift the emphasis in systems development from transactional systems to tactical and strategic systems, they are often reluctant or unable to do so. This column examines the reasons for this and discusses how MIS managers can motivate both users and senior managers to develop these systems.     

Beyond Transactional Systems

Although most organizations realize the need to shift the emphasis in systems development from transactional systems to tactical and strategic systems, they are often reluctant or unable to do so. This column examines the reasons for this and discusses how MIS managers can motivate both users and senior managers to develop these systems.     

The Importance of Userware

Although most MIS managers don't realize it, the way users react to a system often determines whether the implementation of that system is successful. Thus, MIS managers should devote more of their attention to the personal side (i.e., the users) rather than the technical side (i.e., hardware and software concerns) of systems development. This column examines the importance of userware - the user's reaction to a system -and how MIS managers can make it part of their management strategy.     

Decision-making in management information systems research: the utility of policy capturing methodology

Although decision-making represents a fundamental issue in management information systems (MIS), obtaining accurate assessments of the factors affecting employees' decisions may be difficult using traditional methods such as ratings and rankings. Policy capturing, a little-used method in MIS, represents a potentially important alternative to more traditional methods. After demonstrating that policy capturing has been underutilized in MIS, the paper illustrates the use of policy capturing in two decision-making contexts—computer training and software selection. These two studies contrast policy capturing results with more traditional methods, and draw implications for research.     

The Importance of Userware

Although most MIS managers don't realize it, the way users react to a system often determines whether the implementation of that system is successful. Thus, MIS managers should devote more of their attention to the personal side (i.e., the users) rather than the technical side (i.e., hardware and software concerns) of systems development. This column examines the importance of userware – the user's reaction to a system –and how MIS managers can make it part of their management strategy.     

Bridging the Gap: Connecting Systems Objectives to Business Strategy with BSP

Planning the use of computer technology is difficult for MIS managers who are unsure of how best to support business goals. And senior executives who feel that they must become experts in a technology to manage it are often reluctant to give these managers direction. A systems planning methodology such as IBM's Business Systems Planning (BSP) can bring the two together. It offers senior executives the opportunity to learn just enough to make good decisions regarding the use of expensive technology and helps the MIS manager ensure that the information systems developed further corporate objectives.     

Variance tracking MIS in interdependent manufacturing contexts: An initial examination

There are many conflicting signals concerning the effectiveness of variance-tracking management information systems (MIS) in manufacturing contexts. Though there are anecdotal references to dissatisfaction with the systems and conceptual arguments concerning inaccuracy, no empirical evaluation of the effects of such system deficiencies could be found. This, combined with the widespread use of such MISs makes it of interest to further investigate them in manufacturing context. This paper provides an exploratory empirical examination of variance tracking MIS deficiencies. Via a simulation experiment, we find that, in an interdependent manufacturing context, variance-tracking MISs may severely misrepresent whether production departments are in or out of control. We thus agree with those who suggest that variance-tracking MISs may not be appropriate in interdependent manufacturing contexts. Contributions include an empirical demonstration of the kind and extent of MIS deficiencies that can occur in these contexts. However, the exploratory nature of this study imposes significant problems of external validity.     

Bridging the Gap: Connecting Systems Objectives to Business Strategy with BSP

Planning the use of computer technology is difficult for MIS managers who are unsure of how best to support business goals. And senior executives who feel that they must become experts in a technology to manage it are often reluctant to give these managers direction. A systems planning methodology such as IBM's Business Systems Planning (BSP) can bring the two together. It offers senior executives the opportunity to learn just enough to make good decisions regarding the use of expensive technology and helps the MIS manager ensure that the information systems developed further corporate objectives.     

When It' s Time for a Change

Because no organization can afford to stand still in its efforts to develop information systems, MIS managers must be aware of the changing requirements of users and senior management. Although these changes shouldn' t always interrupt the current work of MIS, sometimes exceptions must be made to keep the organization' s competitive edge. This column offers MIS managers some advice on how to accommodate the constantly changing needs of users.     

Helping Users Help Themselves

By allowing end users in individual departments to prepare their own plans “and budgets” for their own information systems, MIS managers can provide a unique opportunity for users to establish more effective and accurate strategic plans. This column describes the responsibilities of both the MIS department and users to make this new cooperative arrangement successful.     

Decision-making in management information systems research: the utility of policy capturing methodology

Abstract

Although decision-making represents a fundamental issue in management information systems (MIS), obtaining accurate assessments of the factors affecting employees' decisions may be difficult using traditional methods such as ratings and rankings. Policy capturing, a little-used method in MIS, represents a potentially important alternative to more traditional methods. After demonstrating that policy capturing has been underutilized in MIS, the paper illustrates the use of policy capturing in two decision-making contexts—computer training and software selection. These two studies contrast policy capturing results with more traditional methods, and draw implications for research.     

New Challenges in Motivating MIS Personnel

Because of changes in the work environment, motivating MIS personnel has become more challenging to both MIS managers and CIOs. Although studies show that most of these employees (with the exception of maintenance personnel) enjoy their work, MIS managers still need to improve elements of their staffs' jobs (e.g., salary and opportunity for advancement) to maintain the quality of their staffs' work. To show how the task of motivating MIS personnel has changed, the author presents some results from his research on motivation factors of MIS professionals.     

Evaluating Methods of Systems Development: A Management Survey

Senior managers should ensure that the processes used to develop computer-based Information systems in their organizations are efficient and effective. To do this, senior managers must plan and control the use of IS resources. Based on recent research, this article identifies the areas that suggest the lack of relevant management practices, including lack of senior management support, lack of standard systems development methods, and lack of concern for software maintenance. These potential problems are presented for both MIS and senior managers to consider if these problems exist in their organizations, to evaluate whether such findings are significant, and to take the appropriate measures to correct these problems.