Management Information System Stoney Crags example essay topic

QUESTION 2 Critical Evaluation of Requirements with respect to Operational, Tactical and Strategic Decision Support Systems Information and Management The organisational structure at Stoney Crags can be categorised into three areas of management, each area will produce requirements from a particular body interacting with the company and will have certain implications. Three examples of decision supports systems are listed below: 1) Strategic Information Top Management 2) Tactical Management Middle Management 3) Operational Management Lower Management Strategic Information (Top Management) This sector of the company will take care of the following requirements and will summarise their findings for the rest of the decision support system. The company will be in pursuit of an automated system that is fully functional and safe providing solutions to the various possibilities. An operational program or system will have the following: 1.

Data on soil in various regions 2. Soil type 3. Acidity and Alkalinity levels By looking at the data provided from my knowledge and judgement it will improve customer service and plant selection. There has to be a method of providing data on, examples are shown below: . Correct directional positioning of garden.

Sheltered / open. Is the garden benefited by sun or shade mostly? How does this affect the garden and the plants? Climate considerations.

Meteorological updates There is a problem to note, the above can only be possible if correct plant selection has taken place. The company has expressed desire for more centres with an ardent desire for the identification of trends in gardening themes and plant requirements to plan strategies that provide optimum growth. Task The main task is to complete a specification of the business needs and therefore be able to create and design an interface in the software listed below: . Visual Basic. Java. Microsoft Excel.

C++. SQL The priorities of the interface is to provide the following information: 1. Search for location 2. Soil type 3.

Suppliers 4. Seasonal availability 5. Accessibility The above requirements will be analysed by Strategic management and the conclusions will be documented as the following: Competitive priorities (marketing) Customer actions (forecasts) Resources availability Government actions (finance). Tactical Management (Middle Management) The following requirements for the organisation will be organised from middle management and they are as follows: Speciality The areas it specialises in: 1. Landscape Garden Design 2.

Creating the gardens dimensions including size and shape, tailored to customer needs. Innovative The state of the art CD ROM provides the necessary capability: 1. The design of the garden 2. It can have a virtual garden aided by customer comments through the design of the system. Problems The difficulties arise when the garden is assessed as the main problem to note is the customers' lack of knowledge in the area of horticulture or gardening. The problems that need to be tackled are listed below: .

If there any matching plants. The availability of plants. Cost of particular plants. Locating correct position for plants. The quality of the soil Aspect of a garden that includes correctly selected plants must undergo the following criteria: 1. Cost examination 2.

Customer affordability 3. Personal stock issue, and supplier status As an analyst the key features of the organisation include the cohesion of various Garden Centres and there close contact that paves the way for the exchange of products. Orders that are made with delivery dates included. If the customer is landscaping their garden then they can request deliveries to be staggered in order for progress to continue at a consistent pace.

If a contractor is hired then it is important that all the necessary plants are at hand along with all the possible organisational supports. As being the consultant I will also be leasing with tactical management in discussing the implementation of an information system. Tactical management will organise the requirements into the following areas: . Planning = This involves internal forecasts.

Control = This involves performance analysis. DBMS using SQL, QBF and RG. Comparison between actual and predicted. Operational Management (Low Management) Manufacturers and Suppliers These users will be concerned mainly with providing customer quality service in exchange for prompt payment of goods. The manufacturers will look for the following information: Correctly selected plants by the customer after consultation with Stoney Crags must undergo the following criteria: 1. Cost examination 2.

Personal stock issue, and supplier status 4. Can plants be delivered to keep pace with progress The suppliers will have to analyse the costs of products requested, look into the affordability issues of customers, "can they afford what they want?" The supplier needs to have documentation that will provide customer's with stock updates and their own status. Garden Centres The organisation Stoney Crags will have close liaison with other similar centres and will need to provide the following information to them: 1. Agreed Price 2. Delivery dates on products requested by customer 3. Contact with their manufacturers and suppliers The information can then be taken by the other Garden Centres and passed to relevant suppliers and manufacturers.

The informational requirements will be documented as the following: . Day to day running. Short term planning. Orders, invoices, etc. Data and Information Data represents an event, a fact such as customer address, a sales invoice number, a job card number, a price and a student age. Information results from the processing of data, analysed data gives information.

System "A system may be defined as a set of connected parts united by some form of regular interaction or interdependencies". Information Systems Information systems exist in all organizations and range in complexity... Technical. Managerial. Formal or informal.

Mechanized. Manual. Computerised. As the consultant interacting with the organisation I have closely looked at the requirements of the different people involved with the organization. After this analysis it is clear that some requirements belong to different levels such as strategic, operational and tactical these have been listed above.

Management Information System Stoney Crags will incorporate a management information system and it is dependant on the following areas: An MIS is dependent on the following factors: . External Environment. Organization structure. Management style. Planning and control. Individual managers needs.

General user needs. Information Conditions. Accuracy. Used in control (feedback). Up-to-date Resources. Men.

Money. Machines. Materials. In Industrial Organisations, the managers do the following tasks: . Specify information.

Identify the information needed. Understand and analyse the information. Take decisions. Types of Information The following are example of information that can be pursued: . Internal information. External information.

Historic information. Internal information is detailed for low management. It can be summarised for higher management. External information is summarised for low management but detailed for high management. Historic information. What?

Where? Who? When? How much? Information characteristics. Structured information can be classified as: i) Math's ii) statistics ) simulation queuing iv) PERT.

Internal or External. Flexibility and interactivity. Logical structure consists of: i) AND ii) OR. Interface with other databases that are query capable: i) QBF ii) SQL ) RG. Flexible methods of presentation.

Adaptive (Change with time). Golden rule Always ask the following questions: . Who needs what information. What are the purpose of the information. When and in what format is the information needed? Information design stages.

Define what activities must be on-going for the system to function properly. Define the minimum information needed to support the identified activities. Define who (in terms of role) is responsible for what set of activities, e.g. job specification... Define the minimum "information flow pattern"; who is responsible for supplying what information to whom... Define the set of information processing procedures (automated or other).