M A N A G E M E N T I N F O R M AT I O N

SYSTEM

H U M A S A R WA R

D E V E LO P M E N T O F M I S
 DEVELOPMENT OF LONG RANGE PLANS OF
THE MIS

Introduction :
 Any kind of business activity calls for long range plans for
success, the same being true for MIS. The plan for
development and its implementation is a basic necessity for
MIS.
 In MIS the information is recognized as a major resource like
capital, time and capacity. And if this resource is to be
managed well, it calls upon the management to plan for it
and control it for the appropriate use in the organization.
 Most of the organization does not recognize ‘Information’ as
a resource.
 Many organizations have spent financial resources on
computers purely to expedite the activity of data collection
and processing.
 Many organizations have purchased computers data
processing and for meeting the statutory requirement of
filing the return and reports to the Government.
 Computers are used mainly for computing and accounting the
business transactions and have not been considered as a tool
for information processing.
 The organizations have invested in computers and expanded
its use by adding more or bigger computers to take care of
the numerous transactions in the business.
 In this approach, the information processing function of the
computers in the organization never got its due regard as an
important asset to the organization.
 However, the scene has been changing since late eighties
when the computers became more versatile, in the function
of Storage, Communications, Intelligence and Language.
 In short, we need a Management Information System flexible
enough to deal with the changing information needs of the
organization
 The designing of such an open system is a complex task. It
can be achieved only if the MIS is planned, keeping in view,
the plan of the business management of the organization.
 The system of information generation is so planned that
strategic information is provided for the strategic planning,
control information is provided for a short term planning and
execution.
 The details of information are provided to the operations
management to assess the status of an activity and to find
ways to make up, if necessary.
 Once the management needs are translated into information
needs, it is left for the designer to evolve a plan of
development and implementation.
 Contents of the MIS Plan

 A long range MIS plan provides direction for the development

of the systems, and provides a basis for achieving the specific
targets or tasks against a time frame.
 The plan would have the following contents which will be
dealt by the designer under a support from the top
management.
MIS Plan is linked to the Business Plan.
MIS goals and objectives:
 It is necessary to develop the goals and objectives for the
MIS which will support the business goals.
 The MIS goals and objectives will consider management
philosophy, policy constraints, business risks, internal and
external environment of the organization and the business.
The goals and the objectives of the MIS would be so stated the
they can be measured. The typical statements of the goals are
as under:
 Provide online information on the stocks, markets and the
accounts balances.
 The query processing should not exceed more than three
seconds.
 The focus of the system will be on the end user computing
and access facilities.
 Information support will be the first in the strategic areas of
management such as marketing or service or technology.
 Business Plan Versus MIS Plan

• Such statements of the goals and objectives enable the designer to

set the direction and design implementation strategies for the MIS
plan.
Strategy for the plan achievement.

The designer has to take a number of strategic decisions for the

achievement of the MIS goals and objectives.
They are:
(a)Development strategy: An online, a batch, a real time.
(b)System development strategy: Any approach to the system
development.
Operational versus Functional; Accounting versus Analysis;
Database versus
Conventional approach; Distributed versus Decentralized
processing; one
Database versus Multiple databases SSAD vs OOT.
(c) Resource for system development: In-house versus external,
customized. Development versus the use of packages.
(d) Manpower composition: Analyst, programmer skills and know-
how.
 The architecture of the MIS:

 The architecture of the MIS plan provides a system

structure and their input, output and linkages.
 It also provides a way to handle the systems or
subsystems by way of simplification, coupling and
decoupling of subsystems by way of simplification,
coupling and decoupling of subsystems.
 It spells out in detail the subsystems from the data
entry to processing, analysis to modeling, and
storage to printing.
The system development schedule :
 A schedule is made for the development of the system. While
preparing the schedule due consideration is given to the
importance of the system in the overall information
requirement.
 Due regard is also given to logical system development. For
example, it is necessary to develop the accounting system
first and then the analysis.
 Further, unless the systems are fully developed their
integration is not possible.
 This development schedule is to be weighed against the
time scale for achieving a certain information requirement
linked to a business plan.
 If these are not fully met, it is necessary to revise the time
schedule and also the development schedule, whenever
necessary.
 Hardware and software plan

The selection of the architecture, the approach to the

information system development and the choice of hardware
and software are the strategic decision in the design and
development of the MIS in the organization.
 The organizations which do not care to take proper decisions
in these areas suffer from over-investment, under-utilization
and are not able to meet the critical information requirement.
 It is important to note the following points:
 1. The organizations strategic plan should be the basis for
the MIS strategic plan
 2. The information system development schedule should
match with the implementation schedule of the business plan.
 3. The choice of information technology is a strategic
business decision and not a financial decision.
 A Model of the MIS Plan

Contents Particulars Focus

Corporate information Business environment and current

operation. Where are we ?

Policy, guidelines, culture. What is the foundation of business ?

Corporate philosophy
Where do we want to reach ?
Current and new
Corporate mission/goals/objectives mission/goals/objectives. What is the risk ? is it worth the
risk ?
Business risk and rewards Clear quantitative statements on How do we achieve the goals and
Business policy and strategy these factors showing a trade off objectives ?
between the risk and rewards
Details of the strategic and policy What is the key in formation ?
decisions affecting the business.
Information needs What are the tools for achievement ?
Strategic/planning, operational.
Architecture of the plan When and how will it be achieved ?
Information Technology details.

Who will achieve it ?

Schedule of development Details of the systems and
subsystems and their linkages
charted against the time scales. How much will it cost ?

Organization of the plan Manpower and delegation details.

Internal and external resources.

Budge Details on the investment schedule

and benefits.
ASCERTAINING THE CLASS OF INFORMATION

 Ascertaining the information needs of the management

for the business execution is a complex task.
 The complexity can be handled if the information is
classified on the basis of its application and the user,
which becomes the basis for the ascertainment.
 The design of the MIS should consider the class of
information as a whole and provide suitable information
system architecture to generate the information for
various users in the organization.
 Let us now proceed to ascertain to the information
needs of each class.
Organizational Information:
 One can define the organizational information as a
whole and provide suitable information system
architecture to generate the information for
various users in the organization.
 Such information can be determined by
constructing a matrix of information versus.
 It can be observed from the table that the
information entity is one, but its usages are
different.
 For example, the employee attendance
information would be used by the personnel.
 Classes of information
Information Class Examples of information User

Organizational The number of employees, Many users at all the levels.

products, services. Locations, the
Functional type of business, turnover and
variety of the details of each one
Knowledge of these entities. Functional heads.

Decision support Purchases, sales, production,

stocks receivables, payables, Middle and the Top Management.
Operational outstanding, budgets, statutory
information.
Middle management and
The trends in sales, production operations management.
technology. The deviations from Operational and management
the budgets, targets, norms etc. Supervisor, Section Officers.
competitors information, industry
and target; and its analysis.

Status information on a particular

aspect, such as utilization,
profitability standard.
requirement versus availability.
Information for problem solving
and modeling. Quantitative
information on the business
status. Non-moving inventory,
overdue payments and
receivables.

Information on the production,

sales, purchase, dispatches
 Functional Information

 The functional information is defined as a set of

information required by the functional head in
conducting the administration and management of the
function.
 This information is purely local to that function and by
definition, does not have a use elsewhere.
 This information is used by a manager to plan and
control his function.
 Functional information is largely factual, statistical and
detailed in multi-dimensions of the function.
 For example, if you take the sales information, it can
be processed in seven ways, viz. the product, the
product groups, the market segment, the geographic
zones, the locations, the customer, and the sales
organization structure.
 The functional information is normally generated at equal
time intervals; say monthly, quarterly, etc.
 for understanding the trend and making comparisons against
the time scale.
 Such information is used for planning, budgeting and
controlling the operations of the function.
 Functional information is also used for assessing particular
aspects of the business.
 For example, the stocks of finished goods, receivables, and
orders on hand throw a light on marketing function of the
organization. The raw material stocks, WIP, orders pending
and payable throw light on the purchase function.
 These information sets have a functional utility and required
in detail revolving around several dimensions.
 The functional information can be assessed on the following
three parameters-the work design, the responsibility and
functional objectives.
Work design:
 For example, for the customer order scrutiny the
available stock, the price, the terms of payment and
the probable delivery is an information set evolved
out of the work design of customer order processing.
 The procedure of the order processing requires this
information.
Responsibility:
 The managers in the functional areas of management
are responsible for achieving the targets and
accomplishing the goals and objectives. It is,
therefore, necessary to inform and update the
information on targets at regular intervals to enable
him to make or change decisions in his domain of
operations.
 Most of these targets are business targets such as
the turnover, production, utilization, stocks and so