AACS 4794 Management Information Systems

Tutorial 2 – suggested answers

Question 1

Yes, I agree. This is because internet can allow people from all over the world to communicate with each

other, no matter at what time, by using email, instant messaging and video conferencing. Hence, problems and issues can be solved easily.

Besides that, it also allows people to collect data and look up information directly, instead of searching through books. It saves a lot of times.

With the use of internet, we can perform our transactions online such as ordering products, transfer of funds and pay bills. It enhances the efficiency of work and provides convenience to us.

Furthermore, a virtual organization can also be created to link people, assets and ideas without being limited to traditional organization boundaries. Therefore, work is no longer attached to its geographical area.

OR

I will disagree because

- Private and confidential information of a company and/or users will be stolen of misuse by hackers.

- Human errors when entering any data and information may still occur.- Of the increase of cyber crime, cyber theft and terrorism.- The risk of system crashing down or data lost due to low security or quality of software and

hardware.

Question 3

Information Center (also called Help Desk), is a special facility housing hardware, software so that they can create information system applications on their own or increase productivity.

It does not need to set up the information center. As if it's set up at main branch that's centralization, it may cause misunderstanding between the staff and IT specialist. For example when there's computer break down in office in Penang branch, misunderstanding for instruction through phone call between the Penang branch staff and the IT specialist may occur because the Penang branch staff may not familiar with IT knowledge.

Next, it's time consuming for the information center set up at main branch.

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AACS 4794 Management Information Systems

For example, information center need to arrange the time and the suitable IT specialist to the branch to solve any technical problem face by them.

For example, when printers or PC break down, that respective branch will have their own IT team can help manage any IT/IS problems.

Question 4

NO!

Centralized IS management more suitable.

Able to achieve objective of good governance - Centralized IS management allows the government tax collection agency to delimit staff

positions and departments in a strict vertical hierarchy and places tight control of organization in a few hands.

- Tight control is placed in order to achieve the objective of good governance. - E.g. Decision can only made by the head office instead of head of the branches.

Economic of scale By implementing centralized IS management in government tax collection agency, government

is able to save up time and cost. Time for record searching can be shorten as centralized IS management allow multi-department

to share applications and data from central servers. Cost can be reduced by establish consistent corporate software and hardware standard. E.g. Tax agency using the same software for tax calculation.

Common reporting system Each tax collection agency in different states using the same reporting method. This could improve the clarity of the report since all the format are same. It is easier for report merging since the managers do not have to re-map the information. E.g. Top management is able to analyze the report easily.

Question 6

As a IS manager, he/she must have a broad understanding of the business processes because it could help to place themselves in the user’s position and develop a system from the point of view of the users.

Even thought the information system managers are expert in Information technology but they also need to understand the business processes because:To ensure the systems used or designed are suitable for the company.

» Different types of business will need or use different types of business process and system to operate.

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AACS 4794 Management Information Systems

» A suitable system will assist the company workers to reduce their workload and make the job become more simple.

» For example, IS manager create a system that follow the different department’s requirement, will result in producing a useful and related report to each department.

Assist company to achieve higher profitability.» Since the Information system manager know about the business processes he will more able to

assist production management to increase efficiency and productivity of operations when there is a change in business practice and management behavior.

» For example, the IS manager improve the system by according to the company’s requirements to increase the efficiency of operation to achieve higher profitability of the company.

Case Study 11. FOUR business benefits are :

Reduce cost - IS helps to reduce theft made by their own their employees as the system can keep track of all inventories. The system can also reduce manual or human errors, thus saving cost on redoing the work.

Saved Time - IS could simplify those complicated procedures like spending more time on paperworks, calculation and analysis. By using IS, it could provide more efficiency and effectively working procedures. This could help for time saving at work.

Security Inventory - IS helps to keep track of inventory from the transaction recorded through the POS to prevent stock from being stolen. For example, Mattress Giant recovered thousands of dollars in stolen merchandise and manual errors.

Accurate Information - Mattress Giant is one of America’s largest bedding retailer therefore the CEO’s decision is very important as it will bring huge affection to the market. IS produce more accurate information to assist CEO for decision making. It is because the revenue of Mattress Giant has been increased by 5.7% in 2002 because of the right decision made by CEO. IS could generate fact based on profile (eg. age, gender, household income) which easily enable salesperson to target their customer within a specific range. Indirectly, IS could also saved a lot of time and money spent on the advertisement.

Question 2(a)

The extracted statement above interprets that Steve Williams persuaded the CFO to understand and examine whether which information technology works properly with the business and make the right investment on the business software that comes along with information technology, but not simply invest on any information technology that is unrelated to the business just because it is popular or highly rated by other users. The CFO of the organization is the person who is in-charge of the costs allocation of resources, so it is crucial to convince the CFO first.

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AACS 4794 Management Information Systems

Once unsuitable information technology is used, it may lead to negative impacts to the company. However, if the company invests on information technology that is integrated with business elements, it will be easier for the staff to operate as staff usually have basic knowledge on the business. This may save the costs of training staff and reduce the risk of making wrong investment. Besides, the staff can carry out their jobs efficiency and effectively.

Question 2 (b)

Firstly, the information system can help the company to save the labour cost. Using the integrated POS and inventory system can substitute the company workforce.

For example, the system can substitute the human worker to make an analysis ,control the product in inventories, arrangement the product shipment and supervise the sales and purchase process. So the company can hire fewer workers and reduce the labour cost.

Second, the information system can help the company to save the internal management costs. Implement the intergraded POS and inventory system can help to reduce the cost of acquiring and analysing information, enables managers to oversee a greater number of the employees. For example, the company can use the information system to find branches that violated inventory security breaches. The company can recover thousands of dollars in stolen merchandise.

Thirdly, using the information system can help the company to reduce the manual error and avoid any unnecessary cost. By using the information system, it helps the staff to record, analysis and calculate better because the information system can give more accurate result and information decrease the human errors. Most of the time ,the manual error not only waste the time to redo and also waste some unnecessary cost.

Fourth, using the information system can help the manager to receive so much accurate information on time, and make them faster in make a good and correct decision. Information system can help them to have better control the inventory sale and purchases processes and avoid overcapitalization.

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