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Background info

The Role of Information System Managements (ISM)

Objective: Assess the uses of information systems in support of operational decision making in organizations.  Competency in focus: Technology fluency.

An information system is a combination of technology-based hardware and software, people with the professional skills to make the hardware and software work, and procedures to make the foregoing function in support of overall enterprise strategy

There is a discussion activity in which you will critically assess the mission, goals, and importance of ISM in the enterprise.  Keep in mind that information systems are found in all types of enterprise, whether public or private, for-profit or non-profit.

Your attention is particularly invited to the video lecture by Professor McFarlan on the strategic nature of information technology, whose overall point is that skillful use of information technology can give a firm or other organization a strategic competitive advantage.

Description: Information technology is not just back-office technology; it is a strategic weapon in today's business environment. IT makes companies survive, excel, and win.

Instruction:

Each student is to critically assess the:

1. Mission 2. Goals 3. Importance of information systems and their management (ISM) in the firm 4. Using their own work organization as an example. 

Consider benefits, as well as costs/risks of information systems and information management, particularly under  (increasing) public scrutiny and regulations aimed at protecting/ safeguarding/ maintaining many different kinds of information. 

Clarification

A. The single most important point made in these materials is that information systems, and their supporting information technology, plus the included telecommunications technology, are not drivers in well-managed organizations; rather, when properly used, they are supporters of the business mission and strategy.

That is true of UM, where the mission is to educate, with the major marketing strategy to be online.  It is also true of Amazon.com, where the mission is to make a profit selling a wide number of products, and the major marketing strategy  is  again, online.

B. The second most important point, stressed by Professor McFarlan and epitomized by Amazon.com, Apple and Google, is that properly-designed and -implemented information systems can convey a strategic competitive advantage to their enterprises.

Example: Here is  a start  on contributing to this week's discussions, with an example using UM as the firm. 

· The  mission of information systems management at University of Maryland Global Campus is to support the teaching and administrative processes of the university in an efficient and effective (recall operations management) way.

· The goals of UM ISM include:

· Being at the state of the art in course delivery at a distance. That's why we have used Zoom, D2L, Google- and pdf format and audio/video materials

· Providing 24x7 reliability in the Learning environment, in PeopleSoft and other essential information systems.  For example, 360 Support is on call via message and telephone at all hours.

· Conserving State and student (ie, tuition) resources in accomplishing the foregoing, which Maryland taxpayers and the state legislature expect.

· The importance of ISM at UM is extremely high, given:

· First, that the University has strategically decided to be the open university of Maryland and the United States, providing learning services to a growing student body mostly* at a distance, thus using information systems heavily. 

· Second, there are a plethora of state and federal regulations, plus community standards, that govern the management of information at UM and thus provide continuing, importance-raising challenges.**

*Currently, about 82% of UM students study exclusively online, and another 10% learn through a "hybrid" online/F2F program. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, UM has moved to 100% online for all students.

**One example is the accommodation requirements of the federal ADA - Americans with Disabilities - Act. These require that information be delivered at UM in ways that accommodate, for instance, visually- and hearing-impaired students. This means, for one example, that we must prepare - and pay for - transcripts of audio materials for hearing-impaired students (and some professors too).