In a wired world, the success of any business is linked to its ability to effectively
integrate technology into its operations.
Most companies recognize and recruit top-notch businesspeople and technology professionals, but at times, these individuals
often don’t speak the same language and
no one knows how to act as a translator.
Management information systems (MIS)
professionals fill this gap in a business.
“From a business organizational viewpoint, MIS is a functional area whose mission is to gather, store and disseminate the
information necessary to successfully
operate the organization,” says Dr. Bradley
C. Watson, professor and chair of the MIS
program at Franklin University. “From an
academician’s view, MIS is the study and
teaching of all the interrelated areas of
knowledge, skills and technologies in
which MIS professionals must be literate
and functional.
“CS (computer science) education focuses on how to best design and develop computers and computer programs. IT (information technology) focuses on how to best
organize, manage and perform the operational aspects of keeping the hardware and
software of an organization successfully
supporting the mission of an MIS department. In contrast, MIS education encompasses, at a high level, both of these technical areas, while melding them with business education.”
Smart Business spoke with Watson
about the importance of trained MIS professionals to the success of businesses.
What key roles do MIS professionals fill within a company?
MIS professionals are found in corporate leadership, management and staff
positions. The two most common leadership roles are known as chief information
officer and chief knowledge officer. As
managers, they manage staff and resources within an MIS Department. As
staff members, MIS professionals fill such
roles as business analysts, systems architects, systems analysts, quality assurance
analysts and business applications programmers.
Why is it important for individuals to receive
an MIS education?
Without timely, accurate, useful, relevant,
comprehensive and sufficiently abundant
information flowing into all areas of an
organization, that organization will fail.
Businesses absolutely need people who
can competently organize, manage and
operate within the MIS functional arena.
Trained MIS professionals are those people.
An MIS education is vital because it equips
these individuals to be competent in all of
the necessary skills and knowledge arenas.
How do MIS professionals add value to an
organization?
First, it’s the MIS professionals who
orchestrate the flow of information to all
the appropriate places and people within
an organization in — as I said earlier — a
timely, accurate, useful, relevant, comprehensive and sufficiently abundant manner.
Without all of these attributes associated
with the flow of information, businesses
can’t operate successfully.
Second, MIS professionals guide the rest
of the organization in terms of what information technologies should be used, where
they should be used and how they should be used to successfully carry out the missions of the various corporate departments
and the organization as a whole.
How do MIS professionals decrease IT
expenses?
Not to oversimplify, but they apply the
same set of skills, tools and approaches
that any competent manager in an organization should apply, while also applying
their specialized understanding and knowledge of technology and the people who
work with technology. They make sure that
the physical resources acquired and used
are not only sufficient to accomplish the
mission, but also are acquired, installed,
managed and operated at as low a cost as
possible without undermining the mission
of the MIS department. They also make
sure that departmental human resources
are employed as efficiently and effectively
as possible.
Why is it crucial for MIS professionals to continually increase their business and technical
knowledge?
Successful MIS professionals hold within
themselves and apply in the corporate
world a fully even-handed blend of business and technical expertise and acumen.
This means that an MIS education must
include an even-handed blend of business
and technical competencies.
But even after graduation from a comprehensive, balanced MIS program, an MIS
education is not complete. Successful MIS
professionals are in a continual state of
learning, because falling behind in either
their business skill and knowledge set or
their technical expertise will mean failure
for them and, quite possibly, their organization. Successful MIS professionals and
organizations will always forge ahead,
applying the latest technologies and business knowledge to make themselves as
competitive as possible in the global marketplace.
DR. BRADLEY C. WATSON is a professor and chair of
the MIS program at Franklin University. Reach him at
[email protected].