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MIS professionals analyze and implement information technology and apply it to their business goals. They communicate with managers and consumers in order for them to better understand their information technology needs as well. MIS professionals acquire unique business-oriented problem solving techniques and work across business functions, having a complete understanding of the organization they are working for. It is important for them to obtain good communication and technical skills when communicating with consumers and administrators. MIS professionals are needed in numerous industries, since MIS is a universal need among businesses. MIS professionals need to perform numerous tasks, some of which may include; networking, business analysis, development, consulting, and security.

 

Management Information Systems, MIS, is the study of relationships among people, organizations, and technology. Those who professionalize in MIS help firms understand maximum benefit from investments, particularly in business processes through the usage of technology. Businesses utilize MIS in order to process, collect, and store data. Anyone who works in business uses information systems. For example, Amazon uses a computer based information system in order to sell its products to its consumers. MIS primarily focuses on data analysis, customer service, and project management. 

 

 

Swim lane diagrams are problem solving tools used in business to visually map out a problem or a sequence of events needing to happen to create a successful outcome of some sort. They can create logical and chronological patterns to a solution. It includes people involved, processes order, activities in the process, decisions and the flow of those decisions.

There are symbols involved in the diagram to specify these exact objectives and activities. A circle represents the beginning and end of the process/ event in process. A rectangle is for an activity in a process while a diamond is for a decision that must be made. An arrow shows where the flow from one thing to another is. And the last shape, a cylinder, is representing stored data.

Another very important symbol is the actors of the event at hand. These can be any people apart of the business, including management, accounting team, CEO’s, COO’s, or customers. Basically the actors are anyone involved in part of the decision to make or event occurring in this process. 

The benefit of swim lanes are to visually show what logically makes sense and the order of events to create solutions and processes. It helps businesses be able to see what they need to do in order to get the results they want. In the example we did in class we were able to visually map out how the actors of the business were going to find their new employee. There was a direct flow of communication between our two actors to get applications for the position, recommend good fits for the position, and set up interviews to meet these individuals. The swim lane was able to show how to do this the best way possible and what flows would work properly to get the best results. It also allows the business to understand what to do if the process does not go as planned and where to go back to in order to try again. It is a problem solver in itself because it makes sure to cover all the bases of a problem or event and how it will be dealt with best. 

Management Information Systems is all about people, databases, and technology coming together to solve problems, find the right path to decision making, clearly mapping out plans and data, and managing data. MIS uses models and technology to create a clear way towards action of different kinds in the business world. The three components of a system are simple actually, people, process, and technology. The people are involved such as MIS professionals who manage the information through systems and the individuals in business apart of decision making and problem solving. Technology that creates and is apart of MIS are education tools, API’s and other software programs such as the Salesforce program we are using in class.

Management information systems are all around us. Canvas, Proctorio, the system I use at work to take orders and process credit card transactions. Canvas works for students and teachers to connect, stay organized, and save data for your classes all in one place. This is a great system because it changes the way we learn and creates a “one stop shop” so to speak for all important material and assignments. It also allows for students to be more successful. 

There are many benefits to MIS systems including organization, data collection, and easy decisions. These systems organize data for companies and put them all in one program to solve problems easier. They collect, analyze, and combine data together to make businesses able to do things like financial duties, marketing activities, and more. Finally these MIS systems can allow for members of businesses whose jobs are to make decisions, to make them easier and faster. This promotes faster business growth and better productivity. These things lead to increasing profit in a company as well which is always a plus. 

A swim lane diagram is a visual representation of a system that includes all the steps, processes, and actors within it. Instead of describing a system with words, a swim lane diagram can allow for a much easier explanation. The shapes used in a swim lane diagram are circles to signify the beginning and end of the system, arrows to indicate the direction of the steps, rectangles to indicate steps in the process, and diamonds to indicate decisions that must be made by actors. Swim lane diagrams allow the order of a system to be easily understood as opposed to reading an explanation of it.

 

MIS in a very valuable tool in today’s business world. MIS stands for Management Information Systems, and it is utilized by implementing technology to solve process and organize the aspects within certain processes. This is valuable to businesses because they contain extremely complex processes filled with many characteristics. MIS allows for a clear organization for those processes and all the numerous aspects within them.

A system is essentially any process that contains people and technology. It can range from an entire community or society to the process of writing a blog post. There is a wide spectrum of what is classified as a system. An easily explainable example of a system is ordering a burrito. The customer must go to the place that sells burritos. They wait in line. They go to the worker who is making the burrito and tell them everything they want inside of it. Then the worker places everything into the burrito. The worker then tells the customer how much it is. The customer then pays and leaves with the burrito. That is a simple example of a system.

Systems allow for the simplification of complexities in business and as well as in the rest of the world.

In my last post, I talked about PB&Js and how a person could describe their process to make one. One way to show this process visually is through a swim lane. A swim lane is a process map, a visual that shows the start and end of a process (represented by a circle) , the actors (represented by text), activities (represented by a rectangle), and decisions (represented by a diamond) in a process, and how the process flows (represented by arrows). Another component in swim lanes is data stored, (represented by a cylinder).

Let’s go back to the components I stated, most are self-explanatory but there is one that can use some clarification: Actors. Actors can be a person, a job, or a component that carry out a process, such as performing an activity or making a decision.

Swim lanes are beneficial because they visually represent who does what in a system and when they do it. They are a way to visually identify a problem and solve it. This is helpful as visuals can help one understand a process much easier than reading a bunch of text can.

MIS stands for Management Information Systems. The goal of MIS is to use technology in order to solve issues that come up  in day-to-day life. A key work in MIS is “systems”. This word is very important in terms of understanding where to start when it comes to this course.

Systems are simply the process in which we do certain activities, it’s a plan, a method. One example could be making a peanut butter sandwich. When asking someone their plan or method to making a PB&J, they could come up with something very simple: Spread peanut butter and jelly on two slices of bread and put the two pieces together. However, this system told by another person could be much more complex: Get in your car, drive to the store, get out of the car, go inside the store, grab a cart, go to the bakery aisle, pick out whole wheat bread and put it in your cart, go to aisle with peanut butter and jams, pick out JIF original peanut butter and Welch’s grape jelly and put it in your cart, go to the self-checkout lane, scan your grocery store card, scan each of your items…the list of steps could go on and on. The PB&J system is one that I had to answer for a job interview. The employer wanted to know my process, my system, for making a PB&J. Would I be an employee who would care about minor details, or would I be an employee who got straight to the point, skipping some details that go would be helpful? In my employers words, you can tell a lot about a person based on how they explain how to make a PB&J.

For the purposes of this class, systems are how people perform tasks, made easier with the component of technology. These are the three components of systems: People, a process, and technology. Now that we understand what a system is, we can understand that an information system is a tool for gathering and interpreting data and using that data to provide information.

We use systems in everyday life, there’s a process for everything. And with the integration of technology, these processes can become easier. 

What is a swim lane? It seems pretty self explanatory, right? It’s a lane that you swim in. Ok, but what about in the business world? What does it mean then? You can think of it as a visual job description for a particular process. It tells each person, or actor, what actions they are responsible for within that particular process and when they must perform those actions. 

Each actor has their own lane, and each lane contains certain symbols that represent an action. It is not the actor that moves from lane to lane. Instead, it is the process that moves throughout the diagram. 

In a swim lane diagram, there are many different symbols that describe different events in a business process. But some of the most common ones are: a circle which starts or stops the process, a square which indicates that an action is taking place, a rectangle which tells when a decision must be made, and an arrow which specifies the flow of the process. 

Business use swim lanes as a visual to better understand a process. Some of the benefits to using them are that they clearly define each role of an employee in a particular process, they can shed light on potential problems or bottlenecks in a system, and they allow system users to fully understand the entire system outside of their own role. It is for these reasons that swim lanes can be valuable tools in all aspects of business.