Introduction to

Information
Systems
 System Definition
 System Concepts
 Information
 Types of Information
Systems
 General System Principles
Systems
 Players in System Game
 Roles of the System
 Required Skills of the System
Analyst
Analyst
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System Definition
What is a System?
 an interrelated set of components that
function together to achieve an
outcome

Three major components:

• Input
• Processing
• Output

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System Definition

Elements of a system:
• Purpose
• Subsystems
• Environment
• Boundary
• Connections
• Control Mechanisms

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System Concepts

Business Concepts
 Collection of policies, procedures,
methods, people, machines, and other
elements that interact and enable the
organization to achieve its goals

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System Concepts

Information System
 Collection of interrelated components
that collect, process, store, and
provide as output the information
needed to complete a business task

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Information Systems

Components
• Work practice
• Information
• People
• Information technology

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Information Systems

Reasons why information system is

needed:
• Growing size of the organization and
the number of competitors
• Growing ability of computers to
process large amount of data with
great speed
• Dramatic increase in volumes of data
generated

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Information Systems

• Advances in communication
technologies to permit faster data
transmission
• Increase in pace of business
transactions
• Much more sophisticated technology
today

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Types of Information System

Transaction Processing Systems (TPS)

• Process large amount of data for
routine business activities or
transactions
• Very important for the organization
since they gather all the input
necessary for other types of
information systems

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Types of Information System

Management Information Systems

(MIS)
• Provide a standard reports for
managers about transaction data
• Work on the purposeful interaction
between people and computers
• Supports a broader range of
organizational tasks to include not only
TPS but also decision analysis and
decision making
• Managers, usually in a report format
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Types of Information System

• Help unite some of the computerized

information functions of a business
• Designed to take the relatively raw
data available through a TPS and
convert them into a summarized and
aggregated form for managers, usually
in a report format.

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Types of Information System

Decision Support Systems (DSS)

• Designed to help organizational
decision makers identify and choose
between options or decisions
• Provides an interactive environment in
which decision makers can quickly
manipulate data and models of
business operations
• Depend on a database as a source of
data
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Types of Information System

Office Automation Systems (OAS)

• Support general office work for
handling and managing documents
and facilitating communication
• Aspects include word processing,
spreadsheets, desktop publishing,
electronic scheduling, and
communication through voice mail,
email, and video conferencing

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Types of Information System

Expert Systems (ES)

• Perform a task that would otherwise be
performed by a human expert
• Designed to take the place of human
expert, while others are designed to
aid them
• Are part of a general category of
computer applications known as
Artificial Intelligence (AI)

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Types of Information System

Executive Information Systems (EIS)

• Provide a generalized computing and
communication environment to senior
managers to support strategic
decisions
• Rely on the information generated by
MIS and allow communication with
external sources of information
• Designed to facilitate senior managers’
access to information quickly and
effectively
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General System Principles

• The more specialized a system is, the less

able it is to adapt to different
circumstances.

• The more general-purpose a system is,

the less optimized it is for any particular
situation. But the more the system is
optimized for a particular situation, the
less adaptable it will be to new
circumstances.
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General System Principles

• The larger the system is the more of its

resources that must be devoted to its
everyday maintenance.

• Systems are always part of larger systems,

and they can always be partitioned into
smaller systems.

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General System Principles

• Systems grow. This principle could not be

true for all systems, but many of the
systems with which we are familiar do
grow, because we often fail to take it into
account when we begin developing the
system.

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Players in the System Game
The System
Stakeholders

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Players in the System Game

System sponsors/owners
 Pay for the system to be built and
operated and set the vision and
priorities for the system

System users
 Use the system on a regular basis to
support the operation and
management of the organization

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Players in the System Game

System designers
 Technical specialists that translate
the business requirements into a
feasible technical solution

System builders
 Technical specialists who build, test,
and deliver the information system

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Players in the System Game

System analysts
 Who determine the requirements
that must be met by the information
system

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Players in the System Game

The Systems Analyst as a Facilitator

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Roles of the Systems Analyst

Systems Analyst as Consultant

 Address specific information systems
issues within a business

Systems Analyst as Supporting Expert

 Draws on professional expertise
concerning computer hardware and
software and their uses in the business

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Roles of the Systems Analyst

Systems Analyst as Agent of Change

• Perform any of the activities in the
SDLC and are present in the business
for an extended period
• Advocates a particular avenue of
change involving the use of
information systems

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Required Skills of the Systems
Analyst

Technical Technical
Knowledge Skills

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Required Skills of the Systems
Analyst
Technical Knowledge and Skills
• Computers and how they work
• Devices that interact with computers,
including input devices, storage
devices, and output devices
• Communications networks that
connect computers
• Databases and database
management systems

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Required Skills of the Systems
Analyst
• Programming languages
• Operating systems and utilities
• Software packages such as Microsoft
Access that can be used to develop
systems
• Integrated development environments
(IDEs) for specific programming
languages

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Required Skills of the Systems
Analyst
• Computer-aided system engineering
(CASE) tools that store information
about system specifications created by
analysts and sometimes generate
program code

• Program code generators, testing

tools, configuration management
tools, software library management
tools, documentation support tools,
project management tools, and others
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Required Skills of the Systems
Analyst

Business Business
Knowledge Skills

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Required Skills of the Systems
Analyst
Business Knowledge and Skills
• Have an understanding of the business
organizations in general

• Understand the type of organization for

which they work

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Required Skills of the Systems
Analyst
Some specifics the analyst needs to know
about the company:

• What the specific organization does

• What makes it successful
• What its strategies and plans are
• What its traditions and values are

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Required Skills of the Systems
Analyst

People People
Knowledge Skills

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Required Skills of the Systems
Analyst
People Knowledge and Skills
• Understand a lot about people since
they usually work on development
teams with other employees

• Possess many interpersonal skills

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Required Skills of the Systems
Analyst
Understand how people:
• Think
• Learn
• React to change
• Communicate
• Work (in a variety of jobs and levels)

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