McGraw-Hill/Irwin © 2008 The McGraw-Hill Companies, All Rights Reserved

Unit TwoUnit Two

Exploring Business Exploring Business InitiativesInitiatives

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Unit Two

• Chapter Six – Valuing Organizational Information

• Chapter Seven – Storing Organizational Information – Databases

• Chapter Eight – Accessing Organizational Information – Data Warehouse

McGraw-Hill/Irwin © 2008 The McGraw-Hill Companies, All Rights Reserved

Chapter 6Chapter 6

Valuing Organizational Valuing Organizational InformationInformation

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Learning Outcomes

6.1 Describe the broad levels, formats, and granularities of information

6.2 Differentiate between transactional and analytical information

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Learning Outcomes

6.3 List, describe, and provide an example of each of the five characteristics of high quality information

6.4 Assess the impact of low quality information on an organization and the benefits of high quality information on an

organization

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Organizational Information

• Information is everywhere in an organization

• Employees must be able to obtain and analyze the many different levels, formats, and granularities of organizational information to make decisions

• Successfully collecting, compiling, sorting, and analyzing information can provide tremendous insight into how an organization is performing

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Organizational Information

• Levels, formats, and granularities of organizational information

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The Value of Transactional and Analytical Information

• Transactional information verses analytical information

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The Value of Timely Information

• Timeliness is an aspect of information that depends on the situation– Real-time information – immediate, up-to-

date information– Real-time system – provides real-time

information in response to query requests

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The Value of Quality Information

• Business decisions are only as good as the quality of the information used to make the decisions

• You never want to find yourself using technology to help you make a bad decision faster

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The Value of Quality Information

• Characteristics of high-quality information include:– Accuracy– Completeness– Consistency– Uniqueness – Timeliness

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The Value of Quality Information

• Low quality information example

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Understanding the Costs of Poor Information

• The four primary sources of low quality information include:

1. Online customers intentionally enter inaccurate information to protect their privacy

2. Information from different systems have different entry standards and formats

3. Call center operators enter abbreviated or erroneous information by accident or to save time

4. Third party and external information contains inconsistencies, inaccuracies, and errors

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Understanding the Costs of Poor Information

• Potential business effects resulting from low quality information include:– Inability to accurately track customers– Difficulty identifying valuable customers– Inability to identify selling opportunities– Marketing to nonexistent customers– Difficulty tracking revenue due to inaccurate

invoices– Inability to build strong customer relationships

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Understanding the Benefits of

Good Information • High quality information can significantly

improve the chances of making a good decision

• Good decisions can directly impact an organization's bottom line

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OPENING CASE STUDY QUESTIONSIt Take A Village to Write an Encyclopedia

1. Determine if an entry in Wikipedia is an example of transactional information or analytical information

2. Describe the impact to Wikipedia if the information contained in its database is of low quality

3. Review the five common characteristics of high quality information and rank them in order of importance to Wikipedia

4. Explain how Wikipedia is resolving the issue of poor information

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CHAPTER SIX CASEFishing for Quality

• Alaska’s Department of Fish and Game requires high quality information to manage the state’s natural resources, specifically to increase fishing yields, while ensuring the future of many species

• Using fish counts the department makes daily decisions as to which districts will be open or closed to commercial fishing

• Allowing too many fish to be caught before they swim upstream to spawn could diminish fish populations – yielding devastating effects for years to come

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Chapter Six Case Questions

1. Describe the difference between transactional and analytical information and determine which type the Alaska Department of Fish and Game is using to make decisions

2. Explain the importance of high quality information for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game

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Chapter Six Case Questions

3. Review the five common characteristics of high quality information and rank them in order of importance for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game

4. Do the managers at the Alaska Department of Fish and Game actually have all of the information they require to make an accurate decision? Explain the statement “it is never possible to have all of the information required to make the best decision possible”