Management Information Systems are typically organized around the functional areas of an organization. Learn about some of the most common applications of Management Information Systems.
Many organizations are structured based on functional areas. This is often reflected in an organizational chart. Typically, functional areas include finances, human resources, marketing, etc. Many of these functional areas have their own Management Information System, or MIS.
A financial MIS provides financial information for managers to make daily decisions on operations within the organization. Most systems provide these functions: Integrate financial information from multiple sources Provide easy access to financial information in summarized form Enable financial analysis using easy-to-use tools Compare historic and current financial activity A financial MIS often has a number of subsystems, depending on the type of organization. These include systems to analyze revenues, costs and profits, auditing systems for both internal and external purposes and systems to manage funds. A financial MIS can also be used to prepare reports for third parties, such as external auditors or shareholders.
A marketing MIS supports activities throughout the many activities of marketing departments. Some of the typical subsystems of a marketing MIS are marketing research, product development and delivery, promotion and advertising, product pricing and sales analysis. One of the most common uses of a marketing MIS is to produce sales reports. These are typically produced on a regular schedule, such as by week, month and quarter. Reports can be organized by sales representative, product, customer or geographic area. Such reports allow managers to see which aspects of sales are doing well and which ones need attention. Perhaps one sales representative has suddenly experienced a drop in sales by losing one major customer and needs some support to develop some new leads. If there are only a handful of sales reps sharing one office, a manager might be able to pick up on this just by talking to everyone. However, what if a manager has to oversee more than 100 sales reps in 12 different offices around the nation? A specialized information system that provides regular updates in a meaningful format will make it a lot easier for the manager to make effective decisions.