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DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

15 January, 2016 - 09:49
  1. The chapter presented a brief example of how the M/S process might or might not support the decision-making needs of the advertising manager. For each of the other functional positions shown in the organization chart of Figure 11.3, speculate about the kinds of information needed to support decision making and indicate whether the typical M/S process would provide that information. Be specific.
  2. Explain how and where operations process goals would be shown in the goal columns of a control matrix prepared for the M/S process. At a minimum, include in your discussion the following topics from CONTROLLING INFORMATION SYSTEMS: PROCESS CONTROLS:
    1. Differentiation between operations process control goals and information process control goals.
    2. Distinction between process effectiveness and process efficiency, and between process effectiveness and security of resources.
  3. Discuss the nature and purpose of the completed picking ticket data store and the shipping notice data, both of which are shown in the logical DFDs and systems flowchart of this chapter. Among other points of discussion, identify each of these data stores as either “sales event” data or “master” data.
  4. “A control plan that helps to attain operational effectiveness by ‘providing assurance of creditworthiness of customers’ also helps to achieve the information process control goal of sales order input validity.” Do you agree? Why or why not?
  5. Examine the systems flowchart in Figure 11.8,Figure 11.9,and Figure 11.10. Discuss how this process implements the concept of segregation of duties, discussed in IT Governance: The Management and Control of Information Technology and Information Integrity. Be specific as to which entity (or entities) performs each of the four processing functions mentioned in IT Governance: The Management and Control of Information Technology and Information Integrity  (assuming that all four functions are illustrated by the process).
  6. Describe how a business intelligence system might be used by any of the managers depicted in Figure 11.2—A horizontal perspective of the M/S process—or in Figure 11.3—A vertical perspective of the M/S process.