2019 Subject Guide PDF

Introduction to information
systems
T. Cornford with M. Shaikh
IS1060
2019
Undergraduate study in
Economics, Management,
Finance and the Social Sciences
This subject guide is for a 100 course offered as part of the University of London
undergraduate study in Economics, Management, Finance and the Social Sciences. This is
equivalent to Level 4 within the Framework for Higher Education Qualifications in England,
Wales and Northern Ireland (FHEQ). For more information, see: london.ac.uk/
This guide was prepared for the University of London by Dr Tony Cornford, Associate Professor
of Information Systems, Department of Management, London School of Economics (Retired)
It is a revision and elaboration of the previous version developed jointly with Dr Maha Shaikh,
Senior Lecturer of Digital Innovation, Department of Digital Humanities, Kings College London
This is one of a series of subject guides published by the University. We regret that due
to pressure of work the authors are unable to enter into any correspondence relating to,
or arising from, the guide. If you have any comments on this subject guide, favourable or
unfavourable, please use the form at the back of this guide.
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Contents
Contents
Section 1: Introduction............................................................................................ 1
Chapter 1: Introduction........................................................................................... 3
1.1 Route map to the guide........................................................................................... 3
1.2 Introduction to the subject area............................................................................... 7
1.3 Sociotechnical approach to Information Systems.................................................... 10
1.4 Syllabus................................................................................................................ 11
1.5 Aims of the course................................................................................................. 12
1.6 Learning outcomes for the course.......................................................................... 12
1.7 Overview of learning resources.............................................................................. 13
1.8 Examination advice............................................................................................... 18
1.9 Glossary of abbreviations....................................................................................... 20
Chapter 2: Coursework.......................................................................................... 23
2.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................... 23
2.2 Introducing the projects......................................................................................... 24
2.3 General rules for submission of assignments.......................................................... 26
2.4 Reminder of learning outcomes............................................................................. 26
Chapter 3: A short history of information systems............................................... 27
3.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................... 27
3.2 Information systems today..................................................................................... 27
3.3 A very simple model of basic computer hardware................................................... 29
3.4 A brief history of computers and networks............................................................. 30
3.5 Modern taxonomy of computers............................................................................ 32
3.6 Client server computing......................................................................................... 33
3.7 Overview of chapter.............................................................................................. 34
3.9 Test your knowledge and understanding................................................................ 35
Section 2: Concepts underlying information systems........................................... 37
Chapter 4: Information and data........................................................................... 39
4.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................... 39
4.2 What is information?............................................................................................. 40
4.3 The value and cost of information.......................................................................... 42
4.4 Data and information............................................................................................ 45
Chapter 5: The ‘systems’ of information systems.................................................. 49
5.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................... 49
5.2 Systems................................................................................................................. 49
5.3 Information systems as systems............................................................................. 52
i
IS1060 Introduction to information systems
Chapter 6: Managing data with technologies....................................................... 55

6.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................... 55
6.2 Data at work......................................................................................................... 56
6.3 Everything is data.................................................................................................. 57
6.4 Data storage and management.............................................................................. 58
6.5 Databases and the database approach.................................................................. 59
6.6 Cloud computing................................................................................................... 61
Chapter 7: Information systems infrastructure: software and services................ 65
7.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................... 65
7.2 Information systems infrastructure......................................................................... 65
7.3 COTSS and User-written programs......................................................................... 66
7.4 Other system development tools............................................................................ 67
7.5 The internet and the world wide web..................................................................... 68
Section 3: Information systems in organisations.................................................. 71
Chapter 8: What do information systems do?....................................................... 73
8.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................... 73
8.2 What information systems do and their consequences............................................ 74
8.3 E-commerce.......................................................................................................... 78
8.4 Robotics, process automation and computers in industrial processes....................... 79
Chapter 9: Enterprise scale: architecture and information systems..................... 83
9.1 Introduction.......................................................................................................... 83
9.2 Enterprise systems: integrating business processes................................................. 84
Chapter 10: Governance of information systems.................................................. 89
10.1 Introduction........................................................................................................ 89
10.2 Governance of information systems and their data............................................... 90
10.3 Governance of data............................................................................................. 91
10.4 Overview of chapter............................................................................................ 94
10.5 Reminder of learning outcomes........................................................................... 94
10.6 Test your knowledge and understanding.............................................................. 95
Chapter 11: Information systems from a societal perspective............................. 97
11.1 Introduction........................................................................................................ 97
11.2 The social and economic context of computer use................................................ 98
11.3 The economic context.......................................................................................... 99
11.4 Government and e-government........................................................................... 99
11.5 The social dimension.......................................................................................... 100
11.6 But it’s not all bad news.................................................................................... 101
11.7 Overview of chapter.......................................................................................... 102
ii
Contents
11.8 Reminder of learning outcomes......................................................................... 102

11.9 Test your knowledge and understanding............................................................ 102
Chapter 12: Practical study of information systems........................................... 103
12.1 Introduction...................................................................................................... 103
12.2 Practical information systems............................................................................. 103
12.3 Questions to ask and details to consider............................................................ 104
Section 4: Information systems development..................................................... 107
Chapter 13: Approaches to the development of information systems............... 109
13.1 Introduction...................................................................................................... 109
13.2 Developing new information systems................................................................. 110
13.3 Where to start: build, buy, rent or participate?.................................................... 111
13.4 Outsourcing...................................................................................................... 114
13.5 Cloud computing and software as a service (SaaS)............................................. 114
Chapter 14: Systems development life cycle...................................................... 117
14.1 Introduction...................................................................................................... 117
14.2 Development projects and the information system life cycle................................ 118
14.3 Review of the life cycle...................................................................................... 125
14.4 The life cycle, packaged software and SaaS........................................................ 126
Chapter 15: Organising systems development.................................................... 129
15.1 Introduction...................................................................................................... 129
15.2 Establishing a development project.................................................................... 130
15.3 Approaches to managing a systems development project................................... 130
15.4 Professional roles in systems development......................................................... 133
Chapter 16: Modelling techniques for analysis and design................................ 137
16.1 Introduction...................................................................................................... 137
16.2 Techniques used in object oriented modelling..................................................... 138
16.3 Use case diagram.............................................................................................. 139
16.4 Class diagram and a data model........................................................................ 143
16.5 From analysis to design: data modelling for database design.............................. 145
Chapter 17: Organisational change..................................................................... 153
17.1 Introduction...................................................................................................... 153
17.2 Organisational change....................................................................................... 154
17.3 Supporting change in a development project...................................................... 154
17.4 Resistance to change......................................................................................... 155
iii
17.5 Change and software........................................................................................ 156

17.6 Criteria for successful applications..................................................................... 156
Section 5: Coursework assignments.................................................................... 159
Chapter 18: Database assignment...................................................................... 161
18.1 Introduction...................................................................................................... 161
18.2 Introducing the Database project....................................................................... 162
18.3 A cinema and films database example............................................................... 162
18.4 Reporting database assignments....................................................................... 164
Chapter 19: Spreadsheet assignment.................................................................. 167
19.1 Introduction...................................................................................................... 167
19.2 Introducing the Spreadsheet assignment............................................................ 167
19.3 Approach to spreadsheet analysis and design..................................................... 168
19.4 Reporting spreadsheet assignments................................................................... 171
Section 6: Reflections on information systems................................................... 175
Chapter 20: Perspectives on information systems.............................................. 177
20.1 Introduction...................................................................................................... 177
20.2 Perspectives on information systems.................................................................. 177
20.3 Information systems as your coursework............................................................ 180
20.4 Sourcing choices................................................................................................ 182
20.5 Technology beyond organisations....................................................................... 182
iv
Section 1: Introduction
Section 1: Introduction
The first section of this subject guide comprises Chapters 1 and 2 and
introduces the course and the subject guide.
Chapter 1 presents a general discussion of the course and its various parts
and introduces you to the learning resources that are available. Chapter 2
introduces the project work required as a part of the overall course. This
project work provides 25 per cent of your overall mark.
Chapter 2 is placed at the start of the guide because we want you to be
thinking about your project work from the very start. However, we do
advise that you wait until you are further into your period of study before
you decide on the specific project you will work on – certainly until you
have covered a good proportion of the syllabus. More detail on the exact
specification of the two elements of the work and how they are to be
tackled are given in Chapters 16, 18 and 19 of the subject guide. There is
also further material available on the virtual learning environment (VLE)
for this course.
1
Notes
2
Chapter 1: Introduction
1.1 Route map to the guide

Welcome to the subject guide for IS1060 Introduction to information
systems. This subject guide provides a road map to help you study for
this course and provide you with what you need to know to complete the
coursework.
This subject can be thought of as comprising four interrelated components:
1. practical experience in developing small systems using standard
packages and writing short reports that document this work
2. understanding the characteristics and uses of information and
communication technologies (ICTs)
3. knowledge of the established information systems concepts and
models used in the academic literature of the subject and by those who
work in the industries that support information systems
4. the processes of information systems development in their full
diversity.
As a general suggestion, and depending on your particular interests
and any previous experience of or study in this area, it is probably most
appropriate to start by tackling the ICT (component 2) and information
systems concepts (component 3) in parallel – and to leave the topics of
information systems development until later. Your work on the project
element of the course should be systematically followed up throughout
your period of study. Certainly, the experience of doing your own projects,
however small they may be, will help you to appreciate many of the issues
that are found in larger and more complex development efforts.
The practical experience aspect of the course, and the projects that are a
part of this, are introduced in Chapter 2. We introduce this early in the
guide so that you can start to think about your projects from the very
beginning of your study and relate it to the other components of the
course as you progress. Of course, completing and submitting the project
work may come later in your studies, but the sooner you start thinking
about it, the better your final work will be.
We must emphasise that the four components of the course outlined above
are very much interrelated and should not be treated as wholly separate.
Consider this example.
The storage of some data about a person within a computer-based system
– for example, their medical records over their lifetime or the courses and
examination marks they achieved as a University of London student – is an
issue that may be considered from all four perspectives.
1. From an information systems perspective, we need to ask:
Why are we storing this data?
What purpose or purposes does it serve?
What (and whose) information needs will it satisfy?
How will we know if these needs have been met?
2. From a technology perspective, we may want to ask:
How can this data be captured, stored, communicated and
displayed?
3
What devices or technologies might be used?

What are their relevant characteristics – reliability, cost, speed,
usability, and so on?
3. From a systems development perspective, we need to consider:
How might we design and build such a system?
What constraints should we consider in terms of legal or
regulatory issues and the interests of the users and those whose
data is stored and processed?
Who is going to undertake the development work and what tools
or techniques will they need to use?
o What exact items of data are to be collected and stored?
4. Finally, from a real world, ‘getting things done’ perspective, you will
need to:
Assess how long the development will take, and what will it cost.
Establish and resource a project to construct the system to do the
job and then deliver a working system to the users within budget
and on time.
Then maintain the systems in working condition for a number
of years or decades, until it is either no longer needed or an
alternative way to achieve the task is available.
You should divide your effort equally between the four main components
of this subject. But remember, effort does not simply equate to time
invested; the practical component of this course, particularly, can absorb
a lot of you time while you master the software and the modelling
techniques. This is not a problem in itself – doing analysis and design
work, and using software can be interesting, challenging and rewarding.
But you need to be aware that this activity is only supposed to represent
25 per cent of both the subject and the final mark. For this reason you
must make sure that you devote appropriate time and effort to the other
components of the course. If you do this you will achieve good marks in
the examination and do well in the final combined assessment.
1.1.1 Aims of the subject guide

The main aims of the subject guide are to:
• introduce you to the subject of information systems and its scope and
content
• give you the necessary guidance as to the work expected of you
throughout the course and the appropriate approach you need to take
to your studies
• specify the resources you will need to use including readings,
textbooks and computer resources, but also resources that serve other
kinds of study activities, such as interviews with professionals and
wider reading
• give you confidence in approaching the various assessment methods
used, including the examination and the coursework.
1.1.2 Course overview

In addition to this introductory chapter, the remaining chapters of this
guide are organised into five main sections as follows:
• The second chapter in Section 1 introduces the course assignments
for developing small information systems using standard packages
4
and writing short reports that document this work. Further details are
given in Chapters 18 and 19.
• Section 2, comprising Chapters 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7, considers Concepts
underlying information systems. In these chapters you will
be introduced to a bit of history of the subject and the concepts of
technology, data, information and systems that lie at its core (hence
information systems). We will go on to discuss further some of the
key technologies used in information systems relating to data and
software.
• Section 3, comprising Chapters 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12, considers
Information systems in organisations. In these chapters we will
address core concepts and models used in the academic literature of
the subject as well as by those who manage information systems and
those who work in the industries that support information systems.
The final chapter in this section invites you to engage with people who
manage information systems to understand how they see their role in
organisations.
• Section 4, comprising Chapters 13,14, 15,16 and 17, turns to
Information systems development. Here we look at the work
needed to identify new information needs and establish a project to
construct a new information system and successfully set it to work
within an organisation.
• Section 5, comprising Chapters 18 and 19, addresses the coursework
assignments, with a chapter each on the database assignment and
the spreadsheet assignment.
• The final section is a single chapter – Chapter 20 – which gives a
reflective overview of the subject. The purpose of this is to help
you to tie together the various parts of the course and increase your
overall understanding.
1.1.3 Access to computers

It is a requirement for this course that students submit two practical
computing assignments for the examination (see Chapter 2). You must
therefore have access to, and make use of, a variety of computing
resources. The structure of the syllabus is built around the assumption that
students will have good access to a modern microcomputer with a suite of
standard software. In particular, you will require access to the following:
1. A laptop or desktop computer: It is most likely that this will be either
a PC running some version of Microsoft Windows, an Apple Macintosh
or perhaps a computer running the Linux operating system. While
these are the most common ‘standards’ in the world, it may well
be that you have access to other computers that will allow you to
undertake the assignments. For example, you may have access to
multi-user or time-sharing systems that allow essentially the same
facilities as a PC but are accessed through online terminals.
2. In theory at least, you could complete the assignments on your
smartphone or tablet – most have a spreadsheet of sorts, and simple
database apps and modelling tools are available too – but we do not
recommend it!
3. Printing facilities: Whatever type of computer you have access to and
use, you will also need to be able to print out in order to produce the
required assignments on paper for assessment.
4. Database package: A database package is software that allows a user
to enter, store and retrieve regular items of data in a structured and
5
coherent manner. A database allows its user to select and extract

particular items of data or produce reports summarising collections of
data. Databases can range from small (a mailing list of the members
of a sports club) to huge (the 50 million or more national insurance
records held by the UK’s Department of Social Security). Common
PC database software in use today includes Microsoft Access,
OpenOffice Base and Oracle. Most database packages offer their own
programming languages (or macro languages), which allow them to
support the development of more sophisticated applications, but you
are not expected to use such facilities. A database package suitable for
this subject must support the relational model. In recent years, most
database projects for this course have been produced using Microsoft
Access, but some students have used other software.
5. Spreadsheet package: A spreadsheet allows for information to be
arranged in rows and columns to be manipulated. The major focus of
a spreadsheet is the manipulation of numerical information, although
modern spreadsheets have a wider range of functionality and can,
in some ways, emulate a simple database. The name ‘spreadsheet’
comes from an analogy with the squared paper used by accountants
to prepare tables of figures. Spreadsheets are one of the main reasons
that everyday managers use computers, since they allow them to
manipulate figures at will, to keep records and to see the results of
modelling alternative assumptions about relevant items of information.
Almost all spreadsheet programs are able to produce various types
of charts and graphs. Some advanced functions supported by today’s
spreadsheets include optimisation, statistical processing and sensitivity
analysis facilities. Among the best-known spreadsheets are Microsoft
Excel, Apple Numbers and OpenOffice Calc.
6. Word processor package: You will need this to prepare your reports.
A word processor is software that allows a user to prepare text
documents. It provides facilities to enter and store text, to lay out text
and graphics on the page and to print out the results. Other facilities
offered by a word processor may include checking spelling, generating
tables of contents or keeping track of footnotes. Among the most
common word processing programs in use today are Microsoft Word,
Apple Pages or OpenOffice Writer. This version of this subject guide
was initially prepared using Microsoft Word 2010 and among the
facilities that we used were the spelling checker, various typefaces and
fonts, styles, automatic page numbering and the automatic preparation
of the table of contents.
Major software producers usually offer their popular word processing,
database and spreadsheet programs as a suite of software designed
to work together. In such suites, each package is standalone in its
functionality, but it can easily work with the other elements of the suite −
Microsoft Office and OpenOffice are examples. If you are in a position to
decide which software to use, then it does make very good sense to choose
such a suite of programs. Some suites may also include other tools, such as
electronic mail or a personal organiser that can be used as a sort of diary
or address book.
When tackling the hands-on project component of the course and
using software packages, you will need to have access to appropriate
documentation. Since the syllabus does not prescribe the particular
software that you should use, it is not possible to specify exact books.
Most popular software comes with a set of manuals that will include
both a reference manual and a tutorial, although these may well be just
6
presented as files on a disk, rather than as physical books. Such tutorial

guidance is often a good place to start to learn how to use a particular
piece of software. In addition, many alternative guides to popular software
are published and such texts can provide valuable extra advice and an
alternative source of information. You can also find useful video tutorials
online via YouTube or similar websites.
1.2 Introduction to the subject area

IS1060 Introduction to information systems is a 100 course that is
part of the Management and digital innovation degree programme.
You might be expecting the phrase ‘information systems’ in the title of
this course and subject guide to be just a synonym for computers and
their direct uses. However, the subject of information systems, as you will
discover, includes a rather broader set of topics and issues. The concerns we
will address here certainly go beyond a narrow focus on technology – that
is a subject that might be better studied under the heading of ‘computer
science’ or ‘computer engineering’. Rather, this subject, and this course,
investigates what we do with this particular technology in the world,
why we choose to use it, who is affected or interested in its uses and how
we organise ourselves to be able to get the best from it. We even go a
bit further, beyond questions of what uses are found for information and
communication technologies (ICTs), to questions about the consequences
that follow – what are often spoken of as the impacts or the ‘so what?’
questions.
Quite often you will return to the five basic questions – first ‘What?’,
‘Who?’ and ‘Why?’, then ‘How?’, and finally, the ‘So what?’ question
that interrogates the consequences that follow. These might include
consequences for people (for example, at work or at home), for
organisations (for example, firms and businesses, not-for-profit
organisations and government bodies) and for wider society (for example,
for social and economic development, for education and health care or for
international patterns of trade).
When we do talk about computers and associated technologies (digital
technologies) we will generally use the phrase ‘information and
communication technology’ (ICT). You will find that ICT is a common
abbreviation in the academic world, particularly in Europe. The related,
older abbreviation is ‘IT’ (information technology). One of the earliest
uses of the phrase ‘information technology’ can be found in a 1958 article
by Harold J. Leavitt and Thomas L. Whistler, ‘Management in the 1980’s’,
Harvard Business Review November/December 1958. Despite this article
being about 60 years old, it is well worth your while to read it and consider
how many of their predictions have, or have not, come true.
The subject of information systems is often discussed under the heading of
the ‘application of ICT’, where this technology is seen as something we apply
to various human activities. Indeed, the word ‘application’ is often used in
the business world to mean a particular use of technology or a particular
type of software specific for a particular task. Thus we might say that word
processing (for example, Microsoft Word or Open Office Writer) is one of the
most important desktop ‘applications’, along with email and spreadsheets.
You will also find people discussing ‘back office’ applications – the kinds of
applications that tie a firm together and serve their internal information
handling needs, for example applications that perform tasks associated with
accounting, inventory management, logistics or human resources.
7
Information systems as discussed here are approached a bit differently,

considered in terms of the needs and tasks required by formal
organisations. Indeed, you will find that that in this subject guide we
often talk about ‘organisations’, which we use here as an inclusive term
which stands for all kinds of organised human activities including, but not
limited to, business firms. Often we will focus on business organisations –
firms or companies – but we will also consider public sector organisations
– a government ministry or some public agency such as a school or police
district. Sometimes we may consider other kinds of organisations that
need information systems such as non-governmental organisations (NGOs)
and voluntary organisations – a church or sports club, a choir or a charity
such as Oxfam or Save the Children.
On some occasions these distinctions between types of organisations
matter – business organisations seek profits and compete in a market,
whereas public bodies do not, at least not directly; NGOs may have many
volunteer workers, while business and government workers are paid.
However, for our purpose the distinctions usually do not matter and we
emphasise the common characteristics of organisations as people working
together with a common purpose, and thus as places where information
technology is or could be applied and may have beneficial consequences.
Note that we say ‘may have’ – not all applications are useful, successful or
help the organisation achieve its goals. Initiatives in using computers can,
and do, fail – so never just assume that adding technology will inevitably
improve things.
As a student, you need to understand from the start of this course – and
at the start of the BSc Management and digital innovation if that is your
degree programme – that we are concerned with more than just computers
and networks and their most direct uses. Rather, we are studying the
information systems which are found in, and are a fundamental part of, all
manner of human organisations. It is hard to be an organisation – a business
firm, a club, a school, or even a family – without having some information
systems to store data and provide information to people who need to use
it to guide their actions. Of course, these information systems may not use
much digital information and communications technology (i.e. computers) –
a paper notebook or diary, a noticeboard, a meeting room or a conversation
can each serve as a part of an information system too. However, here we
are mostly concerned with the more formal and deliberately structured
information systems found in organisations and which, in most countries of
the world, draw in large part on digital technology.
Thus organisations will need to make decisions about what information
systems they need and how big a role they want to give to digital
technology (ICTs) in achieving this. Often it is a fairly easy decision to
make – some task or requirement of the organisation is well established
and well understood, and it is clear that the way things are done currently
could potentially be improved upon with the help of digital technology. Of
course, that ‘potentially’ needs some investigation before a final decision
is made and that investigation – what we will call a feasibility study (see
Chapter 15) – is part of the planning for systems development.
Organisations also face situations when they begin to understand (perhaps
from what their competitors are doing or what they read in business
magazines) that they could do new and different kinds of things if and
when they start to use new digital technology. These are the situations that
we can describe as ‘digital innovation’. This reflects circumstances when,
rather than doing things in the old way, perhaps a bit better, it is time
to think about doing new things and in different ways. Another phrase
8
you may read to describe such a situation is ‘digital transformation’. For

example, today many retail stores with shops on the high street have to
face the challenge of e-commerce (shopping online). Today customers are
less likely to visit the high street as often as they did in the past – rather,
they shop from their smart phones or computers. So for these kinds of
organisations, the pressure is on and they may feel the need to embark on
new digital initiatives (innovation and transformation) – perhaps to test
the waters with a pilot of an online shop or even to boldly sell all their
high street shops and go 100 per cent online. Whatever they decide, they
need to be creative and try something new if they are to survive.
Quite often what we study is the move from a more traditional information
system, for example, based on paper records or older fragmented
computerised information systems, to one based on integrated digital
records and integrated processing of this data. Thus in the past 30-plus
years many organisations have moved from paper letters and memos typed
by a secretary and stored in a filing cabinet, to emails and text messages
typed by the main sender and stored online, or from paper catalogues sent
out in the post to electronic catalogues that are available on websites or
DVDs. Today many of us have made the transition from buying a paper
newspaper every day to getting our news from an online website.
Another good example of the challenges of digital innovation is the move
in healthcare all around the world from a paper-based patient record in
a physical file, to an electronic record stored in a computer network and
potentially easily available to multiple persons and at multiple locations.
Seen one way, this is just a case of applying a bit more technology to a
well-understood task – but you could see it very much as a moment of
digital innovation and transformation where having digital records will
enable all kinds of other radical changes to be made.
As suggested above, it is useful to think through this example under the
headings of ‘What?’, ‘Why?’, ‘How?’ and ‘So what?’ Taking just the ‘Why’
question, it is interesting to think of how many reasons there may be to
make a change from paper to digital records. Is it to deliver better care,
safer care, to help doctors and/or patients make more informed decisions,
to reorganise the way care is given by nurses, to use fewer expensive
doctors, to allow more information-sharing among doctors and nurses or
to make the giving of care cheaper and/or more time efficient? Is it a way
to solve existing and well-understood problems or is it a way to achieve
something new, radically different and (we hope) radically better? One,
rather general, way to answer all these questions is to say that this change
will make healthcare more ‘efficient,’ but what does this word ‘efficient’
really mean, and how confident are we that we can achieve such benefits
anyway? We find that the word ‘efficient’ is often overused by students
to describe the benefits of information systems, so try to avoid it and use
more specific terms for more specific kinds of benefit.
In this example of health care records, doctors’, nurses’ and patients’
interests are involved as well as others such as governments, tax payers
and pharma companies. So benefits and issues can be seen from different
perspectives. This will sometimes be as individuals, as customers or
citizens (for example, patients, tax payers), but also as members of (or
workers within) organisations or members of certain professions (for
example, nurses, managers, clerks, journalists, doctors, engineers or
accountants). The policy makers and managers of healthcare organisations
should be able speak for the organisation itself and what it wants or needs,
but they are not the only voice that should be heard.
9
1.3 Sociotechnical approach to Information Systems

If we want an initial working description of the subject you will be
studying here, it might be something along these lines:
The subject of information systems looks at the uses made
of ICT (digital technology) within human organisations
and societies. In particular, we study how ICTs are applied
to improve or change the way organisations operate and
achieve their goals, and to help people to do their jobs. This
is principally achieved by collecting, storing, processing and
sharing data and information.
This description suggests that the study of information systems entails at

least four slightly separate, but related elements:
• the digital technologies that lie at the heart of computer-based
information handling, their characteristics and capabilities, and the
skills and understanding needed to make them work
• the people who work with, become part of or use information systems
• the useful tasks that they wish to undertake and their specific needs or
requirements
• the social or organisational structure within which an information
system is established (for example, a firm, a factory or government
department, a community or society) and the consequences that
follow.
We could choose to examine principally just one of these four perspectives
– the perspective of technology, the tasks it is applied to, the people who
work with it or the organisational or social structure in which all the above
elements are embedded.
However, these four elements are closely interlinked and we usually need
to consider more than one of them, and often all four. This idea or ‘model’
of technology in organisations as structured around four core elements
was proposed in the 1960s by Harold Leavitt. It is known as ‘Leavitt’s
diamond’ (see Figure 1.1). The model suggests that it is always possible
(even necessary) to relate each of these core elements to the others, and
that if, or when, we change any one of them, it is very likely to have some
effect on the others. Understanding these dynamic relationships can often
give us a clue to provide answers to the ‘How’ and ‘So what?’ questions.
Structure
People Technology
Task
Figure 1.1: Leavitt’s diamond: the basis for a sociotechnical view of information
systems.
Leavitt’s diamond expresses what we call a sociotechnical view of
information systems. That is, information systems are in part social (about
people and human organisations) and in part technical (technology as
10
applied to specific tasks). Indeed, these two domains are so interrelated

that we cannot really expect to take them apart. A manager organising a
meeting with a mobile phone in her hand and an electronic diary open
on her laptop is inherently sociotechnical – so too is a robot working on a
vehicle production line or a checkout machine at a supermarket.
It is vital that you grasp this fundamental concept of the sociotechnical
character of information systems at the outset of this course. It implies
that, given any problem or situation that we study, we should ask both
how the technology influences people or the organisation, and how people
may influence technology choices and the way it is used. We cannot, as it
were, privilege one element and ignore the others.
For the most part, in this course we will consider formal organisations as
the ‘structure’ referred to in Leavitt’s diamond. For example, the ICT, the
people and the relevant tasks could be within a business organisation, such
as a car manufacturer, a retail shop, a bank or an airline, or they could
be in public or not-for-profit bodies, such as a government department,
a hospital, a school or a city council. In such cases the people involved
will usually be the workers or employees of such organisations and their
customers or clients. But as citizens, and in other parts of our lives beyond
any work setting, we also use information systems – for example, as a
student, when talking to friends on Facebook or by email, or when buying
products and services online. Thus in this course we will sometimes shift
our understanding of the ‘structure’ we want to consider to include society
at large or some section of it. This is, for example, the case when we
discuss issues such as personal privacy, data protection and rights of access
to information.
Technology remains an important part of what we study, and while if it
is not the exclusive focus we certainly do consider it in this course. It is
not possible to comprehend how organisations build and use information
systems to serve their needs if we do not have a quite good level of
understanding and some experience of the technologies themselves, their
potential and their drawbacks. We certainly should not just assume
that all technology is good, easy to use and will work as
planned!
For this reason this course is divided into some sections that are devoted
to studying and others that use some contemporary technologies used
by business organisations. It is important to remember that 25 per cent
of your final mark is based on practical experience in developing simple
information systems using standard software packages: a database and
a spreadsheet. This is explained further in Chapter 2 with more detailed
information in Chapters 18 and 19.
1.4 Syllabus
Information systems concepts: Information and data. Capture of data,
storage, processing and display. Information systems in organisations,
the digital economy. Introduction to systems ideas and their application
to information handling activities. The sociotechnical character of
information systems.
Information systems within organisations: The roles and
functions of information systems within organisations including providing
management information, supporting e-commerce, supporting knowledge
work and undertaking transaction processing. Use of information by
various types of people and as applied to various types of task. New
models of organising. Information systems management roles and
11
structures. Students are expected to undertake small investigative case

studies of information systems within local organisations as part of their
study.
Information and communications technologies: Introduction
to computer hardware and software. Communications technologies and
networks, the internet. Data storage systems, files and databases. Cloud
computing. Operating software, applications packages and user written
programs. Open source software. Social networking. (Note: this does
not entail any particular knowledge of electronics, rather it is concerned
with the major components and the logical structures of a computer as
exemplified in popular personal computers and networks including the
internet.)
Systems development: Information systems development approaches;
life cycle, prototyping, incremental models. Systems analysis tasks,
methodologies, modelling and agile methods. Data modelling. Systems
implementation. Professional roles in systems development. Criteria for
successful applications development. Systems implementation and the
management of change.
Practical coursework: The coursework has two elements. A design
and implementation of a small database, and design and implementation
of a spreadsheet model. No specific brands of software are required to be
used, but typical examples would be Excel for spreadsheets and Access for
databases. A student can equally use other software, for example the free
to download open source desktop software available including Apache
Open Office see www.openoffice.org/ or LibreOffice www.libreoffice.org/
In the coursework you are expected to demonstrate and document your
ability to analyse and design these two small applications, as well as show
your mastery of the relevant software. Coursework must be submitted in a
word processed form. These two elements of coursework count for 25 per
cent of the overall mark.
Note: To complete this course candidates are required to submit
coursework for assessment.
1.5 Aims of the course

This course provides a broad introductory understanding of information
systems, seen within organisational and societal contexts. The aim is to
provide students with an appropriate balance of technical and organisational
perspectives to serve as the basis for further study in the field.
1.6 Learning outcomes for the course

By the end of this course, and having completed the Essential reading and
the activities in this subject guide, you should be able to:
• explain fundamental assumptions made in studying information
and communications technologies in organisations as sociotechnical
systems in contrast to purely technical or managerial views
• debate the relevance of the sociotechnical approach and demonstrate
this through the study of a number of practical business and
administrative information systems within real organisations
• express a logical understanding of how the technical parts of
computer-based information systems work, their principal structures
and components, including contemporary technologies for information
storage, processing and communications
12
• explain the various functions of systems and network software and

various classes of business-oriented application packages
• describe fundamental principles that can be applied to ensure that
security and personal privacy is respected in information systems
• explain the tasks required when undertaking the establishment of a
new information system and be able to contrast alternative approaches
to development
• describe and justify a range of professional roles in information
systems development activity, and their changing nature, reflecting in
part changes in technology use in and between organisations
• discuss the social, organisational, legal and economic context of
computer use and be able to debate the significance of information
and communications technologies on the economy and society
• demonstrate, through project work, understanding of the analysis and
design of small projects using database and spreadsheet programs, and
the ability to write brief but informative reports on such work.
This set of learning outcomes provides a useful benchmark against which
you can assess your progress as you work your way through the subject
guide. It will help you to balance your workload of study and revision.
1.7 Overview of learning resources

1.7.1 The subject guide
The subject guide provides an overview of the subject and presents the
material in the structure and sequence outlined in 1.1 Route map to the
guide. However, as a student of the subject, you do have some choice as to
the order in which you approach the various components of study.
You should note also that each of the Essential readings takes a slightly
different route through this material and that no one book covers exactly
what we address in this subject guide. It is probably a good idea to start
your studies by quickly skimming through this subject guide to get an
overview of the route you would like to take.
1.7.2 Essential reading

The principal textbook for this course is:
Laudon, K.C. and J.P. Laudon Management information systems: managing the
digital firm. Global edition. (Boston; London: Pearson, 2018) 15th edition
[ISBN 9781292211756].
This is also a recommended course text for the companion course IS1181
Digital infrastructures for business which students taking the full
Management and digital innovation degree must take as well as IS1060
Introduction to information systems. It is thus a good idea to make
use this text as much as possible for both courses.
It is also important that we explain a bit how the two courses differ. In
very simple terms, IS1060 Introduction to information systems
and Laudon and Laudon (2018) take the perspective of an organisation
or business that wants to use information technology in their information
systems to serve their own business needs. Organisations that have over,
say, 15 employees will have managers and other kinds of professionals –
IT managers, database administrators, project managers, programmers,
systems analysts – whose main job is to procure, configure and run these
information systems. Very small businesses, of course, may need to rely on
13
one or two people to fulfil all such tasks, who may not be professionals in
matters of information systems.
In contrast, the course IS1181 Digital infrastructures for business
takes the perspective of the digital technologies and services that these
people can draw on in order to develop and run information systems.
Its emphasis is on the kinds of digital services that are delivered via
digital networks (e.g. the internet, mobile phones, social media, etc.).
Furthermore, many such services are also delivered to, and used by,
individuals too, so it is not just the needs or interests of organisations we
are concerned with in IS1181 Digital infrastructures for business,
but mine and yours as well.
At the outset take some time to become familiar with the structure of
Laudon and Laudon (2018) and the way information is organised within
each chapter. Note, in particular, the frequent use of case studies at the
start, within and at the end of chapters. You will see that each chapter’s
brief introductory case study has a summary diagram highlighting
management, technology and organisation solutions that have been found
to respond to business challenges, and have thus led to some innovation in
information systems and thus to business solutions.
At the end of each chapter there is a summary of the key ideas discussed
in the chapter as well as review questions, key terms and ideas for further
work. Once you understand the structure of the book, you will be better
able to monitor your developing understanding of the subject and to
evaluate your progress.
The second principal text, within which most topics and useful contrasting
treatments of topics can be found, is:
Beynon-Davies, P. Business information systems. (London: Palgrave, 2013) second
edition [ISBN 9781137265807].
For some topics Beynon-Davies offers a deeper and more thorough
treatment, including topics related to computer technology and systems
development activities. This book is also helpful in supporting your
practical assignments.
Neither of the books listed above provides, on its own, a full coverage of
the whole subject. Indeed, as you are studying for a university degree,
we assume that you will be using multiple sources and will base your
understanding on as wide a reading base as possible.
The following text is relevant to the coursework element of this course
also a useful resource to back-up understanding of other topics:
Curtis, G. and D. Cobham Business information systems: analysis, design and
practice. (London: Prentice Hall, 2008) 6th edition [ISBN 9780273713821].
It is always preferable that you have access to the latest editions of these
books. The world of information systems and information technology
changes rapidly, as does our understanding of what is important and
relevant in developing and managing information systems. If you are using
this subject guide a couple of years after its publication, and new editions
of the books mentioned have been produced, please use the new editions.
Note that Laudon and Laudon (2018) and Beynon-Davies (2013) are the
fifteenth and second editions respectively, and new editions come out quite
often. When new editions are produced, their titles may differ slightly, so
do not be confused by this.
Detailed reading references in this subject guide refer to the editions of
the set textbooks referred to above. If new editions of one or more of these
textbooks have been published by the time you study this course, use the
14
detailed chapter and section headings and the index to identify or confirm
the relevant reading sections. You can also check the VLE for updated
guidance on readings.
1.7.3 Further reading

Bookshops and libraries are a rich resource for books published on topics
related to information systems, computing and business uses of ICT. Many
of these books are adequate, some are excellent and some are poor. Never
mind! For a keen student of information systems, there is certainly no
shortage of materials to study, and you must expect to have to negotiate
your way through this jungle.
If you are told that any book is out of print, do not panic. As a first step,
check with another source − some bookshop catalogues are more up-to-
date than others or check online with one of the large bookselling sites
such as Amazon.com. If a book seems to be completely unavailable, please
tell us and we will suggest alternatives.
There are also many online resources that you can use to widen your
understanding of a particular topic. Of course, not all online material is of
high quality and quite a lot is simply marketing material. Still, even this
type of material is useful as long as you approach it with a critical and
questioning attitude. From time to time in this guide we suggest you take a
look at websites of this kind. Their contents will almost inevitably change
over time, and our suggestions may soon be out of date, but your job is
then to make a sensible use of materials that you do discover.
For example, one of the oldest and most established companies in the ICT
industry is IBM. Their website (www.ibm.com) contains a lot of material
and information. At the time of writing (2018), the front page links directly
to a section called ‘Industries’ (see bottom of page), which in turn has a
sections for various sectors like finance, government or manufacturing.
There you can find details of the information systems used by some IBM
customers in various fields, drawn from various countries around the world.
Please note that when you have read the Essential reading, you are then
free to read around the subject area in any text, paper or online resource.
Indeed, you are positively encouraged to read widely. To help you read
extensively, you have free access to the VLE and University of London
Online Library (see below) and from time to time we do recommend
papers published in academic journals in the Further reading which
appears at the beginning of each chapter.
You may find the books listed below helpful as references or as back-
ups for particular topics. Occasional reference is made to these books in
the subject guide. Students taking the full BSc Management and digital
innovation degree will find these titles useful and relevant in other
subjects as well.
Avgerou, C. and T. Cornford Developing information systems: concepts, issues and
practice. (London: Macmillan, 1998) second edition [ISBN 9780333732311].
Sommerville, I. Software engineering: global edition. (London: Pearson, 2015) 10th
edition [ISBN 9781292096131].
When undertaking the practical assignments, you will probably want
to refer to books to help you get to grips with using a particular word
processor, spreadsheet or database. Because students have so many
different computers and versions of software, we cannot make any specific
recommendations. However, a particularly useful reference series is the
‘Mastering…’ series published by Sybex; another is the ‘…for Dummies’
series published by Wiley.
15
1.7.4 Online study resources

In addition to the subject guide and the Essential reading, it is crucial that
you take advantage of the study resources that are available online for this
course, including the VLE and the Online Library.
You can access the VLE, the Online Library and your University of London
email account via the Student Portal at:
https://my.london.ac.uk
You should have received your login details for the Student Portal with
your official offer, which was emailed to the address that you gave
on your application form. You have probably already logged in to the
Student Portal in order to register! As soon as you registered, you will
automatically have been granted access to the VLE, Online Library and
your fully functional University of London email account.
If you have forgotten these login details, please click on the ‘Forgotten
your password’ link on the login page.
The VLE, which complements this subject guide, has been designed to
enhance your learning experience, providing additional support and a
sense of community. It forms an important part of your study experience
with the University of London and you should access it regularly.
The VLE provides a range of resources for EMFSS courses:
• Course materials: Subject guides and other course materials available
for download. In some courses, the content of the subject guide is
transferred into the VLE and additional resources and activities are
integrated with the text.
• Readings: Direct links, wherever possible, to Essential readings in the
Online Library, including journal articles and ebooks.
• Video content: Including introductions to courses and topics within
courses, interviews, lessons and debates.
• Screencasts: Videos of PowerPoint presentations, animated podcasts
and on-screen worked examples.
• External material: Links out to carefully selected third-party resources.
• Self-test activities: Multiple-choice, numerical and algebraic quizzes to
check your understanding.
• Collaborative activities: Work with fellow students to build a body of
knowledge.
• Discussion forums: A space where you can share your thoughts and
questions with fellow students. Many forums will be supported by a
‘course moderator’, a subject expert employed by LSE to facilitate the
discussion and clarify difficult topics.
• Past examination papers: We provide up to three years’ past
examinations alongside Examiners’ commentaries that provide
guidance on how to approach the questions.
• Study skills: Expert advice on getting started with your studies,
preparing for examinations and developing your digital literacy skills.
Note: Students registered for Laws courses also receive access to the
dedicated Laws VLE.
Some of these resources are available for certain courses only, but we
are expanding our provision all the time and you should check the VLE
regularly for updates.
16
Making use of the Online Library

The Online Library (http://onlinelibrary.london.ac.uk) contains a huge
array of journal articles and other resources to help you read widely and
extensively.
To access the majority of resources via the Online Library you will either
need to use your University of London Student Portal login details, or you
will be required to register and use an Athens login.
The easiest way to locate relevant content and journal articles in the
Online Library is to use the Summon search engine.
If you are having trouble finding an article listed in a reading list, try
removing any punctuation from the title, such as single quotation marks,
question marks and colons.
For further advice, please use the online help pages (http://onlinelibrary.
london.ac.uk/resources/summon) or contact the Online Library team:
onlinelibrary@shl.london.ac.uk
1.7.5 Other useful resources
Newspapers, magazines and trade papers

You should get into the habit of reading weekly and monthly journals as
well as newspapers. Most serious newspapers have regular supplements
or sections devoted to technology and computers, and you should become
a regular reader of these. Most countries have some local publications
devoted to computers and information systems, which can provide very
useful materials for study. Such publications will include news of the local
and global information technology industries, examples or case studies of
systems in use and discussion of systems development practices. A useful
aid to your study on this course will be to keep a (digital) scrapbook of
newspaper and magazine articles that relate to information systems and to
review this material from time to time.
Hundreds of computer magazines are to be found on newsagents’ shelves.
Most are aimed at the home computer user and, as such, are of relatively
little use for this subject. The magazines below, in contrast, all provide
some coverage about computers and information systems within business
organisations – the main focus of this subject.
• The Economist, UK: Although this is not a computer magazine, it does
contain regular articles on aspects of the computer industry, national
policies relating to computers and telecommunications, and issues
around the organisational use of technology. Special supplements on
some aspect of ICT are also published a couple of times each year.
• Datamation, InformationWeek, CIO magazine, USA: These magazines,
aimed at information systems’ managers, report on many issues
surrounding the effective use of information technology in
organisations. There are websites for the magazines (noted below)
from which articles can be downloaded.
• Computing, Computer Weekly, UK: Both of these weekly papers contain
a mix of industry news, articles on particular organisations and
descriptions of new and interesting developments. Other countries will
have similar publications related to their own national marketplace.
When reading materials such as those listed here, you should try to ensure
that you read widely about issues of technology itself and issues related
to the effective (or ineffective) use of the technology in organisations. It
bears repeating that this subject is not about the study of information and
17
communications technologies for their own sake, but to better understand

what they can help businesses achieve and how they can be exploited
within business organisations, public administration and society as a whole.
Internet resources
The assessed coursework does not require you to make any particular
use of the internet. It is almost impossible, however, to have any
understanding of what computers and networks do for us, for governments
and for businesses (or will do in the future), without some experience
of the internet. This would usually mean some experience of using the
world wide web − searching for and locating information resources of
various types − as well as experience of using email and other methods of
communication, such as Facebook, Twitter, chat rooms or net meetings.
Since this subject guide will remain in print for some time, and as the
internet is constantly evolving and updating, it is not helpful to list a large
number of websites here. However, a few sites are worth noting:
www.datamation.com/
The site of the American magazine, Datamation. A good source of material
on contemporary information systems topics.
www.informationweek.co.uk/
The site of the UK weekly publication Information Week. A good source of
news about ICT and information systems.
www.computerweekly.com/ and www.computing.co.uk
The sites of the two most prominent UK weekly computing trade papers.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page
Wikipedia is the largest web-based encyclopedia and is available in a
number of languages. It is often a useful resource to check up on a concept
or to get a second opinion about something. It is not, however, a substitute
for a good textbook and you certainly should not believe everything you
read there.
Unless otherwise stated, all websites in this subject guide were accessed in
December 2018. We cannot guarantee that they will stay current and you
may need to perform an internet search to find the relevant pages.
1.8 Examination advice

1.8.1 Structure of the examination
Important: the information and advice given here are based on the
examination structure used at the time this guide was written (2018).
Please note that subject guides may be used for several years. Because of
this we strongly advise you to always check both the current Regulations
for relevant information about the examination, and the VLE where you
should be advised of any forthcoming changes. You should also carefully
check the rubric/instructions on the paper you actually sit and follow
those instructions.
The examination for this course is made up of two parts − a three-hour
written examination and coursework submitted to the University of London
ahead of the formal examination. As noted above, full information on how
to submit coursework is given in the Completing and submitting coursework
and projects booklet. Further information on the requirements for the
assignments is given in Chapters 2, 18 and 19 of this guide and on the VLE.
18
The format of the written examination is shown in Appendix 1. The

examination has just one section with eight questions, of which you
are required to answer three. These questions usually require either
discursive answers between three and four pages in length (depending
on handwriting and layout) or some structured problem-solving using a
suitable technique such as data modelling.
Remember, it is important to check the VLE for:
• up-to-date information on examination and assessment arrangements
for this course including on submission of coursework
• where available, past examination papers and Examiners’ commentaries
for the course which give advice on how each question might best be
answered.
1.8.2 How to do well in the examination

If you want to do well in your examinations and coursework then there
are four key ideas that you can use to improve your performance:
1. Read about each topic that you study in at least two different
textbooks. For the more technical topics, make use of a good online
reference such as Wikipedia to cross check your understanding. When
you consult two or more sources they will, in all probability, not say
exactly the same things. For example, it will often be the case that
they will use different examples and often rather different technical
language and jargon. You then have to judge and combine the various
accounts, but in doing so you will become an active learner, you will
understand more and you will remember more too. Certainly, you
should never rely on just the subject guide or your lecture notes to give
you an adequate understanding of any topic.
2. Talk about IS issues with your friends, family and fellow students.
Keep on talking. If you can’t talk about a subject then you are unlikely
to be able to write about it in an examination. Best of all is when you
can make jokes about the subject. To be able to joke about something
usually requires a good depth of understanding.
3. Take your learning out into the world – see Chapter 12. Visit
organisations and talk to people who work with or manage
information systems, both technical professionals and users. Ask lots
of questions and test your ‘book learning’ against what people in
responsible jobs actually worry about and what they actually do. Keep
a (digital) scrapbook of newspaper and magazine articles that relate to
the various parts of this syllabus. For example, try to find and keep one
such story each week during the course.
4. Revise carefully what you know about writing essays and reports in
English. What is a sentence and a paragraph? What are they for? How
do you structure one? When writing, how can you ensure that you
say all the things that you want to say, and don’t repeat a single idea
endlessly? Is your handwriting legible to other people; if not, is it
your responsibility to improve it? Take time to identify your strengths
and weaknesses as a writer and then work to emphasise the one and
address the other. Reflection and effort to improve your writing skills
will reap great benefits in the examination for this course and in many
other aspects of your work and academic life from now onwards.
19
1.9 Glossary of abbreviations

In this area of study, as in many others, you will find that people use many
acronyms and abbreviations. The following are the ones that we have used
in this guide; you will undoubtedly come across others in the course of
your reading and you are encouraged to add to this list.
ALU arithmetic and logic unit
ATM automatic teller machine
CAD computer-aided design
CAM computer-aided manufacturing
CASE computer-aided software engineering
CD compact disc
CIM computer-integrated manufacturing
CIO chief information officer
COTSS commercial off the shelf software
CPU central processing unit
CRM customer relationship management
DBMS database management system
DSS decision support system
DVD digital versatile disk
EIS executive information system
ERM entity–relationship model
ERP enterprise resource planning
ESS executive support system
FTP file transfer protocol
GUI graphical user interface
HTML hypertext mark-up language
HTTP hypertext transport protocol
HTTPS hypertext transfer protocol secure
IaaS infrastructure as a service
ICT information and communication technology
IP intellectual property
IP internet protocol (see also TCP/IP)
IPR intellectual property rights
IS information system
ISP internet service provider
IT information technology
kB (K) kilobyte
KMS knowledge management system
KWS knowledge work system
LAN local area network
mB (M) megabyte
MRPII manufacturing resource planning II
NGO non-governmental organisation
20
OIS office information system

RAIDs redundant arrays of inexpensive disks
RAM random access memory
RFID radio frequency identification
ROM read-only memory
SaaS software as a service
SAN storage area network
SCM supply chain management
TCP/IP transmission control protocol/internet protocol
TPS transaction processing system
UML unified modeling language
VLE virtual learning environment
VLSI very large-scale integrated circuits
VOIP voice over IP (internet protocol, see above)
VPN virtual private network
WAN wide area network
WIMP window, icon, mouse, pull-down menu
21
Notes
22
Chapter 2: Coursework
2.1 Introduction
This chapter provides an introduction to the coursework required for this
course. It lays out the general aims of the work, the approach you should
take and the basics of preparing and presenting your work.
2.1.1 Aims of the chapter

The aims of this chapter are to:
• introduce the two elements of coursework required to be submitted for
assessment
• emphasise the need for you to choose suitable topics for this work
from areas that are of interest to you
• indicate the methods and approaches we expect you to use in doing
this work
• give guidance as to the content and structure of the reports you will
prepare and the style of presentation we expect.
2.1.2 Learning outcomes

By the end of this chapter, and having completed the Essential reading and
activities, you should be able to:
• start to develop and document small computer applications using basic
packages (for example, word processor, database and spreadsheet)
• recognise the need to work methodically and to meet deadlines
• appreciate the distinction between analysis work and design work
• apply simple analytical and design techniques to systems development
• transform a paper design into a running application
• prepare a brief report on development work conveying a problem
description, a design and decisions taken with associated reasons
• reflect this experience back to the other parts of this syllabus.
Databases
practice. (London: Prentice Hall, 2008) 6th edition [ISBN 9780273713821]
Chapter 13, Section 13.2.
[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapter 6, Section 6.2.
Spreadsheets
[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapter 12, Sections 12.1 and 12.2.
23

[ISBN 9781292211756].
Look at the ‘Hands on MIS projects’ sections of the various chapters. This
will help you to appreciate the possibilities – for example, at the end of
Chapter 2, an example is given of a spreadsheet of purchasing data to be
used to help inform supply chain management.
2.2 Introducing the projects

We introduce here the project work that contributes 25 per cent to the
overall assessment. We do this at the start of the guide so that you start
to think about the assignments from the beginning of your studies. You
will need to do some further study before you start significant work on
the assignments so you should not rush into the work. However, thinking
about it from day one will be beneficial.
In particular, you need to spend some time thinking about the possible
areas that your work will relate to and the real world context or problem
that your database and spreadsheet will address. You will also need to
develop some general skills in using your software and spend a bit of time
exploring its capabilities. Modern spreadsheets and database systems
can do many things – in the jargon of the field we would say that they
have many functionalities and you cannot, and should not, try to use
all the features they offer in your coursework. However, you do need to
have a good general appreciation of what is possible before you focus on
your particular project. Note that the word ‘functionality’ is often used to
describe what we expect a system or item of software to be able to do.
Later in this guide when considering systems development we will talk
about the related concept of a ‘requirement’ as a statement of desired or
needed functionality. A major task of systems analysis work – work to
develop a new information system – is discovering the requirements of
people in the real world, and specifying them as functionalities that the
technology should provide. Thus we speak of a ‘functional requirement’.
The syllabus requires you to submit two items of work for marking.
Together, the two items of work count for 25 per cent of the marks:
• Preparation of a database project report (12.5 per cent). Further
details are in Chapter 18.
• Preparation of a spreadsheet project report (12.5 per cent). Further
details are in Chapter 19.
These assignments provide students with the opportunity to select and
undertake small ‘development’ projects using common computer tools,
spreadsheets and databases, but also tools for writing the reports such as
a word processor and perhaps a graphics editor for preparing diagrams.
The submitted reports are intended to document your work and to show
how you analysed a particular problem and designed and implemented a
computer-based solution.
In each case, the work must meet certain requirements and must be
submitted in the form requested. Note also that we specify that the marks
for this work are based principally on the report; that is, the written
document, and not on the spreadsheet or database itself. This is a subtle,
but important, distinction. Your job is to write a good report that identifies
and explains the work that you have done.
24
The exact choice of project is up to you, and you will need to work
carefully on identifying and developing your project ideas. Projects are
intended to be individual works, so they must be different to those of any
other student with whom you are studying. Make sure that your chosen
project areas are distinct and in an area with which you are familiar
and interested. Thus our recommendation is that your projects should
be developed out of some experience or interest that you have or some
application that you believe is needed in the world around you. It should
not be just a textbook exercise.
In both database and spreadsheet projects the Examiners want to see
evidence of the originality of the topic chosen as the basis for the work
and for the data used. In our experience as Examiners we have seen too
many students taking boring, abstract and over simple topics as the basis
of their work, or just replicating work based on some standard textbook
example. There is nothing wrong with reading textbooks on databases or
spreadsheet modelling, or exploring examples provided with your software
– indeed this is a good idea – but you must then go beyond any examples
you have studied and create your own projects based on your own chosen
application area.
For the database project, there are two central requirements – first, a
carefully developed class diagram to show those aspects of the world that
your databases will store data about. The second is a normalised data
model that serves as the design that you will implement in software. The
class diagram is the result of analysis work – you studying the world. The
data model, which leads on from the class diagram, is the result of design
work – taking the class diagram as its starting point. If the data model
is well executed, with entities identified, relations clearly expressed and
attributes specified, then the rest of the project – its implementation using
the software – will follow smoothly. In preparing the data model you must
show evidence that you have explicitly considered issues of normalisation.
Further details of class diagrams, data models and normalisation are
covered in Chapter 16 of this subject guide.
For the spreadsheet project, it is less easy to identify a specific or linked set
of fundamental requirements. To achieve a good mark, you need to select
an appropriate problem to tackle – one that has a reasonable quantity of
data and an underlying computational model that you can implement.
The best projects draw on real data that relate to some area that you
really understand or have researched. Weak projects are based on made-
up data or examples from books that provide models that are too simple
or too generic. Remember too, good spreadsheets are designed according
to sound principles. You thus need to give careful consideration to who
the user is, what they want, how the spreadsheet is structured, how it
looks on the screen and on the page, and the clear separation of input
data (independent variables) from formulas and parameters, intermediate
results and final output (dependent variables). Equally, you should choose
graphs and charts so as to provide particular and useful information to the
user and not just generate them for the sake of showing off every feature
of the spreadsheet package. For example, pie charts are easy to produce,
but are you sure that a pie chart is relevant in providing the user of your
spreadsheet with what they want or need?
It is also important for you to understand that the written report is what
the examiners mark. They do not receive any database or spreadsheet files
to run on a computer. Examiners do not expect any accompanying data of
program files with the project work, and if you submit files, they will not
be looked at. What examiners do expect to receive, printed on paper, is a
25
coherent account of the problem you tackled, the approach you used and
key details of how you analysed, designed and implemented your solution.
Any accompanying printouts, screenshots, database tables should only be
provided to support the written report and should be carefully chosen and
referred to in the report. If you just rely on lots of ‘printouts’ and fail to
write a coherent report, the examiners cannot give you many marks.
2.3 General rules for submission of assignments

For detailed guidance on completing and submitting coursework, you
should refer to the most up-to-date edition of the booklet entitled
Completing and submitting coursework and projects. This will give you
submission details for all the project work related to this subject and to
other subjects in the degree programme. A copy of the booklet can be
found on the course area of the VLE.
The booklet contains other useful and important information − for
example, telling you that you must retain a copy of your work and that
you should obtain a receipt from the post office or courier company when
you send it to the University. The booklet also explains that the two work
assignments for IS1060 Introduction to information systems must
all be bound together in a single volume in the sequence:
1. Database assignment.
2. Spreadsheet assignment.
The form accompanying the project work (contained in the booklet) must
be completely filled in and signed, and one copy should be used as the first
page of each assignment. Among other things, the form asks for details of
the hardware and software you used in the preparation of the assignment.
Simple straightforward answers are all that is required here, for example,
Hardware: Samsung NC10 note book and HP LaserJet 2600n; Software:
Microsoft Word 2013.
2.4 Reminder of learning outcomes

Having completed this chapter, and the Essential reading and activities,
you should be able to:
• start to develop and document small computer applications using basic
packages (for example, word processor, database and spreadsheet)
• recognise the need to work methodically and to meet deadlines
• appreciate the distinction between analysis work and design work
• apply simple analytical and design techniques to systems development
• transform a paper design into a running application
• prepare a brief report on development work conveying a problem
description, a design and decisions taken, with associated reasons
• reflect this experience back to the other parts of this syllabus.
26
Chapter 3: A short history of information systems
Chapter 3: A short history of information

systems
3.1 Introduction
In this chapter, we present an overview of the evolution of the subject of
information systems, with a particular focus on recent innovations that
have changed the way information systems are developed and used in
business organisations.
3.1.1 Aim of the chapter

The aim of this chapter is to:
• give you some background on the recent history of information
systems and information and communications technology.
The goal is not to learn this history for its own sake (interesting
and enlightening as it may be), but as a way to understand how the
information systems we use today have evolved to their present form and
the kinds of changes in this subject that we are living through today.

By the end the end of this chapter, and having completed the Essential
reading and activities, you should be able to:
• explain how the technical parts of a computer-based information
system and its principal components and structures work
• discuss the evolution of different types of information and
communication technologies and their consequences
• explain the significance of the history of contemporary information
systems and the importance of legacy systems
• explain the emergence of cloud computing and its predecessor
technologies
• discuss on how technologies may come to (in part) shape
organisations and business processes.

[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapters 5, 6 and 7.

Beynon-Davies, P. Business information systems. (London: Palgrave, 2013) 2nd
edition [ISBN 9781137265807] Chapters 5 and 6.
3.2 Information systems today

This course is about information systems as they have been developed and
used in organisations today and how they work to meet the needs of both
organisations and the people who work with them. We primarily consider
information systems to be associated with digital technologies – otherwise
known as ‘information technology’ (IT) or ICT if we add ‘communications’.
The technologies themselves are the subject of other academic fields such
as electronics, computer science, software engineering or communications
27
engineering. Although each of these fields will be relevant to us at times,

in this course they are at the edge of our primary concerns. In particular,
it is not appropriate to see these technologies in isolation from their
use by organisations and people, the tasks they help us to achieve, the
reasons we choose to use them (or not) or from the various services and
infrastructures they rely on.
Yet, it is hard to talk about information systems without, at the very least,
making some fairly important assumptions about the technology and
what it we expect it to be able to do. Even the most ‘business’-oriented
discussion of e-commerce, inventory management, payroll processing or
digital marketing will be based on assumption that the internet is widely
available, generally reliable, safe and secure, and that certain software
(e.g. web browsers, databases, accounting software, etc.) and various
types of devices (e.g. PCs, tablets, smartphones, cloud data storage) are
available, that people can use them and that they will work more or less
reliably.
Such a discussion will also reflect how the availability, characteristics and
uses found for this technology changes over time. For example, 10 or so
years ago we did not really have mobile internet-connected devices as we
understand these today – laptops in those days were sometimes known as
‘luggables’ and mobile phones (as you will see in in films dating from the
late 1980s) were the size of a small suitcase.
But today, in countries both rich and poor we are almost all using
mobile phones to access information systems (or we should say ‘part
of’ information systems) and, increasingly, we use multi-function tablet
devices such as the Apple iPad or audio-activated ‘virtual assistant’ devices
such as Amazon’s Alexa. It is also fairly clear that in another 10 years from
now, things will have changed again – although the authors of this guide
are not clever or confident enough to say exactly how – but change there
will be.
Many introductory textbooks provide an adequate coverage of basic
technologies, and most of you taking this course will have some
experience of using some types of ICT, although perhaps more in your
personal lives than in a business or organisational context. Indeed, what
you read about technology in textbooks may seem a little dated at times.
This is not surprising because it takes time for a textbook author to
conclude that something is important, to write about it with examples, for
the manuscript to be edited and the book to appear in a shop. Although, of
course, these same technologies might be able to speed up the process bit
perhaps? But it also reflects the fact that people who study technologies in
organisational settings understand that, while our attention may be drawn
to all things futuristic and new in technology, real organisations with long
histories will still use a fair amount of older technology, still functional and
performing usefully. So a little history, or attention to past trends as well as
promising futures, is still relevant today. And the language we use to speak
about information systems is very influenced by that past too.
Within most business organisations today (in update to 2019) working
on information systems is not all about digital analytics, virtual assistants,
smartphones, cloud services and social networking. An important part of
it is about managing the results of previous decisions and the technologies
of previous generations. For example, most organisations’ core databases
(storing the data on customers, products, inventory, invoices and
payments. etc.) will be running on software that is over five years old,
perhaps even 25 years old, and which is based on a basic technology (the
relational database) that is 40 plus years old.
28
We even have a name for such information systems and technology – we

call them legacy systems or legacy technologies, systems and technologies
that are handed down from a previous generation. We may also sometimes
see them described as the installed base. These are technologies that
are still usable, still useful, but not ‘state of the art’ by today’s standards.
Often projects to develop a new information system are constrained by the
legacy systems that surround them and with which new systems will still
need to interact. This is known as the constraints of the installed base.
3.3 A very simple model of basic computer hardware

Whether a computer is huge and powerful or small and portable, we
use the same general logical model to understand its structure. The
elementary model of a computer as a programmable data-manipulation
device is based on four interconnected hardware elements:
• an input device – to get data in
• memory (or storage) – to hold both data and the software that
specifies the data manipulation (the program)
• a central processing unit (CPU or processor) where program code
executed and thus data is manipulated
• an output device – to get results out or transmit them on a network.
In a small laptop or mobile phone, the CPU will consist of a single
microprocessor fabricated on a silicon chip. Instructions to the computer
as to what it is to do (the software, a program) as well as data are entered
via the input device (or devices – for a phone as a download from an
app store) and stored in the memory. From there, the instructions can
be fetched and executed by the CPU. Software allows the data stored
in the memory to be manipulated in various ways, and the results can
be displayed via the output device, for example, on the screen or over a
network to another device.
This simple model needs to be fleshed out in two directions. Essentially
the processor can be seen as having to perform two functions:
• It must understand program instructions so that they can be read and
executed in sequence (the basics of all software).
• By following the program instructions, it must manipulate data items.
The concept of memory also needs to be explored a little more. It is
essential to the character of any computer that it is a ‘stored program’ device
with programs (software) stored in its memory. The memory that holds the
current running program and the current data needs to be able to deliver
this to the CPU at great speed so as to avoid bottlenecks. In this simple
model there is only one CPU and it must not be kept waiting. (In real life,
computers both big and small will often have multiple processors working
in parallel and sharing access to some common storage). Some memory –
referred to as RAM (random access memory) or main memory – is plugged
into the body of the computer with a direct and high-speed connection to
the CPU. RAM is relatively expensive and the amount of data it can store
will be relatively small. When you turn off the computer’s power, whatever
is stored in RAM is lost. Thus, it is said to be volatile storage.
It is fundamental that a computer needs a program to follow in order to do
anything useful – but there is a chicken and egg problem here. How do the
instructions get into the memory if the volatile memory (RAM) is empty at
start up and, hence, the computer has no program to follow to allow it to
read some stored program from a secondary storage device? In practice,
29
you know there must be an answer, because when you switch on your
computer or phone, it does spring into life after a short time. That answer
is contained in a further form of memory – the ROM (read only memory).
ROM is another form of chip memory, but one that will permanently hold
the data that is written into it. A computer will have some small program
permanently stored within itself, one that is able to initiate the reading
of further programs from the secondary storage devices (e.g. discs on a
PC or, perhaps, chip memory). This is often referred to as the bootstrap
ROM, since it ‘pulls the computer up by its bootstraps’. This is where the
everyday expression to ‘boot’ or ‘reboot’ the computer derives from.
The description we have provided here of computer hardware is very brief
and somewhat minimal. This is not, after all, the main focus of this course.
However, you need to understand these few basic ideas of how a computer
works logically and schematically if you are to follow the wider discussions
when we come to explain how computers are used and their consequences
in the world.
3.4 A brief history of computers and networks

The computer that we take for granted today, and as sketched out in the
previous section, is usually acknowledged to have been ‘invented’ during
the Second World War. Both the ENIAC (Electronic Numerical Integrator
and Computer) machine and the Harvard Mark 1 were developed
by teams in the United States in order to undertake the intensive
computations required for the calibration of artillery. At the same time,
in Britain, engineers from the British Post Office developed the Colossus
machine for deciphering intercepted military communications, using
electronic technology drawn from telephone exchanges. Of course, ideas of
aiding or automating calculation and information storage are much older
than that: for example, the abacus (over 4,000 years old), which is still in
widespread use today in Asia, could be seen as an early ‘computer’.
The commercial computer industry, and the use of computers in business
organisations, started in earnest in the 1950s. For the next 30 years
computers were large, very slow (by today’s standards) and effectively
only available to large organisations. These computers were more or
less ‘centralised’ (located in one place), data was brought to them and
the results (printed on paper) produced were physically distributed. Up
until the 1970s and 1980s a chain of shops or the branches of a bank, for
example, might have a delivery of printed paper every day or two and
send back to the computer centre stacks of punched cards for processing.
Activity 3.1
1. From these global IT companies – Apple, Google, Baidu, Lenovo, IBM, Intel, Microsoft,
Oracle, Samsung, Acer, Arm, Lenovo, SAS and SAP – choose three to investigate. Use
the various company websites as the main basis for your research. For each company,
explain:
the primary expertise that each holds
the business model (or models) they use to generate revenues and make profits
(e.g. what they sell and to whom, and how).
The second 30-year period, from about 1980, was different. From the mid-
1990s computers began getting smaller and smaller and more and more
powerful, and communications networking became cheaper, faster, more
reliable and, increasingly, wireless (for short distances). The combination
of these two broad trends – smaller, more powerful computers and faster,
30
more flexible networks – brings us to today where computers are pervasive

and ubiquitous: they are found everywhere, in all kinds of devices and
usually embedded in a network that links them to other devices and
resources. Today we are also in the situation where many physical items
have a unique computer identity and can report data, be tracked and
monitored – think of the bar codes on your groceries. We even have a
name for the super linked-up assembly of technologies that can track and
identify just about everything, which is known as the internet of things.
The key underpinning technology driving this change over the last 40-
plus years has been the silicon chip or Very Large Scale Integrated Circuit
(VLSI), which has been accompanied by a range of other hardware
technologies such as fibre optics for fast digital networks, optical disks for
data storage (CDs), technologies that allow the efficient use of the radio
spectrum, new battery technologies, flat screens, and so on. Behind each
of these developments stands dedicated technology companies – large and
small – which have driven the pace of development. The most successful
companies that have pushed forward this technology are a range of
old, established names (e.g. IBM, Microsoft, Intel) and newcomers (e.g.
Google, Facebook, Apple). They each have their own specialisms in design,
manufacture, marketing, etc. and their own business models that allow
them to generate revenues and make profits. Some are more technical
(making hardware, writing software), some more marketing-based and
others more service-oriented.
Probably the most important idea that helps us understand the pace of
change in these technologies in the last 40 or so years is Moore’s law.
This law was first proposed by Gordon Moore, one of the founders of
the company Intel, in the 1960s. It states that the number of transistors
(elementary electronic circuits) that can be put on a silicon chip of any
given size (its density) doubles about every two years. Since it was first
proposed, the exact rate of doubling has been often debated – and is now
often stated as 18 months – but the general idea still holds today. The
implication is that the available processing power of a computer processor
on a silicon chip will double every 18 months as a result of technological
advances made in the hardware sphere. New possibilities and better, faster,
more complex capabilities are always in prospect. For this reason, for
example, we build information systems for rather short life cycles because
we expect that something better will be along soon. You can read more
on this and details of the various revisions and critiques of the law on
Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore%27s_law).
A second idea that can help us understand more recent change is
Metcalf’s law. This states that the value of a network is the square of the
number of connected users. This law helps to explain that, as networking
technologies have improved over the past 40 years, so too did the value for
users of being connected to them. With the arrival of the global internet
as well as mobile data via the mobile phone network, connectivity has
become almost universally available across the world, with users of the
most popular internet social media platforms numbered in billions. The
consequence of this has been what economists call a ‘network effect’
or ‘network externalities’. This makes it possible, and indeed positively
desirable, for organisations to link to the network and to source specific
services from it. This has led, for example, to the emergence of huge, new
internet-based technology companies such as Google, Alibaba or Amazon,
to the growth of cloud computing and to the potential for many more
‘services’ to be delivered digitally through the network. You can read more
on this and details of the various revisions and critiques of the law on
Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metcalfe%27s_law).
31
3.5 Modern taxonomy of computers

Laudon and Laudon (2018) in Chapter 5, Section 5.1 give a modern
taxonomy of computers. It has long been usual to classify computers into
various distinct types. You need to be familiar with this terminology, even
if has become, in some ways, too limited to encompass all the computer-
like devices we see around us and use ourselves. It is also the case that
today we can take for granted using a network (or ‘the’ network – the
internet), and the linking together of systems, to transmit data, share
resources and access all manner of special facilities.
Personal computers (PCs), desktops, workstations and laptops: These
are the computers with which we are most familiar both at home and at
work – a box of electronics (processor, memory, disks etc,) usually with
keyboard and screen that can function as a computer on its own, but
which is almost certainly connected to some network and thus to other
computers and information resources (e.g. the internet and the world wide
web). Until fairly recently, when the emergence of various new devices
such as smartphones and tablets have outnumbered them, these have been
by far and away the most common type of computer. They, and successor
devices like tablets, today allow all manner of people to have immediate
and dedicated access to a computer with a big screen, a keyboard and
mouse. Such a computer is usually only used by one person at a time,
although they are able to run more than one program at a time.
Workstation is the name sometimes used for a powerful PC, for example,
the computers used by scientists, engineers and computer professionals.
This is in contrast to the general-purpose PC that an office worker or
student may use.
Mobiles, tablets and palm tops: There is now a whole new generation of
computers, which are portable, mobile and multifunctional. They may be
based on mobile phones, laptops or tablet computers such as the Apple
iPad. Such devices use wireless networking (e.g. wi-fi, Bluetooth and/or
mobile phone networks) to connect to other computers and information
resources. Of course, their small size is a great advantage, but is also a
challenge in terms of providing suitable means of input and output. Today
this is often resolved (to some degree) by using touch screens and/or voice
recognition.
Data centres, enterprise servers, mainframes and supercomputers: A data
centre describes a large central computing resource for running programs
and storing data. Big companies that operate across the world may have
just a few such centres to service most of their corporate (enterprise)
computing needs. ‘Mainframe’ is an older term to designate large general-
purpose computers. For a long time, such machines were the basis for
large, centralised data-processing operations: the name ‘mainframe’ has
been used for at least 50 years. In practice, today such a major computer
resource may still exist, but it is likely to be made up of a number of
smaller computers all working in parallel and sharing a set of data
storage devices – disks mostly. An example would be the computers of a
bank, which handle customer accounts, or of a government department
supporting operations such as the issuing of passports, driving licences or
paying people’s pensions. In each case some of the ‘transactions’ supported
might be done online and directly by a customers or citizen, probably via
the internet and a website (see Figure 5.2 in Laudon and Laudon, 2018).
Supercomputers are machines that have been built to undertake high-
speed computations that may involve vast amounts of data. They are used,
32
for example, for performing engineering and scientific calculations. An

example of a use for a supercomputer would be weather forecasting.
Data centres and supercomputers are used for high-volume applications
with extensive data storage requirements and/or a lot of numerical
calculation. They generally still require special buildings with air-
conditioning and cooling systems to keep the computers and storage
devices running.
To check out the fastest and largest computing facilities in the world,
look at the website www.top500.org/ One modern example of a
supercomputing facility mentioned on this website is the computing
facility that supports the big CERN physics laboratory in Switzerland, and
in particular the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) where the Higgs boson has
been detected. It is known as the Worldwide LHC Computing Grid (WLCG)
http://wlcg.web.cern.ch/ This grid includes computers from over 100
sites across the world, including about 20 major data centres in different
countries, all connected by networks and operating together.
Cloud computing: In the wider world beyond science and engineering, a
similar idea to a Grid, known as Cloud computing, is now at the forefront
of computing and the development of new information systems. In this
case a large network of computing resources (processors and storage
devices) is made available for multiple users to use by the minute or by the
kilobyte of data – just as you pay for phone calls by the second in a ‘pay-
as-you go’ contract. Thus it is possible for a business organisation to ‘rent’
processing power and data storage capacity on an ‘as-needed’ basis from
a supplier of such services. There may be no need for even a very large
business to build and manage their own data centre, own any hardware of
software or even employ many IT staff. It can all, in theory, be delivered as
a service over the internet.
The cloud is sometimes termed a utility model, with parallels being drawn
between the ways we gain electricity or water as a standard product
from a utility company. Just plug in, use what you want and pay by the
unit consumed. Individuals too use cloud computing to, for example,
rent storage capacity for, say, general file and photo sharing sites such as
Dropbox (www.dropbox.com). Individuals may also use Cloud services
for providing software – for example, Google Apps www.google.com/apps
Cloud computing servers for storing data is discussed further in Chapter 8
of this guide and for providing software service in Chapter 9.
3.6 Client server computing

As we have noted a number of times above, almost all computers – from
your mobile phone to the largest data centre – are connected to networks
(e.g. the internet), and thus we can also describe them by their role within
the network. It is usual to identify two roles – that of a client computer,
which provides the interface to the user, and that of a server computer,
which provides services across the network to multiple clients. Thus,
my desktop PC is a client computer, when it connects to a mail server
computer across the network at the university so I can send or receive
emails. Figures 5.2 and 5.3 in Laudon and Laudon (2018) show schematic
descriptions of the client server approach.
More generally, the period from about the mid-1980s is described as the
‘client server era’, as networked units of computing resources were used
to build basic computing capacity, rather than relying on a small number
of big centralised mainframes. The internet and world wide web are
based on the principles of the client server approach. For a more detailed
33
description of client server computing and the Cloud, see Beynon-Davies

(2013) Chapter 6.
From the mid-1990s this era of client server was overtaken by what
Laudon and Laudon (2018) refer to as the ‘enterprise internet era’. Laudon
and Laudon (2018) end their discussion of the various era of computing
with what they call the ‘Cloud and mobile era’ which we are currently
experiencing. This categorises quite well the contemporary leading
edge in technology and infrastructure. Although, as they make clear in
acknowledging the ‘installed base’, earlier generations of technology
remain in use and are still quite central to the way we live and work.
Activity 3.2
Conduct online research into the benefits that businesses might accrue by integrating
mobile devices like smartphones into their business information systems and the kinds of
changes these may lead to. Consider this from the perspective of the organisation itself,
its employees and teams that work in the business, and then from the perspective of the
firm’s customers and suppliers. Note: a Google search for ‘mobile technology for business’
came up with a number of magazine and newspaper articles on this theme (as well as
some adverts for consultancy companies, which you can ignore).
3.7 Overview of chapter

This chapter has provided some technical and historical context to
the study of information systems today. It emphasises the evolution in
the technology available to business users in the past few decades, in
particular through use of new communications networking approaches.
The chapter also suggests that these technologies lead to some changes
in how tasks are undertaken, and in this way may come to shape how
business is conducted and how organisations are structured.

• explain how the technical parts of a computer-based information
system and its principal components and structures work
• discuss the evolution of different types of information and
communication technologies and their consequences
• explain the significance of the history of contemporary information
systems and the importance of legacy systems
• explain the emergence of cloud computing and its predecessor
technologies
• discuss how technologies may come to (in part) shape organisations
and business processes.
34
3.9 Test your knowledge and understanding

1. In a short report (300 words) describe four different developments in
information technology of the past 25 years that have influenced how
technology is used by organisations. In each case suggest what the
broader consequences of these technologies have been.
2. Find and describe three examples of a business use of client server
computing.
In each case, try to explain why this approach is used (e.g. the benefits
it brings) and what tasks (processing, data storage etc.) are handled by
the client and by the server.
3. Write a short essay (300–450 words) that introduces Metcalf’s Law
and Moore’s Law and show how each can help in understanding how
the field of information systems has developed in the past half century.
35
Notes
36
Section 2: Concepts underlying information systems
Section 2: Concepts underlying

information systems
In this section we introduce some of the history of information systems –

from the development of the first business computers – as well as some
underlying concepts upon which the study of information systems is built.
In particular, we discuss the concepts of information, data and systems,
and then move on to discuss software (computer programs) and data
storage technologies.
37
Notes
38
Chapter 4: Information and data
4.1 Introduction
This chapter explores ‘information’ and ‘data’. These are two fundamental
concepts underlying the use of information systems. It then links these to
the concepts of knowledge work and knowledge workers.

• discuss the twin concepts of information and data, and link them to
ideas of knowledge and knowledge work.

• explain the concepts of data and information, and the relationship
between them
• give illustrative examples to show how data and information relate
• discuss how information may have value
• explain the concepts of knowledge, knowledge workers and knowledge
work.

[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapters 1 and 2.
Beynon-Davies, P. Business information systems. (London: Palgrave, 2013,) 2nd
edition [ISBN 9781137265807] Chapter 3.

practice. (London: Macmillan, 1998) 2nd edition [ISBN 9780333732311]
Chapter 1.
4.1.5 Synopsis of chapter content

In this chapter we explore the core concepts that underlie information
systems in terms of their reliance on data and their production of (useful,
valuable) information. The chapter introduces data as facts about the
world, and information as selected, processed data in a form that is
valuable to inform decisions and actions. It explores the relationship
between the two in a simple model that takes data as raw material and
processes it to become information for a specific person/purpose. The
ability to use information in a task is then seen as knowledge work
– where a person brings their skills and experience (knowledge) to
interpreting the information and achieving some positive outcome.
39
4.2 What is information?

We use the word ‘information’ often in every day language, but it is a
notoriously difficult concept to pin down. It is often suggested that today
we live in an information age or an information society. One aspect of this
is found in the use that business organisations and governments make of
the data they collect and their use of it to create information that is critical
to their success: for example, for controlling their operations, making
decisions and achieving their goals. In particular, information is produced
and used for decision-making,and for taking action. This can range from
the most basic decisions that a computer can happily make on its own (for
example, is this item in stock and available to sell, or should £50 be issued
to this person, in response to the right PIN being keyed into an ATM?) to
bigger ones (such as, should we build a new factory in South America and,
if so, where?). Information is also traded as a commodity, for example, by
business intelligence companies such as Reuters or Bloomberg who process
and sell data on companies, stock and commodity prices, and provide
information to their clients around the world.
Our enhanced ability to use information resources (which is, in large
part, a result of the invention and refinement of information and
communication technologies) can have a profound impact on the shape
and structure of organisations and whole industries as well as on how they
are managed. For example, the rise of so called ‘budget airlines’ across the
world is partly a consequence of developments in aeroplanes and airports,
and the increasing desire of people to travel. But key to the emergence of
these new airlines has been their ability to make the sale of tickets directly
accessible to customers via the world wide web. Cutting out the middle
man, in this case travel agents, and keeping planes full by dynamically
adjusting ticket prices, helps to reduce prices and thus increase demand.
The budget airline pioneers understood that they could manage their data
and information resources in new and disruptive ways.
4.2.1 Information makes a difference

Despite the key role that information plays in all manner of organisations
and social arrangements, we do not have a single universally accepted
theory of information that explains the essence of the concept. Hence,
we can offer no single definition here. Many academic disciplines are
concerned with studying information, and various theories or accounts for
the nature of information have been proposed. Linguistics studies the way
in which meaning (information) is conveyed among people by the use of
language. In communications engineering, transmission of information is
studied, for example, the design of a telephone network to carry a certain
volume of calls. Logicians and philosophers have an interest in information
in the sense that information is truth or supports justified beliefs.
Statisticians explore and extract meaning out of quantities of observations
of events, and they seek to provide insight into the activities they study –
information. Economists also study information, because individuals make
economic decisions on the basis of what they know or believe to be true
– again, information. Economists also talk about ‘information asymmetry’
when two parties to a transaction have very different access to information
– one knowing more, and the other knowing less.
We could investigate further the concept of information as it is used in this
variety of disciplines, but we will not do so here. If you would like to know
more, Beynon-Davies (2013) Chapter 3 has an in-depth discussion on the
topic. For the purposes of this subject guide, a fairly simple underpinning
40
of the concept can be used, for example, this definition: ‘Information is

knowledge about the world that is sought by people in order to satisfy
their psychological needs and on the basis of which they can take action or
make decisions.’
Contrast this definition of information with that given in Laudon and
Laudon (2018), Beynon-Davies (2013) and in other works you may have
come across. How similar are they?
This definition has a number of important themes. It suggests that:
• People value information, because they actively seek it.
• Information tells us something about the world – that is, it
communicates some state of affairs to us.
• People seek information because they will use it. This may be
either directly or they may use it to make decisions of some kind.
This decision-making aspect of information is usually stressed in
consideration of information systems in a business or organisational
context.
4.2.2 Knowledge work and knowledge workers

Focusing on information’s importance to people in their working lives
(e.g. task and people in the Leavitt diamond) leads us to emphasise the
growing number and importance of jobs and roles that rely on an advanced
ability to use information. People who do such jobs and have such roles are
usually referred to as ‘knowledge workers’ (sometimes contrasted with ‘data
workers’). Knowledge workers do knowledge work; when information is
being used it requires one or more knowledgeable person (e.g. who have
the skills and experience to interpret the information and act upon it).
Activity 4.1
1. Contrast the definition of information given above with that given in Laudon and
Laudon (2018), Beynon-Davies (2013) and in other textbooks. How similar are they,
what are the common themes?
2. Review the definition of knowledge work found in Laudon and Laudon (2018),
Chapter 11. What kinds of tasks do knowledge workers perform in organisations?
What kind of a lower threshold would you establish to differentiate a knowledge
worker from any other employee?
Knowledge workers are people who have specific knowledge, probably

with degrees and other qualifications and who bring specific skills to
work. For example, they might be professionals such as architects, lawyers,
accountants or engineers, or more generally skilled in some aspect of
work such as designers, programmers. Each of these kinds of knowledge
workers may need specific computer systems to help them work, for
example a design workstation for an engineer (or a fashion designer) to
help prepare a new design for manufacture. Other examples of knowledge
workers might include doctors and nurses, (making diagnoses or choosing
drugs for a patient), bank executives (assessing credit risks), and
information technology engineers (configuring computers).
These people each have a distinct problem domain they work in, and each
can be supported by access to specific tools, data and information. Thus
one class of information system we will discuss are knowledge work
systems. We also speak about knowledge management systems
(KMS). These are distinct in that KMS are focused on collecting and
sharing knowledge within an organisation or community. One particular
41
type of a knowledge management system is an expert system in which

some rules (e.g. knowledge) are established in a knowledge base,
together with software that is capable of making inferences based on
this knowledge, with a user interface that allows a knowledge worker to
interrogate the knowledge and the inferences made.
For example, in theory at least, any doctor making a diagnosis could
use an expert system to make the best choice of diagnosis given the
symptoms seen. The knowledge in the system may have been ‘extracted’
from the world’s best doctors and the thousands of cases they have seen.
However, this all depends on the relevant knowledge being capable of
being formalised in rules of some sort, experts being willing and able to
share what they know, and everyday doctors thinking that it is worth the
effort to use the system. In practice today it is seldom done in this way in
medicine or other technical fields.
However, in the last decade new techniques based on using big data
(e.g. many examples of a situation under study), and an AI (artificial
intelligence) technique called machine learning (ML), have emerged. Thus
arguably, we are on the verge of a big improvement in the way we can
capture and operationalise knowledge.
In today’s world, knowledge workers frequently do some (or even most)
of their work using computers and specialised software designed for
their kinds of tasks. They also usually work in teams and so data and
information will be exchanged among their co-workers by technical means
– sending an email, posting on a website, updating a database or blog,
consulting a knowledge management system, or perhaps by tweeting.
Sometimes we talk about knowledge workers sharing and communicating
their expertise through a ‘knowledge base’ or knowledge management
system (KMS), which is a specific type of database system focused on
storing knowledge, insights or case experience in a way that they can be
searched for future insights. Thus a lawyer may use a KMS to access a
knowledge base of laws and specific legal judgments or an engineer may
search in a database of previous designs to find an example of a solution
to a particular type of problem. In each case knowledge is being stored for
future use and is made easily available and searchable.
4.3 The value and cost of information

We value information, we seek it out and we use it. But the information
we use in our daily lives is not always freely available or free in terms of
a direct cost to us. Although we sometimes expect to pay for information,
often the cost is hidden. Consider, for example, the information you can
obtain by using Google searches. Is it absolutely free to you? Is there
any way in which you pay? If we use a search engine to find out what is
on at the cinema, this information may appear to come at zero cost, but
somebody paid for your smartphone, the network and the web design of
the cinema site – probably you or people like you in one way or other.
Businesses and other organisations will devote considerable resources to
ensuring that they have, or can, access the information they need, and
that their presentation and use of information supports their business
objectives. This leads them to building up suitable information resources
and developing information systems with the specific aim of storing and
making information available. Some will be essentially internal to the
organisation, others outward facing. An example of the first would be
a system to schedule production in a factory, of the second a website to
advertise and inform people about the products for sale.
42
Activity 4.2
1. Why do people pay for information – for example, when they buy a textbook, novel or
daily newspaper? Is there any information that you believe should always be available
for free to all, or perhaps to citizens of a particular country? Should, for example, all
personal tax records be made public online, as is done in some Nordic countries?
2. Why do we speak today about our society as an ‘information society’? What do you
understand as the primary characteristics of an information society? Is it just about
the use of computers and networks or the acquisition and processing of data, or does
it signify more?
3. Provide, in your own words, a definition of the concept of a knowledge worker.
Give four carefully chosen and contrasting examples of a knowledge worker and
explain how each of these people works with information and suggest what formal
information systems they might use.
Above we suggest that information has some value and that it is therefore
worthwhile spending resources to improve the availability of information
and its quality. The value of information may be based on a number of
characteristics – whether the information is:
• reliable and accurate
• accessible
• up-to-date or timely
• conveniently presented
• at an appropriate level of detail
• reduces our uncertainty
• exclusive
• pleases (e.g. in the sense of a story, a cartoon or a song evokes a direct
response from the receiver)
• enables some other valued task.
In general, the cost of producing and delivering information will be
significant. An organisation will need to use various types of resources,
including people and technology, to produce, manage and distribute
information. In this way too, our approach to information systems is ‘socio-
technical’ – a combination of concern and consideration for people (what
they do and what they want) and concern for the technologies.
Activity 4.3
Review Section 1.3 in Curtis and Cobham (2008) on the value of information. Explain
the links between the ‘three contemporary approaches to information systems’ presented
by Laudon and Laudon (2018) in Chapter 1 and the ways in which we might value
information.
4.3.1 Intellectual property

We sometimes describe information as intellectual property (IP) or speak
of intellectual property rights (IPR). IPR means that information may be
owned or controlled by somebody, for example, the owner of the copyright
of a book or of a pharmaceutical patent or a company trademark. You can
read the book and make use of what it says (e.g. a cookbook), but you
cannot legally make photocopies of the book and sell them. Patents are
another example of intellectual property rights which bestow a different
sort of ownership to information – ownership of ‘ways of doing things’ but
43
for a limited period of time only. Patents are very important in research-
intensive industries (e.g. knowledge industries) such as the pharmaceutical
industry, whose economics are based on undertaking costly research into
new drugs with the potential for then exploiting them exclusively in the
market for the period of time they can claim patent protection. When
patents run out, anybody can use the ideas that were patented. Patents can
also be sold, licensed and traded, another example of information having
monetary value.
Activity 4.4
Before you continue working your way through this chapter of the subject guide, read
Chapter 6 of Avgerou and Cornford (1998), which has a longer discussion of information
as a theoretical theme in information systems.
Another way to categorise information is as either descriptive or

probabilistic. An example of descriptive information might be the layout
of a city on a map or the number of items in stock in a warehouse. An
example of probabilistic information would be an economic forecast of the
pound–yen exchange rate in two years’ time or the demand for items from
the warehouse over the next two months. Descriptive information can be
traced back to some real-world event or phenomenon, but probabilistic
information can only be traced back to an abstract model and is, in general,
not 100 per cent accurate. An economist can make a ‘informed guess’ at the
inflation rate next year, drawing on some descriptive information, but it is
still only a guess and it may be a bit wrong or even very wrong.
Information may be of high or low quality. A good team of economists
will be expected to produce better forecasts of inflation than a bad team.
How do we know which team is good? We need more information – we
can look at where they received their university education or, better still,
their previous record at forecasting. Similarly, a better camera will take a
picture with higher resolution and detail than a cheap one, and thus it will
contain more potential information of a descriptive kind. But, as we know,
higher resolutions = more pixels = bigger file = need for more storage
and network bandwidth. So the higher quality information comes at a
cost.
4.3.2 Is more information better than less information?

Often what we implicitly mean by ‘good’ information is exactly the right
information, with no wastage; not too much, not too little. A paper phone
book used to contain many names and phone numbers and had they been
randomly organised, they would be of little use. So phone directories,
in their original book form, were organised systematically to enable a
particular number to be found, assuming that the user knew the name of
who they were looking for. In this way we have potential access to a lot of
information, but we can home-in quickly on what we need. In the world
wide web we have the ultimate example – there is an almost unlimited
information available on the web, and search engines enable us find what
we want quickly and easily most of the time.
In a managerial context, an excess of ill-organised information is often
described as information overload. This where a manager or user receives
too much information and cannot determine which parts are important
or relevant. The design of computer-based information systems should be
based on a good understanding of people’s particular information needs
at different times and their ability to handle information. Good systems
should be able to deliver the required information, appropriately organised
44
at the right level of detail. They should not cause information overload.
This is easy to say, but can be far harder to do. How many times have you
looked at a website desperate for a particular item of information and
cursed the designer who seemed to think that putting more and more
information on the site would please more people!
Activity 4.5
1. Think of an example in your own life when you suffer from information overload.
What do you do about it?
2. Look at a selection of information presentations that you use in your everyday life,
for example, a bus timetable, a film listing, a Facebook page, your college timetable
or the contents page of this subject guide. Are these sources of information as well
presented and useful to you as they could be? Can you suggest some improvements?
4.4 Data and information

If information is approached in the manner introduced above – as useful,
valued and relevant intelligence about the world, and hence with value –
then data1 might be approached in a much more direct manner. If we want 1
Data is strictly a plural
to keep it very simple (too simple perhaps) then data is just symbols stored noun (the plural of
or processed in a computer. Another way to describe data is as a medium datum). It has become
common to use it as
for conveying information. Giving it a rather larger role, data is defined
if it were singular.
in the Glossary of Laudon and Laudon (2018) as ‘Streams of raw facts So, rather than say
representing events occurring in organisations or the physical environment ‘these data are’, we
before they have been organised and arranged into a form that people can say ‘this data is’. You
understand and use.’ This is probably a better way to understand data – it will see that we have
adopted this approach
is about the world, events and facts.
in this guide reflecting
In this sense, data can be the basis for information – the raw material – but common usage in the
only if someone seeks it out and interprets it. This may require the person English language. We
to specify what data is sought and then to apply some form of processing apologise to purists
who want to uphold the
to the data, perhaps summarising it or by statistical or mathematical
old distinction between
analysis. If the data is in a computer system, it will have to be extracted datum and data.
and displayed in an appropriate manner – as in the queries and reports
you will design in your database project or the models and charts you will
use in your spreadsheet project.
Data has always been central to how we have used computers and how
we have built information systems. But up until the last decade or so,
we mostly worked with quite small amounts of data – usually collected
for quite specific purposes – for example, the kinds of records a business
keeps about its customers, their orders and their payments. But times have
changed. Today there is much more data available because many more tasks
or actions are supported by technology which spins off data all the time. In
addition, we are more aware of its potential value and have technologies
that can store and handle data in large volumes. This is what we might call
the era of ‘big data’ and is discussed further in Chapter 6 of this guide.
For example, each morning as I come to work in London I use my phone
to read the paper, my machine-readable travel pass to go through the Tube
gates, and my debit card to pay for a cup of coffee. Each time I use any
one of these devices, data about me is collected – my phone’s location is
tracked by the phone company; if I read the newspaper on my phone the
software and service I use ‘knows’ what stories I look at and how long for;
if I search online for winter boots, this too is being noted and will feed
back into the adverts I see on the screen. The bank, through my debit card,
knows where I was at 08.34 am today (I was buying coffee) and London
Transport (the bus and Tube company) has perhaps 10 years of my day-
45
by-day travel data to analyse if so wishes and similar data on millions of

other people too. This kind of data may be useful to help inform future
investment decisions or manage today’s operations. With all that data,
anyone with access can certainly tell with quite good accuracy where I
live, where I work, what kind of coffee I like and who my friends are. This
this data could be a useful resource to help all sorts of businesses make
decisions and target me with product or services. It could equally be seen
as a sinister conspiracy of surveillance that attacks my individual privacy
and my personal freedom.
This is not the right time to get into this debate, but what we can probably
agree on is that there is more data available today on all our daily
activities, emanating from all kinds of devices and objects. For example,
cars and trucks today have sensors and record details of where they go,
how fast and how the various parts are behaving. (Are the rear wheel
bearings getting too hot? Should we replace them?). With more powerful
technologies and analytical software, people do find useful way to use
that data. This is the field known as big data analytics. But people will
also find ways to use the data that we feel is not right. We may then at
least agree that this level of data generation and use has implications and
consequences that we need to think about.
Activity 4.6
1. Look through various textbooks and reference sources (e.g. Wikipedia, a dictionary)
and make a collection of their different definitions of information. How much variety
is there to be found? Do you prefer some definitions to others?
2. A recent report ‘Science as an Open Enterprise’, published in June 2012 by the Royal
Society (available at: http://royalsociety.org/policy/projects/science-public-enterprise/
report/) offered the following definitions of data, information and knowledge:
Data: Numbers, characters or images that designate an attribute of a phenomenon
Information: Data becomes information when they are combined together in ways
that have the potential to reveal patterns in the phenomenon.
Knowledge: Information yields knowledge when it supports non-trivial, true claims
about a phenomenon.
This is a report written by scientists and reflects the way that they see the concepts
we have discussed here. Do you see their definitions as fully compatible with the
discussion here? To what extent do their definitions reflect the fact that they are
scientists? How does this contrast with our status as ‘managers’ or ‘social scientists’?
(Note that we do not suggest that you read this report. But it is always good practice
to cite the sources you use when writing.)
3. Does a knowledge worker’s knowledge come mostly in the form of knowledge of (i)
some kind of theory, (ii) some facts about the world, or (iii) does it come in the form
of practice and experience? Use examples of particular kinds of knowledge worker to
explain your answer.

This chapter introduced the concept of data and information in a linear
model in which data represents facts about the world, events, transactions
etc. Information is then purposefully selected data that is processed so
as to satisfy the need of some person – or perhaps some algorithm. The
chapter discussed why information (and data) has value. The chapter
also introduced the concept of knowledge work and knowledge workers
– those with the skills and experience to interpret information and release
(or capture) its value in decision making.
46

• explain the concepts of data and information, and the relationship
between them
• give illustrative examples to show how data and information relate
• discuss how information may have value
• explain the concepts of knowledge, knowledge workers and knowledge
work.

1. The extract below is taken from a publication of the Institute of
Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.
‘Management needs timely, high-quality information in order to run
their businesses effectively and to facilitate compliance with statutory
and regulatory requirements. Control of the quality of information is
therefore a major function of management.’
What sorts of control do you think are appropriate in order to ensure
the quality of information?
2. When you use the Google search engine or Facebook you are presented
with adverts that are targeted at your interests as they have been
revealed in your recent searches or messages sent using these systems.
Investigate how this is done and how these companies collect data
about you and make money by targetting ads (see for example Laudon
and Laudon (2018) section 4.3 and discussion of Google AdSense, see
also Figure 4.3). Do you have any concerns about your activities online
being monitored and mined for data, and this data being used to select
specific adverts to show you?
3. What are the potential advantages and drawbacks of using big data
techniques in order to provide better information to managers or
to allow us to automate activities? Find a relevant real example to
illustrate your answer – for example in marketing, sport, medicine or
managing public transport.
47
Notes
48
Chapter 5: The ‘systems’ of information systems
Chapter 5: The ‘systems’ of information

systems
5.1 Introduction
In this chapter we explore the concept of a ‘system’ which is fundamental
to how we talk about, design and manage information activities in
organisations.

• introduce the concept of a system and explore its relevance to the
study of information activities.

• explain the principal features and characteristics of a system and apply
these ideas to practical information systems examples
• describe information systems as a combination of technical and social
elements and explain the implications of this perspective.

[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapters 1 and 2.

practice. (London: Macmillan, 1998) 2nd edition [ISBN 9780333732311]
Chapters 1 and 6.

This chapter introduces the concept of a system in general and explores
how it can be applied to the study of information systems. It contrasts
a ‘systems view’ of information systems with a ‘tool view’ that is
applied more narrowly to specific uses of computer technologies in
organisations. The chapter emphasises that, as purposive entities set
within organisations, information systems are essentially sociotechnical in
character.
5.2 Systems
We speak throughout this course about information systems, by which we
mean purposive uses of ICTs by businesses or any other kind of organisation
to provide needed information to allow it to operate. But what does the
word ‘system’ mean or imply? As we show here the idea of a ‘system’ is a
useful and helpful way to think about what ICT can do. In particular the
concept of an information system is different to an approach that simply
looks at computers as exclusively technical devices or as direct and obvious
routes to solving individual and isolated information-handling needs.
49
Thus we can contrast an ‘information systems’ view with what is often

called a ‘tool’ view. Tools are devices designed to be used to undertake
a particular task – we could say they have specific functionalities. Think
of a hammer, a pair of scissors, a spade or a machine tool in a factory.
Computers can be thought of in this way too. People sometimes say, when
trying to cut through a complex or difficult situation involving computers,
‘Oh, in the end it’s just a useful tool’, implying that the technology is (or
should be) suitable to some specific task and subservient to its users –
literally and metaphorically ‘in their hands’.
The information systems view, sometimes also called the ‘ensemble view’,
in contrast sees the technology as part of a package of things that includes
people (users, managers, customers, programmers etc.) with skills, work
practices, beliefs and assumptions, and who are organised in various ways.
From this perspective technology is not a simple ‘tool’ in somebody’s hands
(or, rather, not just a tool), but is a part of a complex set of arrangement
of different types of people doing different tasks and using (sharing)
different technical devices and resources. This shared emphasis on people
and technology as bound up together (ensemble) is of course the basis
for the sociotechnical view, introduced in Chapter 1 and which we discuss
throughout this subject guide.
5.2.1 What is a system?
Activity 5.1
Before working through this next section, read Section 1.1, Chapter 1 of Laudon and
Laudon (2018) and Chapter 2 of Beynon-Davies (2013).
If you have time, you could also look at Chapter 1 and 6 of Avgerou and Cornford
(1998).
A common definition proposes that a system is a collection of components

that interact together and collectively undertake a common purpose.
Systems can be closed systems that have no interaction beyond
themselves or open systems that interact with and change their
environment (beyond their own boundary). Figure 5.1 schematically
shows a system that is made up of interacting components and takes
inputs from its environment and provides outputs to it. The system is
controlled or steered by some feedback process that ensures that, as far as
possible, the desired output is produced.
Activity 5.2
Consider an air-conditioning system. Its main components are a compressor unit, a fan,
ducting and a thermostat that senses the temperature and controls the compressor,
turning it on or off. Explain this system in terms of it being an open or closed system, the
inputs and outputs involved and the control process or feedback that steers the system.
What would you see as the ‘purpose’ of the system? What does it strive to achieve? How
does the output of the system change the environment and thus the input?
50
Input
System Boundary
Feedback
Output
Figure 5.1: A system in its environment.
Activity 5.3
1. Would you consider the economic system of your country as an open system or a
closed system? What are the reasons for your answer?
2. Taking the online store Amazon as a system embedded in an environment of
potential purchasers (of course, it is more than that), explain, with an example, how
the control or feedback might work. First consider what the inputs and outputs are
and what the purpose of the system is. Then try to show how information on outputs
can ensure more or better inputs.
Hint: If outputs are books shipped to people, how can we use that data to improve the
number of inputs (e.g. orders)?
Information systems are, almost by definition open systems – although

specifying their boundary (exactly what is inside and what is outside) can
be tricky and debatable. Thus, information systems will have some relation
with the environment beyond their boundary – accepting inputs and
generating outputs. For example, a payroll system for a company might:
• take from its environment (the wider organisation) data about who
worked how many days as inputs as well as the pay rates for certain
posts
• process this data in various ways to calculate how much to pay people
and how much income tax to deduct
• generate as output instructions to a bank to transfer money to the
employees’ bank accounts as pay, and to the government as tax
payments.
This process has some effect on the company itself (the system’s direct
environment). If people are paid on time and correctly there is one effect;
if they are paid late or too little, there is another. When the government
receives the taxes, it will use them to improve or change the environment
too, so the affected environment reaches beyond the single organisation.
The principal interactions between an information system and its
environment can be described as the:
• receipt of signs or signals from the environment as inputs
• storage and/or processing of the inputs in an organised manner as
data
• manipulating the data to create information (for people to use or to
directly initiate action)
• passing signs and signals back into the environment as outputs.
Outputs will in general be created in response to some input – for example
an input may be a request for some stored data to be processed and
51
displayed. Another example might be an order for goods as an input, and

instructions to the warehouse to dispatch them as output (plus perhaps an
instruction to the factory to make more if they are selling fast, and for the
finance department to send an invoice for payment).
Overseeing this process to check that it operates correctly will be some
form of control mechanism. Controls are based on feedback, either
positive or negative. Within the computer component of an information
system, this control activity is one of the tasks of software, but it must be
remembered that information systems are more than just computers and
that control activity (processing feedback, making decisions, pursuing the
purpose) will also be undertaken by people. Control issues are discussed
further in Beynon-Davis (2013) Chapters 1 and 2.
5.3 Information systems as systems

Information systems are purposive systems. They are established for
particular reasons and have objectives or goals, and are designed or
established to achieve specific ends. In the case of an organisation’s
computer-based information systems, the stated end will generally be
to satisfy the information requirements of particular people or classes of
people, for example, bank managers or bank customers. At a higher level we
could say that information systems are established to serve an organisation’s
overall strategy (i.e. to help it do what it wants or chooses to do).
Activity 5.4
Review the distinction made in Laudon and Laudon (2018) between a formal information
system and an informal information system. How important are informal information
systems, are they purposive in the same way as formal systems?
In general for something to be described as a system it needs to meet

certain requirements:
• It is made up of a number of different interconnected components.
• It is an open system, with inputs as data coming in and outputs going
back into its environment.
• The data is stored and processed within the system and in this way
feedback is generated to control the system and allow it to influence
its environment.
Control is exercised within an information system by a combination of
the logic of the software and the actions of people. If I make a payment
for £10 more than my credit card limit, software alone can decide to let it
through. If I make a payment for £1,000,000 I do not really expect to get
away with it, and the software should trap the transaction and pass it to a
person for follow up.
This last point is important to emphasise once again. An information
system comprises more than computers and software – that is just
a computer system. Information systems include people, and when
information systems are studied or designed, people, the organisations
they belong to and the tasks they do are as central as the technology
(remember Leavitt’s diamond and the sociotechnical perspective in
Chapter 1). To emphasise this perspective we can offer an alternative
definition of information systems saying that, ‘information systems are
social systems supported by technology’. This is another way to express a
sociotechnical approach to the whole subject.
52

This chapter has discussed systems ideas in general and as they are applied
to information systems. It emphasised that information systems, as systems
made up of various different components including technology and people,
and pursuing a purpose, are sociotechnical phenomena.

• explain the principal features and characteristics of a system and apply
these ideas to practical information systems examples
• describe information systems as a combination of technical and social
elements and explain the implications of this perspective.

1. Explain the concept of a system, using two well-chosen examples that
embody digital technologies. Illustrate through your examples how
the control function in a system can help it pursue its purpose and
influence its environment.
2. Airlines use large information systems to enable travel agents,
airport staff and individual customers around the world to check on
the availability of seats, to make bookings and to access tickets and
boarding cards. Considering this as an information system, identify
the main components in the system, the inputs and outputs, the
technology used, the various people and organisations involved,
and the types of information that they require (their information
requirements).
3. ‘Formal information systems are what we mostly focus on as IS
professionals, but in real organisations it is the informal systems that
are the most important. To establish effective new formal systems we
mostly have the necessary skills, but for the informal we really do not.’
Discuss this statement and clearly explain your own views.
53
Notes
54
Chapter 6: Managing data with technologies
Chapter 6: Managing data with

technologies
6.1 Introduction
Data is central to all aspects of information systems, both in the overall
theory and understanding, and in the real world where they are used. In
today’s world and even more in tomorrow’s we potentially have a great
deal of data to capture and use. Of course there are some concerns about
this, concerns about personal privacy, about monopoly suppliers, about
fake or manipulated data. We might also worry about relying too much on
what is easily captured, losing sight of other aspects of the world that are
not so easy to resolve into digital data.

• introduce and explore the concept of data as it is used in information
systems
• consider the ways that data is managed in information systems and the
tools and technologies used for this purpose.

• explain the concept of data as a resource
• describe the concept of big data
• explain why today might be described as representing a new ‘big data
era’ for information systems
• describe the principal features and characteristics of a data
management systems including cloud storage of data, and the use of
database management software
• discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the database approach
to information systems in which data is pooled and shared across an
organisation.

[ISBN 9781292211756]. Chapter 6 covers most of the topics introduced here.
Cloud data storage is described in Chapter 5 and Chapter 12 covers issues of
data and decision making.
edition [ISBN 9781137265807]. Chapters 3 (in particular section 3.4) and 6
discuss data, cloud computing and data security.
Chapters 3 and 8.

This chapter discusses the nature of data as a resource for information
systems. The chapter discusses how data is stored, including as files of
55
records and in shared databases which may be in local storage or in

the cloud. Data is understood in terms of its volume as conventionally
measured, and in terms of the contemporary era of big data. This is
supplemented by discussion of variety of data, its velocity and potential
value.
6.2 Data at work

As we noted in Chapter 4 of this guide, Laudon and Laudon (2018)
define data as: ‘Streams of raw facts representing events occurring in
organisations or the physical environment before they have been organised
and arranged into a form that people can understand and use.’
This may not be a perfect definition, but it does convey the idea that data
comes from the environment and activities in the world first and then
needs to be collected and stored prior to being ‘organised and arranged’
for various uses by people. In systems terms, data is then an input – a
necessary input. and a fundamental resource for organisations. The
chapter also considers the ways in which data is acquired or collected,
organised and arranged (e.g. processed and put to use). As a ‘resource’
data is valuable for organisations and they will want to capture and save
as much as they can that is useful to them.
Our current era is sometimes described as the era of big data – where
organisations are deliberately moving to generate and use more-and-more
data about their activities as well as their products, staff, customers and
anything else they can calibrate or measure. Much of the ‘new’ data is
already generated, but traditionally has been discarded. Some writers talk
about ‘data exhaust’, as a term for the lost data that is (or was once) just
thrown away but is now seen a being valuable.
Explanations of the turn towards big data include our newly developed
ability to generate and capture great volumes of data as a by-product of
business processes that rely on technology. Big data also relies on that
availability of networks and cloud services to capture, store and transmit
data, all leading to reductions in the cost of data acquisition and storage.
It also depends on companies having the skills and infrastructure to make
good use of big data. Indeed the real limiting factor that slows the take up
of big data techniques may be less about technology, and more about lack
of people with the skills to analyse and use big data.
Here is a simple example of big data at work: A refrigerated delivery truck
driving on the highway from one city to another would once have been
generating no data at all for information systems. Perhaps at the end of
the day their driver might report in briefly, but that was it. Not today. As
the truck drives along it will almost certainly be sending data by wireless
to a tracking service. For example, every 20 seconds it can send data on
its speed and fuel consumption, the temperature of the cargo, the hours
worked by the driver, the temperature of the engine oil, the heat of the
gearbox, the weight of the load, the route it is taking, the weather along
the way and so on and so on. This provides vast amounts of data and is
fairly easy to do given this is all available from various devices fitted to the
truck. But why would we want to capture and use all this data?
Activity 6.1
Read the opening section of Chapter 4 of Laudon and Laudon (2018), ‘The dark side of
big data’.
In your opinion what are the three main ethical issues that big data raises? Briefly justify
your answers with examples.
56
Business understands that any and all of this data is potentially useful; to
the trucking company, the senders of the goods, the people expecting a
delivery and the maintenance engineers from the company that runs the
truck and the design engineers at the company that built the truck– and
probably lots of other people too. For example the data on speed or weather
might be useful to a company running a service like Google Maps if it can
show congestion on the road – and this company may pay for such data.
Some of the data will be used in ‘real-time’ and perhaps then discarded,
but much of the data will be collected and added to other similar data
from other trucks and elsewhere and can be analysed in the future for
multiple purposes.
One common way to think of big data is in terms of the 4 Big Vs:
• Volume
• Velocity
• Variety
• Veracity
or even a fifth V for Value.
Activity 6.2
Research online the concepts behind the 4 (or5) Vs of big data.
In what ways do each of the Vs change the way that information systems work and what
we expect them to do for an organisation?
To use big data organisations need to start learning and applying various
new analytical tools and techniques, including statistics and forecasting
to help provide new services that are able to inform decision making by
humans (e.g. Google Maps using traffic data to show congestion on roads
to drivers in real time so they can make decisions about their route). Big
data may also be used to drive automated forms of decision making that
use AI (Artificial Intelligence) technologies. For example, extensive data
bases of patient data with X-rays and MRI scans, as well as treatments
and outcomes, can drive new diagnostic systems to support doctors. The
technology behind this (i.e. using big data on past events and outcomes to
drive intelligent algorithms) is known as ‘Machine Learning’. To read more
about this see a medical example on the website of the company ‘Deep
Mind’ at https://deepmind.com/blog/moorfields-major-milestone/
6.3 Everything is data

Everything we store in a computer is data, and that includes the
computer’s programs, both systems software and applications. As a
resource stored in your computer, data can come in many forms (e.g. text,
sound, numbers, images). From the perspective of a computer’s storage
devices it is all the same. Data, whatever its origin, takes the form of
binary patterns − sequences of 1s and 0s – what we sometimes call bit-
strings. The one and the zero can be stored in terms of an electrical charge
or a magnetic polarity. These technical details need not concern us here,
but in all cases the basic unit of storage is the bit (one binary digit − a 0 or
a 1). It is however common to group 8 bits together as a byte. Bytes form
the basis for measuring storage capacity, as in these approximations:
• a kilobyte (kB) 1000 = 103 bytes – which is close to 210 (1024) bytes
• a megabyte (MB) 1,000,000 = 106 bytes – which is close to 220 bytes
(just over 1 million in decimal)
57
• a gigabyte (GB) – 109 bytes close to 230

• a terabyte (TB) – 1012 bytes close to 240
• a petabyte (PB) – 1015 bytes close to 250
Commonly we use these abbreviations of KB, MB, GB, TB, PB respectively,
although strictly speaking we should differentiate between quantities
defined as powers of 2 and as powers of 10. Thus, in the strict
international definitions, 1 megabyte (1 MB) = 106 while 1 Mebibyte (1
MiB) = 220. However, most of the world uses kilobytes, megabytes and
gigabytes without making any distinctions between powers of 2 or of 10.
In any case there are best understood as orders of magnitude rather than
specific numbers.
As noted above, data in a computer can be of different types, for example
numeric data, textual data, graphical data (pictures), video, sound data
and, programs (program instructions). Each form of data has its own way
of using the raw storage capability of bits and bytes so as to encode the
data. Just by looking at a pattern of 1s and 0s, it is not possible to tell
what type of data is being stored, but once the type is known, then the
pattern can be decoded. For example, the pattern 01001011 represents the
letter ‘K’ in the ASCII code for representing text; but the decimal number
75 if this code is interpreted as a binary number. It might also represent
the machine code instruction ‘add’.
Text is stored in a computer according to standard systems of encoding,
– usually some version of the ASCII code. Each character is stored in
one byte (made up of 8 individual bits). Thus, a name and address of 80
characters will use 80 bytes of storage. All the printing characters that you
can generate from your keyboard have an equivalent representation in the
ASCII code; in. In addition, there are some non-printing codes, – such as
end of line, backspace, line feed, etc.
For numbers we use some form of binary code, perhaps 8 bytes = 64 bits
long. This allows for a useful range of numbers.
Activity 6.3
A warehouse stores information on 3,000 products. Each product description comprises
about 500 characters of text plus a photo of about two megabytes. How much cloud
storage space will need to be allocated (and paid for) to store this information? Express
your answer in megabytes and kilobytes.
Could you store a copy of this database on your phone or on your laptop?
6.4 Data storage and management

Magnetic discs, and to a lesser degree magnetic tapes, have historically
provided the basic storage capability for data used in information systems.
Today these older technologies are often replaced by data storage on silicon
chips, for example, as in your smartphone or tablet, using solid state chips
(e.g. without moving parts). Still, in the cloud and in data centres spinning
disks are still the efficient and economical choice – and even magnetic tape
is a slow but secure form of backup. Whatever the technology used to store
data the way that data is organised and accessed is important – usually
expressed either in separate files or in a common shared database.
6.4.1 Files and records

A file is a named unit of data stored within a computer. For example,
the word-processed version of this document is stored in a file (.DOCX),
58
or a downloaded movie as .MOV. In each case it is held as a sequence

of binary digits. The sequential organisation is vital – the characters of
the document, or the scenes of the movie must be retrieved in the same
sequence they were stored; otherwise the document would be unreadable
and the movie unwatchable! For business information systems, we often
think of files slightly differently – as structured in terms of records made
up of fields (e.g. one record per customer, with fields for name, address,
phone number etc.). These customer records can also be related to other
kinds of record. So a particular customer can be related to a particular
set of orders for products. In this way we get beyond separate files for
customers, orders and products, and move towards an integrated database.
Transaction processing applications (back-office computing) may often
revolve around a master file that maintains the essential data and which
is updated by various types of transaction. While we may talk about such
‘files’, in most information systems of any size today it would be more
correct to talk about a master database (e.g. a structured set of records
rather than a single sequence of identical records). The transactions
(additions, amendments, deletions) may be stored in a transaction file.
For purposes of security and integrity, copies should be made of all data
stored on computers, therefore another type of file is a back-up file.
(Reminder: do remember to back up your project files. You are
responsible for managing this data and keeping back-ups for safety.)
Example
The customer accounts system of Multinational Bank has a database
of customer account details, that is, records containing data on
individual customers. Among the data that is stored are:
•• name
•• customer number
•• date of first opening an account
•• address
•• telephone number
•• email address.
The data is used whenever a person is contacted in any way. In
practice, these records will need to be accessed in any order,
depending on which customer a bank employee wishes to contact
(called ‘random access’). The customer number field has a special
status as the key field, because the customer number allows the
correct record to be uniquely identified and retrieved. The file is
stored in a data centre and a bank employee can directly read any
record or search the file. This is coordinated by database management
system software (DBMS) that takes care of the details of the storage
and retrieval of these records.
6.5 Databases and the database approach

Before the days of database software and cheap computer power,
organising files for each individual program was an important technical
issue – and file access times was often the limiting factor in how long a
computing task took to be done. Today, with database software in common
use, and with cheap computing power and fast storage devices of vast
capacity, we seldom need to think in such technical detail about how
59
exactly data is stored, accessed and retrieved for any given application.
Still, if big data gets really big technical limits do start to have an impact.
In any case, as you will see in undertaking your database assignment,
designing databases is itself a complex task that needs to be carefully
approached (see Chapters 16 and 18 of this guide).
As mentioned above, in the early years of computers each application
(program) had its own separate files to store relevant data. This may
have made it easier to develop each individual application, but it may
also have caused longer term problems. As data needs to be used by
different applications storing it many times is wasteful and will lead to
inconsistencies and errors, it has therefore become standard in business
to approach data storage using a database approach rather than a
file-based approach.
The principle behind the database approach is to store data in an
integrated and coordinated manner, so that many users or application
programs can share it. As a principle, items of data should be stored
only once. This will allow control of information to be improved,
inconsistencies to be avoided and security to be carefully managed. On
the negative side, a database approach requires careful design and active
management and if done poorly, it may allow data errors to propagate
among every application that uses the database. If your bank stores your
email address just once and it is not entered correctly, and all applications
use that single record when they want to contact you, then you will not
get emails from the bank.
When designing a database (a task you undertake as part of your
coursework – see Chapters 16 and 18), the data about the world and how
it works that you want to store has to be carefully assessed and the way
it is stored carefully designed to take into account the needs of all the
various users and their various requirements. Design is also important
to ensure that as data is updated (added to, deleted, changed, etc.), the
overall database still remains consistent.
As a simple example of this kind of problem of updating (which is one
we will return to in Chapter 16) if a company deletes a customer from
their database because the customer has gone out of business, they should
probably also delete any unfulfilled future orders from this customer. But
should they delete all the orders that have been supplied in the past or
all the payments that have been made? Almost certainly not if they want
the accounts to add up at the end of the year and the stock records to be
accurate. You can see from this that designing databases and managing
data is a hard task – one that is undertaken by a particular kind of IT
professional, the database designer and database manager.
A database management system (DBMS) – a specific kind of software -
supports the database approach. This software takes care of the details of
storage of data and provides the user or the application programs with a
simple interface through which they can request items of data and return
them for storage. Such interfaces are provided for programs to use as they
run and for individual users who wish to extract some information directly
from a database on an ad hoc basis – a query language, an example of
which is SQL (Structured Query Language).
Various models have been used to structure data in databases, including
the network model, hierarchical model and object model. For this syllabus,
we only consider the relational model for design of a database, although
we do use an object oriented style of diagramming for undertaking the
analysis – see Chapters 16 and 18 for more detail.
60
6.5.1 Centralised or distributed?

Enterprise scale (companywide) databases can be centralised or
distributed. In a centralised database all the data is stored together,
perhaps at a single location, or perhaps in the cloud, but it is managed as
a single pool of data. Users or specific application programs then access
it as they need to, using devices that are networked, for example a client
computer, a phone or a laptop. The alternative approach is to distribute
the database. We could store, for example, all data relating to motor
cars in England in one place, and all data relating to cars in Scotland in
another. Logically, it might be one database, but operationally data can
be stored closer to where it is generated or most often used. Software
can take care of all this detail as seen by any user of cloud services. For
example, in the case of photos stored on Dropbox, you and I have no idea
where in world they really are or where the backup copies are – and we
mostly do not need or want to know! We just trust the service supplier.
We have a third option – to replicate a database. A full copy of a
database held in two or more locations could be a way to ensure its
security and integrity. If one datacentre is out of action, another is
available. However, this could lead to the problem of ensuring that
updates and changes made in one copy are reproduced on the others, and
that the copies remain synchronised. Again, software can help, but this is
more complex to do and could fail.
Activity 6.4
In London there are over 30 major hospitals. If they all agreed to develop a single
coordinated database of patient records that they could share, which architecture would
you suggest: centralised, distributed, or replicated?
Justify your answer. But note that there is no ‘right’ answer here – just a difficult decision
that IS professionals will need to explain to the users of the system in terms of trade-offs.
Perhaps the users can then decide?
6.6 Cloud computing

As we saw in Chapter 3, much data today is stored and accessed using
cloud services. Data storage capacity is ‘hired’ by a user and paid for by
the gigabyte of data and by the number of accesses made to it – just as
you pay for phone calls by the second. Thus it is possible for a business
organisation to have great data storage capacity or great access to data
from other sources, without owning or managing any storage capacity.
Big well-known companies that offer such cloud services for business users
across the world are IBM, Amazon and Microsoft with many clients, large
and small. Using the cloud (a public ‘for rent’ cloud) lets an organisation
have processing power and data storage facilities (infrastructure in the
jargon – hence infrastructure as a service IaaS). Bigger organisations may
choose to use a private cloud (i.e. one that is dedicated to their needs). In
this way, for example, they may be able to assure better control over data
and higher levels of security.
Cloud services are not just about data storage but may also provide the
opportunity in a similar way to rent the use of a particular software
or a specific service – called software as a service or SaaS (see Laudon
and Laudon (2018) Sections 5.3 and 5.4). SaaS and associated ‘service’
oriented IT offerings have become a central part of cloud computing
services and it is today possible to run even a quite large business without
owning much hardware, buying any software, or having much of an in-
61
house IT department. Individuals too rent storage capacity, for example,

general file-sharing sites such as Dropbox (www.dropbox.com ). They
may also use cloud services to provide software, for example, Google Apps
(www.google.com/apps).
Activity 6.5
Cloud services are usually categorised as being ‘public’ or ‘private’, and in terms of SaaS,
IaaS, PaaS. For each of these concepts prepare a brief definition and give two relevant
examples.
Increased use of cloud computing (e.g. public cloud services) may also
have some benefits in terms of global and local environmental impact.
For example, it has been reported that data centres use more than 1.5 per
cent of all electrical power in the world (see Beynon-Davies Chapter 11,
section 11.8). If cloud computer centres are located where clean cheap
hydroelectricity is generated, and data and work are sent to them using
the internet, then we may save the pollution caused by running computers
on expensive electricity that is generated using carbon fuels (e.g. oil, gas,
coal). As with most issues associated with global warming, greenhouse
gasses and CO2 levels, the potential for green computing is a contentious
issue with many different viewpoints.

This chapter is about data. It considers what data is, how we measure it in
terms of volumes, velocity, variety, veracity and value, and how we might
organise it within organisations and to serve their information systems.
The central distinctions made here are between simple files of one type
of data and a database of different types of data related to each other
and serving as a single shared pool of data for multiple uses and users.
Databases can be centralised, but also can be distributed where different
data is in different locations, or in a replicated database with a full copy
in different locations. Databases might store data from the organisation in
their own data centre, or data may be stored in a public or private cloud as
part of an IaaS, SaaS or PaaS service,

• explain the concept of data as a resource
• describe the concept of big data
• explain why it is today might be described as representing a new ‘big
data era’ for information systems
• describe the principal features and characteristics of a data
management systems including cloud storage of data, and the use of
database management software
• discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the database approach
to information systems in which data is pooled and shared across an
organisation.
62

1. Explain what you understand by the phrase ‘the database approach’?
What benefits should an organisation accrue from adopting such
an approach? What problems or specific issues do you foresee if a
database approach is combined with a distributed approach (for
example, a distributed database)?
2. Explain what is meant by cloud computing. Give three contrasting
examples of cloud computing services that are widely used by
organisations to provide basic infrastructure for their information
systems.
Prepare a brief report for the management of a medium-sized chain of
department stores on the potential benefits and challenges of moving
most of their data storage to a cloud provider.
3. What is big data – how is it different from the kinds of data we
have been using in organisational information systems for the past
50 years? Do you think it represents an important new direction in
information systems?
63
Notes
64
Chapter 7: Information systems infrastructure: software and services
Chapter 7: Information systems

infrastructure: software and services
7.1 Introduction
The aims of this chapter are to introduce and explore the role of the
technical infrastructure in information systems, including software and
networks. These, together with computer hardware, are the underpinning
technical resources that information systems are built upon.

• describe the concept of an IT infrastructure
• explain the role of software in information systems – both system
software and application software
• explain the role of networks in information system, in particular the
internet.

[ISBN 9781292211756]. Chapter 5.

Laudon and Laudon (2018), Chapter 7 for further discussion of the
internet and networks in general.

This chapter is about the technical infrastructures that underpin
organisational information systems. It considers this in terms of software
of all types, networks and the world wide web.
7.2 Information systems infrastructure

The information systems we study here are built upon a technical base.
We call this base the information technology infrastructure (see Chapter
5, section 5.1 in Laudon and Laudon (2018)). By an ‘infrastructure’ we
mean the underpinning resources that enable or support organisations’
information systems. This will include all manner of technology –
computers, networks, software of all kinds – but also the skills and people
who make it work. So a company’s IT infrastructure might be thought of
as a ‘a sub-system’ that contributes to the purposeful behaviours of the
whole. Big organisations will spend a great deal of money and effort on
developing and maintaining their information technology infrastructure.
For many business organisations it is one of the most important routes to
competitive advantage in the market. If this infrastructure fails it can spell
disaster. Think of an airline whose computer systems fail or a hospital that
loses access to its core operational databases.
65
As Laudon and Laudon (2018) point out, the nature of the IT

infrastructure has changed over time. They thus name our era (the period
of the 21st century) the ‘cloud and mobile computing’ era, pointing to
two highly influential developments that have shifted the character of the
infrastructure and the role it has to play in supporting businesses. In the
chapters above we have also mentioned big data as a third contemporary
influence on how IT infrastructures develop today.
7.3 COTSS and User-written programs

A major part of the IT infrastructure is represented by software – both
systems software and applications software. Information systems need
to draw on software (programs) to process data, produce outputs and to
achieve their goals. Well functioning software is also fundamental to the
reliable operation of computers and networks. Thus systems software is
needed to make the computers work (operating systems like Windows,
Linux, Android etc.), network software to support communications and
data sharing of all kinds, and application software to enable the useful
tasks that organisations want done.
All software needs to be designed, written and tested by people –
programmers or software engineers – before it can be used. Some
software is written by the immediate user or their organisation, some
by commercial software companies for sale in the market (packages or
COTSS), and some is written so as to be able to offered as a service to
users across the internet (e.g. as SaaS). In broad terms user organisations
purchase operating systems, networking software and database packages
as a standard product, and focus most of their attention on applications
software.
An organisation can set out to write their own application software if they
have the skills, the time, and the resources, but most organisations rely on
packaged software for business applications – called packages, or COTSS
(commercial off-the-shelf software). Even the largest organisations meet
almost all their core information-handling requirements using purchased
application packages, and it is more likely still that a small- or medium-
sized business will operate in this way.
The market can provide application packages for all standard business
tasks. A payroll program is a good example. Most payrolls in any given
country have to perform the same basic set of calculations in order to
compute tax and insurance contributions and most organisations will want
to keep similar information about their employees. The result is a strong
market in this standard application – perhaps expanded to include other
aspects of human resource management (HRM) and known as HR (human
resource) packages. It makes good sense for most organisations – both
big and small – to buy such packages rather than developing their own
systems from scratch.
Activity 7.1
Go to the website of the software company SAP at www.SAP.com. This is one of the
largest business software companies in the world.
Make a list of the types of organisation they target in their marketing, and the main
business areas and tasks they offer software for. At the time of writing you can find this
information under the ‘Industries’ and ‘Products’ tabs on their website. If they reorganise
the website there will certainly be similar information available.
66
Choosing to use purchased application packages is easier if the

organisation is prepared to alter its ways of doing things to fit in with
the package’s capabilities. If the package is a good one, it should embody
good ways of working and best practices that meet legal and regulatory
requirements, as well as being easy and logical for staff to use. But some
organisations some of the time will want some things to be done in a
special or particular way for which packages are not available or for which
those that are available are not quite suitable.
At this point, organisations have a choice to make:
1. accept what the best available package offers and configure their ways
of working to fit in with the package
2. spend time and money adapting the package (if possible) – known as
customisation, or
3. write their own programs or contract somebody else to do it.
Of course, this last option is a significant commitment and the challenge
of developing bespoke information systems, including all the analysis
and design work, is part of the topic of the third section of this syllabus –
information systems development.
7.4 Other system development tools

Modern programming languages – as used by professional software
engineers – provide great flexibility in writing programs, and support
efficiency in the delivered product. They do not, however, support great
productivity in the actual writing of programs. It is a slow and complex work.
One consequence of this, as described above, is that it is more appropriate
and cheaper to buy software from a specialist producer (COTTS) than to
program it yourself within your own organisation. Another is that it has
become increasingly common for all types of organisational information
systems to be developed using tools that provide more help to the developer
(perhaps a non-professional) and need less detail to be specified. This can
include the configuration of COTSS, and also the use of various kinds of
software designed to make building the technical parts of a system easier.
Good examples of this kind of systems development tool are the database
packages and spreadsheets you use for your coursework. These provide,
as you should discover doing your coursework assignments, an ‘easy’
route to setting up storage of data and tools to allow the design of input
screens, models, output reports and the logic of processing information.
A database package such as you use can provide some of the flexibility
of a programming language, but also provide pre-packaged solutions to
standard problems. Examples would be the way a spreadsheet provides
sorting facilities or a database package includes the ability to quickly
generate reports.
It is also the case that many of today’s information systems are developed
to run over the Internet and in particular the world wide web (the web).
Programming and setting up software for the web is a rather different
activity to conventional programming, and has given rise to many new
tools, languages and techniques that allow, for example, the software
to run an online e-commerce site to be easily set up. As a result, many
development tools are now available for developing web-based systems
quickly; these usually generate hypertext mark-up language (HTML) − the
language for web pages − but add newer techniques, such as extensible
mark-up language (XML) and provide support for links to databases and
many interactive features.
67
7.5 The internet and the world wide web

The internet came about through academic and military projects in the
1970s and 1980s. In the 1990s, it mushroomed, becoming a great network
of networks that spans the globe and provides services to the largest
multinational corporation as well as to individual people. The internet is
used to communicate – as in email or chat programs and social media,
to move data and files around, to provide cloud services – as well as to
publish information to a worldwide community. The internet manages to
operate around the world through the standard adoption of certain rules
and protocols for addressing and passing messages. The principal such
standard is known as TCP/IP (transmission control protocol/internet
protocol). Access to the internet is usually made via an internet service
provider (ISP), which is often part of a telecommunications or media
company. For many organisations today the internet and what it can
provide is the single most important part of their IT infrastructure.
The grounding for the universal and worldwide acceptance of the internet
as the basis for digital communication has been the establishment of
certain standard protocols (rules and conventions) for exchanging
data. The two main protocols at the heart of the internet are TCP, the
transmission control protocol that ensures data is sent completely from
one point to another, and IP, the internet protocol that ensures that each
individual packet of data is routed through the internet to the right
destination. There are a number of other protocols in common use, for
example for the world wide web HTTP (hypertext transfer protocol),
which allows web pages to be located and retrieved.
From a user’s point of view, the main elements of this infrastructure
that they see as they use the internet are perhaps an email client, which
prepares, sends and receives messages, and a browser program such as
Firefox, Safari, Chrome or Internet Explorer, through which they navigate
around the world wide web. Other applications could include instant
messaging, file transfer or voice over IP telephony (Skype).
To find information, world wide web users usually need to access some
kind of search engine such as Google or Bing to provide a list of relevant
sites based on some key words. If and when a user wishes to trust the
internet with sensitive information – for example, to send a credit card
number to a company – then a user may need to become aware of the
various means of securing information, such as encryption and the
protocols that secure servers use such as HTTPS; a protocol enabling the
secured transmission of web pages. Finally, when we come to publish our
own information, we will need to master the simple language used to
prepare web pages – HTML (Hyper Text Mark-up Language).
The existence of the internet has also given rise to new areas of business
supporting and using this infrastructure, including ISPs, and the vast range
of old and new companies that ‘do business’ over the internet – so called
e-commerce.
As one example, Amazon pioneered selling books over the internet but
now offers a vast range of consumer goods. Likewise, airlines now sell
tickets over the web cutting out travel agents, and most banks offer
‘online’ banking services. We can see that this infrastructure (the internet
and its associated standards) is key to these companies’ fundamental way
of doing business – their business model. Many other types of organisation
also use the internet – for example, most governments around the world
now publish much of their material on the web and allow all manner
of transactions to be processed by citizens directly – what is commonly
68
known as e-government1. In this way, all manner of services can become 1

The UK government’s
more accessible and available to their population. There may however also main presence on the
web in terms of services
be some problems in a wholesale move online, not everybody has the skills
to citizens is www.
or even the equipment to access the web and some things are still better direct.gov.uk . Find your
done face to face. own government’s main
website or portal.
Activity 7.2
Research and write up a brief (two-sentence) description of what each of the following
internet related protocols and standards do and how they work:
TCP, IP (often combined with TCP), HTTP and HTTPS, HTML and XML.
The example of publishing information on the internet – and using

browsers to find what is needed and generally making searching and
sharing information easier – has led many companies to consider using the
same model and the same technologies for their internal communication
needs. These are known as intranets (intra means inside). An intranet
is then another part of many companies’ IT infrastructure, allowing
information sharing across the company in a more secure way than an
ordinary website allows, and as the basis for many kinds of useful internal
information systems from telephone directories through training resources
to active knowledge management initiatives.
The internet also has significant consequences in breaking down national
boundaries and jurisdictions. A business may be registered in country
A, operate from country B and sell goods to consumers in country C –
perhaps arranging to avoid any tax liability in any of the three countries.
Information of all kinds can flow into and out of countries with almost
no effective control. Some see this as a good thing, bringing the world
together others see it as a significant risk. And some governments make
great efforts to restrict flows of information across their borders – most
notably China. For these kinds of reasons, the question of ‘regulating the
internet’ is often raised in international forums and by some governments.
Activity 7.3
Research the types of business in your country that have been leaders in offering their
products or services over the internet. Are any targeted to overseas clients? Which are
most successful? Why do you think that is? Are there any obvious missing types of
business – why do you think this may be? There may be some cultural or developmental
explanations for lack of take-up (e.g. desire to bargain and haggle, or lack of credit cards
or the desire to keep transactions ‘informal’).
What are the most successful e-government services available in your country? What do
you think lies behind this success? What benefits do both people and government bodies
obtain from these services? Do they both obtain benefits equally?

This chapter has introduced and discussed the concept of information
systems infrastructure as the basis for information systems development
and use in organisations. It has considered key elements of such
infrastructure including various types of software, and networking
resources including the internet.
69

• describe the concept of an IT infrastructure
• explain the role of software in information systems – both system
software and application software
• explain the role of networks in information system, in particular the
internet.

1. What are the main disadvantages of choosing to use SaaS cloud
services as part of a company’s information systems infrastructure?
Why would you expect SaaS to be appealing to:
a. a large established business looking to provide better enterprise
information systems
b. a new start-up company growing rapidly
c. the secretary of an amateur choir who needs to keep records of
members and concerts they sing in.
In each case justify your answer.
2. Suggest four or five important criteria that a company might use when
assessing which COTSS software to buy for a specialised area of their
business. In particular, consider what aspects of the software vendor
company, the software itself, and the rest of the company’s current
information systems infrastructure might influence such a decision.
3. Write an essay that explains why the internet has had such a strong
influence on how organisations develop and operate their information
systems. Use a few well-chosen examples to illustrate your main
points.
70
Section 3: Information systems in organisations
Section 3: Information systems in

organisations
In this section we discuss core concepts and models used in the academic
literature of information systems, by those who manage information
systems and by those who work in industries that support information
systems. In the final chapter you are asked to engage with people who
manage information systems to understand how they see their role in
organisations.
71
Notes
72
Chapter 8: What do information systems do?
Chapter 8: What do information systems

do?
8.1 Introduction
In this chapter, we address a simple question, ‘For what purposes do
organisations develop and use information systems?’ In other words, and
using the vocabulary of Leavitt’s diamond, what is the ‘task’ they help to
accomplish?
This includes a consideration of a business’s needs and the kinds of
tasks information system can support and thus the ways in which they
contribute to the overall purpose of an organisation. This chapter revisits
some topics from earlier chapters, but here we have a rather different
focus – not on the technology per se, but on the organisation itself and its
goals.

• introduce the main types of information systems found in
organisations and the usual ways of naming them
• show what each of these different types of information system do
• explain how information systems can work together sharing data
located in common databases and thus serve the organisation’s overall
interests.

• identify the various types of information systems organisations use
• explain what each broad type of system does and how it works
alongside and shares data with other systems
• describe and discuss the potential of systems based on business process
automation.

[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapters 2, 3 and 9.
As background, review Chapter 1 of this subject guide for basic ideas of
the consequences of information systems for organisations.

Beynon-Davies (2013), Chapter 8.
Laudon and Laudon (2018), Chapter 10.
Both these chapters give more detail on e-commerce.
73

This chapter is concerned with the various types of information systems
that organisations procure and use. It discusses these in terms of general
functions and the purposes they fulfil – starting with basic transaction
processing for recording day-to-day activities, and then including systems
for support of management, to provide customer services and for other
purposes.
8.2 What information systems do and their

consequences
Today almost all organisations of any size use computer-based information
systems as a fundamental part of how they operate – we could even say that
information systems are fundamental to their existence. If these systems
stopped working for more than a few hours or days, they may well be out of
business.
Thus information systems of varying size and complexity will be found in
a great variety of organisational environments and sectors: in government,
education, health care, charities, military organisations, media and
entertainment and most parts of industry, including manufacturing,
distribution, retailing and financial services, etc.
One of the contexts in which information systems are most prominent
(and have been studied most extensively) is in business organisations.
In Chapters 3 of Laudon and Laudon (2018), some of the (potential)
consequences of information systems for business organisations
are presented, for example, how information systems may flatten
organisations, reducing their levels of hierarchy (see Laudon and
Laudon (2018) Figure 3.6), separate work from location, or redefine
organisational boundaries. They may also change jobs and roles, and
promote or downgrade certain professions and skills. For example, there
are far fewer clerks or typists in the labour force now than there were
30 years ago and more programmers and trainers. The job of being a
secretary has almost disappeared in many organisations as most people in
offices now type their own letters or emails and do their own filing.
Perhaps the most significant consequences of new generations of
information systems are seen by taking a more macro view looking
at whole business sectors on a national or global scale. From this
perspective we see that business activities overall are more divided up
among collaborating organisations. Companies tend to stick to their
core competencies and to contract with others for various kinds of other
services and inputs they need (including but not just IS related ones).
In this way, and making use of digital connectivity and the move to
e-commerce, they become more interdependent, collaborate more, and
share more information and data.
8.2.1 Types of information system

It is usual to see information systems as serving various needs of specific
parts of an organisation’s hierarchy and focused primarily on its internal
needs – from the strategic decisions made at the top to the operations and
tasks undertaken further down (see the pyramid organization model in
Figure 2.6 of Laudon and Laudon (2018) or Figure 1.15 in Beynon-Davies
(2013)). Within this model of the organisation as a pyramidal hierarchy, we
identify a number of separate and distinct classes or types of information
system that will be found within almost all business organisations. You
74
should be familiar with these classifications. However, classifications are not

definitive – and the types of information systems described below should be
taken as generic types and a bit of a simplification. The real systems found
in real organisations may well cross these boundaries (see also the practical
investigation described in Chapter 12 of this guide).
Activity 8.1
Review the various classes of information systems described in Section 2.2, Chapter 2
and sections 9.3 and 9.4 in Chapter 9 of Laudon and Laudon (2018). Make a careful list
of the various types of systems described, their functions and the organisational purpose
they serve. Then contrast this list with the way that Beynon-Davies describes systems in
Chapter 8.
8.2.2 Transaction processing systems (TPS)

Transaction processing systems are systems that undertake standard,
regular and high-volume information-handling activities. A transaction is a
well-understood activity in which data is exchanged or processed to achieve
some result. Common examples of transactions would include: taking
orders from customers, processing the monthly payroll, issuing invoices,
entering payments in the sales ledger or processing credit card debits.
Because the work to be done in each case is ‘well understood’, it is
relatively easy to write or purchase software to undertake the task. Given
that these tasks are all done often and in great volume, the computer can
offer efficiencies of scale, in terms of time taken and of the cost relative to
employing people to do the job or storing data on paper.
Transaction processing systems (TPS) use and maintain databases –
records of activity that occurs. These then become a primary source of
data about an organisation’s operations. For example, as the TPS processes
individual orders for products throughout the month, it stores data each
time in its database, which allows us to provide a monthly sales report to
the chief executive. That is, data is recorded when things (transactions)
happen (orders received, goods shipped, payments made, etc.) and in
that way a summary picture of business activity is available for managers,
providing information they want and which they can use for all manner of
decisions they must make – see 8.2.3 below).
Most organisations started out using computers principally for these
transaction processing purposes. They still preoccupy many information
systems managers, not least because if transaction systems fail, the
company is literally ‘out of business’ – unable to operate. Because
transaction processing systems are built to handle regular, high-volume,
data-processing needs they are often developed with a strong emphasis
on efficiency and time saving. Efficiency, however, is not the only
criterion against which a transaction processing system (or any other type
of system) should be judged. There is no point in being efficient at doing
the wrong things. We therefore also have to think about effectiveness,
user satisfaction as well as reliability.
With large volumes of transactions to deal with in standard ways, a system
that is efficient in doing its work can save time and money. Transaction
processing systems should be able to do most of its work without human
intervention – it will often almost totally automate an activity. For
example, the billions of credit card transactions that are processed every
day have almost no human involvement. In this sense their role is to
minimise the number of ‘users’ (e.g. employees) and to transfer the work
to the computer. They also can transfer work to other people like you and
75
me. For example, when I book a train ticket over the internet and pay
with my credit card I am initiating a transaction and doing the data entry
work as well. I am the customer as well as the system ‘user’ and the train
company is happy that I do some work for them (data entry) which in the
past one of their employees might have done.
Transaction processing systems often exhibit strong ‘economies of scale’.
That is, bigger systems with bigger computers handling larger volumes
of data may be more efficient and/or cheaper per transaction than
a number of smaller systems doing the same work. This provides one
argument in favour of large data-processing centres or integrated systems,
as well as for cloud-based services (SaaS). On the other hand, it can at
times be more effective (if not as efficient) to process data locally,
closer to the original point of input or closer to the user of the output.
8.2.3 Management information systems (MIS)

As the name suggests, management information systems are designed to
provide managers with information on the basis of which they can do their
jobs. In the pyramid of an organisation, managers are represented in the
middle area – overseeing particular kinds of work and reporting upwards
to the higher level of ‘senior’ management. These middle managers
exercise oversight and control of the various parts of an organisation
for which they are responsible and can thus use data generated in
their area for making better, more informed decisions. Management
information systems usually draw extensively upon the resources of data
that transaction processing systems maintain, that is by accessing their
databases.
For example, in a bank, the regular processing of credit card payments
will be done by transaction-processing systems that store the basic data
on customer accounts (each payment in or out being a transaction). The
managers in the bank will have access to this data through the bank’s
management information system and can interrogate this data in various
ways, for example, to see if the number of transactions is rising or falling
year on year, or to see if the level of credit card borrowing is rising or
falling.
Management information systems can be further divided into those that
support operational control – checking that the work has been done
properly – and those that provide support for tactical management and
planning. Often, in practice, the same data may be required in each case,
but for a different purpose.
8.2.4 Decision support systems (DSS)

Decision support systems (DSS) can be seen as a further development
of management information systems. While a management information
system provides access to data and makes it possible to generate
information, decision support systems offer an enhanced ability to
manipulate data − to model it – and in that way to allow a user (a
decision maker) to access better and more useful information, for
example, to explore alternative scenarios.
For example, the managers of a bank may have to determine whether to
approve loans to their commercial customers. In order to do this, they
can use information about the customer (information based on the data
held in transaction processing systems), but there is often a lot of data
and it may not tell an obvious story – How many times have they gone
overdrawn? Is it getting more frequent? What has their cash flow been
over the past two years? These managers may have a separate computer
76
program available that analyses this data, summarises it and lets them
explore ‘what if’ scenarios: ‘What if their cash flow went down by 10
per cent? Could they still pay the loan?’ In this way, the program (quite
probably based on a spreadsheet package) can support and aid the
manager in making decisions about loans.
This is also an example of information systems supporting knowledge
workers, that is helping a person to make their own informed decisions
and exercise their own judgement. The task is not automated because it is
not really able to be, and this kind of decision needs some expert human
involvement to deal with the complex combinations of information that
need to be assessed in order to make a decision. These are what are often
called ‘semi-structured’ decisions in contrast to a ‘structured decision’
which is suitable to be fully automated.
8.2.5 Executive information systems (EIS)

Another general classification that has crept into computing language
in the past decade is the executive information system (EIS). In Laudon
and Laudon (2018), this is described as an executive support system
(ESS). The general idea behind an EIS or ESS is to provide information
to senior managers and executives who need a broad mix of information
from within the organisation and beyond it. The emphasis of EIS is
on the timely presentation of a wide range of information that crosses
organisational boundaries, functions and hierarchies, and supports
decision-making at a senior executive level. To this extent an EIS may be a
bit different to an MIS, but it may be better to think of them as similar in
terms of what they do for the organisation.
8.2.6 Office information systems (OIS) and knowledge work

systems (KWS)
Earlier editions of Laudon and Laudon included office information systems
as a class of system, and we believe that it is useful to retain it as a distinct
type of system. It is not just senior or middle managers who have access
to computers, but potentially anybody and everybody at work. Many
companies have now exceeded a ratio of 1:1 of computers to people, and
we find computers on the factory floor, in the cab of a taxi or a tractor,
with a delivery driver or in the pocket of a policeman.
Office information systems is a name given to the use of computers
to provide general support for people doing in office-type work. Such
systems have become very sophisticated, providing general facilities
for supporting work tasks (e.g. word processors, databases, desktop
publishing and spreadsheets), managing time and managing projects,
supporting communications (e.g. email, social media, video conferencing,
online discussion forums, instant messaging, websites) and giving access
to information (databases and intranets) as well as purpose-made
applications for people to use in their particular day-to-day work (an order
entry system, a customer service system or a system to record individuals
expense claims).
Thirty or more years ago, office automation meant providing word
processors to secretaries and typists; today, it means providing appropriate
technologies, tools and systems to all kinds of workers – in the office, in the
factory and on the road using mobile devices. We can also describe these
systems as ‘knowledge work systems’ – systems that support knowledge
workers. (Knowledge work in general has been discussed earlier in Chapter
4 of this guide and Laudon and Laudon (2018) give further coverage of
knowledge work and knowledge management in Chapter 11.)
77
Other examples of office information systems might include:

• Intranet: is an application providing access to company data,
procedures and reports. An intranet is a sort of internal internet, a
private web resource of data and links for use within an organisation.
We may also sometimes talk about an extranet – the same idea but
shared with others beyond the organisation, perhaps customers and
suppliers. Both intranets and extranets are private, insofar as they are
available only to those with permission to use them. As such, they
usually need some specific security arrangements, such as logins and
passwords. For example, many companies have their staff directory,
holiday booking systems and internal vacancies (to name a few of very
many possible applications) available on an intranet.
• Work-flow: these are systems that ensure that tasks and processes
are coordinated and work is passed on to the next responsible person.
For example, a sales consultant may take an order from a customer
and then pass it to a dispatch manager who then passes it to the
logistics department, which coordinates with the warehouse to arrange
delivery, then notifies the accounts department. All this can be done
and coordinated within a single ‘work-flow’ system, allowing people to
know when their contribution is needed, what has happened along the
way and what will be done next. If the customer calls up (or logs in)
to find out what has happened to their order, then a work-flow system
will help in providing a specific up-to-date answer.
8.3 E-commerce
A very important set of information systems for many organisations today
are those that support electronic commerce (or e-commerce). This is a broad
term to cover all manner of transactions between a customer and a seller
made using digital systems. Customers and sellers may be individuals or very
small businesses, medium or large businesses or government bodies. At their
core e-commerce systems are doing a similar job to transaction processing
systems – facilitation and keeping records of transactions and processing
basic business activities – but they are different in that they reach out beyond
the organisation and offer a direct interface with the customer or client.
We can classify e-commerce as composed of distinct types (see Laudon and
Laudon (2018) Section 10.2):
• B2B business to business (e.g. trade between a motor manufacturer
and a tyre manufacturer)
• B2C business to consumer (e.g. you or me buying books from an
online bookstore), or
• C2C consumer to consumer (e.g. if I buy a second-hand bike from you
on eBay).
Governments also uses similar technology to provide services to citizens or
businesses, which could be G2C or G2B. There are also some examples of
G2G e-commerce, such as between government bodies and across national
borders.
After e-commerce has come m-commerce (m for mobile), which are
similar systems but are aimed at mobile devices and at people on the
move. For example, to buy a cinema ticket in London you may well use an
m-commerce system in an app as you book a ticket late in the day from
your phone as you leave work. Researchers in some markets find that
in the B2C sector a majority of transactions are now made from mobile
devices and apps rather than computer browsers.
78
A key question in many e-commerce areas is how successfully can

established companies move to e-commerce and avoid being challenged,
perhaps fatally, by new entrants and start-ups. Put another way, what does
it take for established businesses to benefit from e-commerce? This is often
posed as the move ‘from bricks to clicks’, that is, from a physical shop to an
online presence.
Some industries have been severely challenged by a shift to e-commerce – a
general example of the consequences of new information systems based on
new technologies. For example, there are now far fewer travel agents on the
high street and in many countries most people book their own air tickets
and hotels online direct to the airline or through e-commerce platforms
such as Expedia. The music industry too has been severely challenged by
e-commerce and by the full-scale digitisation of their product. Not only can
music be sold by online sites, but it can be copied and shared too. Travel and
music were perhaps the first industries to feel these kind of radical change
effects. Today more and more industries and business sectors are having to
work out how they move into a new digital future, for example, mainstream
fashion shops are increasingly challenged by new online retailers.
8.4 Robotics, process automation and computers in

industrial processes
Finally, we must remember that the use of computers extends beyond the
office and administration and the knowledge activities of organisations.
Information systems are used also extensively in various areas of
manufacturing and in production management, and you should be aware
of their use in areas such as computer-aided design (CAD), computer-aided
manufacturing (CAM) and computer integrated manufacturing (CIM).
Recently there has also been a huge expansion in the levels of automation
that are seen in factories and in the use of robots for physical tasks in,
for example, the manufacturing of cars as well as for ‘knowledge’ tasks
such as quoting for a new car insurance policy. This latter kind of systems,
often part of an online business model, is often referred to as ‘business
process automation’ (BPA). This is still a specialised emerging area,
and this course does not assume any particular knowledge in this domain.
But it is well worthwhile to research this topic a little online to get a view
of the (possible) future of business information systems. One way to see
BPA is as an extension of the idea of enterprises systems (discussed in the
next chapter of this guide), but with emphasis on removing people from
the work process by use of AI, and emphasis on integrated sets of tasks that
can offer both efficiency and higher levels of customer satisfaction.
Activity 8.2
Based on an online search, prepare a brief explanation of the concept of Business Process
Automation (BPA). Illustrated your work with a few examples.

This chapter has introduced some of the standard types of information
systems that businesses create in order to meet their information needs.
These types of systems will generally work together and share their data
as well as share the infrastructures for delivering to the user (e.g. the
networks and digital devices people use every day). The descriptions of
these types here is of necessity quite general. In the specific circumstances
of individual organisations they will be adapted to their specific needs
within the constraints of the software being used.
79

• identify the various types of information systems organisations use
• explain what each broad type of system does and how it works
alongside and shares data with other systems
• describe and discuss the potential of systems based on business process
automation.

1. Give a general name (e.g. decision support system, transaction
processing system, computer-aided design, B2C, BPA etc.) to each of
the following examples.
a. an information system in a small grocery store, which keeps track
of stock on the shelves and in the warehouse.
b. a system to remind people to take their medicines using text
messages sent by mobile phone.
c. a computer program that helps systems analysts to develop the
specifications for the software components of new information
systems.
d. a government system that provides advice and guidance on
necessary health precautions when travelling abroad.
e. a system that controls all the machine tools in a car factory’s
production line.
f. an information system used by customer service staff in a
telephone company to log complaints and requests for service and
to schedule appointments for engineers.
g. a system in a bank that allows managers and other staff to prepare
letters, exchange emails and set up their own personal databases.
h. a hospital system to coordinate and facilitate a smooth and
efficient progress for a patient having a hip operation as they move
from the admission ward through the operating theatre, recovery
suite, discharge ward, rehabilitation clinic and home care.
i. a system to allow fishermen to obtain up-to-date auction prices
for fish at various ports via mobile phones, thus allowing them to
choose where to take their catch.
j. a system used by a hospital doctor to help select the right drug to
treat a rare disease.
k. a system that allows a small clothing cooperative in India to take
personal orders for personalised garments from clients abroad.
l. a system used in a construction company to allow designers and
architects to review previous designs and share their insights as to
innovative solutions.
m. a system developed by an online investment start-up company
to allow a customer to design a share portfolio for themselves,
purchase and manage the shares, and maintain all records needed
for tax and pension purposes and all done with minimal (or zero)
human participation.
80
n. a system that links together the sales, manufacturing and

distribution functions in a large engineering company, based on
the use of modular commercial package software hosted by a
service provider on cloud resources.
o. a system that allows schoolteachers to have easy access to
validated and approved educational materials.
For each system, describe briefly:
i. The kind of work they do, the kind of data they process and the
kind of information they produce.
ii. What benefits they would be expected to deliver (think of
overall purpose, e.g. efficiency and effectiveness, but also other
reasons such as growth, competition or finding new markets and
opportunities).
2. Write a report for the senior management team setting out the benefits
and drawbacks of moving the company’s core transaction processing
systems (TPS) from a centralised architecture in a single data centre to
a distributed architecture with smaller TPS systems operating in each
of the six divisions of the firm provided by a SaaS cloud service.
3. ‘Modern computing technologies, including artificial intelligence and
big data, are leading to a new form of more powerful knowledge work
systems that will result in the loss of many knowledge work jobs.’
Discuss this statement and explain the logic on which it is based.
Assess how valid it is.
81
Notes
82
Chapter 9: Enterprise scale: architecture and information systems
Chapter 9: Enterprise scale: architecture

and information systems
9.1 Introduction
In this chapter we look at information systems that support the core
cross business functions of an organisation – what we call ‘enterprise
systems’ or ‘enterprise applications’. These are the information systems
that hold the organisation together and help them to achieve high levels
of operational performance and customer satisfaction. Being central to
how the organisation works and how it interacts with its customers and
suppliers, they also represent the potential for poor levels of performance
and dissatisfaction. For this reason, if no other, enterprise systems need
careful attention and management.

• discuss the importance of enterprise scale systems and how they are
sourced
• show how systems at such scale support a range of core business
processes including transactional processes, supply chain management
(SCM) and customer relationship management systems (CRM)
• assess the business benefits and risks of developing systems at such a
scale.

• discuss the need for an enterprise approach to information systems
and the potential of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software
• explain what various ERP modules do and how they work alongside
other systems and through common databases
• justify the purpose of customer relationship management (CRM) and
supply chain management (SCM) and explain their potential to deliver
significant business benefit for the enterprise.

edition [ISBN 9781137265807] Chapter 6, Section 6.
[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapter 2 (section 2.2) and Chapter 9.

This chapter discusses enterprise systems, information systems serving as
a primary means of binding an organisation together based on integrated
software and common database. The chapter looks beyond a ‘functional’
view of specific types of task with specific solutions, and assesses how
businesses gain benefits from an organisation-wide and integrated approach
to information systems that span core that span core activities. These
include the internal needs, relating to their customers (CRM) and managing
their supply chains (SCM).
83
9.2 Enterprise systems: integrating business processes

The classification of types of information systems given in Chapter 8
suggests that systems are more or less ‘standalone’ – each performing
a specific task or meeting certain people’s needs. This is a function-by-
function view that emphasises a specific task to be done but does not
take a particularly organisation-wide view or look at collections of tasks
that make up business processes. But for real business organisations, the
linking or integration of systems and how they work together or draw
on common data from a shared database in order to achieve a necessary
business objective are perhaps of primary importance. The contrast is often
summarised as the distinction between a function by function view, and
one that emphasises business processes. (Note that this is essentially a
restatement of a systems view: separate parts but coordinated and working
together to fulfil a wider purpose.)
Any organisation that employs more than just a few people needs
information systems that do more than just support individual tasks
in isolation. Their systems need to communicate with each other and
thus serve to integrate the activity of the whole organisation. Thus a
business’s core information systems need to be conceived and built
at an organisational or enterprise scale. They must serve the needs of
many people, both within and beyond the organisation, and ensure that
individual activities and tasks are coordinated. Developing and managing
information systems at the organisational or enterprise scale may be fairly
easy for a small organisation with up to, say, 50 to 100 employees and
a single location, but for big organisations operating on multiple sites,
providing many different products or services and operating in many
countries and time zones, it is a hard task. One way to achieve this linkage
is by using shared databases – the database approach – as discussed in
Chapter 6 of this guide.
But simply sharing data (or trying to) is not enough. Another way to
ensure integration is to ensure that the organisation’s information systems
support identified business processes such as manufacturing, distribution,
finance, research and development (R&D), sales and marketing or
managing human resources.
Thus the information systems introduced into organisations, and the
software packages they are built upon, are often described in terms of their
support of particular sets of business or processes rather than as generic
‘types’ of systems as discussed in the previous chapter of this subject guide.
Here we discuss three types of such enterprise systems:
• enterprise resource planning (ERP)
• customer relationship management (CRM) and
• supply chain management (SCM).
Elsewhere in this guide and in the textbooks you will also meet others
such as human resource management (HRM), knowledge management
systems (KMS) or manufacturing resources planning (MRPII).
9.2.1 Enterprise systems and ERP software

In Section 2.2 of Laudon and Laudon (2018), the key concept of enterprise
systems, or enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems is introduced and
it is developed further in Chapter 9 of the book. Similarly, Beynon-Davies
(2013) discusses Enterprise systems and ERP software in Section 6.6. – see
for example Figure 6.11.
84
Enterprise systems are large-scale, integrated, systems that span the

organisation and help to ‘hold it together’ by integrating business processes
and linking them together. They are almost always based on rented and
hosted (SaaS) software or purchased software (COTSS). Medium-sized
and large organisations use these software packages to ‘pull together’ their
various business activities in a coherent and integrated transaction, data
and information environment.
ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) is used to describe the kind of
software that can help to implement enterprise scale information systems.
These are software packages that are usually modular, that is, they are
offered for sale as a set of separate modules to serve specific and different
business needs. The main focus of ERP is on the internal working of the
organisation and the information, coordination and integration needs that
this generates.
The modules of an ERP software package are designed to work together
so that a company can create the mix of functions that they require. As
Beynon-Davies (2013) suggests in section 6.6, the origins of the ERP
software that enterprise systems are built upon was in providing efficient
transaction processing systems based around a common database – what
he calls ‘back-office functions’. But today they also include many ‘front
office’ functions too, including CRM and e-commerce.
ERP packages and their modules are necessarily quite flexible. Not every
company wants to do a particular task in the same way. For this reason,
and to satisfy a larger set of customers, such software has to be highly
configurable (e.g. adaptable to the needs of different users – see discussion
on configuration in Chapter 13 of this guide). User organisations, as they
implement ERP software and build their own enterprise systems, will
need to make detailed choices to configure the software work for them.
The work of configuring such a package will usually be quite extensive,
and require time and a lot of activity to identify and select the particular
configuration options that will be most appropriate. Doing this work is
often a major project that is beyond the resources of the actual company
and will be outsourced to a consultancy company with experience of
both the particular software package, but also of helping organisations to
change their ways of working – change management.
Thus, as we discussed in Chapter 7 of this guide, and will return to
in Chapter 13, many big information systems projects in companies,
governments and other organisations are focused on choosing, and
then configuring, packaged software or SaaS to provide core enterprise
systems. Such projects may, despite their size and scale, require relatively
little actual programming of new software, but they still need lots of
detailed analysis and design work to ensure that the right configuration
is achieved. This kind of a development project is discussed further in
Chapter 14 of this guide.
9.2.2 Supply chain management as an enterprise system

Another general class of enterprise systems is concerned with managing
the supply chain of the organisation – a supply chain being how an
organisation procures raw materials (inputs), and distributes its product
(outputs). In today’s world this often occurs through a large network
of other organisations around the world – suppliers, service providers,
logistics facilities, customers, finance providers, regulators, brokers and
inspectors etc. Controlling the movement of goods in the supply chain,
and dealing with backlogs or bottle necks to keep a smooth flow, is a real
challenge.
85
As elsewhere, there is a class of software that can help to coordinate and

manage supply chains – supply chain management (SCM). The benefits
of doing it well can be enormous. For example, companies that can use a
‘just-in-time’ approach to supply of raw materials, can save huge cost by
reducing their inventory – but to do this they must trust the supplier (or
suppliers) and manage the flow carefully. A car factory must keep working,
and the suppliers of the most humble component (a nut and bolt, say), must
keep up the deliveries if an expensive halt of all production is to be avoided.
Activity 9.1
Using resources from the web, research and write a brief report (250 words) that offers
a reasoned definition of supply chain management, and lists four or five core areas that
SCM software can support and integrate.
You will find that the websites of major software companies can help you here (e.g. www.
oracle.com). But remember that they are offering their own marketing message, so you
must be a bit careful to get beyond their hype.
9.2.3 Customer relationship management (CRM) Software.

Customer relationship management (CRM) systems are primarily concerned
with helping to keep a business connected to, and informed about, their
customers (or, more generally, all other parties with whom they do business,
be they customers or suppliers, partners, regulators, employees or even
competitors). A primary goal of CRM, as an enterprise scale system, is that
all parts of a business should collect, share and use the same information
on outside stakeholders (including customers). In this way the experience
of customers and others should become smoother, for example they should
not be asked for the same information many times by different people,
and everybody across the organisation should have information available
about past interactions. Knowing more about their customers can enable
organisations to sell more to them and to provide a better level of service,
by, for example, identifying potential new needs or coordinating service and
backup activities. The phrase that Laudon and Laudon (2018) use for this
overall focus on knowing and serving customers is ‘customer intimacy’ –
seen alongside the more traditional ‘organisational excellence’.
The core areas for CRM are sales, marketing and service. Marketing is
about communicating information about products or services, Sales is
about selling specific product to specific customers, and service is all the
follow-up work after a sale takes place, including delivery, maintenance,
providing spare parts, etc. As you can see, CRM touches many parts of a
business organisation – lots of people need to interact with customers and
other stakeholders, or to know something about them. It is not practical
or very effective if all these various parts of the business try to keep their
own customer/stakeholder information – and it can very frustrating to the
customer if they try.
One further important aspect of CRM for modern organisations is
combining it with the use of social media, including advertising on
websites and platforms such as Facebook or Twitter. Using social media
can both serve to allow communication of information to other parties
as well as the opportunity to collect information from them, for example
through cookies and web data provided by third parties, through online
comments and the rating of products or service, and tracking the kinds
of web searches they undertake. It is no surprise the that CRM systems
are one of the major providers of the big data that drives customer
focused data analytics (see Laudon and Laudon (2018) Fig. 9.10) This
86
can be controversial if CRM activity starts to collect and use too much or
inappropriate data about customers, or to apply too much analysis.
Activity 9.2
CRM was one of the earliest large enterprise systems applications that were provided as
a cloud service (SaaS). The pioneer provider for this was the company salesforce.com.
Based on the Salesforce website, or that of another provider, write your own 200-word
introduction to CRM which clearly outlines the scope of such systems.

This chapter turns attention to the large-scale information systems that
organisations develop in order to support their business processes, to tie
their various parts together and to ensure that they are integrated and
work together. These types of system are known in general as enterprise
(scale) systems and are usually based on COTSS products or SaaS services
in the cloud. The chapter has covered three examples of enterprise
systems: enterprise resource planning (ERP), customer relationship
management (CRM) and supply chain management (SCM). By their scale
and centrality to how an organisation functions, these systems can offer
great benefits, but also demand careful management attention.

• discuss the need for an enterprise approach to information systems
and the potential of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software
• explain what various ERP modules do and how they work alongside
other systems and through common databases
• justify the purpose of customer relationship management (CRM) and
supply chain management (SCM) and explain their potential to deliver
significant business benefit for the enterprise.

1. Provide a reasoned definition of enterprise scale information systems.
Explain the general purpose and architecture of such systems.
In so far as enterprise systems impose a standard way of doing things
across a company, what risks or challenges might they pose?
2. If a company takes a strong enterprise systems approach to their
information systems what are the implications for how these systems
are specified, implemented and managed. Does such an approach
inevitably imply a more centralised IT function?
3. Prepare a short (300–500 word) report for senior management that
explains the opportunities and challenges that might arise from a
project to implementation of one of these types of enterprise systems
based on SaaS software :
i. ERP
ii. supply chain management
iii. customer relationship management.
87
Notes
88
Chapter 10: Governance of information systems
Chapter 10: Governance of information

systems
10.1 Introduction
Governance, in the context of information systems, concerns how an
organisation manages and controls its information systems including the
data they process and the tasks they perform. It is about setting up the
structure of the IS department and the rules under which things are done
and the relationship of IT specialists to users. The approach to governance
should reflect the organisation’s goals as well as its values and aspirations.
Governance also needs to ensure respect the law of the land, particularly
on matters such as how data is collected and used.

• introduce the concept of information systems governance
• discuss issues of how information systems activities are managed in
organisations
• understand how the governance of data may be approached and the
legal regimes for personal data in various countries.

• identify the scope of governance of information systems at the
organisation level
• explain the needs for specific rules and standards in the handling of
personal data, and the legal regimes under which this may be done
• propose some key actions to help keep information systems secure
from malicious attacks.

[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapter 2, Section 2.4 (for an introduction to the topic
of IS management); Chapter 4, Sections 4.3–4.4 (for discussion of governance
of personal data); Chapter 8 (for discussion of computer crime and security,
and related governance issues).
edition [ISBN 9781137265807] Chapter 10, particularly Section 10.6.

Further reading on data protection in the European tradition can be found
on the UK Information Commissioners Office website: http://ico.org.uk

This chapter considers issues of the governance of information systems.
The chapter’s emphasis is first on general issues of how the IS operations
are managed and responsibilities are allocated and second on the
management of personal data and issues of security.
89
10.2 Governance of information systems and their data

The governance of information systems is a topic that has developed over
recent years from a fairly narrow set of issues about how an organisation
resources and manages its information systems activities to a topic that
makes front page news and leads TV news bulletins. The shift has come in
part because of the move to big data and the vastly increased amount of
personal data that is being collected and used and sometimes abused.
Across the world companies are being held to account for this kind
of use (and abuse) and in some cases being prosecuted and fined by
governments. As Beynon-Davies (2013) states it there are three reasons
why governance has become more central as a topic:
1. IS and IT are now more central to the success of companies and so
they get more scrutiny by senior managers and regulators.
2. The risk inherent in information system development projects and
in operational systems imposes now needs for robust control and
monitoring.
3. The growth of the power of outside regulatory bodies with backing in
law.
As one example, following the financial crash of 2008, many new
regulations have been enacted across the world for banks. These focus not
just on their financial soundness and balance sheet, but also on the way
they use data and the quality of their operational systems.
In this chapter we emphasis two particular aspects of information systems
governance:
1. general issues of how the IS operations are managed and
responsibilities are allocated
2. management of personal data – data about people.
Note that the coverage here is not comprehensive and there are other areas
of governance we do not consider in depth, such as HR policies, outsourcing
relationships, and general issues of security and integrity of systems.
It is also very important at the outset to be clear that ‘governance’ should
not be confused with ‘government’. In some areas the government and the
law is central to governance (for example in setting rules for managing
personal data and new laws relating to cyber crime), but in many areas
organisations have to make and police their own rules as to how things are
done and what structures, controls and oversight is in place.
10.2.1 Information systems management

Information systems need to be managed just like any other activity in
an organisation. Traditionally, a separate department or division has
undertaken this. In the past this most commonly came under the broad
responsibility of the chief financial officer (CFO) and was run alongside
the accounting functions. This can be explained by the origins of
information systems as accounting applications in many organisations. The
title given to this department may vary, but most commonly it is called the
IS department. Today the IS department (or whatever it is called) is less
likely to be under the CFO but may well have its own board level head.
The most common title for the senior manager who leads in this area is the
chief information officer or CIO. We may also see other ‘chiefs’ involved
such as the chief security officer or chief knowledge officer.
IS departments include many people who undertake duties such as
programming, project management, business analysis, systems analysis,
90
database management and so on – a whole range of professional roles that

will be in different proportions and have slightly different responsibilities
in different organisations (see further discussion on professional roles in
Chapter 16 of this guide).
Whatever the name of the IS department, the title of the senior manager in
charge, or the exact mix of staff employed, the department will undertake
a number of quite distinct responsibilities:
• planning new information systems to serve the business’ strategy
• acquiring, developing, and implementing new systems
• day-to-day management of operational systems in use.
We can summarise these roles in terms of three broad areas: strategy,
development, operations.
In the COBIT model introduced by Beynon-Davies (2013) in Figure 10.10
there is a fourth, higher level, task: to monitor and evaluate how well
all this is done. It is this last responsibility that is most concerned with
governance.
Of course, not all organisations are the same, and not all organisations
arrange their information systems activities in the same way. For example,
some organisations outsource a lot of the activity under the first three
identified areas. When they do so it is in part because they want to be able
to stop giving detailed attention to how things are done. But still, in the
end, any organisation has to undertake the fourth task – to know what is
going on, know if it is good or bad, and to take some action to improve it.
For example, operations may be outsourced to a cloud service provider, or
strategy making outsourced to a consultancy company – but at the end of
the day the risk of poor operational systems, or an inappropriate strategy,
lies with the organisation itself and the responsibility for governance in
this sense will remain mostly within the organisation.
10.3 Governance of data

A lot of data about us is stored in computers. At the very least, your
registration as a student of the University of London produces one
computer record that contains your name, address, age, gender, past
study and examination results. How would you feel if the University was
to sell this data to a marketing agency or to place it all on the internet for
anybody to see? Would you be surprised, annoyed, resigned or indifferent?
It is not surprising that the governance of personal data is one area of
information systems governance that attracts a lot of attention today. For
many organisations this kind of data is very important and valuable, for
example, in marketing, but even more importantly it may be a core part of
their way of working. Companies such as Amazon, Google, Facebook and
many more, both big and small, base their whole business model on being
able to collect and use personal data to provide services to their customers.
They may also sell on this data to others for use in other purposes. As an
example, think of how Google sells data about your online searches and what
they reveal about you to other people to allow them to target adverts at you.
It is increasingly accepted that this use of data about you and me needs
to have some clear limits and that individual organisations need to take
specific measures to achieve this, otherwise they may risk losing the trust
of their customers. In other words, poor data governance carries with it a
‘reputational risk’. You are no doubt aware of a number of companies that
have been heavily criticised for the misuse of personal data, selling it to
91
others or having weak security systems that allow personal data to be stolen
(being hacked.) It has thus been a requirement for a number of years in
many countries that personal data collection and use is regulated by law.
For example, all Member States of the European Union have had to have
national laws based on the European Directive on Data Protection 1998 to
control how personal information may be collected and used. In Britain,
until recently, this has been expressed in the Data Protection Act of 1998,
which requires holders of personal data, with some exceptions, to register
with a government office (the Information Commissioners Office: www.
ico.gov.uk) and to comply with certain core principles when collecting
and handling personal data. In 2018 a new EU-wide regime called GDPR
(General Data Protection Regulation) came into force. This is discussed
further in the section below.
Most countries have some laws and regulations relating to what personal
data a company or other organisation can hold and what it can do with it,
but these will differ greatly in their approach, detailed requirements and
levels of enforcement. Many countries also have rules about not sending
personal data outside the country (i.e. outside the legal regime) unless it
is to a destination where equivalent levels of protection are in place – so
called ‘safe harbour agreements’.
The USA has generally less stringent regulations on personal data than
found in Europe, and addresses sensitive areas (such as education, health,
etc.) in separate specific legislation. For more on this, see Table 4.3 in
Chapter 4 of Laudon and Laudon (2018). It is a useful exercise for you
to collect such information for your own country. Is the law where you
live based more on the European comprehensive view or is it by specific
area as we see in the USA? Who is tasked with supervision of adherence
to the regulations, what are the penalties for breaking these rules? More
generally, you should understand in your local context the reasons behind
the establishment of data protection legislation in various forms and the
threats that inappropriate use of personal information may pose.
10.3.1 GDPR in Europe

In 2018 a new data protection regime was introduced in Europe, applicable
in all EU countries. Known as the General Data Protection Regulation
(GDPR), its general principles are similar to the eight principles of the
earlier 1998 Regulation. The rules under the GDPR, however, have been
tightened and the potential penalties a firm can face if they break them
have increased hugely. Fines are now in millions and potentially in billions
of Euros. The general principle of the GDPR are as in figure 10.1 below:
Personal data should be:

•• processed lawfully, fairly and in a transparent manner,
•• collected for specified, explicit and legitimate purposes,
•• adequate, relevant and limited to what is necessary,
•• accurate and where necessary kept up to date,
•• kept in a form which permits identification of data subjects for no longer than is necessary
for the purposes for which those data are processed, and processed in a manner that
ensures appropriate security of the personal data.
Data Controllers are responsible for compliance with the principles and must be able to
demonstrate this to data subjects and the regulator.
Source – UK Information Commissioners Office, 2018 http://ico.org.uk
Figure 10.1: Principles of the GDPR 2018.

92
Some key parts of the GDPR as it relates to the governance of personal

data about people (customers, employees, sales leads etc.) are given in
Figure 10.2.
Under GDPR organisations must have a named responsible person who
takes responsibility for data privacy issues – the Data Protection Officer.
Organisations must also report data breaches (loss of data, hacking attacks
etc.) to the relevant authorities and affected people soon after the event.
Organisations must:
•• audit all the data they hold and know where it comes from
•• have a reason to hold the data, and be clear that it is legal.
•• know where and how data is stored, and who it is shared with
•• document how data is processed.
Organisations must report data breaches (loss of data, hacking attacks etc.) to the relevant
authorities and affected people soon after the event.
(Excerpted and edited from the UK Information Commissioner website http://ico.org.uk)
Figure 10.2: Organisational responsibilities under GDPR 2018
The GDPR also boosts the rights of individuals to know what data is held
about them and what it is used for. In certain circumstances people can ask
for data to be deleted. This comes under the general category of ‘subject
access rights’.
If you do not live in Europe, the GDPR is still important to you because
many international companies that operate around the world have stated
their intention to adhere to this standard in their operations. Thus GDPR
may come to be seen as a global standard in this area. Certainly, big
multinational companies cannot confidently run their global business and
comply with many different legal frameworks so they are keen to establish
a common set of data governance policies that meet the needs of the major
markets they operate in.
Activity 10.1
Search the UK information commissioner’s website: www.ico.gov.uk
•• Find the information on the right to be forgotten (known as the right of erasure).
How important do you believe this right is?
•• Look up the information on ‘privacy enhancing technologies’. Do you believe that
technology can solve the problem of data privacy, given that technology has created
it in the first place?
10.3.2 Computer crimes

Data protection legislation such as GDPR is established to protect the
privacy of the individual and to give some redress to people who feel
that their rights have been abused. Laws have also been passed in most
countries to make certain acts performed with computers into specific
criminal offences. The well-publicised offence is hacking, which is the
unauthorised breaking into a computer or computer network with the
intention of doing damage or extracting data. The hacker may be doing
this just for the challenge or with a real intent to cause harm, steal
information or perpetrate fraud. It is also the case that such crimes are
quite likely to be committed by an insider – an employee, for example –
for gain or as an act of sabotage.
93
The scale and importance of computer crime is evident in news reports of

data stolen, credit card details lost and victims of various forms of bank
fraud. Some suggest that it exists on a larger scale than we acknowledge,
and that many organisations which have been the victims of such incidents
hush it up for fear of the bad publicity. This is why the GDPR makes it a
requirement to report loss of personal data. In any event, ensuring the
security and reliability of systems is today a central aspect of information
systems governance in most organisations. This leads to a new emphasis on
providing appropriate security and integrity protection to an information
system, through such mechanisms as personal passwords of good strength,
two factor authentication (2FA), encrypting data and logging all accesses
which are now a standard part of many business information systems.
In system terms, this can be seen as part of the control function. It also
implies the need for specific training for all kinds of computer users on
how to remain safe in an online world and for employees who to work
with the systems so as to maximise their integrity. The perfectly safe
system is not really attainable, but with many small improvements in
design, in governance and in how we behave, systems can become a lot
safer in terms of vulnerabilities.
Activity 10.2
1. Find examples of computer crime that has taken place in your country. What laws are
used to prosecute people who commit such crimes?
2. To prevent simple computer crimes and secure systems and their data we often use
a login procedure with some combination of passwords or pin numbers, and perhaps
also a code texted to a designated mobile phone. Suggest three good principles to
be applied when setting up a login process, including how passwords, pin numbers
and access codes are set and changed, how they are used and managed, and what a
good secure software should do in various circumstances.

This chapter has considered issues of governance of information systems
in organisations. The chapter has emphasised three main aspects. First,
the need for organisations to establish a specific department or group with
responsibility for strategy, development and operations, and a place within
the senior management team. Second, it discussed the need to formally
address issues of the governance of data, in line with relevant laws and
regulations. Third, it considered the need to design systems and apply
suitable controls to ensure systems integrity and robustness in the face of
potential computer crimes.

• identify the scope of governance of information systems at the
organisation level
• explain the needs for specific rules and standards in the handling of
personal data, and the legal regimes under which this may be done
• propose some key actions to help keep information systems secure
from malicious attacks.
94

1. Write a brief explanation of what is meant by information systems
governance. Explain the major information systems activities that need
governance and suggest for each area two primary governance issues.
2. Explain what the GDPR is and the main principles that underlie it.
What is new in the GDPR as compared to earlier data protection
regulations? What specific responsibilities does it lay down for
organisations.
3. Write a brief guide on ‘How to Stay Safe Online’.
The guide is aimed at high school students. These students are an
intelligent audience who want explanations and reasons, not simple
rules. The guide is intended to show them a limited number of basic
safety and privacy principles and practices they can use in their
everyday lives online.
95
Notes
96
Chapter 11: Information systems from a societal perspective
Chapter 11: Information systems from a

societal perspective
11.1 Introduction
This chapter looks at the consequences of information systems and digital
technologies in a wider social and economic perspective. The chapter
suggests some of the criteria we might use to assess the benefits and risks
of information systems, and indicates some of the main issues that are
contemporary topics of debate including economic and social concerns.

• identify some of the consequences of the use of information systems
seen at a societal level
• reflect on the ways that we can think about information systems
consequences in both economic and social ways
• account for various policies that governments pursue to improve or
steer the outcomes of the use of technology.

• discuss the impact of information systems at a societal level
• identify alternative and complementary perspectives from which to
consider these issues
• contrast positive and more critical accounts of information systems’
impact in the future.

[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapter 4.

Chui, M., J. Manyika and M. Miremadi ‘Where machines could replace humans and
where they can’t’, McKinsey Quarterly July 2016. Available at www.mckinsey.
com/business-functions/digital-mckinsey/our-insights/where-machines-could-
replace-humans-and-where-they-cant-yet (accessed February 2019, but if this
link is no longer valid when you read this, search online for the title of the
article.)
To gain more understanding of the issues described in this chapter
your best ‘further reading’ is in newspapers, magazines and media that
discuss public affairs in your country and more widely across the world.
It is there that you can find information and news stories that relate to
people’s attitudes to the change that information systems bring, and their
expectations and fears of the future.

This chapter looks at the wider consequences of information systems and
digital technologies from a social and economic perspective. The chapter
97
suggests some of the criteria we may use to assess the benefits and risks
of information systems, and indicates some of the main issues that are
contemporary topics of debate including economic and social concerns.
11.2 The social and economic context of computer use

We have mentioned a number of times in this guide the broad idea that
the use of information systems, data and networks has consequences
that go beyond their immediate designed functions or improved business
processes. We have for example discussed the impact of information
systems on organisational structures, on how business activity is managed
and how supply chains link businesses together. We have also seen
debate over the ethics and appropriateness of the use of big data and the
rules and laws that should apply in the handling of personal data as it is
collected and shared through online service and social media. In the GDPR
of 2018 we have seen an active political response to perceived problems in
personal data handling encapsulated as new laws with new obligations for
data users and rights for citizens.
Today we can see a strong movement across different countries to think
a bit more carefully about the consequences of technology and to ask
ourselves if we are ready for some of these or if we wish to take a bit
more control of the outcomes. Two examples that are much discussed
are 1) what are the implications of the new AI technologies for work and
employment and 2) Can we, should we, or must we, try to control how
and how much children use social media?
In Chapter 4 of Laudon and Laudon (2018) (Figure 4.1) they introduce
a framework for thinking about such issues based on five broad areas to
consider:
1. information rights and obligations
2. property rights and obligations
3. system quality
4. quality of life
5. accountability and control.
They further propose that these kinds of issues should be seen at three
related levels: the individual (person), society (social expectations and
norms) and the polity (politics, regulation and law).
The way that they frame these five ‘moral dimensions of the information
age’ may not be quite how others see it – but in general we do need to ask
these kinds of questions – and find some feasible and acceptable answers.
Activity 11.1
Using the five moral dimensions of the information age framework, and looking at the
three levels of analysis (individual, society, polity), sketch out some response to the
question ‘Can we, should we, or must we, try to control how children use social media?’
The main emphasis of your answer should focus on the ‘should we?’ part.
It is easy to suggest ways to exercise control (‘can we?’), but perhaps
harder to say why we should do it. Just because ‘Something should be
done!’ does not mean that doing anything is justifiable.
In framing your answer you might also look at the ‘Candidate ethical
principles’ given in Chapter 4 of Laudon and Laudon (2018) at the end of
Section 4.2
98
11.3 The economic context

The internet and computer-based information systems, and the
information and communications technology that forms part of them, have
become a significant part of the way in which the economies of developed
economies operate. They are arguably equally or even more important
for the economies of developing countries as well. If a country’s computer
systems and public networks cease to work, are maintained poorly or are
not available, the economy will suffer, productivity will be held back and
the country will be less attractive for investors, generate fewer jobs, and
put off those who wish to do business.
For these kinds of reasons many governments are focused on promoting
good technical infrastructures such as data networks and fostering good
technical skills in their population through education and training. It is
also partly for these reasons that many countries in both the developed
and developing world have substantial programmes to promote computer
education in schools, colleges and universities. There is a common
understanding that a country’s economic growth potential is based on its
economy being both a good and innovative user of information systems
in its various sectors, but also a credible initiator or innovator for new
technologies themselves and for business models based strongly on new
uses of these technologies.
A more challenging analysis of the consequences and outcomes of the
contemporary focus on technology and innovation might be bleaker. It
could suggest a situation in which a relatively small elite gain most of
the economic and material benefit of these changes (e.g. the technical
professionals, business owners, bankers and investors etc.), while the
majority see their jobs at risk, wages stagnant and public services reduced.
Rather than liberating us all and building strong and fair societies,
technology enhances the differences between sectors of society (both
locally and globally) and sows the seeds of conflict and decline.
You decide which version you find more convincing!
11.4 Government and e-government

Governments themselves are also increasingly dependent on information
systems in terms of public administration and providing services to
their citizens, for example, in health care and education. It is important
therefore for us to consider information systems not just as a tool of
business or administration, but also in terms of their wider role in shaping
our society, its primary institutions and how it operates.
Based on the view that the development and economic growth of countries
requires the take-up of technology in general, and information technology
in particular, many countries have developed policies that deliberately
promote the use of information technology, by:
• sponsoring and subsidising technology industries and those who wish
to invest in them
• attracting inward investment from global tech companies
• investing in communications infrastructure (networks)
• sponsoring education in the field
• providing opportunities for training.
Countries also sponsor and finance research and development in
information technology and information systems development practices.
99
In the UK, for example, successive governments have pursued initiatives to

promote computers in schools and ICTs in the school curriculum, though
it must be said these efforts seem to meet with at best mixed success.
Governments have also strongly promoted and funded information
systems in the health service and more generally across all manner of
government activities.
There is a special area of study of e-government that considers the ways
that information systems are used to deliver services to citizens and
smooth the interaction between people and various government bodies.
A common example in many countries is filing income tax returns online,
issuing passports online or providing new information services via websites
or mobile apps. E-government also extends to new attitudes to the sharing
or distribution of information, under such initiatives as ‘open government’
and ‘open government data’. For some researchers who study this area
the impact of information systems and e-government may be to change
the nature of public administration – for example reducing the number
of government employees able to use discretion in decision making, and
leading to more limited kinds of services that can be ‘programmed’ and
delivered online and outsourced to private sector organisations. (Note
however that such debates in any detail are beyond the scope of this
course.)
The movement towards e-government is sometimes justified by the belief
that through these systems citizens will become better informed about
how government operates and spends their money and serves them, and
be enabled to offer their own opinions and feedback about such services.
E-government is thus equated by some commentators with a stronger and
more active kind of democracy or social participation.
Activity 11.2
Are there any efforts in your own country to use technology to improve the
communication between citizens and government bodies. What are the arguments used
for pursuing such policies?
11.5 The social dimension

Digital technology has changed the way in which organisations of all kinds
operate and the information resources that they use. As a consequence
they have changed how people live and work, and the kinds of jobs they
do now and will do in the future. Computers and innovation around
how information systems are used are usually seen as essentially positive
influences, making work easier and more pleasant, and helping all sorts of
organisations to provide convenient and high-quality services.
Not all people see this as a positive advancement. Computer-based work
may be boring and repetitive. A clerk who once worked at a desk with
paper had some freedom to pace the work and select the order in which
things were done. A clerk or equivalent today – perhaps a worker in a
call-centre – sitting in front of a computer terminal with a headset on and
reading a script as they talk to customers may have less opportunity to
manage and control their working life. Their job is to read the script in
front of them, finish the call, and get on to the next one. Not perhaps a
very satisfying way to earn a living. And, of course, we could paint this
dystopian vision in many ways for many kinds of workers – Doctors too
increasingly work to scripts and protocols, financial managers are second
guessed by AI algorithms, and taxi drivers are slaves to their GPS (which
may be redundant in a few years when driverless cars are perfected.)
100
Indeed, ICT has also been accused of potentially causing large-scale

unemployment by displacing workers whose jobs are ‘automated’ away.
Those whose work is capable of being ‘programmed’ by new artificial
intelligence technologies and those without the skills needed to work
closely with computers may find it less and less easy to find good jobs and
may find themselves relegated to more menial manual tasks. As another
example, at the upper end of the scale, the job of a radiologist (a doctor
who interprets X-rays and scans in order to diagnose problems) may soon
be almost wholly substitutable by an AI-based computer program.
For a quick round-up of ideas about computers, AI and employment, see
the article listed in the Essential reading above ‘‘Where machines could
replace humans and where they can’t’ at www.mckinsey.com/business-
functions/digital-mckinsey/our-insights/where-machines-could-replace-
humans-and-where-they-cant-yet
Activity 11.3
Find examples of jobs in your country that have been reduced in number or relocated by
the advent of computers and communications systems. Can you find counter-examples
of new jobs that have been created as a result of new information and communication
technologies?
11.6 But it’s not all bad news

The sections above have listed a number of negatives associated with
digital technology and information systems. But, there are also positive
interpretations of digital technology and information systems’ impact in
our world:
• They allow widespread access to information which empowers people
and helps them to lead richer and more productive lives.
• They encourage communications and an interchange of ideas that
benefit us all and allow us to live together.
• Some work tasks are better done with computer-based technologies
– robots, for example, can be used to perform messy or health-
threatening activities in factories.
• Other important goals are served for example adaptation in the face
of climate change and reduction in CO2 emissions are made possible
using smart technologies.
• AI based systems using machine learning can revolutionise the
effectiveness of knowledge-rich activities such as engineering design or
medical diagnosis and treatments.
Overall, we probably do need to acknowledge that information systems are
based on a powerful technology that does raise moral and ethical issues
that impact and challenge us all. We certainly cannot just assume that
what is new is always good or that if it serves the interests of one powerful
group in society then we should not question its consequences for others.
Activity 11.4
Looking around you, and seeing the lives that you, your family and your friends live,
prepare a short ‘score card’ for information systems that lists with examples the five main
advantages or benefits that information systems and digital technologies bring, and the
similarly the five main disadvantages, risks or threats.
On this basis, and using your score card data as evidence, write a half page ‘Manifesto for
tomorrow’s information systems’.
101

This chapter has introduced a view of information systems that looks
beyond the individual organisation solving its own problems. It suggests a
societal perspective that considers how information systems may affect the
interests of society as a whole and of specific groups within society.

• discuss the impact of information systems at a societal level
• identify alternative and complementary perspectives from which to
consider these issues
• contrast positive and more critical accounts of information systems’
impact in the future.

1. What are the main issues discussed in your country concerning the
way that the internet opens up information and allows it to flow across
borders? Has the government made any significant new policies in this
area?
2. What consequences for society at large might the development of
e-government bring over the next 10 years? In your answer identify
the interest groups or stakeholders who will potentially benefit, and
any who may not.
3. ‘The coming of AI technologies, business process automation and
smart devices is going to radically re-shape how society is organised
and how our children lead their lives. That is quite certain. But what
is less clear is if this will offer better lives and better communities to
people.’ Discuss this statement and assess the argument being made.
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Chapter 12: Practical study of information systems
Chapter 12: Practical study of

information systems
12.1 Introduction
In this chapter we will discuss applying and testing your knowledge about
information systems out in the world.

The aim of this chapter is for you to:
• assess how relevant the ideas introduced in this course are for real
organisations that are managing and using real information systems.

By the end of this chapter, and having completed the activity outlined in it,
• outline the mix of issues and concerns that IS managers are faced with
• discuss the value and currency of the concepts taught in this course
• describe the ongoing and continuous cycles of change and adaptation
that is central to information systems management.

There is no Essential (or, indeed, Further) reading for this chapter. Instead,
in this chapter we require you to discuss the material in the course with
professionals who work with information system. After meeting and
talking with IS managers and technology specialists, you can then follow
up in the main textbooks topics that have cropped up in conversation.

The chapter suggests a set of questions that you can use when you meet or
interview IS managers or technology specialists, or if you are able to visit
an organisation and see what kinds of systems they have developed and
use. The intention of the task is to allow you to match the material taught
in this course, and as presented in the main textbooks, with the experience
and concerns of real IS managers.
12.2 Practical information systems

As part of this course, you are asked to briefly study information systems
in a real-world organisation. The many case studies in Laudon and Laudon
(2018) the other textbooks and magazines are useful and interesting, but
nothing is as educational as uncovering the reality of information systems
‘in the wild’ for yourself.
Ideally your study should entail visiting an organisation (or more than
one would be wonderful) and asking people who work there questions
about how, and for what purposes, information and information systems
are used, and how they are developed and operated. Alternatively, it may
be possible to arrange for an information systems manager from a local
business or organisation, or perhaps a consultant who advises businesses,
to give a talk to a group of students and answer some questions about the
information systems they manage or advise on.
103
It may be that you fear that arranging any such direct contact with people
who manage information systems is not possible. Don’t worry. You will be
surprised how willing such people are to talk about what they do! But if
all attempts fail, we suggest that as an alternative you take time to review
in some detail two or three of the case studies that are given in Laudon
and Laudon (2018) and Beynon-Davies (2013). For example, the case of
EasyJet in Chapter 5 or Uber in Chapter 10 of Laudon and Laudon (2018),
and the case of London Ambulance in Beynon-Davies (2013), Chapter 13.
In each case do some more online follow up.
Remember the goal is for you to get a feel for the kind of real-world issues
and concerns that information systems managers face in their day-to-day
jobs. In the examination for this course you may have the opportunity to
use such information from visits or from case studies to illustrate your
answers with powerful examples.
When you do talk to people and study real systems, you will discover
that most medium or large sized organisations have a number of distinct
areas of activity that are supported by separate information systems. In a
commercial business, this may include activities in such areas as:
• production planning
• production control
• product development
• marketing
• sales
• accounting
• payroll
• personnel, and so on.
In a hospital, it may be such areas as:
• scheduling operating theatres
• managing patient admissions
• keeping online medical records
• controlling the issue of drugs.
In a hotel, it could include:
• reservations
• room assignment
• scheduling staff
• keeping track of client accounts (lodging, food, bar bills, etc.).
12.3 Questions to ask and details to consider

On a visit to a real organisation or in interviewing an information systems
manager, you could include the questions set out below. Of course your
conversation will be a bit different and probably covering fewer topics.
• What are the main purposes and uses of computer-based information
systems in this organisation (the main information systems)?
• What are the systems that are essential to staying in business? You
can then work out if those identified are best described as transaction
processing systems, management information systems, decision
support systems, etc. Which would you see as achieving the scope and
scale to called ‘enterprise systems’?
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Chapter 12: Practical study of information systems
For the main systems identified you can then go on to ask more detailed
questions:
• What is the main type of data gathered, processed and stored?
• How is the data stored (in a file, a local database or a shared database,
in the Cloud)?
• For each system, who are the main users, who puts data into the
systems and who makes use of it subsequently?
• Has the advent of new systems had a significant impact on the
organisation and how things are done? Have jobs been lost or gained?
Have the required skills altered? Has the management structure
changed?
• In what ways, and to what extent, does the system support the
organisation’s overall strategy? Is it possible to envisage new systems
that would have a significant or different strategic role in the future?
• Draw a use case and class diagram – see Chapter 16 of this guide
– showing the main actors and processes and the classes of things
in the world about which data is stored and accessed. Where does
the data processed originate, where is it stored, where and how is it
transformed?
• Who designed the system, wrote the programs, designed the reports
and determined what data should be stored in the system? Was it
formally planned or did it emerge over time? Was the planning (to
whatever extent) done within the organisation or by consultants?
• If software packages were bought from outside vendors, did the ways
of working for this organisation have to change to fit the package?
• Are there any specific external constraints on how the system
operates? (For example, an accounting system may have to meet
certain legal requirements; there may be government reporting
requirements and a system that stores information about people will
have to conform to data protection legislation.)
• Does the system require any particular security measures? Are there a
limited number of authorised users? If so, how are others kept away?
• What would happen if the system were to fail? Is there a back-up
procedure? Are safety copies made of the stored data? Could the
organisation function without the particular system? If so, for how
long – minutes, hours, days or months?
Each of the systems you identify might be seen as constituting a system in
its own right – people with information needs in their jobs are matched
with technology to support them. Alternatively, the distinct areas may
be seen as subsystems that contribute to the overall achievements of the
business or organisation. In this sense, the concept of an information
system is very flexible, and this flexibility makes it useful. If a system
can be broken down into subsystems, which can themselves be analysed
and studied as systems, the basic approach can be applied at a variety
of appropriate levels, for example, at the enterprise level, but also at the
department or individual worker level.
To take an example, at first glance the sales order-processing activity of a
business could be seen as a single enterprise system and its interactions
with other aspects of the business and with customers could be analysed.
Thereafter, individual tasks comprising the sales activity, such as taking
orders, checking availability in the warehouse, arranging shipment, issuing
invoices or receiving payments, might be worked on individually, with
each being considered as an information system in its own right.
105

This chapter is devoted to encouraging students to go out into the world,
leaving the text book and lecture notes behind, and examining real
information systems ‘in the wild.’ This should help you to make sense
of the course material through real examples. It should also help you to
develop a critical understanding of the challenge of managing information
systems.

Having completed this chapter, and the activity outlined in it, you should
be able to:
• outline the mix of issues and concerns that IS managers are faced with
• discuss the value and currency of the concepts taught in this course
• describe the ongoing and continuous cycles of change and adaptation
that is central to information systems management.

Once you have completed some of the tasks here, and have talked to
people who work with information systems, you should reconsider what
you have learned.
• What are the two most surprising or unexpected aspects of IS
management that you have encountered?
• What aspects of what you have been taught in this course seemed
most significant or important to the people you talk to?
• What aspects were substantially different or contradictory to what you
have been taught here? (Note that you should expect to see differences
in emphasis, understanding or methods, depending on who you talk
to. So do not be surprised to hear contradictory perspectives.)
106
Section 4: Information systems development
Section 4: Information systems

development
The chapters in this section are concerned with the development of

information systems within organisations, be they business firms,
voluntary organisations or in the public sector. System development
usually occurs when a deliberate decision is made that the organisation
would benefit from a new information system to serve its needs.
Chapter 13 considers the broad approaches that we may take to the task
and to providing the technical resources needed (software, hardware etc.)
including using packaged software and using SaaS (Software as a Service).
Chapter 14 is concerned with the life cycle as a generic project structure
for systems development, while Chapter 15 looks at some of the methods
and tools that are used when developing systems. Chapter 16, the final
chapter in the section, turns to a discussion of the various professional
roles that participate in the development and management of information
systems.
107
Notes
108
Chapter 13: Approaches to the development of information systems
Chapter 13: Approaches to the

development of information systems
13.1 Introduction
This section is about systems development – the work needed to create
and set to work a new information system. At the outset we need to
distinguish information systems development from software engineering
– that is from programming and software development activity. While
software engineering is concerned with the standards, techniques and
practices for the construction of high-quality software, our topic of
information system development covers a broader range of issues
more focused on the organisation, business processes, the users and their
work practices, as well as the interests of other relevant parties, and the
wider business environment. As you should see at once, this suggests
strongly a sociotechnical perspective.
Of course one part of information system development may well be
concerned with the production or tailoring of software, and to do this well
we may rely on software engineering knowledge. However, developing
software is not the main focus of most organisations when a need for a
new information system is identified.

• introduce you to the broad approaches to developing new information
systems in organisations
• identify the criteria that might be used to define a successful
development project
• explain different choices in approach to the technical elements of a
new information system that must be made at the outset
• explore some of the implications of these choices.

• outline the alternative technical resources (information technology
infrastructures) which an organisation may choose to underpin new
information systems
• construct a case for or against using packaged software, outsourcing,
open source software or cloud services as part of core information
systems infrastructure.

[ISBN 9781292211756]. You should review the content of Chapters 2 and 3 –
and then read Chapter 13.
109

practice. (London: Macmillan, 1998) second edition [ISBN 9780333732311].
Chapters 2, 3, 4 and 5 cover systems development in some detail and depth.
Pressman R.S. and B.R. Maxim Software engineering: a practitioner’s approach.
(London: McGraw Hill, 2015).

The emphasis in this chapter is on the approach taken to providing the
technical resources needed for systems development. This whole section
and this chapter emphasise a broadly sociotechnical approach in which the
tools (technology) are considered alongside the people involved and the
tasks that the information system will support.
13.2 Developing new information systems

A primary motivation for studying and learning about information systems
is to be able to participate in or lead projects within organisations that
aim to build good new information systems. ‘Good’ here means systems
that are delivered on time and on budget, meet the needs (information
needs) of various people and serve the organisation’s goals, and which
are also technically sound, maintainable over time, and flexible so as to
accommodate future changes in requirements.
Activity 13.1
Find details of recent information systems projects in your country or elsewhere that has
failed in some way to meet the criteria listed above.
Often such failed projects are written about in newspapers or business magazines. Public
sector organisations are often identified with such cases – although this my just reflect
the wider public scrutiny they receive when compared to private sector companies.
Meeting all these criteria for success is never easy in a project of any scale.
Quite often systems development projects fail to deliver on one or more of
these criteria and are written off as a waste of time and money – a failed
project. To try to improve the prospects for success many concepts, models
and recommendations for achieving successful systems development are
given in books and training materials. These set out guidelines for good
practice in developing and managing information systems, including for
preparing the specification of what is needed (systems analysis) and for
managing the complex project that will deliver this.
In addition a large number of tools and techniques have been developed
over the years for various specific tasks required in the work of developing
a new information system. By a tool or technique we mean some
formalism, modelling style or sequence of actions that help to achieve
some task. For example, a tool may be a type of diagram that helps people
communicate ideas (e.g. a use case diagram) or a set of steps to take in
refining an outline design to make a more detailed one (e.g. normalisation
of a database design).
In this chapter we focus on the broad choices available for providing
the technical parts of a new information system – broadly the software
component and associated hardware architectures – what is sometimes
referred to as the information technology infrastructure. In the following
chapters of this section we consider some of the other aspects that may
affect the success or failure of a development project – such as how projects
themselves are organised and the process they follow, how systems are
specified, and how they are introduced into the organisation itself.
110
13.3 Where to start: build, buy, rent or participate?

Most organisations, as we have already discussed in this guide, do not
build their principal (enterprise scale) information systems from scratch.
In particular they do not program most of their own software, nor do they
design from scratch most of their own business processes. And, of course,
they probably do not build their own computers or install their own
networks. Doing these things themselves would not make sense and they
would not have the skills or other resources to do them. As in other areas
of economic life, there is a market for these items and services, and they
can be purchased from a variety of sellers and in a variety of ways.
In this respect the task of systems development becomes one of making
the appropriate purchases (often called ‘procurement’ or ‘sourcing’) and
then to configure these parts (computers, networks, software, services like
training, etc.) and undertake the required changes in the way the business
operates so as best to match the organisation’s needs or ambitions in the
new information system.
That sounds fairly easy but it soon becomes clear that for any non-trivial
new information system, this sourcing of parts (hardware, software,
networking, specialist services, training etc.), and assembling them
together to deliver some specific needs for a group of people, in a
fixed time frame and with a fixed budget, is a complex task – or more
specifically what we call a project.
Activity 13.2
It would be useful at this point if you look up the definition of a project online. What are
the specific characteristics that are associated with something being called a project?
13.3.1 Using application packages

A new information systems will, almost by definition, require some
software to embody the rules and procedures for data manipulation
(capture, processing and display). Organisations usually choose not to
develop their own software for their information systems for good reasons.
Rather they choose to purchase software packages that can do the required
task (‘buy, not build’). As we have discussed earlier, these are commercial
off-the-shelf software (COTSS). The advantages in terms of saved effort
and starting with a proven product can be very great, but there are
disadvantages too – you only get what the package offers and that may not
be what you really want. It also likely to be the case that the organisation
will have to change its business processes and/or work processes to fit
in with any particular purchased software – indeed that may be the goal
if the software embodies the best practice way of doing a task and the
organisation want to move in that direction.
The alternative is to change the way that a software package operates
by changing the software (e.g. customising it by recoding certain
parts). This may be possible, but will probably be costly, both now and
into the future. On the other hand, good packaged software usually
allows many configuration options, allowing potential for a user or
organisation to make the package work the way they desire. Still, even
configuration is skilled work, requires thought and takes time. This is one
reason why organisations often hire specialist consultants to help them
do configuration and more generally to support the integration of a new
system based on packaged software into their business processes.
111
Activity 13.3
Research and write two brief paragraphs describing what is meant by 1) customisation
and 2) configuration of a software product.
Then contrast the two concepts and explain the benefits and problems of either
approach. Structure your answer from two perspectives. First a company considering
using a package for an enterprise system and second from the perspective of a company
developing and selling packaged enterprise software.
Despite the reliance COTSS there will be times when organisations will
make decisions not to rely on packages but to develop and program their
own systems. The criteria that they use to make this decision can include
questions of their technical skills and capabilities (can they do it?), the
availability of suitable packages (is there any alternative?), the time scale
they are working to (how quickly do they need it?). One situation where
it may make sense to write your own software is where something really
new or innovative is wanted that does not yet exist. Or perhaps a smaller
extra element can be bespoke developed and work with or alongside a
COTSS product – as apps are added to a phone. But even then it may
make sense to outsource the development work to a specialist rather than
take it on in-house.
It is important to understand that choosing to use COTSS for an
organisation’s information systems does not remove the bulk of the
tasks needed for systems development (see the next chapter). Packaged
software – beyond the simplest examples – is never a simple case of
insert the disk, load the software and off you go! That may work for a
computer game, smart-phone app, or a word processor, but it won’t for an
accounting system, e-commerce portal, payroll or logistics system (think,
for example, of the sociotechnical issues in each case). So we should see
COTTS as representing a slightly different approach to development work,
but still representing real work and a real project, rather than as a short
cut that minimises the development work and moves straight to a new
working system.
Indeed, when using a COTSS approach there will need to be extra
emphasis in some areas, such as on choosing which package to purchase
and implement, and who to contract to help in doing this, as well as all the
legal and contractual arrangements for supply, service and upgrades. There
may also be an extra need to focus on training and change management if,
as is often the case, the chosen package will impose new ways of working
on staff in the organisation (see Chapter 17).
13.3.2 Configuration work:

As we noted above, where packaged software is used there may be
little formal programming to be done, but there will be quite a lot of
‘configuration’ work, setting up the software so it works in a way that is
compatible with this particular organisation’s needs and ways of working
and with other information systems that it may need to interact with.
This will also imply a good deal of testing to ensure that it is working
coherently and reliably.
For example, a standard business software package might send out an
invoice (a request for payment) once an order is received and processed.
But when exactly should it send it might need a configuration to be
made? Is it when the order is received, when the goods are allocated in
the warehouse, when they are shipped, when the good are received, or 90
days after the goods are certified as working?
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Different industries or companies will have different requirements and the

package should be configurable to meet any of these timings. In a similar
way my word processor (a software package) can be configured to use UK
English, Singapore English, Canadian English or American English as its
default language for the spelling checker. The one I am writing on now has
13 possible versions of English available to be the default option, as well
many other languages.
To do the configuration for a major enterprise system a lot of information
about how thinks work now, or should work in the future – perhaps both
– has to be gathered and agreed. Thus to implement an enterprise scale
business package will usually entail a as part of the project that a team
of specialists and professionals undertake a lot of fact finding (systems
analysis) so as to agree how to do the configurations.
But purchasing COTTS from a specialist vendor and setting up and
managing a substantial project to implement it may not always be the
most appropriate approach to developing a new information system and
there are some other possibilities we may wish to consider.
13.3.3 Open source software

First we may not need to purchase the package; there may be some free
software available to do the job. That is, open source software that is
developed by a community of people and organisations, and which is
distributed ‘for free’. ‘Distribution’ includes distributing the source code
(original programming code), so in this way a new user of an open
source package is in theory be able to do some customisation work at a
reasonable cost. (Remember that ‘closed source’ software – COTSS – does
not make the original code available to users to fiddle with – or at least
not for free.)
Many students on this course will be using some open source software
every day, for example the web browser Firefox, or the Open Office
desktop suite of programs. Many businesses use network software that
is open source, for example the Apache web server, or run the Linux
operating system on their server computers. Even core enterprise
applications are available as open source software, for example while SAP
is the largest commercial provider of ERP software (discussed in Chapter
9 of this guide), there are open source competitors – for example Odoo
based on a project called openERP.
Activity 13.4
Compare the business functions available in the open source software from Odoo
www.odoo.com/ with those available from SAP www.sap.com
One of these products is free to download, one costs large sums of money. How can that
be possible?
If you were a senior manager of a big company which of these do you think you would
want to use, when and why?
If you look at the websites of various open source software products (e.g.
those named above – Firefox, Apache, Linux) you will see that they usually
speak of themselves as supported by a community. That is, as a group of
people and organisations who collaborate and cooperate to develop and
support software in some area that they are interested in or for which they
have a need. Big IT companies, such as Microsoft, IBM or Hewlett Packard,
participate in open source communities, alongside individuals and a range
of other smaller companies.
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We also need to understand that open source software is not really ‘given
away for free’, it is distributed under a license (licenses come in many
versions) that says more or less, that you are free to use the software,
modify it and pass it on to others, but you may not yourself sell it. There
are various forms of open license the best known (and most restrictive on
how the software can be used) being the General Public License – GPL –
see http://opensource.org/licenses/gpl-license .
13.4 Outsourcing
The more traditional approach to reducing the burden of developing and
running new information systems is to pay somebody else to do it for
you. This is generally known as outsourcing. There are many specialist
companies, large and small, that will undertake to develop new systems
for you, help you to implement them in your organisation, and/or will
then run them on a continuing basis. And they do this, of course, for a fee.
Many government and public sector information systems in the UK and the
USA are outsourced to big service companies, often known collectively as
‘system integrators - SI’. These companies have large and experienced staff
and their own data centres where they manage online systems and store
their clients’ data. In other countries there may be less of such outsourcing
of IS in the public sector, but it is still a popular option for business firms;
for example in energy, banking and finance, transport and manufacturing.
Activity 13.5
Find out if government bodies in your own country (national government, city government
etc.) outsource any of the development and operations of public facing information
systems. For example, online tax returns, issue of passports and driving licenses, collecting
parking fines, payment of pensions.
Create a list of key arguments as to why this may be an appropriate policy for
governments to take, or why it may not be.
A particularly common type of outsourcing found in big businesses in the

developed world is offshore-outsourcing where IT tasks are undertaken
in other countries, usually motivated in part by lower wages and lower
costs. Thus, for example, many companies in Europe and North America
outsource some of their IT operations to countries like India, Mexico, China
or the Philippines. We should understand that, while lower labour costs may
be a part of the reason to do this, there are also very experienced people
with excellent skills working in these countries, in software development as
well as in operations (running systems), and support services (including call
centres). Thus offshore outsourced work may be of the highest quality. That
said, in recent times, there has been a bit of a move to ‘reshoring’, that is
moving tasks back to the home country. Some people argue that as process
automation based on AI becomes more and more powerful, there will be
less and less reason to pursue offshore outsourcing.
13.5 Cloud computing and software as a service (SaaS)

Open source software may be free, but it is still takes an effort to
implement, just as for any other packages software. So too outsourcing
is usually based on a carefully written contract between supplier and
customer, and is based on a long-term arrangement – usually three to
five years, perhaps longer. There is, however, another option that is
increasingly used and which does not require so much implementation
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work, nor entering into a long-term contract. This option is just to rent the
‘service’ that you need from a cloud service provider – an approach known
as ‘software as a service’ – SaaS’.
In a case like running a payroll for a large or a small company it may
well today be best just to send the names and work hours, bank details
and rates of pay etc. of your employees over the internet to a specialist
company once a month and let them do the work to ensure that salaries
are paid. If the business grows or shrinks it can buy more or less payroll
services, and perhaps can switch its supplier if it is not happy with the
service after a few months. A payroll service might extend further to offer
support for all HR (Human Resources) activities, for example recruitment
websites, hiring, promotions, training, professional development,
disciplinary procedures, retirement etc. – each of which might even be
served by a different SaaS supplier (but that would get really complex to
manage!). Still in principle a set of small specialist service providers could
be chosen over a single big integrated service offering.
You have already met SalesForce.com in an activity in Chapter 9 of this
guide. A decade or more ago this company was an early SaaS pioneer for
business users www.salesforce.com. Today, almost every standard business
activity is available ‘as a service’. For example, Google docs (docs.google.
com) provides desktop computing (word-processing, presentations and
spreadsheets) on demand and via your browser as does Microsoft with
their Office 365.
Activity 13.6
If a large company adopts SaaS for most of its business computing needs, what tasks, if
any, do you think may still need to be undertaken by an in-house IS department as new
systems are identified and developed?
Are there any tasks that cannot be contracted out, one way or another? Are there any
tasks that should never be contracted out?

In this chapter we consider information systems development from the
perspective of the information technology infrastructures that these
systems are built upon. The chapter considers these options in terms of
build or buy decisions, packaged software, open source software, cloud
services and outsourcing.

• outline the alternative technical resources (information technology
infrastructures) which an organisation may choose to underpin new
information systems
• construct a case for or against using packaged software, outsourcing,
open source software or cloud services as part of core information
systems infrastructure.
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1. What criteria should a company use when it makes the choice between
developing the software for a particular business systems itself with its
own staff, purchasing a package from a software supplier, or choosing
to use SaaS?
2. ‘When you use COTSS the key to success is to make all necessary
changes in your business processes and work activities, never
customise packaged software and keep configuration to the most
general and widely used options’. Discuss this view from an
experienced CIO.
3. What are the claimed benefits of open source software? Why might a
company choose to use open source software in its core information
systems? Why might a software company choose to make some of its
software open source and thus freely distribute it?
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Chapter 14: Systems development life cycle
Chapter 14: Systems development

life cycle
14.1 Introduction
Whatever the overall approach to infrastructure used to develop new
information systems (see discussion in the previous chapter), some
form of project will almost always need to be established when a new
information system is to be developed. We say ‘almost always’ because an
exception is where a new system emerges slowly over time as numerous
individual people make small changes or additions. Similarly, with modern
technology and platforms such as Facebook or SalesForce, or even a simple
spreadsheet, a very small effort may produce a very useful system almost
instantly. But in such cases the system may not always be very robust, long
lived, large scale or particularly fit for the purpose they serve.

• introduce the general life cycle model for a systems development
project
• explore the core activities that the life cycle identifies and the sequence
in which they are undertaken
• establish the key difference between establishing what a new system
should do (analysis), and how it should be constructed (design).

• describe the information systems life cycle and how it is used to
structure systems development projects
• contrast a structured, life cycle approach to systems development and
other alternative approaches
• write a detailed breakdown of the main tasks and phases in a life cycle
approach to the development of a new information system
• identify and describe the principal professional roles in systems
development
• explain information systems development in terms of the management
of change and an organisational intervention.

[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapter 13.

This chapter explores a sequential view of systems development. It
introduces the life cycle model of system development – a phased or linear
approach that proposes specific tasks to be completed in sequence along
the way to establishing a new information system in use.
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14.2 Development projects and the information system

life cycle
This chapter is about how substantial development projects are structured
in terms of a sequence of specific activities – what is commonly known as
a ‘waterfall’ or life cycle model. This kind of model proposes a linear (or
mostly linear) sequence of activities from start to finish. In this case ‘start’
means a need is identified while ‘finish’ means a new system delivered and
in use. The metaphor of a waterfall is intended to indicate that you can go
onward and down easily, but it is hard to go back up to revisit and redo
previous tasks.
A development project of this type will usually start with an identified
need and then some work to establish the business case for a particular
new system, then some work of analysis and design for the new
information system so it will meet the identified needs and fit into the
sponsoring organisation’s existing systems and ways of working. Then
there is work actually to ‘build’ it, and then to bring it into use. This
sequence of activities sounds very straightforward and logical, and can
help us to plan and build something new that is appropriate and suitable
for the specific purpose. Think of the analogy with a task such as building
a single new house or a 400-unit housing complex, one a smaller project
than the other but essentially needing a similar approach. First establish
basic needs, then consider the option available, do some planning and
estimate the resources and finance needed, then design the overall layout
and the individual detail of specific buildings or rooms and their associated
infrastructures (electricity, drains etc.), then organise construction and
finally help people to move in and lead their lives. At that point the
‘project’ probably ends and the useful life of the building begins.
In this spirit the life cycle model adopts a time-oriented perspective and
proposes a sequence of discrete stages through which an information
system development project proceeds. You need a good understanding of
this model because it is the way in which development activities are most
often discussed, providing a conceptual framework and a vocabulary that
we can all share. But you also need to understand that it is just an abstract
model. In real life, systems development activity will often not follow
the model directly, and indeed there are other approaches as discussed
later in this chapter and the next that are in widespread use that conform
less to the life cycle but are just as valid. Indeed, part of the job of IS
professionals is to know which approach (or model) to use in different
situations.
You will also find that different books and different authors will set out
different versions of this basic life cycle (see for example the version in
Laudon and Laudon (2018) Section 13.2 and Beynon-Davies (2013)
Chapter 12), but you should be able to recognise that while the names
used may change for particular activities, and they may be bunched
together in more or fewer discrete phases, the concepts remain essentially
the same. One of the words often used in life cycle descriptions, and which
can cause problems, is implementation. To a programmer or software
engineer, this means taking design specifications and writing programs. To
an information systems analyst, this means taking the programs and other
components and setting them to work in the real world. When you read
the word, you should always ask yourself which meaning is intended. In
this subject guide, we sometimes avoid using this word and instead use the
words ‘construction’ and ‘changeover’ for the two distinct meanings.
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Activity 14.1
Draw up a table of the equivalent life cycle stages as described in Laudon and Laudon
(2018), in Beynon-Davies (2013), in this guide and in one other textbook or web
resource. Align similar stages and show when one version provides a more detailed
breakdown of the work.
14.2.1 Problem exploration

We start our version of the life cycle with problem exploration – what
is sometimes called ‘determination of scope and objectives’ and what
Laudon and Laudon (2018) speak of as ‘identify processes for change’.
This involves establishing where and why a new information system might
be considered and the broad purposes it might serve. The first concern
here is to identify the stakeholders (people or groups) in the situation
under study. Which people have a reasonable case to be listened to as we
contemplate a development of a new information systems? These can be:
• users (people who currently do similar tasks or in the future will use
the system)
• managers with relevant responsibilities
• customers or clients (who may be also be users – directly interacting
with the system)
• senior managers who will authorise resources for the new system
• analysts, developers, consultants who have professional competence
and experience including the organisation’s IT department
• service providers, COTTS suppliers, SaaS providers.
The views and perceptions of all these stakeholders may need to be
investigated, so that some consensus on the broad definition of the
problem(s) under study and of what is possible for the system proposed. It
is at this stage that the scope and objectives of a development project can
be established and agreed.
The start of the life cycle, and thus this exploration phase may come about
as a result of:
• a definite problem that has arisen
• an opportunity that has been detected
• broader planning and management activities, which have identified
a particular need for a new information system, perhaps to replace
an old one that is inefficient or hard to maintain or as part of wider
planned change.
From this earliest stage we will be capturing and assessing different
people’s requirements of the new system, that is what they want it to do
and how, and we need to appreciate that they will not all agree.
One specific type of requirement that will be focused on is an ‘information
requirement’ (e.g. what information people want the new system to
provide) Remember from earlier chapters in this guide that ‘information’
is something that specific people want and will respond to or act upon.
At the outset these information requirements will be quite general, such
as ‘a monthly report of sales’, ‘information on costs of manufacture’. As
the analysis progresses these requirements will become more detailed
and specific, and each requirement that is accepted or included (many
will not), will need to have some specific functionality designed into
the software at the Design stage (see below). Thus systems analysts and
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software engineers speak of functional requirements – those requirements

that are translated into specific software functionality – things the
computer will do. These are contrasted with non-functional requirements,
which are general qualities or constraints that are expected of a system
(speed, reliability, adaptability, testability etc.).
14.2.2 Feasibility study

Feasibility studies explore the possible forms that a system may take and
help determine which is the most appropriate. They once again involve
talking to various interested parties and exploring the current way that
the organisation operates, and its constraints. Factors of a proposed or
potential new system that need to be considered to judge the most feasible
approach may include:
• financial feasibility
• technical feasibility
• social and organisational feasibility
• legal and ethical feasibility.
For some of these aspects, quantitative techniques may be appropriate
(e.g. cost–benefit analysis to assess the economic feasibility of alternative
proposals); while for others a more qualitative approach may be required.
It is important to remember at this stage that there will almost always be
more than one possible way to proceed (including doing nothing), and
some careful evaluation will be needed to determine the best route to
take. The general options to consider at this stage would include some of
the following:
• buying a COTTS product (a package) or adopting an open source
product
• in-house development of the system (perhaps including writing
computer code or adapting open source products)
• hiring external consultants to work with in-house staff
• contracting the whole project out (outsourcing)
• renting a suitable service to provide the needed IS functions (SaaS)
• doing nothing – this option should not be ignored! It may be that the
feasibility study comes to the conclusion that nothing should be done –
at least not at the present time.
When the go-ahead for a project is given, probably by senior managers in
the organisation who have control over the resources that will need to be
committed, the following steps can be taken:
• define in detail the goals and desired outputs of the development effort
• identify the tasks and resources needed to complete it
• establish a detailed schedule and a budget
• set up a project management structure.
At that point we are ready to get into the more detailed work of systems
analysis. You may note here that Laudon and Laudon (2018) include the
feasibility study in systems analysis while we choose here to separate it out.
14.2.3 Analysis
Following a go-ahead decision we then perform detailed exploration of
the area in question. Depending on the approach adopted (see Chapter
13) analysis may be very detailed (e.g. if the systems is being developed
in-house and is very much customised to the particular company’s needs),
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or rather less so (e.g. if a package is being adopted and some basic work
is needed to fit the company’s ways of working to the functions provide by
the packaged software).
In any case, the analysis stage is concerned with the identification of the
general characteristics of the environment under study and developing
a logical model of the new system, which can be revised, adapted and
extended to meet the specific requirements of the users in terms of
new and/or amended information processing – that is, to meet people’s
information requirements.
Analysis usually starts with looking in some detail at the current situation
and current information handling – what is called the ‘current physical’
system. From this, an abstract view of what is currently done can be
established – the ‘current logical’ system. From there, a ‘new logical’
system, which includes features expected in the new system, can be
developed as a paper specification. In analysis that is probably as far
as we would go – the ‘new physical’ system is the work of design and
construction phases. In modern analysis practices the most emphasis
is placed on establishing the ‘new logical’ model. Work on the ‘current
logical’ can be quite schematics and sketchy – just enough to understand
what must change.
Class diagrams and data analysis (discussed in Chapter 16) is an important
part of this stage, and most modern approaches to information systems
analysis recommend that class diagrams, data analysis and data modelling
should form a significant part of analysis work.
Many diagrams, mapping techniques and tools have been developed to
support the analysis task. Over 30 years ago a set of tools and practices
known as structured systems analysis were developed, and they have
remained widely used up to today. They include:
• data flow diagrams to capture the information handling processes
• a data dictionary to catalogue all the data items flowing between these
processes
• a data model that ‘sketches’ the relations among data elements (like
the ER models you develop for the database coursework)
• mini-specifications detailing the procedural elements of the system
(e.g. what is to be programmed on the computer).
In the past 15+ years or so an alternative approach has been developed
and become dominant, known as object oriented systems analysis. This too
is supported by a set of tools and techniques, the best known of which is a
set of diagram types and modelling approaches known as UML (standing
for unified modelling language). We use two UML diagrams in this course,
and they are introduced in Chapter 16 below. These are:
• use case diagram: to show which people and other information
systems interact with a proposed new system, and what the new
system does for them
• class diagram: to show the classes of things in the world the new
system needs to know about and for which data will need to be stored.
Whether we are using structured systems analysis or object oriented
modelling, the tools are used together to provide complementary views of
the system that combine to give a coherent model (e.g. future logical). The
output of analysis is then a system specification (e.g. a statement of what
the new system should do, and for whom). It is not principally about how
in technical terms this is to be achieved. This specification is then used
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as the input to system design. In a colloquial sense, we could say that the
result of analysis activity should allow us to say to the technical experts,
‘Make me one like this’, as we hand over a set of outline specifications.
Their job is then to do a technical design and actually build the system (or
at least its technical parts).
14.2.4 Design
The design stage involves establishing a full specification for the new
system in explicitly technical terms – establishing all the details of how
things are to be done. We can briefly define the difference between this
stage and the previous one as being between saying what is needed, and
then how it will be provided. This stage may need various decisions to be
made about which parts of the new system are to run on a computer, and
exactly how, and which are to be handled by the human participants. Once
again, alternatives have to be evaluated.
Design then moves on to a detailed specification of the various
components identified, including but not limited to:
• design of programs (functional descriptions)
• design of user interfaces – screens, forms etc.
• database design.
The technical environment of the system also needs to be described. For
example:
• hardware and software requirements
• communication and networking arrangements
• database and capacity planning (how big is the data? how fast is the
outputs needed? at what speed is the usage and data growing?)
Design work will extend well beyond the design of programs and
include for example the design of documentation and training materials
to accompany the system. New jobs may have to be designed, new
responsibilities allocated, etc. Indeed, even if a new system is wholly based
on COTTS or SaaS, there will be plenty that still needs to be designed.
14.2.5 Construction
The construction stage involves the actual development of the various
items required for the new system. The specifications developed in the
design stage are the basis for developing these components. Among the
principal items are computer programs or configurations of software,
but computers themselves may have to be purchased and set up. Items
such as forms, reports and training manuals need to be produced and
probably security procedures and back-up services established. At all times
during the construction stage, these various items will need to be tested
– individually and then working together (what is known as unit and
integration testing).
14.2.6 Changeover
Changeover or conversion is about putting a new system to work. The
most critical period for most information systems projects is the day they
are first used seriously. Before that day comes, hardware and software will
need to be installed, staff will need to be trained and data converted to
new formats. Training is often identified as a critical part of a successful
changeover. It may proceed in a variety of formats:
• Comprehensive training: all the users receive full and detailed tuition
on all the features and levels of use of the system.
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• Cascade training: a target group of users is given a comprehensive

introduction to the system and then this group act as instructors for
the rest of the user population.
• Focused training: the users are divided into groups according to their
intended level of use of the system (e.g. data entry users, command-
level users or system administrators) and then trained accordingly.
• Incremental training: the users alternate between increasingly
advanced training sessions and hands-on periods of system use.
The effort involved in changeover (implementation) of a new system
means that it can often be the largest single area of expenditure, and
represent the highest risk to success.
Various strategies can be adopted for making the changeover to using a
new system. It may be direct changeover (big bang) – at a single
stroke, pilot running – first in one part of the organisation so as to
reveal problems before widespread use, or parallel running – with
a period when the new system runs alongside the old. A phased or
incremental approach may also be taken, in which some parts of the
new system are implemented and allowed to settle down before more
changes are introduced.
When new computer-based information systems are introduced it usually
means that things are expected to change in how tasks are undertaken
and by whom. Old ways of working will need to be discarded and new
ways introduced. For this reason it is important that information systems
developers consider their work as more than just the development of
technical systems, but as part of an overall change process in support of
the organisation. This needs them to think of what they do, in part at least,
as the management of change within the sociotechnical tradition.
We also should understand that those who are expected to willingly use
new systems may resist them – even sabotage them. There is often not
much that is positive for users in the new systems that they are asked to
use – for example their jobs may become more regimented, more boring or
their bosses may oversee their work in much finer detail. If we understand
such potential reasons for resistance, and do our best to design systems
that are more acceptable to staff, then resistance may be reduced and
success may be more likely. A number of remedies can help ensure that
change is seen as beneficial, many of which start at start at earlier stages
of the life cycle. These include:
• Explaining to everybody why a new system is needed.
• Explaining how it will work and why.
• Providing general education as well as specific training.
• Taking care in ensuring that the real requirements of those who will
use a system are established and it is not technology for technology’s
sake.
• Involving as many interested parties in the analysis and design activity
– remember that it is probably the users who really know the problem
area.
• Remembering that in designing information systems you are also
designing people’s jobs – make sure that they are interesting and
varied jobs. This is a basic concern in sociotechnical approaches.
• Be flexible, adaptable and willing to learn from experience.
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Over many years, and through many research activities, information

systems studies have repeatedly established that there are two key factors
that seem to define overall success in changeover (implementation)
efforts. These are:
• the active commitment of senior managers to a new system, (people
will follow their leaders if their leaders give a strong positive message)
and
• the involvement and respect shown for the system’s users’ interests,
(people involved in development efforts are more committed to
making them work.)
If both these aspects are achieved, then changeover will be much more
likely to be successful. If neither has been achieved, then changeover is the
point in time when the awful consequences will be revealed.
14.2.7 Evaluation and maintenance

Evaluation and maintenance are performed during the working life of a
new system. It is important that new systems are reviewed or evaluated
periodically to ensure that they are performing as expected or are still
meeting users’ needs. An evaluation that reveals problems may become the
starting point for a whole new cycle of information systems development,
but evaluation more often will result in some proposed changes and
amendments to a system – an activity known as maintenance.
A new information system should deliver some benefits to the organisation
that sponsored its development, but as time goes on the organisation’s
requirements will change and people will start to ask for changes to be
made. Some of these will be intended to correct faults in the developed
system – corrective maintenance – others to provide or improve
features of the system – perfective maintenance. In either case,
further work will be needed. A third, and in some ways more important,
class of maintenance work involves making changes that are required to
meet changed requirements – adaptive maintenance.
We should probably expect quite a lot of corrective maintenance in the
first period of use of a new system, as bugs and problems are revealed,
but we would hope that the level of such activity would reduce over time.
Perfective maintenance is to some degree optional, but usually over time
we will identify parts of the system that should be improved, be moved to
different hardware, incorporate better technology, etc.
Adaptive maintenance is more interesting to consider. On the one hand a
good system should have been developed so that the needs of users were
anticipated to a good degree and further adaptations are not needed. Still,
in a dynamic organisation we should expect change both in the way the
organisation works and in its business environment. We cannot hope to
capture all such possibilities during analysis, so we had better be ready
for adaptive maintenance activity to keep the system effective for current
needs. Indeed, we might go further and suggest that adaptive maintenance
requests show that a system is still relevant and useful. People are more
likely to ask for changes to be made to a system that they find useful than
for one that they feel is hopeless.
Nevertheless, in general, maintenance work is viewed as a necessary evil,
not a sign of a healthy system. Doing maintenance is not a job that is
much enjoyed by analysts or programmers, but it is of vital importance.
Maintenance can be made much easier if the initial design of a system is
of high quality and is well documented. Indeed, one of the main rationales
for careful approaches to analysis and design (as in the life cycle) is to
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produce good documentation that will make maintenance easy. This is

particularly important when one realises that the cost of maintenance over
the full working life of a system can be as high or higher than the initial
costs, particularly if the task is not made easy.
Activity 14.2
Considering the various development tasks (life cycle phases) we have set out so far in
this chapter, identify for each one the two most significant risks it poses to achieving a
successful outcome for a project.
For example it may be that the largest risk in analysis is not speaking to the right people,
or in implementation/changeover in providing poor training – but these are just examples
and they may not reflect your understanding.
14.3 Review of the life cycle

In reviewing the life cycle model as a whole you should understand
that each step in the process needs certain things to be done, items
to be produced and decisions to be made. The life cycle also sets out
some specific roles in development activity and some of the distinct job
descriptions. For example, a business analyst might play an important
role in the first two phases. A systems analyst may take over the analysis
activity and then pass on the work on to a systems designer or database
designer, followed by programmers or similar technical staff members.
When it comes to changeover other people may find a role, for example
trainers, business change or benefits realisation managers. Lastly, we
may need specific people to manage the system in operation, for example
network managers, database administrators etc. Of course, not every
project calls for all these various types of people, and people will often
fulfil multiple roles. Put another way, systems development should be a
team effort and people should talk to each other and support each other
through the project.
By adopting (or rather adapting) this model for systems development, it is
intended that key decisions about a new system are made at the outset in
a rational and logical sequence. For example:
i. determine what problem or opportunity is to be examined
ii. generate alternative approaches
iii. choose one approach to take forward
iv. perform further detailed analysis and information gathering
v. on the basis of the analysis, decide the overall logical structure of the
desired new system.
So far, in this sequence, no explicit or detailed decisions about hardware or
software to be used need to have been made. It is generally appropriate to
determine what is to be done, before getting on to how it is to be done,
even if some assumptions are in everybody’s minds, for example that the
new system will run over the internet and use a browser as its primary
user interface platform and be based on SaaS.
The distinction between what and how is the basis of what is known as
the ‘top-down approach’ to systems development. The top being about
the (abstract or ideal) goals and needs of the organisation, and moving
down into detail and specific new functionalities and work practices at the
bottom. Traditionally this has been the most usually advocated approach.
However, as we see in the next chapter, it might be different in some cases,
125
in particular where an incremental and iterative approach is taken and

little things are done over time that add up to bigger changes (what could
be called bottom-up).
As you study the life cycle model you must remember that it is not the only
way to develop systems, and indeed few development efforts are fully tied
into the model today. For example, in today’s business environment, where
most organisations rely on packages and purchased software, they may feel
that they can just buy a good ‘solution’ for their business ‘problem’. Does
this mean that the life cycle approach is inappropriate or superseded?
14.4 The life cycle, packaged software and SaaS

As discussed in earlier chapters, the balance of development effort changes
for users of SaaS, COTTS etc. and there is less need to specify, produce and
test software. If SaaS is the chosen approach then many of the technical
decisions as to how a system will work have effectively already been made.
So, instead of working out what we want a new system to do, we shift
towards a style of work in which we are more concerned with how we will
change the organisation and the way business could be done that ‘fits’ the
chosen approach and service.
This shift in perspective can be quite profound if organisations give up
the goal of being (in respect of information systems) different from their
competitors, and come to rely on similar software to build similar systems
that do similar tasks. Thus the idea of competitive advantage obtained
from custom developed or in-house built software may be rejected. As
we all know, there is potential for being a good user of even a standard
system. For example, as you perhaps have observed, some people get a lot
out of their smart phone and are sophisticated users of multiple features,
and some people (with the same hardware and software) struggle. So just
using standard software or services does not inevitably imply just being
average in the business practices it supports.
One other distinct shift for large scale or enterprise systems (e.g. based
on ERP or similar packages) is that the changeover itself becomes a very
substantial project in its own right (e.g. a project with the main purpose as
effecting some business changes for the whole organisation and which goes
well beyond setting up a technical system and asking people to use it).
This section has suggested some shifts in emphasis for the life cycle view
when COTTS or SaaS is used, but despite these important qualifications, it is
still the case that most of the activities suggested by the life cycle model are
needed in some form for most non-trivial systems development efforts.
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Activity 14.3
1. The life cycle model can be used in many types of IS development, but will probably
be adapted according to the project and the approach. Suggest how phases might be
different for the following types of project:
development and implementation of an enterprise wide standard business
package across the 25 operating companies of a multinational engineering
corporation
development and implementation of the same package using a SaaS provider in
a single government department with just one main location and 35 users of the
system
development and implementation of specialised in-house developed software as
part of an innovative e-business project within a start-up budget airline.
2. If you were developing some specific software together with a small group of
enthusiastic users using a prototyping approach without the benefit of the life cycle
show how you would undertake something equivalent to each of the life cycle stage?
3. Do you think that users doing ‘what they want’ using desktop tools such as a
spreadsheet, a database, Facebook or Dropbox need any of the structure found in the
life cycle? (Do you need any of it when doing your projects for this course?)

This chapter has introduced the structure of a waterfall or life cycle
information systems development project. It has described the phases of
work within such a project and assessed how this structure might adapt to
the use of SaaS or COTSS.

• describe the information systems life cycle and how it is used to
structure systems development projects
• contrast a structured, life cycle approach to systems development and
other alternative approaches
• write a detailed breakdown of the main tasks and phases in a life cycle
approach to the development of a new information system
• identify and describe the principal professional roles in systems
development
• explain information systems development in terms of the management
of change and an organisational intervention.
127

1. Development projects often fail at the last stages (e.g. during
changeover). Why is this?
How is it possible that a well-designed system that is based on a
thorough analysis of needs can fail at this time?
2. Why have some system development projects in recent years moved
away from the ‘top-down’ approach to one that is a more ‘bottom up’?
In your answer pay attention to both shifts in the available
technologies and infrastructures, and to a desire for a different kind of
change so as to achieve the best for the organisation.
3. Explain the distinction between the work of analysis and the work
of design within a traditional information systems project using the
life cycle. How can we be sure that analysis does in fact influence the
design of a system?
When you have studied the next chapter of this guide, come back and
answer this supplementary question: If a project is run using an agile
approach, to what extent does this change the relationship between
analysis and design?
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Chapter 15: Organising systems development
Chapter 15: Organising systems

development
15.1 Introduction
The previous two chapters have discussed a number of questions about
our general approach to sourcing information systems and a generic
model of system development activity in a project more or less following
the life cycle model. In this chapter we look in more detail at alternative
organising principles that we might use when setting up a project and
the tools and techniques that can support them. The chapter ends with a
discussion of the various professional roles that people take within systems
development activities.

• introduce various organising principles for systems development,
ranging from the most structured and formal linear approach, though
to modern incremental or agile approaches and end-user-computing
• review the principal professional roles within information systems
development projects.

• explain the strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to a
systems development projects, including those based on structured
methods, agile approaches, end-user involvement and prototyping
• identify and justify suitable approaches for projects that have different
characteristics of scale, user involvement, innovation etc.
• identify and explain the main professional roles engaged in
systems development work, and more broadly information systems
management.

[ISBN 9781292211756]. Review again Chapter 13 and then read Chapter 14.
edition [ISBN 9781137265807] Review Chapter 12.

Laudon and Laudon (2018) do not provide a unified coverage of the
topic of professional roles, although it is discussed in a number of places
throughout the text. For example in Chapter 2, section 2.4, in general
terms and in Chapter 14 for project related roles. Beynon-Davis (2013)
similarly discusses roles across Chapters 10 and 11 – see for example
Section 11.4.
Agile manifesto (2001) http://agilemanifesto.org/history.htm.
129

The life cycle discussed in the previous chapter offers a schematic and
generic way to understand development activities and how they may be
logically linked. However, the principles underpinning the way projects
operate can be quite different, ranging from the most structured, planned,
paper-based and linear sequence of tasks, to more agile, iterative and
exploratory approaches. This chapter considers some of these alternative
approaches, and the professional roles that information systems experts
and users undertake in development work.
15.2 Establishing a development project

As already suggested, most information system development is approached
as a ‘project’ activity. That is, it takes place during a limited period of
time during which some resources (money, people etc.) are allocated and
mobilised to achieve some specified goal. In this chapter we see that the
style of approach to a development project can vary in a number of ways
– for example, how formal and sequential it is, how much effort is put into
specification and design, or how adaptable and agile the activities can be.
Whatever the approach taken, at the outset we usually try hard to assess
realistically how long it will take, and how much resource will be needed
(in particular the cost, people needed and time). Somebody will be paying
for the project and they want to know when they will get what they want
and how much they will have to pay, making this calculation of cost versus
benefit fundamental to working out if it will be worthwhile to go ahead.
We often get this estimation wrong – usually being too optimistic about
time taken, costs and benefits. Thus many computer projects in the public
sector and in business fail to the extent that they are delivered late and/
or over budget – and often in such cases the resulting system is not really
working very well either. Sometimes a project is just abandoned once the
probability of a poor outcomes becomes understood. The understanding
that development projects can and do go wrong or end up out of control,
does mean that organisations and managers try to start out with a solid and
appropriate project structure in mind and a clear plan of the tasks needed.
They do, however, have some alternatives available as to how the project is
to be managed, and this chapter starts out looking at some of these.
15.3 Approaches to managing a systems development

project
This section discusses a number of ways of organising a development
project. The default is perhaps the ‘vanilla flavoured’ life cycle project: very
linear, very much paper driven and dependent on getting the requirements
right at the start. But these characteristics may not always be desirable, so
alternative approaches are available that allow more flexibility, a bigger
role for users and do not depend so much on an early and unchanging
statement of the requirements.
15.3.1 Structured development

Structured systems development advocates a careful, step-by-step approach
to performing the various tasks needed to develop a new information system
in line with the basic life cycle view. Indeed structured development might
be seen as a synonym for the life cycle. One advantage claimed for this
approach is that the timing and the cost can be estimated early on and then
be monitored carefully. Thus if a project is slipping out of control this can be
identified early while there is still time to take some remedial action.
130
The structured approach, as seen in the chapter above, is concerned with

specifying for each step what is to be done, how it is to be done – the
techniques to be used – and what is to be produced – the deliverables.
A deliverable is the output from one stage that serves as the input to the
next. In so far as the deliverables of any phase are reports, designs etc.,
this is a paper-based approach to developing systems that relies on careful
analysis and design work before any actual programming, configuration
or ‘construction’ takes place. Although perhaps it is not so paper based
today when there are many computerised tools to help prepare and
document a system as it is developed. These kinds of tools are known as
CASE tools, standing for Computer Aided Software Engineering, a name
that gives a hint of the origins of the approach in software engineering.
Many organisations that face large and complex systems development
efforts adopt just such a detailed and specific approach to the various
stages of a project, and to how various tasks should be done. The emphasis
is on specification of the ‘what’ aspects, and firm control of the ‘how’.
These sets of guidance are known as development methodologies.
15.3.2 Prototyping and incremental and evolutionary

development
The structured development approach is based on detailed analysis and
design work prior to construction of a system. This is indeed how we
expect you to do your project work for this course – as a paper exercise of
analysis and design before you implement your design in software and
test it. But this is not the only possible approach to developing information
systems and may not be the most suitable one for many real world systems.
In the prototyping approach, the development activity – or a part of
it – is concerned with building a prototype real system that can be used
to explore users’ requirements and possible technical solutions. For this
reason it is sometimes called an ‘experimental’ approach.
Example
A new sales oriented system is being developed to allow sales staff of MultiNational Bank
to offer up-to-date investment advice to their clients. The key question to be asked when
designing this system is not what to put in the database, but how to let the sales staff
search it so it can help them in their work. A small prototype version of the system is built
and various different user interfaces tried out. On the basis of these experiments with
prototype systems the developers may be able to determine the best interface to use in
the full-scale system.
As in the example above, a prototype may be small in relation to the

required system or it may only provide limited functionality, but it can
still help to resolve questions about users’ real requirements and the
best approach to satisfying them. Prototyping is often advocated as an
adjunct to structured systems development, providing a valuable and
effective approach to be used when determining uncertain requirements or
interacting with potential users.
Building on the concept of prototyping, it may be possible not only
to try out a system or some part of it – to do experiments to improve
understanding – but also to develop the real system in conjunction with its
users hand-in-hand with the system’s day-to-day use. This is what is usually
called a participative approach – based on users’ active participation.
131
Example
The dispatch department of MultiNational Bank is responsible for transferring all manner
of items from the main data centre to the various branches. One day, computers will
handle everything (?), but in the meantime, lots of paper, forms, manuals and brochures
have to be shipped back and forth.
The manager who organises the dispatch of the vans and couriers needs a computer
system to help his staff do this work. The basic requirement is for a system that contains
information on regular delivery schedules and that can help in drawing up a weekly
rota. This, however, is just the start of what could be achieved. The system could then be
developed to record the actual dispatch of items, inform the recipient branches to expect
them and keep track of the performance of the various carriers that are used. The system
could also allow one-off or special deliveries to be slotted into the schedule with minimal
disruption.
The management team has 20 more ideas for how the system could be developed further
and grow.
The best approach to development in such a case may not be to design one system – it
might very soon get out of hand – but to start with some simple functions. On the basis
of use, the next steps to be taken would be worked out with the users to reflect their
priorities. In this way, the system can evolve over time. The maintenance phase of the
system lifecycle, particularly adaptive maintenance, is one version of evolution, but the
evolutionary approach makes this type of ongoing change, adaptation and improvement
the goal, rather than a necessary evil.
15.3.4 Agile development

Given that many new information systems are developed in conjunction
with the users, and based on adaptations and refinements of existing
technical resources, or the use of packages, the general prototyping or
iterative approach is now quite common. Indeed it has been taken a step
further in recent years as Agile approaches and methods have come to
prominence.
The sense that development has to be faster and more flexible gave rise
20 or so years ago to the Agile movement, originally started by software
developers but now influencing all aspects of systems development work.
The core idea is that a large project can be broken down into a set of
smaller projects, to be finished in short time frames by a small team and in
close collaboration with the users. This ensures a good ability to adapt to
changing needs and developing understandings along the way. The values
and goals of the Agile movement are well expressed in the original Agile
manifesto, produced in 2001 – see http://agilemanifesto.org/history.htm.
We are uncovering better ways of developing software by doing it

and helping others do it. Through this work we have come to value:
Individuals and interactions over processes and tools
Working software over comprehensive
documentation
Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
Responding to change over following a plan
That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the
items on the left more.
Figure 15.1 The Agile manifesto. http://agilemanifesto.org/
132
Activity 15.1
Search on YouTube for introductory video training on agile methods and in particular
the SCRUM method of agile project management. Are you convinced by the arguments
presented in favour of using the SCRUM method?
15.3.5 End-user development

Ever since the development of the microcomputer and user-friendly
software packages, people have been able to build their own small,
computer-based information systems without much help from professional
computer people. This is very true today where it takes little skill or
resource to, say, set up a blog or a Facebook page, buy and sell via
eBay, or to communicate widely (if not always wisely) with Twitter.
Spreadsheet software is another example, extensively used in all manner
of organisations to build small and ad hoc information systems and simple
databases.
This kind of end-user development of systems is taken for granted today
in most contexts, but the IS professionals and IS management may still
worry about too much of this kind of freelancing, and about the quality of
systems being built by untrained amateurs. Their worry may, for example,
be about lack of testing and systems with serious errors, lost data or
potential leaks of information arising from such activity.
Activity 15.2
The manager of the marketing department of MultiNational Bank needs to keep the
names and addresses of hundreds of people she deals with and the projects they are
working on. The bank provides no system to help her other than the address book in
the email package she uses. She has, however, developed on her own system: a simple
database of names and addresses and projects, which she runs on her laptop and phone.
The bank’s information services department did offer her a one-day course on end-user
computing, and she is using the bank’s recommended database package. If she needs
help, she can telephone the bank information centre and talk to an advisor, but for the
most part, she is able to develop and maintain this simple application herself.
Think about this example and identify the various benefits and risks that are associated
with such end-user computing.
15.4 Professional roles in systems development

In this second part of the chapter we turn to look at the professional roles
that may take part in a development project. It is usual to distinguish four
main roles in overall information systems development and management:
Chief information officer (CIO): The first and most senior role
is that of the CIO. This is the senior manager in an organisation, who
takes responsibility for information systems and information resources
in a company – just as a chief financial officer takes responsibility for
financial and accounting matters. This is a senior management role –
probably at the level of the board of directors or just below. The CIO takes
responsibility for the operations of information systems, their development
and their management, for the strategic direction of technology for the
company as a whole, and for the broad issues of systems governance. They
will also almost certainly take responsibility for the security and integrity
of the systems in use and how data is collected and used. Under new laws
coming into many countries (e.g. the European GDPR see Chapter 10),
the CIO or somebody similar may have formal and legal responsibility for
ensuring that the relevant data protection laws are obeyed.
133
System analyst and business analyst: The second role is that

of the systems analyst or business analyst, who deals with the overall
issues of determining what system to build, establishing the business
case for making the investment, and their broad structure. This person
is expected to have a good understanding of the technical issues of
systems development, such as systems modelling using analysis tools,
but also a good understanding of the business processes that a system is
intended to address. The analyst thus takes the leading role in the first
three stages of the life cycle. The analyst is normally the intermediary
between the technical staff or service providers on a project on one side
and the management and users on the other. It is common for systems
analysts to have served sometime in a more technical role such as the
role of programmer. Business analysts, on the other hand, may come from
broader management backgrounds.
Programmer, software engineer: The third main role is that of the
programmer or software engineer. These are the people who undertake the
technical development activity – notably technical design, configuration
and programming. Programmers are often differentiated into applications
programmers – who develop and maintain the computer parts of an
organisation’s information systems – and systems programmers – who are
concerned with maintaining the computer systems and their software.
For example, a programmer responsible for the operating system or a
computer network may be described as a systems programmer, but a
programmer working on a new web based sales system would be an
applications programmer.
Project manager: scrum master: The fourth and perhaps most
critical role in systems development is that of the project manager. This
person is responsible for seeing the information system development
project from conception through to completion, within budget, on
schedule and according to specification. A somewhat similar role is
taken in agile development by a scrum master. The project manager is
responsible for planning and organising the work that needs to be done,
allocating people and other resources to tasks, coordinating the various
project activities, monitoring and reporting on the progress of work and
taking remedial action when the actual progress of work deviates from
the plan. Depending on the size and complexity of the project, the project
manager may or may not personally have to carry out some part of the
project work. Project management is often the promotion destination for
systems analysts.
Some other roles also emerge, including:
• Database administrators, who take responsibility for developing
and managing databases.
• HCI designers (human computer interface) who design and test
good interfaces that users find easy and intuitive to use.
• Web editors, who maintain information on websites and similar
public and in-house web resources. This may be in part a technical
role, but also a role that is concerned with wider communications,
design and writing skills.
• Network managers, who look after the connections and
communications in an organisation. Networks generally evolve and
grow over time, so managing them and ensuring their reliability and
ability to fulfil requirements can be a major task in a large or widely
distributed organisation.
134
• Training coordinators, who ensure that training is delivered in

appropriate ways, as a central part of information systems innovation
projects and as general continuing professional development for all
type of employee.
• ‘End-user support’ workers or help desk staff, who provide advice
and information, and help non-professional employees to do their own
computing.
Given how information systems are developed today, we should
also note that the users (e.g. all manner of people with other
responsibilities across an organisation) will have a major role in
information system development and management. They can do the
work themselves perhaps, but they should also be active participants
in bigger or more formal projects and structures (e.g. to embody
the sociotechnical approach). For example, it is quite common with
large development projects for the board or committee in charge to
be chaired by a senior user – not a technical specialist. In this way
it is hoped that a project will stay focused on real users’ needs and
interests, and not drift off towards the interests of the developers
themselves.
This further raises the question of how much information systems
knowledge other people should have. Should, for example, people
working as sale staff, human resources, production managers or
accountants have formal training in information systems - or should
this be left to the experts?
Activity 15.3
Using a newspaper or website, find the most common job titles that are used when IT/
IS related jobs are advertised in your country or city. No doubt this will be different in
different countries. For the top four job titles look up a job description for that role. For
example, you could use the website www.prospects.ac.uk/types_of_jobs.htm which is
UK based and provided for university graduates to help understand their various career
options. You may be able to find a similar database in your own country.

This chapter has introduced a number of alternative ways to organise a
development project, and identified some of the key roles for professionals
within the development activity.

• explain the strengths and weaknesses of different approaches to a
systems development project, including structured methods, agile,
end-user and prototyping
• identify and justify suitable approaches for projects that have different
characteristics of scale, user involvement, innovation etc.
• identify the main professional roles that are engaged in systems
development work, and more broadly information system
management.
135

1. ‘Agile methods sound all well and good, but I am a manager and I
want to know what people are doing from day-to-day and week-to-
week. I need to see that they are working towards delivering what
I have asked for. It sounds to me as though agile methods are about
people being out of control and just doing what they want.’
Discuss this statement and construct some reasoned arguments
that might persuade the speaker that agile approaches to systems
development might be of some benefit to her organisation.
2. What are the key skills for a project manager leading a systems
development project for an enterprise system? Must they always
be very technically proficient, or is it more important that they can
provide leadership and support to other people who are undertaking
specific tasks? How important is it that they understand the specific
area of business for which the system is being built?
3. Write a short report for a company CIO which sets out a recommended
policy for support and control of end-user development projects. In
the report you should consider the benefits and the risks of end-user
computing, and suggest some of the rules that should be established
and the resources that should be available.
136
Chapter 16: Modelling techniques for analysis and design
Chapter 16: Modelling techniques for

analysis and design
16.1 Introduction
Systems development according to the life cycle model introduced in
Chapter 14 and as discussed through alternative perspectives in Chapter
15 almost always includes the key activity of analysis. Once the broad
direction of a project has been established special effort is needed to
explore needs, understand constraints and then plan and document a new
system in both its business processes and its main technical elements.
This must be done so that, in later activities, designers are appropriately
briefed. The designers’ work is to move on from the what and why
aspects that analysts consider to the how, and then to provide the
required detail so that a new system can be built (programmed,
configured, new jobs and roles established, databases established etc.) In
this chapter we look at this analysis activity in terms of very simple object
oriented analysis practices and we introduce tools that you will use in your
project work as it develops through scoping and analysis to design.

• introduce the modelling language UML
• introduce the use case diagram as a tool that allows an analyst to
present an initial depiction of a new system, the main tasks it supports
and the principal users of the system (called actors)
• introduce the class diagram as a tool that allows an analyst to map out
the main items and events in the world that a system should represent
and store data about.

• explain the purpose of a use case diagram and a class diagram as tools
for analysis of new information systems
• undertake analysis work to allow you to draw a simple use case
diagram using the UML notation
• undertake analysis work to allow you to draw a simple class diagram
using the UML notation
• take a class diagram onwards to provide a set of normalised relations
suitable for a database design as in the coursework assignment.

For reading about UML and the particular diagrams we introduce here you
should look at some online resources as below.
The Wikipedia page on UML is at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unified_
Modeling_Language#Structure_diagrams
The IBM website has a UML Primer at www.ibm.com/developerworks/
rational/library/769.html
137
Some UML tutorials on YouTube include those below, but there are many
more out there.
Use case: www.youtube.com/watch?v=zid-MVo7M-E
Class diagram: www.youtube.com/watch?v=UI6lqHOVHic
Curtis, G. and D. Cobham Business information systems: analysis,
design and practice. (London: Prentice Hall, 2008) sixth edition
[ISBN 9780273713821] Chapter 16.

Kent, W. ‘A simple guide to five normal forms in relational database theory’,
Communications of the ACM 26(2) February 1983 pp.120–25.
16.1.5 References cited

Laudon and Laudon (2018) Figure 6.11.

In this chapter we look at the analysis work required for almost any
information system in terms of very simple object oriented analysis
practices. The chapter introduces two tools – the use case diagram and the
class diagram – that you will use in your project work as it develops through
scoping and analysis to design. But the chapter has a wider purpose in that
these two simple tools can help you understand how we move from general
ideas about a system to pinpoint the specific aspect that the information
systems should provide – in terms of support to users and meeting their
information requirements and in terms of data collected and used.
16.2 Techniques used in object oriented modelling

The person who does this kind of analysis work, the systems analyst, needs
to be able to provide a high-level overview of:
• what things the proposed system will do for its users/sponsors, their
requirements including in particular their information needs
• where data comes from and then goes to in the wider world
(remember: information systems are open systems and so get data
from the world around them and return it to that world)
• what data processing should take place, first at a high level of
generalisation and abstraction, and then in increasing detail
• what data needs to be stored, or more specifically, what things in the
world (objects, transactions, people etc.) will need to represented by
some stored data.
These are all posed as ‘what’ questions, and it is a broad but useful
generalisation we have already met to say that analysis is about ‘what’,
while the subsequent phase of design is about ‘how’.
For this subject’s coursework, students are expected to understand and
be able to use two basic techniques used in systems analysis as a way to
express answers to these ‘what’ questions – the specification of a new
system. Both are based on specific diagrams, though they will usually need
to be accompanied by some extra detail in a textual descriptions too.
The two diagrams we use are named as:
• use case diagram
• class diagram.
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These two diagrams are a part of the Unified Modelling Language (UML),
a modern standard for documenting systems analysis work as well as
systems design. UML has been established by an influential industry
body the Object Management Group (OMG) as an open standard.
Being an open standard means that UML is freely available to be used
by anyone with no licence fees to pay – just as open source software is
freely available without fees. As its name implies, UML is a language –
for building models of information systems – and it provides modelling
methods appropriate for developing new information systems from an
idea through to implementing an operational system. As a modelling
language UML includes model elements (fundamental concepts), notations
(visual versions of model elements) and guidelines (idioms of usage or
recommendations).
UML is not a specified process for development activity or some other
version of the life cycle. Another way to say this is that it is not a
‘methodology’ – a methodology being a tightly coupled and prescriptive
process for how to develop systems. So we can and will use elements
of UML for all kinds of development work and in support of all kinds
of development approaches. What UML does, as a language, is allow
developers and other people to express and communicate ideas about
a new system, often using diagrams and pictures, but it is up to the
developers, managers and users to determine what needs to be expressed,
and what the right sequence of activities is for developing models and
moving forward towards a new information system.
For the purposes of this course we are going to introduce and use only
a small subset of UML. If you take further courses in this area you will
learn more UML, principally in the course IS2182 Innovating digital
systems and services. The two elements of UML we consider here are
as follows:
1. Use case diagram: used to capture users’ overall requirements. A use
case diagram defines the boundary of the system under analysis and
identifies actors (people, and perhaps other information systems) who
participate with the (technical) system, and the ‘things that they want
to get done’.
2. Class diagram: used to capture the static structure of a proposed
system in terms of classes (types of relevant objects or ‘things’) and
their relationships one to another.
16.3 Use case diagram

A use case diagram is about actors – people or other device/systems
who act (do things) in the world – and who need a system to help them.
In order to get things done they use or become part of an information
system. To say that they ‘become part of’ reflects a sociotechnical view
of information systems, which are always a part technical, part social
and part organisational (remember Leavitt’s diamond). Actors might,
sometimes, also include other computers, systems or databases that
interact with the system we are considering – for example bank credit card
services might be an actor in a retail system – approving or not approving
payments.
Strictly we should say that an actor is a ‘role’, not a person, and one person
(or even one computer) could take on more than one role with respect
to a system. In the example below, a person could be both a nurse and a
patient – a nurse one day and a patient the next – these being two roles
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they can play depending on circumstances. Within the broad structure of

UML an actor and a use case are model elements and the diagram below
shows the usual notation used to depict them.
Prescribe
medicines
Doctor
Administer
medicines
Nurse Review
medicines
Supply
Pharmacist medicines
Figure 16.1: A simple use case diagram showing an electronic prescribing (eP)
system for a hospital to support the giving of medicines to patients.
The phrase ‘use case’ may not sound quite right in English on first hearing.
It comes from a Swedish author (Jacobson). Perhaps it sounds better
in Swedish. The phrase and the concept has however caught on and is
widely used to convey the notion of ‘the case of somebody (an actor)
using a system to do something useful’, which is a very appropriate way to
document systems requirements during early phases of systems analysis,
in particular functional requirements. Remember that a functional
requirement is one that will need a specific implementation in software. So
a use case says that ‘this actor/these actors will use (e.g. be involved with)
the information system to help achieve this task/these tasks’.
The notation is very simple. A stick figure stands for the (human) actor.
An oval represents a whole and complete task the systems will do (the use
case itself) and this is given a short and imperative name (book course,
enter order, check credit, administer medicines). In the example above the
four use cases all relate to medicines being given to patients in a hospital
and the activities of various actors. We have also chosen to add two
borders on this diagram. Symbolically at least the outer diagram shows the
boundary of the information system, and the inner one the boundary of
the technical, programmed, computer systems – but such boundaries are
not really needed unless they really help to explain the context.
All actors shown on a diagram must be related to at least one use case,
and all use cases on a diagram must have at least one actor associated with
them. An actor sends a message to or otherwise stimulates a use case, or the
use case sends a message to the actor, and this provokes some response.
Each use case (oval) in the diagram should be a whole operation from the
perspective of the actors involved, and provide some value to the actors.
The most common error in developing a use case diagram is to break it
down into too fine a detail at first. Remember, this is intended to provide
a high level and user-oriented depiction of what a system can do – not
contain any internal design detail.
A large system may require many use case diagrams each showing
some distinct subset of functional requirements. In general there is a
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premium on keeping a use case diagram simple and direct so everybody

can understand it. In the case of your project work, we ask for just one
use case diagram for each of the projects and you are advised to keep it
simple, useful and informative.
There are various elaborations possible in the use case diagram, with
notations to allow it to express more ideas about the general architecture
of a system and the tasks it supports.
• One use case can make use of another in an <<includes>>
association. An arrow from the user to the used indicates this. This
is a simple ‘subroutine’ relationship – one use case uses another for a
particular task.
• A use case can also be modelled in terms of an <<extends>>
association, in which one use case is based on another, but extends its
functionality or deals with some special case. Here the arrow points
from the extended use case to the basic use case.
In the use case diagram below the Cook can Make a cake, and to
do this they will (always, often, usually) Measure flour. But this is a
separate use case because other use cases may also need to include the
same activity. Sometimes the cook will bake a cake that needs to be iced.
So we recognise this as a special case of baking that extends the basic
Make a cake.
The usual advice is to be very careful in using these extra elements – the
principal aim of a use case diagram is to be simple and understandable,
and detail can come later. You can read more about these two elaborations
in Curtis and Cobham (2008) Chapter 16.
<<extend>> Measure Flour

Bake a cake
<<include>>
Bake an iced
Cook cake
Figure 16.2: A use case diagram illustrating <<include>> and <<extend>>

associations.
The use case diagram captures well the basic ideas of what a system
is supposed to do, but a diagram alone is seldom enough to convey all
the detailed information that is required. Thus it is usually necessary to
provide some textual description to accompany the use case diagram, as
well as a textual description of each actor (who exactly they are) and each
use cases in the diagram. Such a description will include the objectives for
each use case, how it is initiated, how it delivers value (e.g. supports the
overall systems purpose) and any required pre-conditions etc.
To develop a use case diagram (or set of diagrams) for real world systems
we usually start with finding (some of) the actors:
• Who needs the system?
• Who uses the system?
• Who supports or manages the systems?
• Who benefits from the systems?
Remember too that an actor does not have to be a human role; an actor
could be a device, or another computer based system that exists outside
the current systems scope.
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Once we have found relevant actors we can start to express their needs in
terms of broad functionality – the use cases they need to do their tasks.
Use cases are there to get things done, to process or retrieve information,
or to monitor activity and report on events. By asking these types of
question we will be starting to think about the possible shape of a future
system.
Figure 16.1 is an example of a use case diagram of an everyday activity
familiar to most of us from TV and films if not real life, giving medicines to
a patient in hospital. Information systems are increasingly used to support
this activity, often described as Electronic Prescribing (eP) systems. Three
actors are shown in Figure 16.1: the Doctor who prescribes medicines,
the Nurse who administers them to a patient and the Pharmacist who
supplies the medicines and also reviews and checks the prescription. Each
of these roles (people) will interact with the computer. Each has to get
something done to fulfil the overall purpose of the system, which is to
provide safe, timely and appropriate medicines to patients.
You may think that a patient should be shown as one of the actors –
indeed perhaps they should – but in most such systems the patient does
not directly interact with the computer system. We certainly could
imagine a case where they would, for example, need to confirm they have
received their medicines, receive an email or a text message to confirm the
prescription and to review their own medicine’s history. Mothers may want
to know what inoculations (medicines) their children have had, or on
leaving hospital another doctor may want to review the record. With that
in mind try to add to the above diagram a Patient actor and one or more
suitable use cases.
As it is shown here there are four use cases (ovals) in the diagram – that
is four ‘chunks of functionality’ that we think we want the software to
incorporate to support the work processes of these medical staff. You should
be able to appreciate that the very simplicity of the diagram is its strength.
For example, you could have a good discussion with nurses, doctors
and pharmacists about this diagram, probably everybody would quickly
understand it, and they could probably identify a few more use cases and
tell you a lot of extra detail about each use case (e.g. the how part).
‘How’ is important of course, but the use case diagram is not intended to
say much about how things are done, just what is done. For example, we
may feel that there is an implied sequence of events here: probably in the
rough order prescribe, check, supply, administer. But the use case diagram
does not concern itself with this. At the start of a development effort it is
important not to add too much detail or too much sequence – that can
come later. Indeed UML has other specific diagrams (tools) to capture the
sequence of events and the messages that would link together these use
cases and actors – for example the object-sequence diagram – but we do
not consider this diagram type in this course.
Activity 16.1
The TOPCAR limousine company is working to develop a new information system to
support corporate credit accounts. So far they have come up with this loose textual
description of the systems.
A client company can make a request for a credit account, in which case one or more
credit checks are made. If these are positive, a credit account is set up on file.
Thereafter, an authorised person from such a company can phone up a dispatch clerk
and request a booking, or make a booking using a smart phone app. When this happens,
availability of a taxi at the requested time is checked, as is the credit status of the client
company. If these two checks are successful a booking is made.
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After the customer has used the taxi, the driver sends in a record of the work, including
the time and the distance. The cost of the booking is calculated and added to the account.
At the end of the month accounts are sent to client companies for settlement.
Sketch a use case diagram for this system. First identify the actors, then the ‘chunks of
functionality’ that these people interact with. Try to restrict your diagram to five or less
use cases. Remember, in a use case diagram you are not expected to be concerned with
sequences of events, and the individual use cases should have no associations between
them other than perhaps <<uses>> and <<extends>>.
Remember too that this is an exercise in simplification and communication. You
will need to leave out some of the detail while capturing the basic functionality that is
needed. This is never easy, not in exercises nor in real life systems development work.
16.4 Class diagram and a data model

Use case diagrams are about modelling actors and the functionality
they expect or need. Another important aspect of information systems
development addressed during the analysis phase, is establishing in
appropriate detail (i.e. not too much) the classes of things that a system
will hold and use data about. The goal is to establish a logical model of
the world around the system and the things there with which it interacts
(again – think open systems). Once this logical model is established and
agreed among the various stakeholders then designing the database
element of a new system can go ahead (a ‘how’ question addressed in the
design phase).
Here we must hold on to the distinction between analysis and design.
Analysis is about needs, requirements and some idea of the future
logical systems we are seeking to build (the what). Design will take that
information and work on the detail to allow the new system to actually be
constructed (the how).
Earlier in this chapter we introduced the class diagram and described it
as ‘used to capture the static structure of a proposed system in terms of
classes (types of relevant objects or “things”) and their relationships one to
another’. We focus in particular on business classes, ones that relate to the
domain of a new system.
Put in plain English, business classes are the ‘types of things in the real
world that we will need to know about’. So, if a new system is going
to process orders sent in by customers for various products, we can
immediately identify some classes: customers, orders, products. In simple
terms we might say that a ‘class’ is suggested any time we use a noun in
our description.
Here is another example of a simple description and some classes that
emerge.
‘On any given day the new system will allocate available airplanes to fly
specific flights between two airports and then allocate qualified pilots to
take charge of the flight.’
Here we can see immediately four potential classes (nouns): pilots,
airplanes, airports and flights. Each are quite plausible as important
things such a system would need to store some data about and they are all
related to each other in specific ways (e.g. how many pilots does a flight
need to be allowed to take off?).
For analysis we can put this understanding into a class diagram based on
UML notation. UML supports an object oriented approach to analysis and
design, and the basis for object oriented model building is… well… objects
and classes of objects. My VW Golf is an object that belongs to the class of
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motor cars. The class diagram is concerned with broad types of things (e.g.
cars) rather than specific examples (e.g. my VW Golf, which is an object
rather than a class). Nevertheless it is usual to use the singular name when
naming a class (e.g. order not orders, student not students, prescription
not prescriptions etc.). A class diagram is used among other things as the
basis for database development including for your project for this course.
When we build analysis models, we are, at least initially, trying to build
a model of the environment within which a system will operate, and
with which it has to maintain some level of correspondence. Thus if we
have customers or patients, or medicines or doctors out there in the
world, we will probably want to model or represent them within our new
information system. In this way, we identify the object classes (or just
classes) and use them to build a ‘map’ or model of the domain. Later on
in the development process we will shift our view towards software and
detailed processes by which things happen (e.g. design). But for now, in
analysis, it is the problem domain that we focus on.
The graphical depiction of a class in a class diagram is a box with up to
three compartments. At the top we name the object (singular noun), in
the middle we describe the attributes (data values) that the object should
retain. At the bottom we can add the operations or functions, the things
that the object can do, or the events that it can respond to. This third level
is the basis for a fully blown object oriented analysis and design process,
but we will not develop this aspect in this course.
Identifying relevant classes and giving them a name, at least initially, is
quite easy. Think of the electronic prescribing system discussed above.
What are the types of ‘things’ that we want to collect and hold data about?
Patients, prescriptions, medicines, for a start, plus perhaps administration
events such as when medicines are given, checks done by pharmacists, and
deliveries of stock to the ward. We probably also need to store information
about the actors – doctors, nurses and pharmacists so as to record who
does what or who is authorised to do what.
To keep it simple we will focus here on the prescribing activity itself. One
way to think about a prescription is as an order written by a doctor for
some medicines (one or more) to be given to the patient – perhaps once or
perhaps regularly for so many days. This structure, of an order for various
items for a customer (e.g. patient), is very common in all sorts of business
situations, and is the most common example of a class model/data model
found in textbooks. (See for example Laudon and Laudon (2018) Figure
6.11). Below (Figure 16.3) is our version of this general model written
using UML notation – and then the model adapted for the specific case of
prescriptions.
For the moment let’s take the classes as given. We want to concentrate
on the associations between classes. Note also that the class boxes are
very simple. This is because we have not, as yet, defined any Attributes
(or Operations). In the very early stages of analysis we do not need to do
this, once again, keep it simple. There is plenty of ‘analysis information’
contained in the diagram already in the associations between classes. In
our new proposed system we will be able to ‘follow’ these associations so,
for example, a prescription can be ‘linked’ to a particular patient, or we
might need to answer a query such as ‘List all the patient who are taking
medicine X.’
In the diagrams below we interpret these associations in specific ways.
Thus they say that there is a relationship between a Customer and an
Order such that a Customer can have 0 or more orders (0…n). Each
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Order is made up of 1 or more Line Items(1..*). In other words it is not

possible to have an Order for zero items (does this make sense?). The solid
diamond on the left end of the association line says that this association
between the two classes is a ‘composition’. That is, a Line Item belongs to
an Order, is a part of it. If we delete the Order for some reason, all the Line
Items are also deleted. Note that customers and products are independent
classes, hence no more diamonds in the diagram. A Line Item is associated
with one Product and any given Product can be associated with zero or
more Line Items.
In the lower diagram this same structure tells us the same detail. It
says that a Prescription will be associated with just 1 Patient, but that
a Patient can have 0 or more Prescriptions. The diagram also tells us
that a Prescription can be for 1 or more Items, and that each item on a
prescription relates to a single medicine. All of this is information we
should check with the medical staff to make sure we have it right! For
example, there may be some logical reason why doctors or nurses do want
to allow a prescription with no Items, it would be good at least to ask.
The general version of the ‘customer-order-product’ class diagram in UML
notation
0..n 1..* 1
Customer Order Line Item Product
1 0..*
A version of the same abstract model adapted for prescriptions of

medicines
0..n 1..* 1
Patient Prescription Item Medicine
1 0..*
Figure 16.3 Two examples of a class diagram using the same pattern.
These two diagrams here and the others in this chapter were drawn using
SaaS software freely available at https://yuml.me/
The script used to produce the first diagram was as below.
// Order Order Line Class Diagram
[Customer]1--0..n[Order]
[Order]++--1..*[Line Item]
[Line Item]0..*--1[Product]
This class diagram shows the overall structure of the data that a
system will need to store, shown in terms of different classes and their
associations. This provides a useful notation and simple but powerful ideas
to work with. Using them on a real problem should convince you.
16.5 From analysis to design: data modelling for

database design
To take this class diagram model on to form a database design we use
the relational database approach, in which data is considered as being
stored in square tables, one table per class. The actual details of how the
computer stores the data need not concern us in analysis activities – that is
largely taken care of by database management software.
A table or relation has a number of columns representing the items of data
to be stored related to any given class (what we call its attributes). The
rows represent the occurrences of items to store data about, examples of a
particular item of the specified class. We call these entities. In this way, a
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table of Patients may have a layout as shown in Table 16.1; adding more
Patients would mean adding more rows.
Patient Number# Patient Name Age Gender Allergy

58447 Peter Small 23 Male Nuts
21944 Mary Jones 23 Female None
55633 Lola Smith 26 Female Nuts
18647 John Smith 28 Male None
419745 Mary Jones 18 Female Milk
Table 16.1. The Patient relation
We can write down the design of this relation in the following form:
Patient(Patient number#, Patient Name, Age, Gender, Allergy).
We can put this information about the attributes on the class diagram as in
Figure 16.4:
Patient
Patient No+
1..*
Patient Name
Prescription
Age 1
Gender
Alergy
Figure 16.4: Attributes added to Patient in class diagram.

The script for YUML is:
[Patient | Patient No+;Patient Name; Age; Gender; Allergy] 1--1..*
[Prescription]
Note that YUML does not allow the # character so we have used a +
instead to indicate the key attribute.
The relation itself is called PATIENT – it has so far five attributes with the
names Patient Number, Patient Name, Age, Gender, Allergy. The field Patient
number has + or # after it to indicate that this is the key field. The value of
the key field must be unique for each entry in the table and here, as in many
cases, this is achieved by giving entities unique reference numbers – just as
the books on the subject reading list have unique ISBN numbers and any
database dealing with books might use ISBN numbers as the key.
In this simple case, we have only one key field, but it may be the case that
two fields taken together form the key – a composite key. An example
of a table with a composite key might be:
Vehicle(Model#, Engine size#, year#, price).
None of the attributes taken alone – model, engine size or year – can
uniquely identify a particular type of vehicle (for example, a 2012, 1.6 litre
Honda Civic), but taken all together they do. Note also that in the Patient
example none of the other fields can be used as the key – in particular, we
have two Mary Jones, two people of 23 years and two people with a nut
allergy.
The order in which the Patients appear in the table is unimportant, unlike
a simple sequential file structure. In the database approach, we assume
that we will access records by using the values of the various fields, for
example patient number 23817, or all patients with a nut allergy. Another
way of saying at this is to say that we are interested in one class (type
of entity) – patients – and we have identified five attributes of a patient,
including a key attribute.
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Doing data analysis and building a data model for a real information
system generally will require consideration of more than one class as
we have seen. In this example, we have identified another three classes:
Prescription, Item and Medicine. This leads to another three relations:
Prescription(Prescription Number#, Patient Number, Date, Doctor
issuing etc. )
Item(Item Number#, Prescription Number, Medicine number, Dose,
Frequency etc.)
Medicine(Medicine Number#, Name, Unit Size etc.)
What is the relation between Patient, Prescription, and Item? Well, it is
expressed in the class diagram and in the relations above. In the relations
we can see that all underlined attributes link us to another class. When
the database is working as part of the information system we need to be
able to make and maintain these relationships. As shown above, we do
this by using the key of one relation as an attribute in another. When a
key attribute occurs in another relation it is known as a ‘foreign key’. So
Medicine Number and Prescription Number are shown as attributes of the
class Item, and each is underlined to indicate each is a foreign key – the
link to Prescription and Medicine.
Activity 16.2
Take this simple example of an association; Footballers and Football clubs. (Assume for
the moment that a player can only play for one club.)
First draw the appropriate class diagram and show the multiplicity of the association.
Then, assuming that each resulting relation has a key (say Club Number# and Player
Number#), how would you represent this association? For example, which relation (Club
or Player) would contain a foreign key and what would it be?
Then move on to a situation where a player can play for more than one club. Can you
1) redraw your class diagram showing the appropriate association and 2) show how the
keys might be used in the relations? [Note that this can get tricky and could puzzle you.]
The class model introduced above is intended to show us important things

about associations out in the real world that an information system needs
to reflect and respect. When we leave analysis and come to design it is
important to ensure these real world relationships (associations) can be
accurately represented and kept up-to-date in the developed database.
Activity 16.3
With that in mind, consider the appropriate relationships in the following cases and
highlight any issues or questions that may arise:
•• husbands and wives – (think of the English king Henry VIII)
•• mothers and children
•• books and authors
•• cars and drivers
•• cinemas and films
•• films and actors
•• films and directors.
In some of these cases we will find many-to-many relations (M:N) out

in the world (e.g. one film has many actors, one actor is in many films).
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This poses a problem when we come to database design and the use of
foreign keys. Similarly, one-to-one relations may be a bit suspect, because
they may suggest that the two entities are one and the same. This is not
always the case though. A one-to-one relation between two entities might
represent a situation in time – as in drivers to cars.
So far, this section has approached data modelling through a simple
example and by appealing to a common sense understanding of the way
the world is organised and how we can represent it. In the situation of
developing a data model for a new information system (including when
working on your project), the sequence needs to be a bit more formalised:
• Identify and name classes of things about which data will be stored.
• Identify and name the association among the classes.
• Draw a class diagram.
• Identify the attributes of each entity (example of a class) and select the
key attribute(s). This may require creation of a specific new attribute/
number.
• Ensure that the identified associations could be supported through the
keys (e.g. the key of one relation could be the attribute of the other – a
foreign key).
16.5.1 Normalisation
At this stage, we may seem to be finished and, indeed, a class diagram
alone may be adequate to fulfil most needs of the analysis phase of
systems development, but there is one further important step we must
undertake when we move to design – that is normalisation.
This is a process by which we make sure that the database we are
designing will contain all the information we want, that the data will
be accessible to us, and that the data is stored as far as possible with
minimum redundancy and to support easy and reliable updating. In
particular, this is to ensure that each piece of information is stored as far as
possible only once in the database. This will make updating far easier and
more error free.
Normalisation is important for you as you study for this course, because
you may get exam questions about it, but also because your database
project is expected to include a set of normalised relations.
The ideas behind normalisation are quite simple:
All entities (e.g. examples of a particular class) must contain the same
number of attributes – this is called the first normal form. This rule
excludes variable repeating groups. Consider the following example:
if students can study a variable number of subjects; this might imply a
relation with a variable number of fields. For example, assume that a
student could attend as many subjects as they wished:
Student(Student number#, Student name, Address, Subject1, Subject2,
Subject3…Subject*)
This is not in first normal form because some students would have two
subject fields, some five etc.
To put it another way, we have a N:M relationship between Student and
Subject (one student can take many subjects, one subject can have many
students), but that is not allowed in the database if it is to meet first
normal form. The solution is to add an extra class (e.g. a new relation),
called Course, to ‘link’ a student to as many subjects as they like, and at
the same time allow a subject to be linked to as many students as needed.
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This kind of relation is called a ‘linker’. The relation Course can have as
many rows for any one student as needed, each representing a selected
Subject.
The resulting set of relations are then:
Student(Student number#, Student name, Address)
Subject(Subject number#, Subject name,…)
Course(Student number#, Subject number#…)
This third relation is the link between Student and Subject.
Each entity (row) in Course represents an individual student taking a
particular subject; further attributes such as individual attendance or mark
achieved could be added here. In this way, the many-to-many relation of
Students to Subjects is made into two one-to-many relations via a linker
entity Course – Student to Course and Course to Subject.
The second and third normal forms are a bit more tricky. They scan be
summarised by saying that ‘Any attribute in a relation must provide a fact
about the key, the whole key and nothing but the key’. We break this down
a bit further.
Second normal form is violated if a non-key field is a fact about a subset of
a key. In this example, ‘Lecture hours’ is a fact about the subject – only one
part of a composite key. Exam mark is however fine if it is related to the
specific student and course.
Course(Student number#, Subject number#, Exam mark,
Lecture hours)
If the above design was adhered to, the lecture hours would be repeated
many times and any change to be made would require many updates
to the database in the Course relation. Also, if there were no students
taking a particular subject – perhaps temporarily, for example, during the
vacation – then there would be no place to store the lecture hours data.
The answer is simple, move Lecture Hours to be an attribute of Course.
In general it may be that an attribute is moved to another relation, or
perhaps a new relation needs to be created.
The third normal form is violated if a non-key field is a fact about another
non-key field, as in:
Teacher(Staff number#, Name, Department, Building)
Building may be a fact about the teacher (‘where their office is’ would be
OK) or about the department (where the department office is would not
be OK). A better design is:
Teacher(Staff number#, Department)
Department(Department#, Office location)
Normalisation is important principally so as to ensure that information is
stored only once and that inconsistencies do not occur in a database when
data is added, changed or deleted.
The set of relations resulting for a college database after some
normalisation might be:
Student(Student number#, Name, Address, Staff number (of tutor))
Course(Student number#, Subject number#, Exam mark)
Subject(Subject number#, Lecture hours)
Teacher(Staff number#, Teacher name, Subject, Department)
Department(Department#, Location)
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Note how the relations we need to record and use are supported by using
the key or keys of one relation as non-key attributes of another. Even so,
this example still leaves problems to think about: consider the relation
Teacher – is it in third normal form? Are we sure that each Teacher has
only one subject, and it is a subject related to the department? As an
exercise, normalise (e.g. redesign) the model to solve these problems and
then draw the appropriate class diagram.
Finally, once you have worked through from an initial class diagram to a
set of normalised relations, it should be easy to draw a final class diagram
and to implement the design using a database package. The only step
remaining is to determine the exact form in which each field will be stored
(e.g. as integers, real numbers, character strings, dates, etc.).
Activity 16.4
The TOPCAR limousine company is developing a database to be used as part of a real
time dispatch system. The intention is that customers can make online bookings or sets of
bookings for cars, requesting a particular type of vehicle (small car, large car, minibus), or
a particular driver. Some customers have credit accounts with the company, some do not.
i. Suggest candidate classes for this database, justifying your choices.
ii. Identify and name the associations between the classes, indicating their multiplicity.
iii. Draw the initial class diagram.
iv. Design the relevant relations with key attributes.
v. Identify and resolve any issues of normalisation you can see.
vi. Redraw a final class diagram
vii. Show how identified association can be supported through suitable keys.

This chapter introduced the UML notation for a use case diagram and
a class diagram. These are an essential part of the analysis for the
coursework assignment. The chapter also discusses the development of a
class diagram into a normalised data model.

• explain the purpose of a use case diagram and a class diagram as tools
for analysis of new information
• undertake analysis work to allow you to draw a simple use case
diagram using the UML notation
• undertake analysis work to allow you to draw a simple class diagram
using the UML notation
• take a class diagram onwards to provide a set of normalised relations
suitable for a database design as in the coursework assignment.
150

1. Explain how the combination of a use case diagram and a class
diagram can provide the essential starting point for system analysis
work for a new information system.
2. Why is the extra step of normalisation needed before a class diagram
can be used as the design for a database? Explain in particular what
the second and third normal forms are, and what problems arise if
they are not achieved in a database design.
3. Sketch an initial use case diagram and class diagram in UML format
for the following example:
The system is for use in restaurants. Waiters take Orders from their
allocated Tables on a mobile tablet. A table’s Order can be for one
or more Meals, and a Meal can consist of one or more Courses,
as well as drinks. An Order is sent to the kitchen where the Chief
Chef prioritises orders and arranges for the food to be cooked.
When food is ready in the kitchen the Chief Chef notifies the
table’s Waiter to collect them and deliver to the Table.
The Diners at a Table may add to or change their order during
their time at the restaurant. When the Table is ready to pay and
leave the Diners go to the front desk and the Manager prints out
the bill and takes payment.
Note that what is expected is an initial draft of the diagrams
suitable for discussion with the users. Some aspects may need
you to make assumptions or propose alternative versions. In these
cases, prepare a short note of explanation.
151
Notes
152
Chapter 17: Organisational change
17.1 Introduction
This final chapter in this section of the guide returns to the sociotechnical
theme of change. In almost all cases the aim in systems development is
to make a difference and that means bringing about some change in the
organisation that sponsors development or benefits its wider environment.
But such change is not always easy to achieve even if the technical
elements of a new systems and its design are well conceived.

The aim of this chapter is to discuss:
• the ways that change occurs as a result of information system
development projects
• how organisations and projects can respond to resistance to change in
the wider user community
• the approaches that can be used to help ensure that desired change
does occur.

• explain why development projects lead to organisational change as
both short-term outcomes and in longer time frames
• identify and select suitable approaches to ensuring that change occurs
as desired
• identify and select suitable approaches to handling unexpected
outcomes, including resistance to change and beneficial unexpected
changes
• outline general guidelines for how the potential for beneficial
organisational change can be established in a development project.

[ISBN 9781292211756]. Review Chapter 3 and read Chapter 14.

Avgerou and Cornford (1998) Chapter 11.

The sociotechnical model tells us that organisational change, and changes
in tasks, is the inevitable consequence of changing technology. It may also
indicate change in the people who perform a task. Generally we want such
change and the introduction of technology is a deliberate way to bring
it about. Still, not all the desired change may actually occur, and some
unexpected changes may also occur (both positive and negative).
Information systems development projects are more likely to be successful
if the objective of achieving change is recognised from the outset and it
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is supported through the development process. This can be achieved in

particular by taking users’ needs into account as well as their opinions and
desires in respect of their work, by designing new roles and tasks that are
seen as beneficial by users, and by resourcing implementation/changeover
activities, such as training, that can reinforce change.
17.2 Organisational change

When information systems are introduced and set to work in
organisations, they initiate changes. In part this is indeed the purpose of
most new systems, to make a difference, improve performance, support
innovation or allow new activities to occur. Perhaps it is even to improve
the satisfaction of the people who undertake the task. However, it is often
the case that the changes that occur once a new system is developed and
put to use are not quite what was expected. Perhaps the system ‘fails’ (i.e.
does not manage to do what was intended; but more likely a new system
achieves some or even most of the desired effects, but also has some
unexpected and unpredicted consequences). Some of these may be quite
negative; for example, perhaps the system creates some tensions between
different parts of the organisation, or creates working conditions that
people do not like. Perhaps it works well, but causes problems elsewhere
in the organisation. At other times the unexpected consequences may be
quite positive, with a new system ‘opening up’ new possibilities that had
not been considered before.
Chapter 3 of Laudon and Laudon (2018) explores such changes in terms
of a two-way relation between organisations and technology (see Figure
3.1). The chapter offers alternative theoretical positions to explain how
technology enters and changes organisations – including an economic
explanation through transaction costs, and through sociological and
political theories. From this you should grasp that an economic or purely
managerial view is not the only way to understand technology and
information systems; achieving ‘efficiency’ (cost efficiency or operational
efficiency) is not the same as success!
Laudon and Laudon (2018) also suggest some of the ways in which an
organisation is changed by technology – for example through a ‘flattened’
hierarchy or improved flexibility (both could be desired changes or
unexpected changes). We sometimes speak of deliberate action to
create new organisational forms (NOFs) to represent the potential of
technology and IS to allow us to organise differently – perhaps as loosely
aligned teams, or as alliances of small organisations, and escape from
the traditional (and perhaps inflexible) hierarchical structures of the last
century.
17.3 Supporting change in a development project

Within a development project there are a number of ways to make
desirable change more likely to occur. Here we outline three basic ideas
that should help.
Involve users from the start. It has long been an axiom of good
systems development that users need to participate in development
projects. This is for two reasons. First they probably know more about
the particular task than anyone else. Their knowledge is valuable, even
essential. Second, if they are involved and participate fully they will be
more likely to understand what will change and how it will change. More
importantly, they can also see why change is needed. They will ‘own’ the
change we could say.
154
Design jobs for people. Tapping the knowledge of users is important,

but the relationship with them can go a bit deeper. A new system is an
opportunity for the organisation to gain some benefit, but it can also
be an opportunity for the employees or users to get a job or set of tasks
that satisfies their desires. As jobs change – an inevitable aspect of new
information systems – it may be possible to design ways to improve
people’s working lives – as one of the main aims for the development. So
a project to improve the efficiency of sales order processing might equally
become a project to improve the working life of the sales employees. If the
labour market is tight, and there is high turnover of staff with associated
costs, this may be an economically sensible approach too.
Resource changeover (implementation): If a system fails, or
underperforms, it is often traced back to the changeover phase – when
abstract designs and tools met cold reality. Things can and do go wrong
at this time. But if there are resources available to address issues that
emerge, and to adjust things, provide backup or offer support, then a
tricky situation might end up as a big success. By resources we mean
people who can support workers during the change, perhaps extra staff
during the period, providing more training, fixing software problems
etc. In many changeover phases of projects there is the idea of the ‘floor
walker’ – IT staff who hang out with the users and provide immediate
input when things are not clear, and collect feedback that can be swiftly
actioned.
This probably all seems obvious, but you may be surprised how many
projects devote significant resources to analysts and design, spend a fortune
on software, and then just expect the users to accept what they are given.
17.4 Resistance to change

Chapter 3 of Laudon and Laudon introduces the idea of ‘resistance
to change’ as a key concept in understanding what happens when
information systems innovations are introduced. This proposes that people
resist change almost as a basic human reflex, and we need to understand
why before we can think about strategies to ‘overcome’ resistance (some
might even say ‘crush’ resistance). There is further discussion of this
perspective in Laudon and Laudon (2018) Chapter 14, Sections 2 and 3.
You should be aware that not everybody believes so strongly in the idea
that people resist change as a reflex – just because they won’t want to do
new things – or that it is older people who are most likely to exhibit such
a response. An alternative perspective gives people a bit more credit for
basic intelligence and for being rational in resisting things that are not
beneficial for them. This suggests that managers and designers need to
take more notice of what people want and what they do not want for their
new systems to be welcomed and rapidly accepted – reflecting a positive
sociotechnical perspective.
Activity 17.1
Consider each of the phases of an information systems development project as given in
Chapter 15.
For each phase suggest two or three things that might be done to help positive change
occur.
If a project is run using a prototyping approach, or using agile methods would this make
a good outcome for change more likely?
155
17.5 Change and software

Promoting change is an important part of almost any IS development
activity. As we noted above, the hope of making some kind of change
in behaviour, task or organisational structures is almost always the
primary reason for which we undertake the tasks of information systems
development in the first. Projects are not usually based on a perspective of
‘technology for technology’s sake.
For example, if a company sets out to acquire a new HR (human resources)
and payroll systems, and as part of this buys a suitable software package
or SaaS, it is probable that the new systems (e.g. the package or software-
based service) is chosen so as to allow them to do some new things, or
perform this essential task more efficiently and effectively. In paying for
new software they may think that they will in effect ‘buy’ a new way
of doing payroll and HR tasks, for example with new pre-programmed
input screens, reports etc. Indeed, many such elements of new ‘business
processes’ will provided as part of the ‘package’, and the people who work
on the development project (IS professionals, HR managers and the users
who enter and use the data) will need to assess and configure all this as
appropriate. And the people working in HR will probably have to learn new
skills, work in new organisational structures and learn new work processes.
What is programmed into the software should be a well-founded, even
the ‘best’ way, to do the relevant tasks so that it represents a good starting
point. Thus vendors of business software often speak of their product
embodying ‘business best practice’, using this as a selling point – with the
strong implication that if you use their software, you will get the benefits
it offers. What we want to add in this chapter of the guide is that you will
also need to make changes to how work is done and what people do. Make
sure you take this part seriously if you want a successful project.
Another example of ‘best practice’ embodied in software might be in
an inventory control package (software to control stocks of items in a
warehouse). This kind of software can use statistical and management
science models to ensure that stock levels for each item are kept at an
optimal level; just enough to satisfy expected demand (based on data
held on past demand patterns), with some margin for fluctuation, and
programmed to generate a re-order when stocks get below a certain value.
In such a case one element of the change that occurs may be to take work
away from people (e.g. deciding on a re-order quantity) and passing it to
the computer software. Such ‘process automation’ is discussed a lot these
days amid predictions of a loss of some types of jobs as clever software
come in to take over.
Even high status professions such as doctors, lawyers and financial
analysts are potentially threatened by this according to some studies.
Whether this turns out to be correct or not in all cases, the idea alone is
enough perhaps to build up resistance among a workforce and jeopardise
their enthusiasm for new ways of working.
17.6 Criteria for successful applications

As a summary of the ideas in this chapter we can say that successful
information systems projects – whatever the approach used in their
development – almost always need to provide systems which achieve a mix
of the following outcomes:
• aligning with the overall goals of the organisation sponsoring them
and the managers who control the resources needed
156
• drawing on the active participation of the systems users throughout

the development project
• providing the right information to the right people in the right time
frame
• embodying best practices but in way that aligns with the specific
organisation and its workforce
• managed into use rather than just switched on and expected to work
from day 1
• providing appropriate levels of security to ensure that data and
information are reliably available, but only to those who should have
access to them
• be maintainable through time and able to adapt to new requirements
as they occur
• be liked by those who must use them, seen as easy to use, appropriate
to the task, and enhancing working life
• make the best use of information technology.
As part of any IS project the specific criteria for judging its success in use
need to be established early in the development. These criteria probably
need to be carefully balanced between the more economic or technical
outcomes (costs, work rate, efficiency, reliability etc.), and the softer, more
people-oriented ones (attitudes, skill upgrading, absence rates etc.) This
helps progress to be monitored and allows a balanced judgement of the
quality of the final system in when it is in use.
Activity 17.2
Using the list of criteria given above, assess the potential to deliver successful information
systems of:
a. a large structured development project using packaged software
b. a small prototyping based project for technical specialists, and
c. end-user computing.
Suggest three measurable criteria that could be used to assess the success of a new
information system, for example a new library catalogue system in your college. The
measures should be as objective as you can imagine, and not rely just on people’s opinions.

In this chapter we have discussed how and why organisational change occurs
(indeed should occur) as a consequence of information systems development
projects. But change is not inevitable and it may be resisted. When this
occurs it is important to be clear as to how resistance is interpreted – as
evidence of ‘bad’ or ‘uncooperative’ users, or as evidence of ‘poor’ strategy
or design. Sociotechnical theory tells us that success is more likely if the
users are involved in development work from the outset and their interests
are taken seriously. We also see that not all change that occurs is expected
– some unexpected change may be good, and some bad, but to handle this
requires active management as evidence of outcomes is collected.
157

• explain why development projects lead to organisational change as
both short-term outcomes and in longer time frames
• identify and select suitable approaches to ensuring that change occurs
as desired
• identify and select suitable approaches to handling unexpected
outcomes, including resistance to change and beneficial unexpected
changes
• outline general guidelines for how the potential for beneficial
organisational change can be established in a development project.

1. The sociotechnical view of information systems suggest that new
information systems including new technologies, have consequences
for: 1) how organisations are structured and 2) how particular tasks
are done. Using relevant examples, show for each case the kinds of
changes that new information systems might bring.
2. New information systems are expected to make a difference and lead
to change. However, not everybody will necessarily be pleased with
the expected or designed changes, and indeed they may resist it. As
an IS development manager, how would you set about managing a
development project so as to ensure that change did occur and that
users welcomed it?
3. ‘Resistance to change is more likely to occur in IS development projects
that use packaged software than when in-house development occurs.
This is because packages generally do not reflect the way that any
particular organisation works and how it undertakes tasks.’ Evaluate
and discuss this statement.
158
Section 5: Coursework assignments
Section 5: Coursework assignments
This section includes Chapter 18 on the Database assignment and Chapter

19 on the Spreadsheet assignment.
159
Notes
160
Chapter 18: Database assignment
18.1 Introduction
The database assignment asks you to demonstrate an understanding of the
basics of analysis and design for databases as well as to provide evidence
of the use of the main features of a database package.

The aim of this chapter is to give you all the information you need to
start thinking about and working on your database project. To complete
the assignment you will need to draw on other information from within
the syllabus of this course, such as data technologies (Chapter 6),
class modelling and normalisation (Chapter 16) as well as the relevant
bibliography.

By undertaking this assignment you are expected to demonstrate the
following through the analysis, design and construction of a small
database application:
• selection of a suitable problem to be solved by a database application
• production of a use case and class diagram using UML notation – this
is a system overview and logical database design that reflects the
aspects of the world that you store data about
• production of a set of normalised relations – a physical database
design
• design of a data input screen or screens
• design of a query screen
• design of a report for use on screen and/or for printing on paper.

[ISBN 9781292211756] Chapter 6, Section 6.2.
This is the same reading as in the Databases section of Chapter 2
‘Coursework’.

You will probably need some information on the database software you
are using and its features. Such software will probably have a manual and
the popular software such as Microsoft Access will have many ‘how to…’
guides available. In Chapter 1 we recommended books in the ‘Mastering…’
series published by Sybex and the ‘…for Dummies’ series published by
Wiley.
Whatever software you use you can also find lots of online help in the
manufacturer’s website or in other resources. You may also find YouTube
tutorials on specific aspects of the software are a very useful resource to
use.
161
18.2 Introducing the Database project

One example of a database assignment is sketched below. It is intended
to illustrate the type and scale of problem that you are expected to tackle.
Please read through this chapter and the example given first and only then
start to think about what you are going to work on for your database work.
Remember, you will not be given a project topic area. Rather, you are
asked to choose your own database problem from the world around you
– from your college or a local business or something associated with some
hobby or pastime perhaps. Suitable problems require the recording of data
on three or more related classes of things and require the production of a
number of contrasting reports or outputs. You should not attempt database
projects that exceed about five classes. Two classes is probably too simple
but may be the starting point for your work as in the example here.
18.3 A cinema and films database example

Consider this example of a possible database project. Your database will
allow a person to review all the films that are on in London this week. The
users can discover at which cinemas particular films are showing as well
as find out what films are showing at any specific cinema. The aim is to
help people plan their entertainment and then to book tickets. You could
imagine this as a popular website or phone app, although you will not
actually make it available on the web or as an app. Rather your job is to
prototype the information search part of such a website.
Your task at the outset is to draw a use case diagram of the overall system
as it is conceived. Doing this will help you to get the details right, allow
you to seek out confirmation of your understanding from a teacher or
fellow students, and allow you to scale the project appropriately to include
some but not all the aspects of the system. For example in the use case
diagram here we have three actors: staff at individual cinemas entering
and updating their own schedules of film showings (Cinema Manager),
a person who vets and edit the information and then makes it available
online (Web Editor), and people who search the database and buy tickets
(User).
Enter Weeks
Schedule
Cinema Vet and Edit

Manager Schedule
Release Schedule
Online
Web Editor
Film Lookup
Cinema Lookup
Add to Basket
User
Book Tickets
Figure 18.1: Use case diagram for Cinema-Film database example
162
Taking the project forward you must limit it in scale and focus on the
database aspect. This could be achieved by just including the aspects that
relate to the Web Editor (e.g. just the ‘vet and edit schedule’ aspect as data
input to the database) and the ‘User’ (e.g. just the ‘lookup’ and ‘add to
basket’ aspects as output from the database).
Once you have prepared the use case diagram and have made choices of
the core functionality you will prototype (e.g. selected use cases), you can
turn to thinking about the data needed, its structure and how it will be
searched. At first sight this suggests two classes of things about which this
information system will store data – various films and various cinemas
– and of course the association between them. An association is the link
between things of one class and things of another in UML diagrams we use
to prepare analysis and design for these systems. Sometimes we express
the idea of an ‘association’ using the word ‘relationship’, but when doing
analysis (e.g. thinking about the problem and the real world) we should
stick to the word ‘association’.
For example, if 2001: a space odyssey – a classic film from 1968 by Stanley
Kubrick, and in part about AI and a computer called HAL (one letter back
in the alphabet from IBM?) – is showing at five particular cinemas, then
these five cinemas would be ‘associated’ with the film. So one film can
be associated with a number of cinemas, and equally a single cinema can
show a number of films.
If the database can store or remember this association, then a user of the
database will be able to receive an answer to their query about ‘Where is
2001: a space odyssey showing?’ But, just knowing where is not enough.
They will also want to know when. This will lead us to add another class
of relevant ‘things in the world’ to store data about – which we might call
a showing or screening. We then need to reflect these three classes in a
UML class diagram.
Below are two simple examples of such class diagrams with the second
one showing some of the attributes (data items) that we would want to
store for items of each of the three classes. In these diagrams each box
represents a class of things we want to keep data about, and the line
linking boxes an association.
0..*
Film Cinema
0..*1
Figure 18.2: A simple class diagram for film and cinema.

The label 0...* at each end of the association line in Figure 18.2 means
that there can be ‘zero, one or more films’ showing at a particular cinema
(the cinema may be closed this week for redecoration, hence zero), and
that there can be zero, one or more cinemas showing a particular film.
This is what we call a ‘many-to-many’ association.
The key to database analysis is to think about such associations as they exist
in the real world, and then how this reality can be expressed accurately in a
class diagram. The many-to-many relationship in Figure 18.2 above, which
is how the world looks at first sight, is then developed into the idea of a new
class called Showing, which allows us to specify a particular film (i.e. 1
film) being shown at a particular (i.e. 1) cinema at a particular time – hence
the simple 1 at one end of the associations shown in Figure 18.3 below. This
figure also includes some of the details that we might need to store about
each class – what we call the attributes of the class.
163
Film
Showing Cinema
Title
Director
0..* 1 name
Day
Length 1 Time 0..1 phone no
Rating address
Figure 18.3: A class diagram for films, showings and cinemas.

As an exercise explain what change you would make to the diagram in
Figure 18.3 if a single showing could include up to four separate films
(perhaps shorts or trailers). To get to the full answer to this exercise will
require that you have studied Chapter 16 in detail, but even if this is the
first time you have read through the subject guide, you should be able to
take the first steps to allow for this detail to be faithfully recorded in the
class diagram, and thus take the first steps towards design for a database.
(You might also ask if you could ever have a showing with no film?)
Chapter 16 of this guide contains a lot more necessary detail about
analysing and designing databases, but the two diagrams above should give
you a basic understanding of the task, and an informal introduction to the
UML class diagram. Please note also that the example used in Chapter 16 of
this guide (a database of customer orders for various products, or patient’s
prescriptions for various medicines) is commonly used in textbooks (see for
example Laudon and Laudon (2018) Section 6.2 and Beynon-Davies (2013)
Chapter 3). It is a fairly complex class diagram but an excellent one for the
purpose of illustrating the task of analysing and designing a database.
It is not, however, appropriate as the main basis for your
database project.
This is for two reasons. First, you will have used it to understand the topic,
it is not your own idea. Second, given that this is a complete ‘solution’ to
a common database application (e.g. a business processing orders from
customers), and is already fully worked out by somebody else, using it
means that you do not have the opportunity to demonstrate your ability as
a database analyst and designer. Thus the Examiners will give low marks
to a student who submits a database project that is just based on the
customer-order model or the cinema-film model used in this chapter.
18.4 Reporting database assignments

When preparing your report for the database assignment, you are asked to
include the following items.
1. A description of the database problem tackled.
2. A use case diagram showing the system and its main functions in the
wider context and with the people (actors) with whom it will interact.
3. A class diagram for the application, showing the various classes
identified and their associations. You must use UML notation as
shown in Chapter 16.
4. Evidence that you have undertaken normalisation and the subsequent
relations that you will implement in the software, showing the
attributes and keys together with their field type and ‘picture’ (the type
of data– text, date, number, etc.).
5. A small sample of the data in the basic relations set up in the database.
In the case of the cinema database described here this could include
some real data taken from your local cinemas for a particular week.
164
6. Designs for data input screens and reports and queries produced.
7. Very brief description of how the system is operated and the
commands used to undertake each task. (Note: it is assumed that this
is done by using interactive commands of the database package, not by
any programming.)
8. Examples of the input screens and output reports produced.
The total report should be about six pages of carefully laid out text, figures
and diagrams, with an absolute maximum of eight sides of text including
all examples of printouts or other necessary computer-generated reports.
Reports must be permanently bound (for example, well stapled, not
secured by paper clips or slipped as loose pages into plastic binders). Each
page should be numbered and should have your student number on it.
The report must be produced with the aid of a word processor and you
are expected to insert relevant diagrams or screen shots into the text.
Diagrams should either be prepared using a computer package, or perhaps
done by hand and scanned in to the document if you are a talented artist.

In this chapter we considered the key steps you need to take in carrying
out your database assignment, looked at an example project and identified
the eight elements you are required to include in your report for the
assignment.

Having undertaken this assignment you are expected to have
demonstrated the following through the analysis, design and construction
of a small database application:
• selection of a suitable problem to be solved by a database application
• production of a use case and class diagram using UML notation – this
is a system overview and logical database design that reflects the
aspects of the world that you store data about
• production of a set of normalised relations – a physical database
design
• design of a data input screen or screens
• design of a query screen
• design of a report for use on screen and/or for printing on paper.
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1. Sketch use case and class diagrams for the following situations:
a. A university library database available online to librarians,
staff and students and including textbooks, novels and poetry
anthologies. Basic data for entries include: authors, editors, the
various editions available and the publishers. The system is to be
used to log loans (books issued to library users) as well as to allow
staff members to recommend new books for purchase and for
librarians to generate orders for new books.
Think about how would you handle tricky issues in the class
diagram such as multiple copies of the same edition of the same
book, and records of book loans? How would you handle a poetry
anthology with various poems by various authors?
b. A jazz society database of jazz music able to be searched by the
society’s members. Data available includes particular concert
or studio session, songs, albums, singers, producers, writers.
This database also holds User Generated Content (UGC) (e.g.
comments provided by people who are members of the society).
Keep your class diagrams as simple as you can, but also note all
complexities or confusions that you might need to deal with later.
2. Write a short (200 word) essay that explains the need for
normalisation of a database design before it is implemented in
database software.
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Chapter 19: Spreadsheet assignment
19.1 Introduction
The aim of the spreadsheet assignment is to demonstrate an
understanding of the basics of analysis and design for simple numerical
models in a spreadsheet as well as to provide evidence of the use of some
mathematical and data management features of such a package.

The aim of this chapter is to give you the information you need to start
thinking about your spreadsheet project. To complete it you will need to
draw on other information from within the syllabus of this course (e.g.
data technologies (Chapter 9), decision making (Chapter 12) and use case
modelling and database design (Chapter 16).

By undertaking this assignment you are expected to demonstrate the
following through the analysis, design and construction of a small
database application:
• selection of a suitable problem to be the basis for a spreadsheet model
• a logical spreadsheet design that reflects the aspects of the world that
you store data about and how to manipulate it
• design of a data input, query screen and/or output screens
• use of simple mathematical and data management functions in
preparing a spreadsheet.

[ISBN 9781292211756 Chapter 12, Section 12.1 and 12.2.

You will probably also need some information on the spreadsheet software
you are using and its features. Such software will probably have a manual
and the popular software such as Microsoft Access will have many ‘How
to…’ guides available. In Chapter 1 we recommended books in the
‘Mastering…’ series published by Sybex and the ‘…for Dummies’ series
published by Wiley.
Whatever software you use you can also find lots of online help in the
manufacturer’s website or in other resources. You may also find the
YouTube tutorials on specific aspects of the software are a very useful
resource to use.
19.2 Introducing the Spreadsheet assignment

The purpose of this assignment is to demonstrate an understanding of how
to undertake analysis and design for a spreadsheet, as well as to provide
evidence of knowledge of some of the main features of a spreadsheet
package. Spreadsheets are tools used for analytical modelling purposes,
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namely, the description of a situation by a set of quantifiable variables

and their relations. One of the most common uses of spreadsheets is in
accounting practices − for example, the calculation of the balance sheet
of a company or the budget for a project. However, spreadsheets have
proved useful in a variety of contexts including, for example, project
management, engineering, geology, statistics and operational research.
From a management perspective spreadsheets can be seen as a type
of decision support system (see also Chapter 8 of this guide). For this
assignment we recommend that you approach your spreadsheet broadly as
a decision support system intended to help somebody use available data in
a model to make a decision or to gain some extra insight. Thus we do not
expect a spreadsheet that is just a simple structured descriptive report like
a balance sheet or budget.
What we mean by this is that your spreadsheet should be able to help
somebody by manipulating or modelling some data (you could say
‘playing with’ some data) and allowing the user to input their own choice
of variables or parameters in order to assess the resulting outputs. So,
for example, you might ‘play with the numbers’ before signing up to a
new mobile phone contract – just to see what the price implications are
across phone networks if you make various levels of calls and use certain
amounts of data.
19.3 Approach to spreadsheet analysis and design

The basis of a spreadsheet developed to meet these requirements will be
an analytical model that relates different types of data (probably mostly
numerical data) in order to offer some insight.
Such a model can be built in six steps:
1. framing the problem and identifying users (e.g. in a use case diagram)
2. identifying the variables and parameters that describe the problem –
the input to the model
3. quantifying as many of these variables and parameters as possible
4. specifying the relations among variables and how they combine – in
other words, the model you will use
5. specifying the required output from the model in terms of a user’s
interrogation of the model – reports
6. testing the spreadsheet with carefully chosen data and identifying and
correcting errors.
Curtis and Cobham (2008, pp.236–38) provide a very useful brief design
methodology for a spreadsheet along these lines, distinguishing five
elements that can be developed as five separate sections – or separate
spreadsheet tabs:
1. user information (e.g. to customise the spreadsheet for a particular
person or set main parameters such as users name, tax rate, currency
exchange rate, units being used etc.)
2. input data (the data you might alter in order to try out different
values)
3. logic (e.g. the model – probably more or less fixed)
4. report (what the user wants to see or know, presented in the most
usable style)
5. identifying errors.
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In the example in Curtis and Cobham (2008), worksheets and the

workbook feature of the Excel spreadsheet package are used to specify a
separate worksheet (tab) for each of these five elements. Doing this may
seem too complex for a simple project, but it can help you to concentrate
on the core distinctions between customisation (Tab 1), input data (Tab
2), model (Tab 3) and output (tab 4) – plus reporting errors.
The benefits of this kind of analytical modelling or decision support come
from the ability of the user to adjust and interrogate the model. Therefore,
flexibility and robustness are required qualities for the model. A great deal
of good modelling practice when developing spreadsheets is incorporated
in two fundamental laws of spreadsheet modelling.
1. The first law specifies that any cell on the spreadsheet should contain
either a variable (number or text string) or a formula, but never a
combination of the two.
2. The second law requires that any item of input data or model
parameter should appear only once. This helps ensure that you
will not have problems with inconsistent data when updating some
important value.
Figure 19.1: A spreadsheet abiding by the two laws of spreadsheet modelling.

Figure 19.1 gives a simple example of the application of these two laws.
The spreadsheet problem uses the interest rate as an input variable or
parameter and it is entered in one spreadsheet cell only (in cell C4 here).
Thereafter the model makes reference to that cell to use the interest rate
in any subsequent calculation. Thus you should thus never write the cell
formula for cell D8 as =C8*0.065 (assuming that the interest rate was 6.5
per cent) and you would absolutely never replicate such a formula. The
correct approach according to these laws is to enter the formula in cell D8
as =C8*$C$4 – the use of the $ signs makes an absolute and unchanging
reference to cell C4. This is a formula that can be copied or replicated
down the column. In this way we can be sure that all the formulae in
column D, however many there may be, will use the same reference to the
interest rate. If and when we wish to change the rate we need only enter
the new rate (say 8.5 per cent) once. The alternative approach of writing
the formula as C8*0.065 would mean that we had to hunt down every use
of 0.065 and change it, creating considerable potential for error.
Interrogation of an analytical model usually means the generation of
numerical results, but it could be as textual data. More sophisticated
interrogation practices include:
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1. What-if? analyses – what if the interest rate was to go up by

2 per cent?
2. Sensitivity analyses – if the cost of one component of a manufactured
product was to double, how much would the overall cost go up?
In other words, how sensitive is the final cost to the prices of one
component?
3. Goal-seeking analyses – How much must the marketing budget
be if we are to achieve a 4 per cent growth in market share? This
spreadsheet would be based on a model that relates sales achieved to
marketing spend.
4. Optimisation – What is the optimal mix of advertising spend as
between newspaper advertisements, online advertisements and
television commercials? Such a spreadsheet might be a more
sophisticated development of the goal-seeking one above.
In each case, answers to these questions will require a particular style
of interrogation of a basic model and they are supported by various
functionalities of spreadsheet packages.
You are expected to consider the following areas in your project work and
to write about this in your report:
1. Analysis of your problem domain in terms of a simple use case
diagram.
2. The variables and relationships incorporated in a model.
3. Overall design of a spreadsheet for clarity and to support an
appropriate style of interrogation (‘what-if?’, optimisation, etc.).
4. Use of appropriate functions for data manipulation – for example,
sort, sum, average, look-up tables and other simple mathematical and
statistical functions.
5. Formatting of cells for text and numbers. In the example above, cell
C4 contains the number 0.065, but it displays as 6.5% – an example of
formatting that cell as a percentage rather than as a number.
6. Design of an onscreen and printed report from the spreadsheet.
7. Design of graphical reports including the choice of appropriate graphs
and charts.
Activity 19.2
When choosing a graph as the output from a spreadsheet suggest the type of data that
would be suitable for display using:
1. a pie chart
2. a bar chart or histogram
3. an x/y plot or scatter plot.
Two example assignments are given below. These are intended to illustrate
the type of problem that you are expected to tackle. As with the database
project you must choose your own spreadsheet problems from the world
around you – from your college or business or something associated with
some hobby or pastime. Economic data, exchange rates, share prices,
demographic data or even the weather report may provide appropriate
data. Suitable problems are those that require you to summarise or model
numerical data (say up to 80 raw data points), to show a result or a trend,
to permit some ‘what-if?’ questions to be asked, and to produce from this a
printed report and a graphic chart.
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Our experience as examiners suggests that projects based on basic

accounting reports, balance sheets, flow of funds, etc. are not good
topics for this project. They are usually so set in their format, and so
reliant on simple addition and subtraction, that you have little opportunity
to demonstrate your own analysis and design skills or knowledge of the
various functions of a spreadsheet package.
19.4 Reporting spreadsheet assignments

When reporting your spreadsheet assignment, you need to produce the
following items:
1. A description of the spreadsheet problem tackled including simple use
case diagram showing the system and its main functions in the wider
context and with the people (actors) with whom it will interact.
2. A paper-based model of the problem representing the relations
between the independent and dependent variables that you use. This
may be in the form of a diagram or as arithmetical equations. For
example, if a model was developed to cost products from a factory it
might be based on formulae such as:
base cost = materials cost + handling charge
manufacturing cost = (batch set-up cost/batch size) +
(time on machine * hourly machine rate)
total cost = base cost + manufacturing cost
This can be shown as above as formulae, but might better be shown in
a diagram or flow chart.
3. The design criteria used in preparing the spreadsheet, for example
choice of multiple spreadsheets in a workbook, layout, task
breakdown, choices made in cell formatting, use of colour.
4. A description of the key formulae used in the model and as written for
the spreadsheet.
5. Steps taken to enforce data validation (input validation, cross-checking
of calculations, reporting of error conditions), and overall integrity of
the model (appropriate use of cell referencing, not mixing variables
and numbers in the same formula, etc.).
6. Very brief descriptions of how the system is operated – how to
undertake each major task. This can be very brief – a good spreadsheet
should usually be fairly obvious to a user.
7. One or more figures showing the spreadsheet as it appears on the
screen in whole or in part. It is usually best to crop out specific bits of
a sheet that you wish to comment on.
8. Reports and appropriately annotated graphs.
Remember, the total report should not exceed six pages of carefully laid
out text. As with the database work, examples of printouts and other
necessary computer generated reports can be appended. The assignment
should have a copy of the submission form as the front page. Reports must
be permanently bound together with the database report (for example,
well stapled, not secured by paper clips or just slipped into plastic
binders). Each page should be numbered and have your student number
on it. The report must be produced with the aid of a word processor and
you are expected to insert relevant diagrams or screen shots into the text.
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In this chapter we discussed how to approach your spreadsheet
assignment and the benefits of designing your spreadsheet as a decision
support system. We examined six steps to building an analytical model
for spreadsheet design and introduced the two fundamental laws of
spreadsheet modelling. We concluded by identifying eight elements you
are required to include in your report for the assignment.

Having undertaken this assignment you are expected to have
demonstrated the following through the analysis, design and construction
of a small database application:
• selection of a suitable problem to be the basis for a spreadsheet model
• a logical spreadsheet design that reflects the aspects of the world that
you store data about and how to manipulate it
• design of a data input, query screen and/or output screens
• use of simple mathematical and data management functions used in
preparing a spreadsheet.

1. Read these two examples of possible spreadsheet projects and use
them to help you find your particular area of interest.
Example 1
A spreadsheet is to be used by a motor racing team to calculate the appropriate volume
of fuel to have in the race car at the start of a race. Calculating this is the task of the Race
Planner and should be undertaken well before the start. A car can have more fuel, but
the car will be heavier and will travel more slowly. On the other hand, if the car is light on
fuel, it will have to refuel more often – and that takes time. The calculation must take into
account that different drivers have different skills at driving a fast light car or a heavier and
slower car. Other relevant issues are the length of the race, the running conditions (fast or
slow, wet or dry), the air temperature and an estimate of what the competition is going to
do. The spreadsheet must also let the team manager evaluate alternative tactics during the
race and as events unfold. Thus during the race, the model needs to be updated with the
actual fuel usage and refuelling times, and alterations in strategy, weather etc.
Enter race parameters
Enter driver parameters
Enter car parameters
Race Enter weather details

Planner
Optimise refuelling plan
Update weather details
Update car details
Team Update refuelling history

Manager
Whatif for fuel
load and stops
Figure 19.2 Use case diagram for Fuel Load spreadsheet example.
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The use case diagram above shows some of the aspects that need to be addressed, in
particular the Race Planner’s role in optimising the fuel load at the start, and the Team
Manager’s role in updating and changing decisions in real time using a ‘What if’ kind of
analysis.
This example is probably of no interest to most readers, but to a car racing fanatic it is a
fascinating and a welcome challenge. Your task is to find something as interesting to you
to serve as the basis of your spreadsheet.
Example 2
Develop a spreadsheet to analyse the tax position of an employed person in your
country. This will need you to do some research into the exact details of the tax rules
of your country and will include issues of income tax as well as health and other social
insurances, pension contributions, etc. The circumstances of an individual – for example,
married or with children – will also generally affect the amount of income taken in tax, as
may other characteristics, such as age or outstanding student loans.
The spreadsheet can be used to generate a table and chart showing the marginal tax rate
that applies at various levels of income – that is the percentage of the last $ or £ taken in
tax and other deductions as income rises.
The model may also answer questions such as, ‘How much do I need to earn gross to take
home a given net amount?’ This is an example of goal seeking. You might also use such a
model to inform a politician about the marginal tax rate that various individuals face and
as a way to model new and perhaps fairer policies.
2. What spreadsheet chart would you use for the following situations?
Justify your choice:
to show monthly rainfall data over three years
numbers in a country’s population within age groups and by
gender
movement in Gold price in US$ over five years
the relationship between GDP per head and road accidents per
100,000 population in European countries
the proportion of the government’s overall annual budget allocated
to education, defence, healthcare and infrastructure.
3. Sketch a paper model for the following situations:
a. Calculating body mass index (BMI). Weight data may come in
pounds, grams or stones and pounds. Height data in inches,
centimetres or feet and inches. (You can find the BMI formula
online if need be.).
b. To work out the cost per student of a class trip to a musical
show (You can think of this as a decision support system to help
calculate the cost of participation according to what is planned).
This is to include tickets, hire of a bus, insurance and meals. The
cost will depend on the number of students who choose to go; for
example, bus hire is fixed for n = 1 to 50 while every 10th ticket
is free from the theatre after you get to 15 people. And meals are
similarly open to discounts if numbers are larger.
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Notes
174
Section 6: Reflections on information systems
Section 6: Reflections on information

systems
In this section we reflect back on the topics studied in the course, and take
an overview of how we understand information systems as both a core
part of modern organisations and as an area for detailed academic study.
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Notes
176
Chapter 20: Perspectives on information systems
Chapter 20: Perspectives on information

systems
20.1 Introduction
The previous chapters in this guide have introduced the themes of the
syllabus and provided you with guidance and support for your study of
the various topics and areas by reading, researching and discussing. In this
final chapter we step back to take an overview of the subject and to reflect
on some of the main interlinking themes that have been introduced. This
chapter is for this reason rather different from those that have gone before.
The intention is to encourage you to develop your own overall perspective
on the subject as you come to the end of your study, prepare for your
exams, and perhaps contemplate choosing some further information
systems courses or even a career in this area.
You need to develop your own overview perspective for two reasons.
First, for you to become a confident expert in information systems you
need to develop your own high-level ‘map’ of the subject as much as you
need to gather specific and detailed knowledge of particular topics. The
overview is what lets you make sensible judgements, see tensions and
contradictions, or imagine solutions to problems.
The second reason is more close to hand. When you answer examination
questions you will often need to combine areas of knowledge from
different parts of the syllabus. An acceptable answer may be mostly about
one topic, but a really good answer will often draw on and echo other
ideas or themes. In this way, with the advantage of your own good high-
level view of the subject, the examination answers you write will develop
more persuasive arguments and you will be able to demonstrate a deeper
and more integrated kind of knowledge.

The aims of this chapter are to invite you to look back at what you have
studied, and to place the individual elements into a wider understanding
of the subject.

The best summary of this chapter is simply: ‘Get the big picture, remain
critical and enquiring!’
20.2 Perspectives on information systems

20.2.1 The basics: information, data, technology, systems,
organisations
It is good advice to any student to make sure they are familiar with the
basics of a subject – the fundamental ideas upon which it is built. This is
not a question of learning by rote a string of definitions, but of identifying
the central ideas that underpin discussion and that recur in many
different debates. For this subject this includes the linked ideas of data
and information, how they differ and how they relate. After all, we study
information systems, not (principally) data systems. Many issues we
have addressed (e.g. database design, MIS, DSS) are framed, in different
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Introduction to information systems
ways, as developing an understanding of the links between recording

phenomena as data and then using this to provide information to help
people individually and collectively achieve some purpose.
The idea of acquiring or capturing data, storing it and then using it
for some organisational or social purpose is fundamental. The way we
come by data is usually as a result of what we do (e.g. as transactions
or events occur – perhaps the daily production volumes of biscuits made
in a factory), but sometimes we go out to seek it (a market research
survey of the likes and dislikes of biscuit buyers). Some data can be used
in automated (programmed) procedures that have no direct human
involvement (e.g. automatically ordering more of the ingredients to
make biscuits when the stocks reach a certain low level), but many uses
of data will involve or engage people (e.g. a DSS for the production
manager to help her schedule production of different types of biscuit).
People, in general, do not use data directly. They need it processed,
modelled, filtered or combined to meet their specific needs – they seek
information, they value it and they will pay to for it, paying in time,
effort, costs of new infrastructure or purchasing it as a service.
This leads us to the idea of a system, as a combination of elements or
resources that work together as a coordinated whole for a particular
purpose. The concept of a system (a systems perspective) is an idea we
can apply at various levels: at a macro level the global economy can be
seen as a system, similarly we might speak of the education system, the
class system or the legal system. In this subject we usually apply the
concept a more meso (middle) level; information systems seen as are
part of an organisation (which could itself be seen as a system). Within
an organisation we may identify a sales management information system,
a human resources information system or a production planning system.
Enterprise systems, in particular, have a purpose to tie together all the
parts of the organisation. By thinking and talking, at any level or in any
subject, in terms of systems we are saying that multiple elements (in our
case hardware, databases, software, people, devices, papers and forms
etc.) are combined and coordinated in some ways (e.g. by exchanging data
and using feedback loops) and work together to achieve some purpose.
One resource we expect to find in the information systems we study
at any level (society, firms, or specific functional areas) is technology,
in particular digital technology – what we also call information and
communications technology or plain information technology (ICT or IT).
Whatever name we use, the basic characteristics of this technology are
important to reflect on: its ability to collect, to store and to manipulate
data, and its ability to run programs (software). The programmability
of digital technology makes it a very flexible and versatile resource. Your
smartphone does many jobs, and can easily take on a new task depending
on your interests and need. For example, my phone apps include an
emergency first aid manual with video clips (a kind of DSS), tide tables,
weather forecasts, real time bus information, as well as a compass, piano,
torch and a ruler. I can search the web, check a map, read the paper, book
train tickets or hire a car. You may have the same model of phone but you
certainly have a different mix of apps that you use. Thus digital technology
devices are able to be configured to a specific context or user, able to
respond and take account of changing circumstances, and at times able to
select for itself courses of action. In this way digital things are fast, data,
driven and ‘smart’.
But it is important to remember that they are probably not as smart as
you! For most work in the world, other than very easy-to-specify tasks, we
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still need people even if they can be aided by digital technologies and data
resources. But how long will this remain true you may ask? The answer is
we do not know and opinions or respected experts are sharply divided.
Still, so far our focus in information systems is, for the most part, on the
ways that we can add this technology, with these characteristics, to human
organisations to help them achieve their goals. Technologies are thus
placed into a social setting and expected to work with and for people.
We need therefore to take interest not just in the technology but in the
relationships between people and technology – hence the emphasis we
place on the sociotechnical approach. When we adopt this view we can ask
questions about what people want or need in their lives (e.g. doing their
jobs at work, living their live outside work), and how technology might be
able to provide this. But different people will want different things so the
process of finding ways to satisfy all is complex – sometimes impossible.
Still, ideas like participation, user involvement, prototyping, or job (re)
design are important aspects of achieving successful information systems
that fit into our world.
20.2.2 Digital technology’s consequences

In this subject we return time and time again to the question of what
new digital technologies bring to organisations, markets or societies, the
effect it has on them or the consequences that follow new technologies’
use. Often this too is posed in sociotechnical terms, as consequences for
people in a technologically dense world (e.g. consequences for personal
privacy, for children, for your career). When studying information systems
we are posed with questions as to what a certain technology or type of
system implies about the availability and management of data, but also
the kinds of future uses that might be found for it, and the possible results.
For example, today digital medical records, social media and Facebook,
smartphones and tablet computers pose these kinds of questions for many
organisations and at a societal level too; should we encourage their use,
what new things do they perhaps allow us to do, is it all good or are there
problems or risks to face up to, do we have access to the right skills to
manage them well, who will benefit or gain value, who will suffer a loss?
As these kinds of questions arise, asking how significant technology is
or will be in causing changes, we need to consider changes at many
levels. Changes in the nature of work, changes for different sub-groups
– employees, managers, customers, suppliers, but also changes in how
organisations (or industries or markets) are structured. Of course to be
an organisation is to be organised (can you imagine a non-organised
organisation – does the idea make sense?), and to be organised is to have
some structured ways of collecting and communicating data, but whatever
this is it might be radically changed by some new information technology.
Hence, from one perspective, information technology and its capabilities
can be seen as almost ‘defining’ the organisation it is employed within.
Not everybody, however, would agree with such a position or see
technology as so significant or dominant. Thus an alternative perspective
is one that emphasises how malleable and flexible digital technologies are
(e.g. their programmability), and how individuals or specific organisations
can shape them to meet their particular needs or desires. Whatever your
view is on this question (does technology shape organisations, or do
organisations shape technology?), you can be sure that you will meet
people who take an alternative view. So be ready to defend your own
position and don’t just sit on the fence!
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20.2.3 Rapid change and learning from history

Behind these discussions about the significance of technology for
organisations is often an understanding that digital technologies are
relatively new (60+ years in widespread use), and are still rapidly
developing. The internet, which today we see as central to all manner of
ICT usage, has less than just about 25 years of widespread use and the
devices we carry around with us have raw power to outperform quite big
computers of the 1980s. This fast pace of developments is significant and
has interesting consequences for us, and the world we live in, even if the
basic logical model of a processor, RAM and secondary storage, and an
interface is as valid for a smart phone as it was 60 years ago for the first
generation of business computers.
What is perhaps most significant is that we expect our technologies
to change- tomorrow will be different to today – and to a large extent
most of us are quite well prepared to embrace this change and seem to
welcome it. Thus organisations have information technology departments
and managers who expect to rebuild or redesign their basic information
systems on a regular basis as new technology arrives, itself creating new
needs. Today it may be all about cloud computing and big data, but
tomorrow it will be something else that destabilises our current certainties
and renders today’s ways as obsolete.
There are themes of continuity too. While computers have evolved and
become smaller, faster, networked, and very affordable, many of the
organisational tasks that we use them for have not really changed that
much. Stock in a warehouse still needs to be managed, bills have to be
paid, invoices issued, people hired and their salaries paid into a bank.
An order for goods will today arrive electronically rather than on paper,
but that alone is not a huge change for many organisations. What may
be more significant is that an order can be sent electronically around the
world, from the UK to China, or from Mozambique to Jamaica. In other
words the world, its people and its economy, is more connected and thus
interconnected. Recession in Europe affects everybody, Korean dance
videos go global, and political and social movements draw on technology
and move across frontiers and between continents.
This combination of rapidly developing technology and new devices, less
rapid change in the tasks to which these technologies are applied, but
huge change in the scale they operate on, gives a particular dynamic to
the information systems field. We also need to recognise that technology
develops and changes rapidly but organisations and people may often
be slower or more reluctant to change – perhaps with good reason. Thus
change at the organisational, social or societal level may be a bit slower
than the pace of technical innovation suggests. In the end it is the changes
we see in how people live their lives, how firms succeed in their markets,
or how governments serve their populations that matter the most.
20.3 Information systems as your coursework

The coursework you undertake in this course has a deeper significance too.
It is intended to help you learn some skills, but also to help you reflect on
how projects work, and how the work of analysis, design, and construction
link together in projects to develop information systems. Doing the
practical work should make you aware of some the problems faced when
gathering requirements accurately and writing them down coherently, and
then designing a small system that actually does what you want it to do.
If you then extrapolate the troubles you have faced by a thousand times
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(at least) to account for organisational complexity through multiple users,

varied expertise, competing interests etc. then you may become more
accepting and knowledgeable of potential (we could say inevitable) pitfalls
in developing and implementing information systems.
Doing this work should help you tie together many concepts and issues
you have studied in the course, but in a practical manner – you often need
to ‘get your hands dirty’ in order to understand something. You should also
accept that you might not (will not) do it perfectly the first time. To use
another metaphor, you can only learn to ride a bicycle if you are prepared
to fall off. So, when you make your first efforts to draw a use case or
class diagram, normalise a database, or struggle to lay out a document
with edited screen shots on a word processor, you are actively learning
some new skills and if you take time to reflect on it, attaining some new
conceptual knowledge.
Information systems work in the IT industry is very much project-based
because it is often structured in terms of a specific goal, limited time scale
and finite resources. Projects are usually managed in stages and dependent
on the achieving the right sequence to complete the many interdependent
tasks. A simple outline version of this is found in the life cycle approach.
It provides a framework for managers to help them to plan, structure and
budget development work as well as to manage it thorough time and
assess the progress made. The life cycle proposes clear stages with certain
tasks and outputs specified at each stage. It helps to provide clarity for
professional roles (e.g. analysts versus designers versus programmers) and
helps define responsibilities and allocate appropriate resources. But does
all this logical structuring really work?
The life cycle is, indeed, often seen as bureaucratic and inflexible, adding
complication and petty demarcations that hinder progress, consume time
and generate piles of paper. Worst of all (some say) it demands a clear
statement of the objectives at the outset and does not expect these to
change along the way, even if in real life this is almost inevitably going
to happen. For these reasons many experts try to break away from such
a rigid structure and look for alternatives. At the very least we can agree
that the life cycle approach is not useful in all cases and recognise the
alternative methods and approaches that have emerged to compensate
for such challenges. As you develop your understanding you should
become more confident of being able to analyse these alternatives, be it
evolutionary prototyping, agile methods or use of SaaS.
The problematic nature of projects as a way of delivering useful
information systems leads us to another strong sociotechnical theme.
One of the oldest sociotechnical prescriptions for success in information
systems is to involve a system’s ultimate users from the outset and
ensure that they participate in development. This is often called ‘user
participation’ or ‘user centred design’ and has a long history back to the
1950s when it was first seen as essential to get the best from technology,
to fit it into a social situation in such a way that it was acceptable and
would become productive.
Today we still see very similar arguments being made. For example,
for involving practising doctors in developing information systems for
hospitals in order to produce systems that reflect their specific ways of
thinking and working. (You would probably be surprised how little doctors
who work day-to-day in a hospital are involved in developing these types
of system, but after all they are busy and often not very knowledgeable or
even interested in IT)
181
More generally, participation of users and other stakeholders throughout

the development process should make implementation or change-over
smoother and reduce problems of resistance or misunderstanding,
and thus make failed or unused systems less probable. Users who are
consulted, directly or via representatives, and who participate in analysis
and design work, it is argued, are more committed to a system that should
better serve their needs and desires. They should become more effective
at doing their (redesigned) jobs using a new system they helped shape.
Gaining the productive involvement of users remains a significant issue
today, both within traditional projects and in other contexts too, for
example in open source software development or in crowdsourcing.
20.4 Sourcing choices

For senior organisational managers there is a wider set of concerns as to
how they prepare for and manage the totality of information systems that
their organisations need. In particular there are choices to make as to
how they obtain their information systems and supporting infrastructure
and how they run them. This is the topic of sourcing. Many organisations,
including government departments, multinational firms and smaller
businesses outsource major systems to specialist companies both for their
development and to run them.
IS managers have to assess these and other sourcing options and make
carefully balanced decisions. In this they are faced with tricky questions
such as: Is outsourcing cheaper and less risky than an in-house operation?
Do the available packages embody good and useful business practices
(best practice) and allow an easy and direct way to modernise and
reform our organisational procedures? Is open source software safe and
reliable enough? If we choose it how will bugs and errors get corrected?
But if we buy COTTS from major suppliers are we going to be locked in
to their product (and their fee structure) for the rest of time? Managers
have to weigh up the needs of their users, the functionality required, and
availability of alternatives, budget constraints, risk factors, basis for best
practices and more. Remember too that internal decisions are not made in
isolation. IS is often seen as potentially offering a competitive advantage
(or a competitive disadvantage) so organisations deciding on how,
where and what sort of IS to develop and use need to be aware of their
competitors’ decisions and wider industry trends.
20.5 Technology beyond organisations

Information systems are needed by organisations for a specific roles,
reasons, and functions but it is important also to contemplate the wider
change new information systems have wrought on society. For instance, as
you should be aware, your own government is almost certainly developing
e-government strategies to deliver new public services or old services in new
ways. Think about the way that information systems are being purposively
used in education or healthcare, and the reasons that are used to justify such
developments. We also need to think about who has access to technology
and why some may be excluded (intentionally or otherwise) – the ‘digitally
excluded’. Is there a ‘digital divide’ in your own country between those who
‘get it’ and use it and benefit from it, and those who cannot or will not? Is
this about wealth, about infrastructure, about age, or about attitudes? And
just how much should we worry about the ‘digitally excluded’?
You are probably also aware of initiatives to use information systems
to provide more open or accessible government (e.g. providing more
182
information about government activities to citizens or offering them rights

to ask for information), as well as privacy laws to protect personal data.
The new social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter
and the various similar systems around the world are often implicated
(rightly or wrongly) in empowering ordinary citizens and causing
new types of politics or social movement to emerge. They are equally
implicated in misusing personal data, exploiting their users and shrugging
off responsibility for the things they facilitate.
Ultimately, information systems is a subject that deals with the most
important issues of all! These trends and the ambiguous view we take of
big digital platforms, are challenging how we understand information,
its power, the access rights, legal responsibilities and the needed laws
under which it develops. Perhaps, through such debates, we can mould
the sort of society we want to live in in the future, we can take charge of
technology and not let it take charge of us.
183
Notes
184

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Introduction to information

Published by: University of London

Chapter 6: Managing data with technologies....................................................... 55

11.8 Reminder of learning outcomes......................................................................... 102

17.5 Change and software........................................................................................ 156

1.1 Route map to the guide

What devices or technologies might be used?

1.1.1 Aims of the subject guide

1.1.2 Course overview

1.1.3 Access to computers

coherent manner. A database allows its user to select and extract

presented as files on a disk, rather than as physical books. Such tutorial

1.2 Introduction to the subject area

Information systems as discussed here are approached a bit differently,

you may read to describe such a situation is ‘digital transformation’. For

1.3 Sociotechnical approach to Information Systems

This description suggests that the study of information systems entails at

applied to specific tasks). Indeed, these two domains are so interrelated

structures. Students are expected to undertake small investigative case

1.5 Aims of the course

1.6 Learning outcomes for the course

• explain the various functions of systems and network software and

1.7 Overview of learning resources

1.7.2 Essential reading

1.7.3 Further reading

1.7.4 Online study resources

Making use of the Online Library

1.7.5 Other useful resources

Newspapers, magazines and trade papers

communications technologies for their own sake, but to better understand

1.8 Examination advice

The format of the written examination is shown in Appendix 1. The

1.8.2 How to do well in the examination

1.9 Glossary of abbreviations

OIS office information system

2.1.1 Aims of the chapter

2.1.2 Learning outcomes

2.1.3 Essential reading

2.1.4 Further reading

2.2 Introducing the projects

2.3 General rules for submission of assignments

2.4 Reminder of learning outcomes

Chapter 3: A short history of information

3.1.1 Aim of the chapter

3.1.2 Learning outcomes

3.1.3 Essential reading

3.1.4 Further reading

3.2 Information systems today

engineering. Although each of these fields will be relevant to us at times,

We even have a name for such information systems and technology – we

3.3 A very simple model of basic computer hardware

3.4 A brief history of computers and networks

more flexible networks – brings us to today where computers are pervasive

3.5 Modern taxonomy of computers

for example, for performing engineering and scientific calculations. An

3.6 Client server computing

description of client server computing and the Cloud, see Beynon-Davies

3.7 Overview of chapter

3.8 Reminder of learning outcomes

3.9 Test your knowledge and understanding

Section 2: Concepts underlying

In this section we introduce some of the history of information systems –

Chapter 4: Information and data