Decision Support System:<\/p>\n
A decision support system is an integrated suite of computer tools that allows the decision maker to interact directly with the computer to retrieve information useful in making semi-structured and unstructured decisions. Examples of these decisions include things like merger and acquisition decisions, plant expansion, portfolio management, new product decisions, and marketing decisions.<\/p>\n
Decision making is an essential managerial activity. It can be conceived of as consisting of four phases: intelligence, design, selection, and implementation.<\/p>\n
Important aspects of a decision support system:<\/p>\n
1) The most important consideration is the ease of use of the decision support system – its ability to allow non-technical people to deal with it directly. The biggest and most enduring problem with computers was their inflexibility, their inability to allow the person who actually needed the data to interact directly with the computer.<\/p>\n
2) The ability to access information should not be restricted to only one part of the organization or to certain administrative or professional groups only. Instead, the resource should be distributed to all the people and part of the organization that needs it without widespread access; The power of an advanced distributed processing system will not be exploited as it was in the past.<\/p>\n
3) An ideal decision support system that contrasts sharply with the previous way of designing applications shouldn’t be a “system” at all in the strict sense of the word. Instead, the Decision Support Builder should be highly adaptive and can be easily used by professionals to rapidly design data support prototypes appropriate for each specific decision-making task. This adaptive tool should allow for rapid design changes if the original design does not closely match the information-gathering style or needs.<\/p>\n
4) To adequately support the human element, this highly adaptive support capability must be able to provide access to operational data in addition to summary data already processed by application software designed for other specific operational tasks. Equally important, this tool must provide the professional with access to the raw data of the organization and must allow access to be accomplished in a single step using a single uncomplicated procedure or command and without the need to re-key the non-abridged data.<\/p>\n
5) Organizations need access to the original data sometimes because efficiency is related to how well the original data is organized in the system; The Decision Support Builder must be able to interact with a real DBMS. It must also be able to access standard “flat” files indirectly using the power of the host computer to facilitate both user interface and data access without altering existing files.<\/p>\n
6) The Decision Support Constructor should allow the user to decide whether the information should be displayed on a CRT monitor for immediate use or whether it should be printed for later use. The best way to accomplish such a flexible presentation of data is through a workstation. A management or information professional workstation will include a keyboard, display, and interface to a printer that can print everything from straight text to graphics such as pie charts, bar charts, and line charts.<\/p>\n
7) The support tool must interact with many different systems and capabilities, must be compatible with all of these systems, and the tool must provide users with a single, easy-to-use language for accessing, manipulating, and presenting data in a way that best supports the end user.
8) In order to facilitate the formatting and manipulation of the displayed data, the decision support generator should ideally be able to interact with word processing software. With this capability, DSS becomes the important link between data processing and office automation, integrating both functions into a very powerful, easy-to-use and straightforward system.
Characteristics of Decision Making in the Global Business Environment:<\/p>\n
Business strategy\/decision making characteristics
Multinational: (decentralized consortium) Decentralized decision-making for subsidiaries, informal relationships between headquarters and subsidiaries
International: (co-ordinated consortium) The most vital decision and knowledge are generally developed at headquarters and transferred to subsidiaries
Global: (central union) Decisions made at the knowledge center are developed and maintained at the center
Transnational: (integrated network) decision-making and knowledge generation distributed among units<\/p>\n
Managers and Decision Support System:<\/p>\n
The daily work of a manager, as hundreds of brief activities of great variety, which require rapid shifts of attention from one issue to another, and which are often initiated by emerging problems. The manager maintains a complex network of contacts outside and within the organization. A successful manager does not get sucked into the onslaught of these activities: he maintains a personal agenda. An effective manager proposes their own informal structure within the corporate structure as it is and uses this network to keep themselves informed and influence others. It is understood that a proactive manager makes special efforts to develop a long-term vision and a long-term agenda.<\/p>\n
The need for the types of information that a decision support system produces has always been there. Decision support systems have become popular primarily because of their ability to address this need. Nowadays, computers, the advent of the database management system in the 1970s, provide means to store and manage a large amount of data, and the number of software packages that include decision support system functions has greatly increased. Finally, many MBAs who are trained in analytical techniques have made it to the middle and upper levels of companies, as these individuals know how to use the tools that a decision support system provides. So in most organizations, managers have used computer-based data processing applications. This leads to the development of a decision support system in the business world.<\/p>\n
It is a common notion that modern decision making is a highly structured process. According to this view, management makes decisions by collecting and analyzing all relevant information, reviewing all possible alternatives, and then calmly and rationally choosing the course of action that provides maximum benefits with minimum risks.<\/p>\n
Managers play three types of roles in performing their jobs. Interpersonal roles are primarily based on face-to-face interactions; Through in some cases computerized means of communication may be used. Informational and decision-making roles are supported by a variety of information systems, which make information available, aid decision-making and serve as a means of communication.<\/p>\n
All managerial roles contain an element of decision making: decision roles are the ones in which this is the crucial aspect. The manager collects resources in a new way. A decision support system helps an entrepreneur to consider options, choose one, and plan for its implementation. Dealing with disturbances is part of management control. Resource allocation is the essence of planning and decision support systems have become indispensable in many organizations for their purpose.<\/p>\n
The manager is a problem solver, and the primary activity in problem solving is decision making. Decision making is the process of defining a problem, developing an alternative solution and selecting and implementing one of them. An experienced manager recognizes a problem similar to one he has already encountered. An intuitive understanding of a problem often depends on such an ability to create an analogy. A systems approach to problem solving helps manage complexity.<\/p>\n
Decision Support System in Organizational Environment:<\/p>\n
The organizations that have been most successful in implementing DSS have a lot in common. They have a well-established, well-monitored and well-organized data processing system that provides transaction processing data needed for DSS. These organizations have spent the additional funds and personnel necessary to keep research and development focused. All departments in the organization communicate with mainframe computer clusters. Entire departments have enough confidence to initiate and manage systems projects. The mainframe groups have many people on their staff who have either come from all of the other departments. Organizations use education and training software to build mutual understanding between departments and the computer group.<\/p>\n
Capabilities offered by DSS:<\/p>\n
1) Decision support in unstructured situations – where, precisely because of a lack of structure, the problem does not lend itself to full computing, but requires computer assistance to access and process a huge amount of data.<\/p>\n
2) Help in quickly obtaining the results of the quantities needed to reach a decision.
3) Run in ad-hoc mode to suit the user’s current needs, rather than in a generally scheduled manner as a management reporting system does.<\/p>\n
4) Supporting the various stages of the decision-making process.<\/p>\n
5) Promote high-quality decision-making by encouraging decisions based on the integration of available information and human judgment.<\/p>\n
6) Provide flexibility rather than a predetermined usage pattern – making it easier to accommodate the specific decision-making style of individuals.<\/p>\n
7) Facilitate the implementation of decisions that frequently cross departmental boundaries.<\/p>\n
8) Supporting group decision making, especially through the Group Decision Support System (GDSS).<\/p>\n
9) Give managers the opportunity to gain a better understanding of their business by developing and working with models.<\/p>\n
Conclusion:<\/p>\n
In the past several years, computers have been increasingly used in the fields of financial management, production analysis, short-range planning, and geographical analysis. Today computers are used in the decision making process as a decision support system. Decision support system are types of management information systems whose main objective is to support the human decision maker during the decision-making process. DSS’s strength lies in supporting decision-making in situations that require human judgment and computer power. A decision support system primarily supports strategic, tactical and operational planning.<\/p>\n
A properly designed and integrated decision support system has become a very powerful support tool that enhances the productivity of professionals at all organizational levels in all departments. It can effectively increase the number of existing employees in the organization by reducing the workload, thus increasing productivity. And with newer technology and newer software tools, it can bring us closer to bridging the gaps and the processes that connect the worlds. These features can give today’s organizations more pressure than ever before to maximize efficiency while reducing costs unprecedented benefits in the use and management of both human and computer resources.<\/p>\n
reference:
1) \u201cManagement Information System\u201d by Vladimir Zwas
2) \u201cThe Nature of Organizational Decision Making and the Design of a Decision Support System\u201d George. B Hopper.
3) \u201cIntroduction to Business Data Processing\u201d by Lawrence S. Aurelia
4) \u201cManagement Information System\u201d by James O. Hicks JR<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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