CB2500 Chap.1 The Five Components of an Information System
The Five Components of an Information System
Two of the five components are people
The opening lecture lists what an information system is made of and keeps the order fixed: hardware, software, data, procedures and people, interacting to produce information. Two of the five are human, and that is not a rhetorical flourish.
It is why a package that works in one company stalls in another, why an answer naming only technology is incomplete before it says anything else, and why this subject is taught in a business school.
The materials press the point twice, warning against believing an information system can simply be bought and against treating technology staff and systems staff as the same group.
Six system families, sorted by what a person does with them
The lecture answers the question of what information systems look like in practice with a grouping rather than a list.
Systems you use record what happened: transaction processing collects, modifies and retrieves transaction data.
Systems you manage with turn that record into something readable: management information systems turn recorded transactions into a reading of how the organisation is performing, decision support systems support choices that have not yet been made, expert systems apply captured expert knowledge, and artificial intelligence systems learn from past experience.
At the top, executive information systems put information from inside and outside the firm, bearing on its goals, within quick reach of senior managers.
Two pairs inside that grouping are worth separating now because they look adjacent and are not: monitoring against supporting a choice, and applying written rules against learning from data.
Four professions, four different accountabilities
The same lecture names the careers the discipline leads to: project management, information systems auditing, business analysis and digital marketing.
Each is a different answer to what an organisation does with the same five components, and case questions that ask who should decide something usually want one of these four named.
How this chapter is used later
Every subsequent chapter assumes this frame.
Automation is described as work crossing from the human side to the computer side; information quality is judged against the cost of all five components rather than of a licence; and a project recommendation that changes only hardware and software has left three components untouched. Learning the list takes ten minutes. Using it as a checklist on every answer is where the marks are.
What this chapter covers
- 01
Hardware, software, data, procedures and people
- 02
Why an information system cannot simply be purchased
- 03
Information technology staff against information systems staff
- 04
Transaction processing as the layer that records
- 05
Monitoring with a management information system
- 06
Supporting an unmade choice with decision support
- 07
Expert systems against artificial intelligence systems
- 08
Executive information systems and external information
- 09
Project manager, auditor, business analyst, digital marketer
Find the component that is actually failing
- 2Rule out the components that are working, with a reason for each.
- 3Name the component at fault and the exact ambiguity it carries.
- 3State the change and which other component it forces to move.
Key terms
- Information System
- Five interacting components, hardware, software, data, procedures and people, that together produce information.
- Information Technology
- The hardware, software and data products an organisation can acquire, before any procedure or person is arranged around them.
- Transaction Processing System
- A system that collects, modifies and retrieves the transaction records an organisation generates as it operates.
- Management Information System
- A system that turns recorded transactions into a reading of performance against something already defined.
- Decision Support System
- A system that supports a decision not yet made, typically by letting a reader vary an assumption and see the consequence.
- Expert System
- A system that applies a stored body of expert knowledge to offer advice or reach a decision.
- Executive Information System
- A system putting information from inside and outside the firm, bearing on its goals, within quick reach of senior managers.
The Five Components of an Information System FAQ
What is the difference between information technology and an information system?
Technology is what an organisation can buy: machines, programs and data products. A system is what exists once procedures and trained people are arranged around that technology so it produces something useful. The practical consequence is that no purchase creates a system by itself, and that two firms running identical software can get completely different results.
How do I tell a management information system from a decision support system?
Ask what the output is for. If it compares performance against a target that has already been set, and the reader then intervenes, it is management information. If the output changes when the reader varies an assumption, so that options and consequences are being explored, it is decision support. A fixed weekly comparison is the first even when it looks sophisticated.
Why does the course insist that people and procedures are part of the system?
Because most failures live there. A question asking you to identify the components of an information system is not answered by naming software, and a recommendation that changes only what is purchased leaves the two components where meaning is actually lost and where two teams most often diverge.
Exam move
Take any organisation you use weekly and write its five components in the fixed order, one line each, then circle the two you could change without buying anything. Do this for three different organisations and the list stops being a list.
For the system families, write one scenario per family in which the output goes to a named person who then does a named thing; the family becomes obvious once the reader and the next action are on the page.
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