Final Question # 4

1. Describe or define DSS.

Answer:

Decision Support Systems (DSS) are a specific class of computerized information systems that supports business and organizational decision-making activities. A properly-designed DSS is an interactive software-based system intended to help decision makers compile useful information from raw data, documents, personal knowledge, and/or business models to identify and solve problems and make decisions.

Typical information that a decision support application might gather and present would be:

* an inventory of all of your current information assets (including legacy and
relational data sources, cubes, data warehouses, and data marts)
* comparative sales figures between one week and the next
* projected revenue figures based on new product sales assumptions;
* the consequences of different decision alternatives, given past experience in
a context that is described.

Reference:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decision_support_system


2. Distinguish DSS from MIS.

Answer:

The terms MIS and DSS stand for Management Information Systems and Decision Support Systems respectively. There has been a lot of talk regarding these two, whether they are actually the same thing or if there are any significant differences between the two.

MIS is basically a kind of link to facilitate communcation between managers across different areas in a business organization. MIS plays a pivotal role in enabling communications across the floor of an organization, between various entities therein.

DSS, many consider, is an advancement from the original MIS. However,this is not the sole difference between the two. While there may not be too much separating the two, the difference is still there,as is apparent when we say DSS is an advancement over MIS.

The essential difference between the two is in focus. DSS, as the term indicates, is about leadership and senior management in an organization providing good, reliable judgment as well as vision. MIS, on the other hand, is about focusing on the actual flow of information itself.

Reference:

http://www.blurtit.com/q255508.html


3. Illustrate (give examples) how DSS can improve company's competitive advantage and organizational performance.

Answer:

There are some advantages of DSS

1. Improves personal efficiency
2. Expedites problem solving
3. Facilitates interpersonal communication
4. Promotes learning or training
5. Increases organizational control
6. Generates new evidence in support of a decision
7. Creates a competitive advantage over competition
8. Encourages exploration and discovery on the part of the decision maker
9. Reveals new approaches to thinking about the problem space

Reference:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decision_support_system