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Information technology in support of individual decision‐making
Author(s) -
Wood J. R. G.,
WoodHarper A. T.
Publication year - 1993
Publication title -
information systems journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.635
H-Index - 89
eISSN - 1365-2575
pISSN - 1350-1917
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2575.1993.tb00117.x
Subject(s) - bounded rationality , executive information system , rationality , categorization , knowledge management , management information systems , information system , hierarchy , information technology , computer science , decision support system , database transaction , r cast , management science , business decision mapping , information processing , data science , artificial intelligence , psychology , engineering , epistemology , economics , philosophy , neuroscience , electrical engineering , market economy , programming language , operating system
. The use of computers in organizations has often been justified by reference to the ‘improved decision‐making’ which will result from the use of new technology. Rarely, if ever, is any precise measurement given as to how such improvements will be judged. Phrases such as ‘better information leads to better decisions’ and ‘what managers require is more information’ dominate the literature on management information systems (MIS). Alistair Preston argues that this alignment with top management allowed MIS to legitimize and elevate itself as both a serious practice and an academic discipline. The two dominant themes in the relationship between information technology (IT) and managerial decision‐making have been the use of Herbert Simon's work on decision‐making and Anthony's pyramidal structure of types of application system, the latter model leading to a powerful categorization of types of computer‐based information systems (i.e. transaction processing, management information systems, decision support systems, executive information systems). The models of decision‐making employed at each level of this hierarchy are those characterized by Simon as ‘objective rationality’ and ‘bounded rationality’ and these models encourage a view of information as representing some objective reality which can be captured, stored and processed within some form of technology. Dick Boland has argued forcibly that Simon's work has been crucial to the current level of understanding of information and technology within organizations. Less concern has been given, however, to the role which IT itself plays in reinforcing this rationalistic view of information and decision‐making. As Mitroff has pointed out, to represent (or model) a problem is to conduct an inquiry into its nature. Likewise, Dick Boland suggests that information technologies are themselves social inventions that are malleable and shaped during use but that such sets limits and opens possibilities that shape the users as well. Hence, information technologies both incorporate and give rise to changes in our vocabularies for knowing ourselves and our institutions. It will not be enough, therefore, for us merely to change our existing models of managerial decision‐making, it will also be necessary to design new technologies which will reflect and encourage the use of such models. In this paper we shall use the framework provided by Mitroff to try to consider a number of different paradigms of inquiring system and to see what technological forms would need to be developed in order that we may provide technological support for individual decision‐making based on each paradigm.