Work System
Work system has been used loosely in many areas. This article concerns its use in understanding IT-reliant systems in organizations. A notable use of the term occurred in 1977 in the first volume of MIS Quarterly in two articles by Bostrom and Heinen (1977). Later Sumner and Ryan (1994) used it to explain problems in the adoption of CASE (computer-aided software engineering). A number of socio-technical systems researchers such as Trist and Mumford also used the term occasionally, but seemed not to define it in detail. In contrast, the work system approach defines work system carefully and uses it as a basic analytical concept. A work system is a system in which human participants and/or machines perform work (processes and activities) using information, technology, and other resources to produce products/services for internal or external customers. Typical business organizations contain work systems that procure materials from suppliers, produce products, deliver products to custom ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Computer-aided Software Engineering
Computer-aided software engineering (CASE) is the domain of software tools used to design and implement applications. CASE tools are similar to and were partly inspired by Computer-Aided Design (CAD) tools used for designing hardware products. CASE tools were used for developing high-quality, defect-free, and maintainable software. CASE software is often associated with methods for the development of information systems together with automated tools that can be used in the software development process. History The Information System Design and Optimization System (ISDOS) project, started in 1968 at the University of Michigan, initiated a great deal of interest in the whole concept of using computer systems to help analysts in the very difficult process of analysing requirements and developing systems. Several papers by Daniel Teichroew fired a whole generation of enthusiasts with the potential of automated systems development. His Problem Statement Language / Problem Statement An ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Socio-technical Systems
Sociotechnical systems (STS) in organizational development is an approach to complex organizational work design that recognizes the interaction between people and technology in workplaces. The term also refer to coherent systems of human relations, technical objects, and cybernetic processes that inhere to large, complex infrastructures. Social society, and its constituent substructures, qualify as complex sociotechnical systems. The term sociotechnical systems was coined by Eric Trist, Ken Bamforth and Fred Emery, in the World War II era, based on their work with workers in English coal mines at the Tavistock Institute in London. Sociotechnical systems pertains to theory regarding the social aspects of people and society and technical aspects of organizational structure and processes. Here, technical does not necessarily imply material technology. The focus is on procedures and related knowledge, i.e. it refers to the ancient Greek term ''techne''. "Technical" is a term used to r ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Information System
An information system (IS) is a formal, sociotechnical, organizational system designed to collect, process, store, and distribute information. From a sociotechnical perspective, information systems are composed by four components: task, people, structure (or roles), and technology. Information systems can be defined as an integration of components for collection, storage and processing of data of which the data is used to provide information, contribute to knowledge as well as digital products that facilitate decision making. A computer information system is a system that is composed of people and computers that processes or interprets information. The term is also sometimes used to simply refer to a computer system with software installed. "Information systems" is also an academic field study about systems with a specific reference to information and the complementary networks of computer hardware and software that people and organizations use to collect, filter, process, cr ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Service System
A service system (or customer service system, CSS) is a configuration of technology and organizational networks designed to deliver services that satisfy the needs, wants, or aspirations of customers. "Service system" is a term used in the service management, service operations, services marketing, service engineering, and service design literature. While the term frequently appears, it is rarely defined. One definition of a service system is a value coproduction configuration of people, technology, internal and external service systems connected via value propositions, and shared information (language, laws, measures, etc.). The smallest service system is a single person and the largest service system is the world economy. The external service system of the global economy is considered to be ecosystem services. Service systems can be characterized by the value that results from interaction between service systems, whether the interactions are between people, businesses, or n ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Project
A project is any undertaking, carried out individually or collaboratively and possibly involving research or design, that is carefully planned to achieve a particular goal. An alternative view sees a project managerially as a sequence of events: a "set of interrelated tasks to be executed over a fixed period and within certain cost and other limitations". A project may be a temporary (rather than a permanent) social system ( work system), possibly staffed by teams (within or across organizations) to accomplish particular tasks under time constraints. A project may form a part of wider programme management or function as an ''ad hoc'' system. Note that open-source software "projects" or artists' musical "projects" (for example) may lack defined team-membership, precise planning and/or time-limited durations. Overview The word ''project'' comes from the Latin word ''projectum'' from the Latin verb ''proicere'', "before an action," which in turn comes from ''pro-'', which d ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Supply Chain
In commerce, a supply chain is a network of facilities that procure raw materials, transform them into intermediate goods and then final products to customers through a distribution system. It refers to the network of organizations, people, activities, information, and resources involved in delivering a product or service to a consumer. Supply chain activities involve the transformation of natural resources, raw materials, and components into a finished product and delivering the same to the end customer. In sophisticated supply chain systems, used products may re-enter the supply chain at any point where residual value is recyclable. Supply chains link value chains. Suppliers in a supply chain are often ranked by "tier", with first-tier suppliers supplying directly to the client, second-tier suppliers supplying to the first tier, and so on. Overview A typical supply chain begins with the ecological, biological, and political regulation of natural resources, followed by the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ecommerce
E-commerce (electronic commerce) is the activity of electronically buying or selling of products on online services or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile commerce, electronic funds transfer, supply chain management, Internet marketing, online transaction processing, electronic data interchange (EDI), inventory management systems, and automated data collection systems. E-commerce is in turn driven by the technological advances of the semiconductor industry, and is the largest sector of the electronics industry. Defining e-commerce The term was coined and first employed by Dr. Robert Jacobson, Principal Consultant to the California State Assembly's Utilities & Commerce Committee, in the title and text of California's Electronic Commerce Act, carried by the late Committee Chairwoman Gwen Moore (D-L.A.) and enacted in 1984. E-commerce typically uses the web for at least a part of a transaction's life cycle although it may also use other technolog ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Systems Development Life Cycle
In systems engineering, information systems and software engineering, the systems development life cycle (SDLC), also referred to as the application development life cycle, is a process for planning, creating, testing, and deploying an information system. The systems development life cycle concept applies to a range of hardware and software configurations, as a system can be composed of hardware only, software only, or a combination of both. There are usually six stages in this cycle: requirement analysis, design, development and testing, implementation, documentation, and evaluation. Overview A systems development life cycle is composed of a number of clearly defined and distinct work phases which are used by systems engineers and systems developers to plan for, design, build, test, and deliver information systems. Like anything that is manufactured on an assembly line, an SDLC aims to produce high-quality systems that meet or exceed customer expectations, based on customer ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Soft Systems Methodology
Soft systems methodology (SSM) is an organised way of thinking and it can be used to tackle general problematic situations that arise in the real world and in the management of change by using action. Developed in England by academics at the Lancaster Systems Department, by utilising a ten-year action research programme.Checkland P.B. and Scholes, J. (1990) Soft Systems in Action, Wiley ev 1999 ed/ref> Overview The Development of ‘Soft Systems’ Thinking was first developed using earlier approaches at problem solving, In the 1960’s Systems thinking was only thought of with ‘Space age’ technology, to which was then thought to be extended to reach all ends of society, including civilian life. Peter Checkland and his many colleagues such as Brian Wilson were the first to develop this approach. Checkland himself stating that the system analysis of this kind should be seized upon by professional politicians for their own legitimate purposes. The primary use of SSM is in the a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Peter Checkland
Peter Checkland (born 18 December 1930, in Birmingham, UK) is a British management scientist and emeritus professor of systems at Lancaster University. He is the developer of soft systems methodology (SSM): a methodology based on a way of systems thinking systems practice. Systems practice is the idea of uncovering an optimal solution within complex environments, thus leading to a thorough understanding of the system, analysing and adapting to change in the environment. In an important way his work preceded data science and change management disciplines in the next century. Biography Checkland attended George Dixon's Grammar School, and in 1954 received a M.A. degree in chemistry at St John's College, Oxford, where he graduated with 1st class honours.David BrownPeter Checkland honoured by OR Society, LUMS News 28 January 2007. He worked in the industry for 15 years as a manager in ICI's chemicals business. At the end of the 1960s he joined the pioneering department of Systems ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Neil Ramiller
Neil Clifford Ramiller (born 1952) is an American academic, and Professor of Management at the Portland State University School of Business Administration, known for his work with Swanson, E. Burton on the management of information-technology innovations, particularly on organizing vision. Biography After received his BA in Anthropology and Chemistry from Sonoma State University, Ramiller has done graduate work in anthropology and linguistics in the 1970s. Later in 1996 he received his PhD from the UCLA Anderson School of Management under supervision of E. Burton Swanson, and his MBA from University of California, Berkeley.Neil Ramiller: Professor of Management Vita at pdx.edu, 2013. In the 1970s Ramiller had started his career in cultural resources management, doing both archaeological fieldwork and adminis ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Information Systems
An information system (IS) is a formal, sociotechnical, organizational system designed to collect, process, information storage, store, and information distribution, distribute information. From a sociotechnical perspective, information systems are composed by four components: task, people, structure (or roles), and technology. Information systems can be defined as an integration of components for collection, storage and data processing, processing of data of which the data is used to provide information, contribute to knowledge as well as digital products that facilitate decision making. A computer information system is a system that is composed of people and computers that processes or interprets information. The term is also sometimes used to simply refer to a computer, computer system with software installed. "Information systems" is also an academic field study about systems with a specific reference to information and the complementary networks of computer hardware and soft ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |