Taking a New-Generation Manager Perspective to Develop Interface Designs

Digital natives are increasingly populating organizations’ management. As they have higher expectations with respect to IS accommodating their (non-functional) user preferences, interfaces of management support systems (MSS) are becoming more important. We develop design guidelines for new MSS interfaces from a new-generation manager perspective. We compile a set of requirements from a literature review and based on a multiple-case study we synthesize five guidelines: (1) use sparklines to present information at a glance and complement them with tooltips to access details, (2) support economic value-added concepts as a “must-have” and be aware that self-service predictive analyses make them more valuable, (3) draw managers’ attention to critical events in real-time by sending notifications to their smart devices, (4) to harvest the knowledge of different users, integrate collaboration capabilities into MSS interface designs, (5) align different information media with managers’ device selection and do not forget their mobile offline use situations

A First Perspective on Requirements of New-Generation Managers for Collaboration Technology to be Integrated into Management Support Systems

Companies today are mostly populated by new-generation managers—consisting of digital natives and digital immi­grants. New-generation managers have expanded their role in operations and have to make decisions faster than in the past. Management support systems (MSS) serve as mana­gers’ central, hands-on, day-to-day source of information. Thus, the present situation is favorable for redesigning MSS in two respects: On the one hand, new-generation mana­gers’ faster decision making is driving a new demand for self-service MSS. Unlike earlier MSS, self-service MSS accommodate individual user preferences and increasingly enable managers to operate MSS themselves. On the other hand, as companies become larger and more dispersed, face-to-face meetings and even telephone calls become less prac­tical, but new collaboration technology is becoming in­creasingly important. Subject to these considerations, we examine collaboration technology—technology assisting people working towards the same goals—suitable to be incorporated into MSS for new-generation managers’ self service

LEVERAGING IN-MEMORY TECHNOLOGY TO IMPROVE THE ACCEPTANCE OF MSS - A MANAGERS´ PERSPECTIVE

Management support systems (MSS) help managers to perform their jobs more efficiently. With in-memory technology, a new IT enabler promises to support managers by benefits ranging from reducing time for MSS data entry and analysis to completing even new topics of analysis. Hence, the present situation is favorable for an MSS redesign applying in-memory apps. Such apps are field-tested and ready-to-use, but from a business perspective they lack impact. Based on findings from a literature review and results from a workshop with an expert focus group validated with one-on-one manager interviews, we propose four initial use situations in which in-memory apps contribute to greater MSS acceptance: (1) In-memory apps should accelerate the MSS response time for both check status and receive an alert. In doing so, they should focus on information from management accounting. (2) By delivering information more timely, in-memory apps should contribute to MSS standard reports and financial closing. (3) In-memory apps should accelerate MSS response time for both ad-hoc analysis and drill-down/drill-through analysis. (4) Leveraging in-memory apps, MSS ad-hoc analysis and drill down/drill-through analysis should become more flexible.

The Effectiveness of Case-Based Reasoning: An Application in Sales Promotions

This paper deals with Case-based Reasoning (CBR) as a support technology for sales promotion (SP) decisions. CBR-systems try to mimic analogical reasoning, a form of human reasoning that is likely to occur in weakly-structured problem solving, such as the design of sales promotions. In an empirical study, we find evidence that use of the CBR-system improves the quality of SP-campaign proposals. In terms of the creativity of the proposals, decision-makers who think highly divergent (i.e., who tend to generate many, and diverse ideas in response to a problem) benefit most from prolonged system usage. Creativity, in turn, is positively related to the (practical) usability of a proposal. These results suggest that the CBR-system is most effective when it is used as an idea-generation tool that reinforces the strength of divergent (creative) thinkers. A convergent thinking style, in which case the CBR-system has a compensating role, even has a negative impact on CBR-system usage. Increasing the decision-maker's personal belief in the usefulness of the system, e.g., by training or education, may help to alleviate this reluctance to use the CBR-system.marketing management support systems;sales promotions;case-based reasoning;weakly-structured decision making

MANAGERS AND COLLABORATION TECHNOLOGY: A BUSINESS PERSPECTIVE FOR IMPROVING MANAGEMENT SUPPORT SYSTEMS

Over the last years managers have expanded their role in operations and nowadays they make decisions faster than in the past. Collaboration technology promises to support managers in doing so. Hence, the present situation is favorable for a redesign of management support systems (MSS) incorporating collaboration technology. To examine such technology, we consider analyst - and consumer -type managers´ perspectives and cover collaboration technology for different devices. Based on findings from a literature review and arguments validated in structured manager interviews, we propose four initial design guidelines facilitating collaboration for managers: (1) Coordination: MSS should indicate the availability of other users, send read confirmations, and provide document sharing. (2) Communication: MSS should enable on-topic annotations and sending them to other users at the push of a button. (3) Cooperation: MSS should provide a comprehensive managerial self-service search function. (4) Devices: For shared documents and textual annotations tablets have become managers most wanted smart device type

Situational Management Support Systems: Accommodating the Growing Range ofWorking Styles, Use Cases, and Access Modes

Digital natives increasingly populate organizations' management. These new-generation managers more naturally accept management support systems (MSS), but also have higher expectations about how they should accommodate their individual user preferences. As a result, managers question MSS that have been developed without configuration mechanisms to accommodate their working style, relevant MSS use cases, and different MSS access modes. The objective of this article is to reveal managers' different MSS use situations and propose levers for tailoring (conceptual) MSS design to them. Use situations generalize classes of similar user-group preferences. We first apply findings from a literature review to cluster managers' user-group preferences into 36 MSS use situations. Second, we propose that the selection of end-user devices can serve as a main lever for MSS configuration. Third, we complete the configuration with a MSS user-interface design. Finally, we demonstrate utility of our configuration model by presenting and evaluating a prototyp

Sustainability management : insights from the viable system model

A review of current literature on sustainability standards reveals a significant gap between their adoption and the implementation of sustainability into every level of the organisation. In this paper, it is argued that in order to overcome this challenge, an appropriate model of an organisation is needed. The Viable System Model (VSM) is proposed as such a model and, in order to illustrate this argument, it is used to interpret the ISO 26000 standard on Social Responsibility (SR). First, the VSM theory is introduced and presented by modelling the hypothetical company Widget Co. Then, the clauses of ISO 26000 are mapped on the Widget Co. model, together with detailed descriptions and examples on the organisational and managerial implications of its adopting the standard's guidelines. The result is the identification of generic SR functions that need to be performed by the various organisational governance systems, as well as their dynamic interrelations, thus clarifying implementation issues. Moreover, by identifying different SR management layers, VSM is suggested as a way forward to develop an integration model for SR issues and respective sustainability tools. Finally, a discussion is given on the implications of using this approach to integrate sustainability standards and the way this research contributes to recent developments in sustainability research

Proceedings of the NSSDC Conference on Mass Storage Systems and Technologies for Space and Earth Science Applications

The proceedings of the National Space Science Data Center Conference on Mass Storage Systems and Technologies for Space and Earth Science Applications held July 23 through 25, 1991 at the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center are presented. The program includes a keynote address, invited technical papers, and selected technical presentations to provide a broad forum for the discussion of a number of important issues in the field of mass storage systems. Topics include magnetic disk and tape technologies, optical disk and tape, software storage and file management systems, and experiences with the use of a large, distributed storage system. The technical presentations describe integrated mass storage systems that are expected to be available commercially. Also included is a series of presentations from Federal Government organizations and research institutions covering their mass storage requirements for the 1990's