Enterprise Resource Planning - a realisation of MIS

Businesses and other organisations are deploying technologies such as Management Information Systems (MIS) to enable them to highlight their strengths and weaknesses, improve their business processes and operations, and align their business processes according to the needs of their customers and clients.

The Wikipedia entry on MIS  quotes;


A management information system (MIS) provides information that is needed to manage organizations efficiently and effectively. Management information systems involve three primary resources: people, technology, and information or decision making. Management information systems are distinct from other information systems in that they are used to analyze operational activities in the organization. Academically, the term is commonly used to refer to the group of information management methods tied to the automation or support of human decision-making, e.g. decision support systems, expert systems, and executive information systems.

Since the advent of information technology technology deployment MIS have evolved from disparate deployments of specialised software applications providing limited functionality, into ever wider and more integrated tools providing information analytics across the organisation.

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is a model and realisation of MIS which allow organisation managers the ability to discover the current global state of the organisation. It aims to '..provide an organization with integrated software modules and a unified database which enable efficient planning, managing, and controlling of all core business processes across multiple locations. Modules of ERP systems may include finance, accounting, marketing, human resources, production, inventory management and distribution.'

Organisations are increasingly using Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) to integrate internal and external management information across an entire organization. In principle, it can embrace finance/accounting, sales, manufacturing, human resources and customer/client relations, automating these activities with an integrated software application, and typically employing a database as a repository for information.

About this blog

If you have been directed here from one of our websites, then you have some interest in or curiosity about management information systems (MIS). If you arrived here through an internet search, you also have at least a passing curiosity about MIS's although you probably have never heard of myself, or webfactotum.

However, if you have stumbled across this blog purely by accident and maybe don't even know what an MIS is then you are also very welcome to browse the blog. Our approach is that internet technology is the most democratic technological development yet, since it has the universal scope and utility to make it accessible to all.

In this blog, I want to evangelise about web based MIS's and all that they can do for businesses in particular, but really, all kinds of organisations. Also, these benefits are not just for the big boys. They really are within reach of virtually everyone.

So, if you have even only a passing interest, and don't want to do battle with a lot of technical jargon and obfuscation, you may be pleasantly surprised by my future posts. You may even be interested enough to want to find out more about what an MIS can do for you.