Business Management (ICT)

•  Data is facts that have been formally collected
• Information is data that has been processed into a form that can help decision-making, planning, control and performance.

• An organisation must have high quality information, it must be;

• Accurate
• Appropriate (fit for purpose)
• Timely (up-to-date)
• Objective (free from bias)
• Available (can be obtained easily)
• Cost-effective
• Concise (to the point)

Explain why information must be... (the reasons above)

• To monitor and control the business
• Info can be used to make sure business is running properly
• Can be used to check progress so that the company can see where the problems are
• For example; the profit and loss account
• To Assist in the decision making process
• Quality information would allow owners and managers to make decisions on setting prices, choosing suppliers, meeting targets, hiring and firing of staff.
• To Measure Performance
• You can evaluate how well the business is performing using information gathered
• To identify New Opportunities
• In identifying new or changing opportunities to be involved in, you may have to collect written and oral information

• PC
• Blackberry/smart-phone
• Email
• Internet
• Video Conferencing
• Networks
• E Commerce

Costs

• Development, installation, maintenance, retraining costs.
• New skills must be learnt by staff and retraining can be difficult
• Production will stop during implementation of the new ICT
• Staff motivation will decrease when workers no longer have to use their own skills
• Staff do not respond well to change.
• 

Benefits

• Productivity increases
• Reduction in waste
• Speed of work increases
• Accuracy is improved - (computers make fewer mistakes)
• Labour costs decrease
• communication is improved

 Word Processing

• application that allows users to type and edit text
• create memo to staff, write letter to customers.

Desk Top Publishing

• application allows user to create page layouts using text and pictures
• Create leaflet, poster.

Presentation software

• used to create presentations, quizzes, information points and other multimedia products.

LAN - Local area network - covers small area, such as a building (school)

WAN- Wide area network - covers geographical area (Internet)

• Files can be shared easily between users
• Data is easy to back up as all the data is stored on the file server

• Viruses can be spread to other computers throughout a computer network
• Danger of hacking. Security procedures are needed to prevent such abuse (e.g. firewall)

Primary information

• researched by people inside the business
• used for business own purpose
• collected by observation, interview, returned questionnaire
• Its fit for purpose
• However; may cost lots of money to collect
• researcher may be bias (loaded question)
• pressured into saying you like it.

Secondary information

• gathered from published sources
• books, newspapers, the Internet
• e.g. hair magazine
• usually less expensive
• unreliable, could be inaccurate
• competitors can access information

Internal information

• Data taken from records within a business
• financial statistics, previous sales figures, customer databases
• Trends can be identified
• Past performance can be looked at and interpreted in order to predict future performance
• May be irrelevant or out of date
• competitor may also be able to find it (PLC &LTD)

External information

• Gathered from outside sources such as the government and competitors
• info on PESTEC factors can be gathered
• broader range of opinion
• may be out of date and available to others
• will be expensive and time consuming to gather
• may have bias

Written

• form of text - report (can keep on file)

Pictorial

• Form of pictures and photos - health and safety poster (make people more aware)

Graphical

• Form of graphs and charts - sales figures

Numerical

• form of numbers - financial predictions (spreadsheet)

Quantitative info

• measured information expressed numerically
• helps analyse information and make predictions

Qualitative Info

• descriptive information, involves opinions or making judgement on something
• allows business to find out peoples opinions on their product
• May be bias and difficult to analyse