DECISION-MAKING
SYSTEMS
Decision Support Software
Reasons for the growth of decisionmaking information systems
• People need to
• People must make
• People must
techniques, such as modeling and forecasting, to
make good decisions
• People must
the corporate asset of
organizational information
Transaction Processing Systems
• C
transactions/activities.
regarding business
– That data is stored in a database and then mined/analyzed
using one or more decision making techniques
• Transactional Data being captured
–
–
–
–
D
Inventory
Items being
Payments
and
• Uses
at the point of origin
and
of the system
.
: captures data
The Organizational Pyramid and
Information Needs
• As you move from lower to upper levels in an organization,
information needs move from
in nature to
. Analytical information supports
. Info also becomes
and more
Different Decision Types
• Programmed Decisions (structured decision)
–S
– Quantifiable.
relationships
– Very easy to automate (program) these types of
decisions.
• Nonprogrammed Decisions (nonstructured decision)
– Ill-structured situations with
between variables
– Not easily quantifiable in advance. No agreed-on
decision making method.
– There may be
(although some
answers could be better than other answers).
• Most decisions that you make
structured and nonstructured (containing elements of both).
• Various forms of decision support tend to be used when
dealing with nonstructured aspects of a decision. (DSS
helps you
)
• With artificial
intelligence, the
decision making
expertise is
so that
the AI system
Problem Solving Approaches Used by
Computer-Aided Decision Making
Systems
• O
: find the
very best solution
given the constraints
provided
(aka the
• S
)
: find a
, one
that
of
your decision
,
without necessarily
being the best solution.
DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM
(DSS)
Highly flexible and interactive IT
system that is designed to support
decision making when the problem is
( i.e. Nonprogrammed
decision).
are a common form of
decision support system (DSS)
Alliance between You and a DSS
• Decision support systems help you
, but you
must know how to
, and how to use the
results of the analysis
– A DSS
in making a decision, as opposed
to making the decision for you.
– Power of a
DSS is its
ability to
analyze
information
and its ease
of use.
QUANTITATIVE MODELS
OFTEN USED BY A DSS
• Three quantitative (
include:
) models often used by DSSs
1. S
– the study of the impact that changes
in one (or more) parts of the model have on other parts of
the model
2. W
analysis – checks the impact of a change in
an assumption on the proposed solution
3. G
analysis – finds the inputs necessary to
achieve a goal such as a desired level of output
DSS Quantitative Model: What-if analysis:
change
and see what
on the model
DSSQuantitative Model:Goal-seeking analysis
what
must occur in order to achieve the
?
A DSS Can Help With Analysis
Tasks Like
•
•
•
•
•
•
Deciding where to spend advertising dollars
Analyzing sales trend information
Analyzing drug interactions
Developing airline schedules
Pricing products
Allocating limited investment dollars among
several potential projects.
• Budget setting.
Inventory control.
• Cash flow forecasting.
Processing rules are
. Human
required.
Applied Uses of a DSS
Y
SYSTEMS are a form of DSS
used by airlines to alter the price of seats on available flights
on a minute by minute basis, comparing the number of seats
sold to an estimate of what was expected. If fewer seats
have sold, more low-cost seats are made available. If more
seats have sold, less low-cost seats are made available.
Objective: have the
• Airlines are using optimization software to save
money on the costs associated with each flight by
reducing the number of miles traveled, fuel used
and/or overflight
fees paid, with the
system also taking
weather and wind
speed & direction
into account.
GEOSPATIAL INFORMATION
SYSTEMS (GIS)
• A Geospatial Information System (GIS) is a
specialized decision support system designed
specifically to
– Spatial information is
that can be shown in
, such as roads, population distribution
characteristics, sewer systems and other utilities, income
levels, health conditions, areas of high or low crime, etc.
– The strength of a GIS is the ability to
with a mouse click.
• ArcExplorer 2:
showing features in
San Diego (can find out
more info about an
attraction by placing your
mouse over it)
• Pg. 213: Haag
– GIS used in the space
shuttle Challenger
investigation
– GIS used in tree
maintenance in
Chattanooga
– GIS used in the 2001
Virginia highway
sniper investigation.
• Pg. 188: Analyzing
hurricane destruction
in Florida.
• Businesses
use GIS
software to
information,
, and make
decisions.
• Can layer in
info with a
mouse click
• Marketing
applications
• Westar Outage
Map
EXECUTIVE INFORMATION SYSTEMS
•
Executive information system (EIS) – specialized DSSs
designed for use by
in order to make
•
Most EISs offering the following capabilities:
–
Consolidation – involves the
and
features simple roll-ups to complex groupings of interrelated
information
– Drill-down – enables users to get
information
–
, and
Slice-and-dice – looks at information from
, of
Digital Dashboards
• Digital dashboard –
from
multiple components and presents it in a unified
display