Case Study ‘Can You Communicate?’

You have been employed as a consultant to report on the effectiveness of communications in an organisation and on the kinds of measures, including the introduction of new technology, which can be taken to improve communication in the organisation.

Undertake a study of a communications system used in any organisation that you know (this could be in your school/college or a local firm). You should consider the operation of both the formal and the informal (‘grapevine’ ) system.

1. Identify communications channels between different employees and departments within the organisation and with external organisations What information is passed along these channels, and why? In each case identify whether channels are formal or informal, open or restricted, one-way, two-way, or multi-track.

2. Describe the communications system and evaluate its effectiveness in supporting the functions of the business - production, sales and marketing finance and accounts, personnel, etc. Compare this to the kinds of purposes which you think a good communications system should fulfil. In making a judgement about effectiveness, survey the views of the users of the system (e.g. employees, customers, and suppliers).

3. Identify various equipment used by the organisation for the purpose of communications. What exactly is the equipment used for?

4. Report on how Information Technology has changed communications within the organisation and on how it might do so in future.

5. Recommend possible improvements to equipment and its use, staff training, and channels of communication, and how these might have a positive or negative impact on individuals and/or the organisation.

You should prepare a written report in a business-style format preferably using a computer word-processing package, and also present your findings and recommendations to the rest of your group using handouts and a variety of visual aids.

Unit 6. Information Processing

Key words: information processing system, manual systems, electronic systems, wordprocessor, spreadsheet, database, graphics package, desktop publishing, mailmerge, multimedia, computer-aided design, computer-aided manufacture, open systems

6.1. The Purposes of Information Processing

Handling business information

Businesses transmit and receive vast quantities of information each day. Information about incoming orders, sales, outstanding debts, payments, receipts, purchases, production costs, outputs, personnel, and many other items all have to be handled, interpreted, and distributed to those who need to use the information. Finally, the information must be recorded and stored for future reference.

In order to handle this information as efficiently as possible, businesses set up information processing systems. An information processing system is a set of rules or procedures designed to handle information and turn it into a manageable and understandable format which can be referred to in future. The primary purpose of an information processing system is to convert large quantities of data into manageable information.

Manual and electronic systems

Information processing systems can be manual – for example, a paper-based filing system – or electronic, involving the use of powerful computers to sift, store, and make sense of large volumes of information. Improvements in technology have expanded the capacity of organisations to retain and process ever-increasing amounts of information, from personnel records and market research observations, to financial data. Most firms combine both manual and electronic systems. Paper-based files provide an important extra back-up in case of computer failure or theft.

Information processing will, therefore, involve some or all of the following tasks:

Retrieving Classifying Presenting Sorting Filing

Communicating Copying Summarising Distributing Researching

Analysing Collating Checking Calculating Storing Comparing