© 2003, Educational Institute Chapter 10 Information Management Managing Technology in the Hospitality Industry Fourth Edition (469T or 469)

© 2003, Educational Institute 1 Competencies for Information Management 1.Define the purpose of management information systems and describe functions performed by information technology. 2.Describe the typical responsibilities of managers and staff working in the information systems area of a hospitality operation. 3.Describe the data processing cycle and cite the advantages of electronic data processing. 4.Identify the types of data and distinguish bits from bytes. (continued)

© 2003, Educational Institute 2 Competencies for Information Management 5.Identify major features of database management software and describe how they can be used by hospitality operations. 6.Distinguish hierarchical database structures from relational database structures. 7.Distinguish multidimensional database structures from traditional database structures. 8.Describe the features and functions of frequent diner applications. (continued)

© 2003, Educational Institute 3 Management Information System—Purpose  Monitor progress toward goals.  Measure performance.  Identify trends/patterns.  Evaluate alternatives.  Support decision making.  Assist in corrective action.

© 2003, Educational Institute 4 Management Information System—Functions  Enables managers to monitor/administer transactions/ activities  Provides control over business resources  Produces timely/comprehensive reports formatted to managers’ needs  Eliminates unnecessary documents  Streamlines procedures

© 2003, Educational Institute 5 Electronic Data Processing Transforms data into timely, accurate, and useful information by reducing throughput, streamlining output, and minimizing the handling of data. Throughput: the time elapsing between data input and information output, a measure of data processing efficiency Streamlining: only generating output (reports) requested by those who actually use the information

© 2003, Educational Institute 6 Bits and Bytes  Kilobyte1,024 bytes  Megabyte1,048,576 bytes  Gigabyte1,073,741,834 bytes  Terabyteapproximately 1 trillion bytes Bit: smallest unit of electronic data (either 0 or 1) Byte: sequence of bits representing a single character and a measurement of memory

© 2003, Educational Institute 7 Database Management Features  Files, records, fields  Create, access, and merge data files  Add, select, and delete data  Index, sort, and search data files

© 2003, Educational Institute 8 Database Management Hospitality Functions  Personnel management  Payroll processing  Marketing research  General ledger accounting  Tax reporting  Direct mail marketing  Sales reporting

© 2003, Educational Institute 9 Hierarchical Database Structures  Files, records, fields arranged like roots of a tree  Precise data searches  Comprehensive statistical analyses  Rigid perameters  Time-consuming to incorporate new data definitions

© 2003, Educational Institute 10 Relational Database Structures  Files, records, fields formatted as rectangular tables of rows/columns  Popular due to simplicity of data arrangement  Ease of data manipulation  Flexibility of data handling

© 2003, Educational Institute 11 Multidimensional Databases Data warehouse: supports organization-wide decision making enabling elaborate queries on large amounts of data requiring extensive searching Data mart: a multidimensional database organized for one department or function Data mining: exploring a database to uncover patterns and relationships Online analytical processing (OLAP): decision support software enabling a user to quickly analyze information summarized into multidimensional views and hierarchies