[comp.infosystems] Planning for MIS Programs

wmuhanna@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Waleed A Muhanna) (06/24/91)

To initiate a different view of the strategic planning process for our
MIS program, we wish to consider the following questions:

(1) What are the ten most important issues likely to be addressed in
    the academic (scholarly) literature in MIS over the next five
    years?

(2) What are the most important issues likely to be taking the attention
    of executive practitioners in MIS over the next five years?

For clarity, the latter question can be split into two:

   (a) What are the ten most important issues that involve MIS and will
       receive the attention of general managers over the next five
       years?

   (b) What are the ten most important issues in MIS that will receive
       the attention of MIS practitioners over the next five years?

I would like to tap into the collective wisdom of this net.  I am also
hoping that this would evoke a thorough and thoughtful discussion of these 
issues in this newsgroup.

Please e-mail your comments to me (muhanna@osu.edu) or post them to this
newsgroup.  If there is interest, I'll summarize to the net.  

I look forward to your input and participation.

-=-
Waleed A. Muhanna      Dept. of Accounting and Management Information Systems   
muhanna@osu.edu (internet)                          The Ohio State University
muhanna@ohstmail (bitnet)                                   1775 College Road
phone: (614) 292-3808, fax: (614) 292-1651                Columbus, OH  43210

ghm@ccadfa.adfa.oz.au (Geoff Miller) (06/26/91)

wmuhanna@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Waleed A Muhanna) writes:
>To initiate a different view of the strategic planning process for our
>MIS program, we wish to consider the following questions:
>(1) What are the ten most important issues likely to be addressed in
>    the academic (scholarly) literature in MIS over the next five
>    years?
>(2) What are the most important issues likely to be taking the attention
>    of executive practitioners in MIS over the next five years?
[...other stuff deleted...]

I see two main issues:

1.  Increasing demand from users for access to information they need to
    do their jobs.  By "access" I mean more than just a hardware link to
    a system  -  access also encompasses the whole area of the user 
    interface to corporate data resources.  Another side of this is the
    changes to traditional work patterns caused by the availability of
    information and information technology  -  at the moment I think 
    most users are several years behind what the equipment on their desks
    could do for them.

2.  Increasing demand from top management for cost justification of 
    MIS expenditures.  So many projects have been "over-sold" in past
    years that managements are now (justly) cynical.

I think these issues will certainly affect the practitioners  -  whether
they will be effectively addressed in the scholarly literature, and
whether most practitioners have time or facilities to keep up with that
literature anyway, are different questions.

Geoff Miller  (ghm@cc.adfa.oz.au)
Computer Centre, Australian Defence Force Academy