Management and Organizational Behavior

The speed at which international business and trade are growing has given new dimension to the multi-functional roles managers are forced to play.

In spite of the multiple constituencies a manager must please (subordinates, superiors, fellow managers, stockholders and other financial stakeholders, and the local and global community) there is a common thread linking these constituency obligations û that of managing the information created by and used by these diverse constituencies. This paper argues that the ability to manage information has become as important as the ability to manage the people who manage the information.

An additional argument the paper makes is that the common rhetoric about technology falls into two extreme categories:

uncritical acceptance or blanket rejection. Such extreme positions leave poor choices for action and critical thinking about what managers and companies really want--and need-- from technology.

This paper also challenges the myth that whatever technological changes come along must be accepted out of hand. Instead, the paper seeks a "middle ground" where managers, technologists and all stakeholders might build a better awareness of the complex, "organic" nature of both technology and information resources.

Much concern is also given to the fact that management "language" has yet to catch up to modern technology, noting the tendency to gravitate towards

. . .
job to an MIS (Manager of Information Systems) whose primary obligation was to choose the computer and networking equipment for the company, supervise the training of work station personnel, and, in general, consider the role as one of managing "data." When this changed subtly in the 1990s to a job of managing information instead of data, increased the job duties to an also include interfacing with all other divisions or departments in an attempt to make IT serve the company, instead of the company serving IT. This has resulted in many companies now assigning IT strategy to teams of managers, rather than simply to the technical masters. Some companies have even added the position of Chief Information Officer to the ranks of top management, mostly to ensure that the IT of the company always matches the strategic directions of the company. In this situation, the CIO must be both technologically astute and sharp with business matters, and this dual ability is not in ready supply today, although the situation appears to be improving. Managing the Information Managers One of the primary roles of the CIO is to manage those technicians assigned to him or her, always maintaining the correct blend of technological currency and
. . .

Some common words found in the essay are:
Schell Marmer-Solomon, PROCESS Abstract, Information Managers, Workers Sanchez, Indeed McLoughlin, Business Speed, Information Systems, Information Level, Information Management, Management Perey, information technology, managing information, management software, logic action, marmer-solomon 1997, fleming 1997, perey 1996, business manager, schell marmer-solomon 1997, software programs, management tools, quinn snoek rosenthal, wolfe quinn snoek, kahn wolfe quinn, mis manager information,
Approximate Word count = 3307
Approximate Pages = 13 (250 words per page)

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