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Chapter 14

Types of information systems

There are three levels of management – strategic, tactical and operational. Each
creates different types of strategy within the organisation and therefore needs
different types of information:

TIME LEVEL OF SOURCE DEGREE OF FREQUENCY
HORIZON DETAIL CERTAINTY

STRATEGIC LONG-TERM AGGREGATED/ MAINLY UNCERTAIN INFREQUENT
SUMMARISED EXTERNAL
TACTICAL

OPERATIONAL
IMMEDIATE HIGHLY INTERNAL CERTAIN FREQUENT
DETAILED

 The strategic level of management

– requires information from internal and external sources

– strategic information would relate to the longer-term strategy on the
company's market share, which in turn informs the production plan.

 The tactical level of management

– requires information and instructions from the strategic level of
management, together with routine and regular quantitative information
from the operational level of management

– the information must be detailed and precise.

 Operational level of management

– requires information and instructions from the tactical level of management

– primarily concerned with the day-to-day performance of tasks

– most of the information is obtained from internal sources.

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