Information & Management Systems

A management consultant and training & development company

which can best be described by the following key terms:

Information & Management Systems can serve, in a most user-friendly way, your organizational needs concerning information systems (IS) products and services before, during or after your adopting them. We could be your best consultant due to our beliefs and experiences.

1. Our views are truly independent

Independent view or a second opinion is important when as an IT user, you have doubts about over-simplified statements and loosely made promises.

Information technology (IT) suppliers or service providers generally tend to focus on the positive sides and the powers of electronic information systems. They are tempted to promote their own products and services and therefore may experience conflicts of interests.

Many books and articles also tell you that IT can help your organisation to manage (plan, organise, lead, control, etc) at all management levels. We can conduct more critical analyses for you on such statements and promises.

Critical assessment include those of:

-organisational impacts--long-term, short-term, positive, negative, tangible, intangible ones

-contribution of IS to an organisation—to business objectives and policies, satisfaction of user needs at different levels and departments, organisational communications, etc

-cost-effectiveness of systems—return on investment and productivity, judging from various angles; how information and technologies are actually consumed

2. We bridge gaps between technology and business management

We base our views and suggestions on the following beliefs:

-business needs should determine information and technology needs, not the other way round

-machines should serve people, not the other way round

-technologies can only meet some (but not all) organisation objectives; for managing organisations well, IT has to be used effectively

-information is power; but it is more important to get good than a lot of information

-the most important objective of using communications technology is to help people communicate; any IT that has become a communications barrier has to be removed

-the lack of understanding and appreciation between and IT managers and business managers could be the worst organisational nightmare

3.  We bridge gaps between theory and practice

Many IT books and articles advocate the importance of user friendliness while using a lot of impressive jargon that only IT experts can understand. We understand that IT users do not want to be lost in a jargon jungle, spending a lot of time for clarifying the rights and wrongs.

We understand that IT users want to know the right theoretical IS concepts and models applicable to their organisations. We can help selecting the appropriate ones.

We believe that IT users need good documentation containing clear and user-friendly analyses and diagrams linking up different boxes (representing processes such as ordering, calculating, sorting, etc) and arrows (representing flows such as information, paper documments, money, products, materials, etc)
 

4  We bridge gaps between with people at the supply and demand sides and at neutral organisations

We understand the needs and concerns of user organisations. When and where to express opinions and make complaints if not satisfied with suppliers’ services and promises, which IT laws and regulations are applicable in specific situations, how to learn from other users’ good and bad experiences, are some examples.

Dr Charles Lam has been for many years closely monitoring IT policy changes and participating in policy making as a member of several pro-user advisory committees.

Dr Charles Lam has been maintaining constant dialogues with senior members of the Government, supplier associations, user organisations, Consumer Council, professional bodies, business support groups, learning institutions, social groups, and some publishers of IT periodicals. He regularly offers training courses and seminars, designs and prepares courseware for learning institutions and has got articles published.