Abstract Science Construction’s business is in planning, developing and building road projects. The major of its clients are municipalities, city governments, and other public sector entities. While the bankruptcy rates for these clients is very low, when economic downturns happen, their ability to pay in a timely fashion also suffers. This leads to businesses such as Science Construction needing to take on additional debt and to find creative methods in order to stay afloat during times of recession. Methods such as selling accounts receivables at discounted rates and taking larger lines of credit through banks and other lending institutions are some of the ways organizations can remain viable when their cash inflows have turned into a trickle. Science Construction is asking the Turkish Courts to postpone their bankruptcy proceedings for a year while they attempt to restructure. Through this, suggestions such as forcing shareholders to pay their debt to the organization, gaining credi...
According to Watson (2007), the term “data” is generally used to emphasize raw facts. This data can be in the form of mathematical symbols or in words, which is used to define or describe a certain thing. And for the term “information”, it is usually defined as the identified data (data combined with a meaning). Finally, the term “knowledge” is referred to the information in combination with experience, context, interpretation, and reflection.
Gallauger (2015) had connected the three terms altogether in a logical way. He illustrated that “data” is merely raw facts, which is useless unless it is turned into “information. This transformation occurs when data is put in a context by which relevant questions could be answered. Along with the managers’ “knowledge”, their experience and expertise, and the information collected, efficient decision making will be approachable.
Gallauger (2015) had connected the three terms altogether in a logical way. He illustrated that “data” is merely raw facts, which is useless unless it is turned into “information. This transformation occurs when data is put in a context by which relevant questions could be answered. Along with the managers’ “knowledge”, their experience and expertise, and the information collected, efficient decision making will be approachable.
Thus, data and information affect organizations competitive advantages in three significant ways (Porter & Millar, 1985):
- Reshaping industry structures, thus modifying the rules of competition.
- Giving companies new methodologies to outperform their competitors.
- Creating new businesses, even from an existing firm’s operations.
Dr Yogesh Malhotra, the founding Chairman and Chief Knowledge Architect of the Global Risk Management Network, LLC, said that knowledge could be the ultimate competitive advantage when it is utilized as an action-oriented tool. All information systems, information technology, and data cannot contribute in gaining an advantage over other competitors unless translated and interpreted into actionable value propositions. These business value propositions which are continuously refined to ensure they are not marginalized by radical discontinuous change (BMA, 2003).
Data Management is not only about carrying out numeric calculations, but data management technologies could be applied as follows (Watson, 2007):
- Data Models: models or mechanisms which enables users to choose which data to be interpreted and creates correlations and constraints between them.
- Storage Management: mechanisms used for storing data in a logically compatible and space efficient manner.
- Access Methods: mechanisms used to locate the requested data from a huge amount of data and retrieving them efficiently.
- Query processing and data manipulation: mechanisms that enable users to create, examine, change, and delete data.
- Security: mechanisms that secure data.
- Transaction processing: mechanisms which enables multiple users to check and modify data without malfunctioning its logical compatibility.
- Application program interface: mechanism by which other software systems can make use of the data management system.
The mentioned technologies along with what is called “Business intelligence tools”, managers can get well informed about any issue or opportunity concerning their company. Thus, these tools facilitate the process of decision making and set a foundation to make decisions based on actual data. Moreover, those tools can help predicting possible results of such decisions, and accordingly managers and executives could act (Exforsys, 2008).
References:
- BMA. (2003). Is knowledge the ultimate competitive advantage?. Retrieved from: http://km.brint.com/BMA.html
- Exforsys. (2008). Business Intelligence Role in Making Corporate Decisions. Retrieved from: http://www.exforsys.com/tutorials/business-intelligence/bi-role-in-making-corporate-decisions.html
- Gallaugher, J. (2015). Information Systems: A Manager's Guide to Harnessing Technology. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License.
- Porter, M. E. & Millar, V. E. (1985). How Information Gives You Competitive Advantage. Retrieved from: https://hbr.org/1985/07/how-information-gives-you-competitive-advantage
- Watson, R. T. (2007). Information Systems. Global Text Project. Licensed under Creative Commons 3.0
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