Barriers to progress in information system design

Abstract
The Gorry-Morton framework (Gorry and Morton, 1971) has helped clear up much fuzzy thinking about management decisions and decision support systems. Formerly, there was a tendency to equate Simon's (Simon, 1961) notion of Programmability with Anthony's (Anthony, 1965) analysis of decision making level, the not-so-tacit assumption being that decisions at the Strategic Planning level are almost completely Non-Programmable, while those at the Operations Control level are more Programmable. (See Anthony himself.) Counter-examples abound: the vice presidents who engage in annual budgeting and long-range planning find these activities just as routine and tedious (for which read "Programmable") as the foreman's shop loading tasks; the dispatcher faced with the after-math of a fire has a problem as Unprogrammable as a president faced with Ralph Nader.

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