Management Information System (MIS) Reflective Journal

During this second semester, one of the modules that Taylor’s Business School requires me to learn is Management Information Systems (MIS). Through this semester, I have gained a relative amount of knowledge from the lectures, tutorials and as well as the video group assignment on the use of information systems in enterprise.

Firstly, the lectures conducted by Dr. Choo and the tutorials conducted by Dr. Ho for MIS were interesting and informative. During the early stages of being introduced to MIS, I was led astray with the technical terms which I was introduced to. Nevertheless, using interactive videos and answering my weekly tutorials had drastically improved my understanding and interest in this module. Furthermore, I also found it useful that I was exposed to things beyond the syllabus’s module such as augmented reality as well as the applications of MIS in the real world such as for e-shopping on Amazon and Wal-Mart or social networking such as Facebook and Twitter.  Through this newly gained knowledge, I am aware on how the theories learnt can be applied to real life situations. For example, Hilton uses customer relationship management (CRM) system to further enhance their services by remembering their customers’ preferences for their next stay. 

Besides going through the learning process, I found the video group assignment to be equally beneficial. My group members and I which consist of five people started the process by deciding on the topic we wanted to focus on. We were required to create a three to five minutes video clip to encourage the usage of information systems in enterprises. After intense discussion, we decided to use transaction processing system (TPS) as our main topic. After that, we discussed our topic with our tutor and our lecturer to ensure that the chosen topic would fit the requirements of the assignment as well as gain their advice.   

After that, we did our research and wrote the script while discussing the scenes needed for our videos. In our group, everyone contributed creative ideas which we discussed and agreed upon. The shooting of our scenes and planning out the processes took us a whole day. Then, we continued with the editing of the video to make it look for professional. Throughout this assignment, I have gained great amount experiences with working as a team as well as tuning and perfecting my communication skills. This project has helped us learn how to plan and improvise for the project so that it would fit our current skill sets and strengths. Furthermore, I have also gained knowledge about video shooting and how to make ordering systems at restaurants easier with TPS. In general, this was a very fun and informative project which I would love to do again.

In conclusion, MIS is an informative and beneficial module. I believe that this module would benefit me later in the working environment. Therefore, I am delighted that I have learnt this module and I hope I will pass with flying colors for this module.

Business Communication Reflective Journal

 Write a journal reflecting on the process of completing the Business Report.

For this module, Business Communication, we are required to do a group assignment. The requirements of the assignment is in a group of four members, we are required to choose a business center or business premise such as a café, restaurant, a mini market or a fashion boutique and write a business report analyzing the operations of the center. In order to collect information such as the background of the company, marketing strategies, internal and external communications, we have to conduct an interview with the owner of the organization. We also are required to assess the problems faced by the organization and make recommendations for further improvement.

As for me, this is not my first experience in preparing a business report or learning this Business Communication module. During my foundation year at Sunway College, I took up Business Communication and I prepared a business report as well. However, this particular business report was quite different because we were required to interview the organization to collect information of the organization’s daily business processes. I was really excited about the business report because it feels like we have to really produce a report or sort of ‘speculation’ about a small business.

As always, there were definitely some expectation fulfilled and some were unfulfilled during the journey of embarking this business report. For me, a better communication with my group member is a gain because I now understand my group members more than before and I also gained some communication skills for myself.  Another expectation fulfill is my expectation on learning a successful business owner’s life experience. The person that we interview, Mr. Tan did not only just gave us the information required for the assignment, but he was also kind to give us a lot of inspiration so that we could be successful like him one day and reach for the stars. But there is one thing that went as unexpected, which was the questionnaire. The questionnaire prepared by us was not as helpful as we expected it to be. Our questionnaire had some question that we did not asked during the interview because it was not suitable.

Like any good experiences, there will definitely be some issues faced that had to be overcome. The issue faced by us was the lack of time. We had difficulties scheduling an interview with the owner of GH Auto Logistic Sdn. Bhd. When the owner, Mr. Tan, finally got in touch with us, we only had one week to conduct the interview and prepare the business report before the due date. Problems came piling even more when we had two other assignments due on the same week. Hence, we had to juggle everything well in order for every assignment to be perfect. Fortunately, with good cooperation among my four group mates made this assignment a success. We divided the work load equally among ourselves and the report was done within a day before the due date.

From this process of preparing the business report, I have learnt that cooperation within a team is crucial in order for a project to run smoothly. I have also learnt that any business, no matter big or small, will tend to face problems on a daily basis. So, only a rational person could troubleshoot the problems and bring success to the company.