CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.0 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Institution is a community of people. It is also individuals efforts working together in pursuit of common purposes called “Organizational goal”.
Organization is any group of two or more persons working together to achieve a goal or goals. (Ricky Gtiffin, 1984. PP4-55). The goals may be that of profit motive for business organization; Spreading of knowledge for Colleges and Universities; National defence by the Army; Social Satisfaction by social chibs; etc. there is need for combination and Utilization of money, men and materials resources for the attainment of Organizational goals that led the Organization into division of labour.
In broad terms, there are two types of organizations
(i) The profit Motive Organization (Business Organization)
(ii) The non-profit Motive Service Venture.
The primary aim of the former is to make profit on Investment while the objective of the latter is determined by the Social and Political Considerations such as meeting the needs of people in the area of basic health-care, providing quality education, etc. Such group Include:- all Governmental Agencies, the United Nations Organization, World Health Organization (WHO) etc.
Basically, Information is to data what a finished Product is to the raw-materials used in producing it.
According to Anthony and Reick (2003; P 270), Information is a fact, datum, observation, perception or any other thing that adds to knowledge. Data in their states are only relevant as historical records which can be filed away because there is no immediate need but once there is a need to use them for management purpose, they are received, organized and packaged in such a format that will help management in their function of planning, forecasting or control.
Information can be external or Internal to a business Organization or an establishment and, how it is finally put to use depend on the nature of the organization.
External Information will Include:- All the Information gathered from sources outside of the immediate environment of the organization, such as International journal, Government gazettes; Statistical journal; world raw-materials reports; etc.
While those Internal Information Include those from different branches or sections of the organization such as: personnel unit, production unit, etc which could reflect the company’s account, stock records department performance analysis etc.
In Management, Information is most often related to the purpose for which its is needed.
This implies that there is a factor of relevance in information need and utilization with in any Business Organization or Institution.
The types of Information required by a one section of the organization may not be the same that another section of the organization requires to carry out its functions
Information can either be quantitative or non-quantitative. Accounting Information is mostly quantitative in nature and it is usually expressed in financial or monetary terms, as well as accompanied with non-monetary Information Management of the Institution etc