Management Reporting Systems-Structure and Design

A management reporting system is essentially a mechanism for monitoring the 'mission9 of an organisation. That mission has usually been defined by a formal plan in terms of three distinct streams: the desired organisation structure; the time-phased statement of organisational goals; and the critical variables for success, To the extent that the formal plan is imprecise or inadequate, failing to take into account the actuality of the real-life situation, the de facto points of decision-making, and the personnel, the monitoring system becomes open-ended and ineffective. Designers of the reporting system must, therefore, take into account the impact on it of such constraints.