Статистика України (Dec 2016)
Statistical Methods for Information Quality Management
Abstract
Information quality is a central factor in achieving the planned levels of social and economic parameters. The overwhelming majority of the existing approaches to information quality management do not consider information as a resource enabling for comprehensive measurement of the processes that are going to be managed, which results are critical for the effectiveness of management decisions. Management of either information quality or socio-economic processes is not a single act; it continues in parallel with a process that is subject to management decision. The phase of current management deals with control of the conformity between intermediate planned parameters and reported ones, to find out the reasons for errors and develop correcting actions in order to reduce the negative impact of the errors on the final result. This problem can be adequately solved by use of high quality information which assessment and management constitutes a complicated and important statistical task given the global informatization and comput erization of the modern times. It is argued that information can be considered as high quality one when its structure and content meet the managers’ needs. Managers, meanwhile, have to set up the problem to be solved by collecting data. It means that the set of parameters to be asked by a manager from the statistics has to be constructed in the last turn. A manager acts as a customer of statistical information. A manager will, therefore, be capable to assure information quality, if he keeps with the principle of relevance when formulating an information order for a statistician, which is an operative principle of the Ukrainian statistical bodies. This principle can be met once a set of parameters is constructed by key statistical methods and approaches, cluster analysis in particular. This method allows for reducing the number of parameters provided by the reporting information by 30-40% without affecting the relevance of managerial information. The information becomes more objective, its quality increases, which enhances the management performance.
