INF5004W
:: Master of Commerce in Information Systems Coursework
About the Program
General
What you can expect
What you cannot expect
The field of Information Systems is characterised by constant change,
continuous introduction of new technology and concepts, and a welter of
commercialism that tends to obscure management issues. An undergraduate degree
prepares individuals to take jobs in the area of business information systems;
the honours programs; to lead IS efforts (including development) at a
supervisory or management level. However, there is a need to be able to take
control of the concepts and trends, to guide and lead, to anticipate and
capitalise, to "master" the concepts while the technology transforms as one
watches. Our Master of Commerce in Information Systems is designed
to bring students to this mastery level without enrolling them in a technology
chase. A one- or two-year program, the masters focuses on information systems
research and critique, rather than the technology itself. It is intended to
develop critical reading, writing, research, management, and teaching skills and
to prepare graduates to be able to "self-teach" throughout their
careers. The content is the application of information systems to commerce and
management and the management and commerce of information systems itself. While
the masters is generally seen as a terminal degree, it is an ideal preparation for
a doctoral program in information systems, too.
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The Masters program will prepare you to understand and undertake research in information
systems. As a practitioner in IS you will continually have to select
among alternative methods, methodologies and tools; your sources of information
have to be evaluated systematically and you will have to evaluate your own
practice. As a manager in IS, you will have to lead others, making
choices in your own activities and in creating appropriate and productive
working environments; your sources of information, including your own
organisation, will have to be evaluated, and you should evaluate your own
activities, too. As an executive manager in our field, you will lead
organisations, making strategic IS decisions and attempting to convince others,
who know nothing about IS, that you are right; you will have to make good
arguments and evaluate the information you receive to create these arguments, as
well as evaluating your own effectiveness as an executive. As an entrepreneur
in IS, you will have to stay a bit ahead of the state of the market, achieving
competitive advantage in a rapidly-changing field; evaluating information
sources and issuing consulting reports will be a major part of your success.
Finally, as a teacher or researcher in IS, research will form a
major part of your vocational supply chain, a major aspect of your own practice.
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The Masters program is designed to cater to an accomplished
clientele, individuals with an outstanding academic background in IS, equivalent
to an honours degree in IS. In no sense can the Masters program be considered
a "conversion" course for those from other fields to move into
IS. That end is best served through our post-graduate
diploma program. Those who enter the Masters are assumed by have strong
technical and managerial knowledge of information systems either from academic
preparation or valuable practical experience.
Why
this is so is because the Masters program focuses on research in IS in
preparation for conducting masters-level dissertation research. A
prerequisite for completing the masters dissertation is a thorough background in
information technology, system design and development, information technology
management, and business applications. Students coming from related
disciplines such as computer science or software engineering may well have much
of this background. Those whose undergraduate degrees are in other
commerce disciplines such as marketing or finance or accounting might well be
able to acquire sufficient technical background. However, those from other
fields will normally experience a lot of problems because they will not have
good intuition about the research they are to do. We encourage students
from these other disciplines first to do an honours degree in IS (through taking
the postgraduate diploma and then going on to part-time honours) before
attempting the masters degree. Back
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