9. Information moves around

Most organisations are split into definite parts called departments or sections - each has a specific job to do.

For example in a car dealership, typical departments are:

• Sales Floor
• Parts ordering / stores department
• Repair garage
• Accounts / Financing operation
• Customer orders.

Each department depends on information from each other.

For example a customer comes in to exchange their old car for a new one. This leads to the following information flow:

1. Sales area talks to the customer to see what they need and in addition they send information to the garage operation to look over the old car.
		2. The garage looks over the old car and sends information to the parts department for the bits they will need bring the car up to spec.
3. Parts department sends information to their suppliers for the bits.
		4. Meanwhile, the customer wants to pay for the new car with a finance loan, so Sales send information to the Finance department to see if a loan can be arranged.
5. Eventually the customer cannot find the exact car she wants from stock so Sales send information to the Customer Order department to raise an order with the car factory.

This is just a small part of the information flows going on, as each piece of information needs a response - for example

• Garage - "car is ok but only worth a few hundred pounds"
• Parts - "we can get the parts in a day or so"
• Finance - "Yes her credit rating is fine, so loan approved"
• Car factory - "New car will arrive in three weeks"
• Sales to customer - they let her know the outcome of all this and shake hands on the deal.