MIS - What is it?

<p>As I go through the average salaries of Undergrad business majors, Management Information Systems consistently ranks up there. Could someone knowledgeable please shed some light as to what exactly it is. Similar to the legendary Accounting thread</p>

<p>It’s sort of like computer science for business majors. You will learn about databases and business software and that sort of thing. The main idea behind the major is that by getting a business degree and all of the related business classes, as well as taking IT classes focused on business, you will be able to talk the language of IT and the language of business. You’ll know the very basics of accounting like everyone else who gets a business degree, as well as the basics of finance and marketing and so on and so forth. That means you can speak the same language as the accountants and whatnot as well as the same language as the hardcore computer science types, making you an important link between the two. </p>

<p>As far as why it pays so well, there is a lot of weeding out because the classes are difficult(coding and whatnot). You also learn useful skills which employers are willing to pay for.</p>

<p>Honestly MIS is a useless degree in the long run. If you think about most management positions, they are all filled through majors in computer science/engineering who ascended through the ranks. People want specialized degrees, not broad general ones</p>

<p>my cousin is will have this degree in December, lets see if he can find a job</p>

<p>Oh I don’t know about that mudrock. While MIS isn’t necessarily as specialized as CS, I think employers would expect that someone with a BBA in MIS would have more relevant classes than a CS person would. At my school every MIS major graduates with about 70 or so out of 120 credit hours devoted to some kind of business class. CS majors here in another college getting a B.S. will have a lot more of their 120 hours devoted to who knows what…probably stuff a business doesn’t care about. Further, MIS classes will have more to do with internal control type material than a regular CS classes do. </p>

<p>I certainly think CS majors will have better luck in software firms, but other businesses? I don’t know about that. If you plan on joining the Big Four(advisory, ERS, whatever each firm calls their IT people) or Accenture or whatever, you are probably better off being MIS. I’ve been to plenty of events put on by professional services firms and I haven’t come across any CS majors. </p>

<p>When I was forced to sit through an MIS panel of alums, only one said he had done coding or other highly technical work after his first few years. That guy only did it because he enjoyed that kind of thing. The rest moved up in the ranks and their jobs were mostly about managing either newbie MIS recruits or former CS majors who did the heavy lifting technically but who needed direction from people who understood the business needs of the company and the capabilities of the IT side.</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.suite101.com/external_link.cfm?elink=http://www.umsl.edu/business/mis/misvscsc.html[/url]”>http://www.suite101.com/external_link.cfm?elink=http://www.umsl.edu/business/mis/misvscsc.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>This website explains what Info Systems majors do…</p>

<p>How strong is the MIS program you have gotten into? Some programs are complete joke, but the ones where you actually do DBMS, Systems Analysis and design, along with accounting and finance are great…firms increasingly want their employees to have both - good IT knowledge, along with a feel for business concepts.</p>

<p>I got into mccombs at Texas</p>

<p>Congratulations, McCombs has a very highly ranked MIS program. I know Accenture hires a lot of them to do IT consulting, which looks good and pays well.</p>