This selection of 14 articles reprinted from HBR focuses on the applications of management systems that provide decision-making information. Specific problem related to information technology and decentralization, improving estimates involving uncertainty, and methods of multiproject control are discussed, as well as the management information systems. Other topics handled include the use of operations research in marketing, the building of a marketing information system, and the necessity of monitoring the market continuously.

The articles are: Information technology and decentralization (by John F. Burlingame), Who should control information systems? (by Philip H. Thurston), Diagram of management control (by James W. Culliton), How to organize information systems (by John Dearden), What's ahead in information technology (by John Diebold), Fallacy of the one big brain (by Pearson Hunt), Operations research in marketing (by Philip Kotler), Better management of managers' careers by Lawrence L. Ferguson), Hoe to build a marketing information system ( by Donald F. Cox and Robert E. Good), Improving estimates that involve uncertainty (by Donald H. Woods), Multiproject control (by Robert A. Howell), Management information crisis (by D. Ronald Daniel), Master plan for information systems (by Marshall K. Evans and Lou R. Hague), Monitor your market continuously (by Russell I. Haley and Ronald Gatty).