Managers have a considerable workload

In their work, managers display some typical characteristics that are significant and relevant in relation to the design of the business intelligence systems they use. Other people, situated in the lower regions of the organization require also business intelligence systems but such systems are different in several ways. The type, the structure and the nature of managerial tasks as well as the working environment can play a significant role in relation to the user interface design of business intelligence solutions.

Information retrieval behavior

The “need” for information can be caused by four types of modes (Vandenbosch, 1997). When managers have no intention or specific purpose to find anything and are just viewing some data it is called undirected viewing or scanning which is often the case in the first sub phase of the decision making process. This is similar to undirected surfing on the internet. At the extreme other end of the continuum, we find the formal search mode which is “a deliberate effort to find a piece of information” (Aquilar, 1967). This is also referred to as focused searching.