[SOUND] Welcome to Module 1. In this first lesson, we'll pursue the following objectives. By the end of the module and this first lesson, you should be able to recognize the prevalence and variety of decisions in organizations, and understand the reliance of organizations on information. Now let's talk about what we'd see if we were to look inside of different organizations. No matter how large or small, no matter if it's for profit or not for profit, and no matter if it's a manufacturer, retailer, or service-based organization, what we would see in every organization is decisions, decisions, and decisions. Now, what types of decisions would we see? All kinds. From the everyday mundane decisions like an employee deciding, should I work an hour of overtime to the decisions that are long-term and strategic. Guiding the firm for the next five or ten years. Now, who are we talking about when we think about decision makers? Well, we have the owners of the organization. But then also, all of the managers and employees who are making decisions on behalf of the owner. And when are decisions being made? Well, in many organizations, there is recurring decisions. Stuff that goes on, on a weekly basis or monthly basis. But then, of course, there's the one off decisions that pop up whenever they need to be made. So, when are we talking about the decisions? Whenever necessary. Now, all decisions are different. But if there's one thing that all decisions have in common, it's the need for information. And given the variety of activities that go on inside the firm, and the variety of decisions, you can think about the information as being the lifeblood of the organization. The stuff that keeps the organization going and the owners and managers and employees all figuring out how to achieve organizational objectives. Now what types of information can we think about? Well, there is financial information and when we think about the common accounting courses, that's the first thing that comes to mind. You can think about financial statements, you can think about debits and credits, account balances. All the dollars and cents that represent the costs, revenues, assets, liabilities and equity inside of an organization. But accounting doesn't stop just at the financial information, it also includes the non financial information. A lot of that is quantitative itself. You can think about productivity measures like how much rework needs to be done or what the quality of our products are on some scale. But non-financial information includes qualitative information as well. Things like customer satisfaction ratings about the product or the good that's purchased by those customers, and after sale service. Those ratings are qualitative in the sense that people are very satisfied or somewhat dissatisfied with the organization or the product. So that's just the beginning. But before we move on, why don't we have a quick checkpoint to make sure we're all on the same page?