ISDS 406

What is the Analysis Phase of the SDLC?

The analysis phase answers the questions of who will use the system, what the system will do, and where and when it will be used

What happens during the analysis phase?

During this phase, the project team investigates

any current system(s), identifies improvement opportunities, and develops a concept for the new system.

What are the three steps of the analysis phase?

1. Develop analysis strategy

2. Requirements gathering

3. System proposal

Why is an analysis strategy developed?

to guide the project's team efforts

What does the analysis strategy usually include?

studying the current system (called the as-is system) and its problems, and envisioning ways to design a new system (called the to-be system).

How is requirements gathering done?

through techniques such as interviews,

group workshops, or questionnaires

analysis models

Describe how the business will operate if the new system is developed

System proposal

The analyses, system concept, requirements, and models are combined into a document

called the system proposal, which is presented to the project sponsor and other key

decision makers (e.g., members of the approval committee) who will decide whether the

project should continue to move forward.

What is the design phase?

decides how the system will operate in terms of the hardware, software, and

network infrastructure that will be in place; the user interface, forms, and reports that will be

used; and the specific programs, databases, and files that will be needed

Design phase - although most of the strategic decisions about the system are made in the development of the system concept during the analysis phase...

the steps in the design phase determine exactly how the system will operate.

Implementation phase

The final phase in the SDLC, during which the system is actually built (or purchased and installed if the design calls for a prewritten software package)

What is the phase of the SDLC that usually gets the most attention? Explain.

Implementation; for most systems it is the longest and most

expensive single part of the development process.

What are the three steps of implementation?

system construction, installation, support plan

Where do project ideas come from?

A project is identified when someone in the organization identifies a business need to build a system

What are examples of business needs?

supporting a new marketing campaign, reaching out to a new type of customer, or improving interactions with suppliers

Where do business needs arise from?

some kind of "pain" within the organization, such as a drop in market share, poor customer service levels, unacceptable product defect rates, or increased competition

Business needs can also surface when the organization identifies unique and competitive ways of using IT. Explain

Many organizations keep an eye on emerging technology, which is technology

that is in the early stages of widespread business use.

The business need drives the high-level ... for the system

business requirements

What do business requirements describe?

the reasons for developing the system and outline the capabilities it will

provide the organization.

How should business requirements be explained?

at a high level so that the

approval committee and, ultimately, the project team understand what the business expects from

the final product

What should business requirements summarize?

the features the IS must include, such as the

ability to collect customer orders online or the ability for suppliers to receive inventory status

information as sales occur.

What is the business value?

The project sponsor has the insights needed to determine the business value that will be

gained from the system, in both tangible and intangible ways.

Tangible value

can be quantified

and measured easily (e.g., 2% reduction in operating costs).

Intangible value

results from an

intuitive belief that the system provides important, but hard-to-measure, benefits to the organization

(e.g., improved customer service, a better competitive position).

Project Sponsor

The person who initiates the project

and who serves as the primary point

of contact for the project on the

business side

Examples of project sponsors

Several members of the finance department

Vice president of marketing

CIO

CEO

When a strong business need for an IS is recognized, often as a result of BPM, a person (or group) who has an interest in the system's success typically steps forward. Who is this person called?

the project sponsor

What does the project sponsor develop?

They develop the initial vision of the new system.

The project sponsor works throughout the SDLC to...

make sure that the project is moving in the right direction from the perspective of the business and serves as the primary point of contact for the project team

Who is usually a project sponsor

Usually, the sponsor of the project is from a business function

such as marketing, accounting, or finance; however, members of the IT area can also sponsor or

cosponsor a project.

If a project is primarily technical in nature (e.g., improvements to the existing IT infrastructure or research into the viability of an emerging technology)...

Then sponsorship from IT is appropriate

When is joint sponsorship by both the business and IT functions necessary?

when projects have great importance to the business, yet are technically complex

What are the elements of a system request?

project sponsor, business need, business requirements, business value, special issues or constraints, FTE/full-time equivalent

project sponsor

The person who initiates the project

and who serves as the primary point

of contact for the project on the

business side

business need

The business-related reason for initiating the system

business requirements

The new or enhanced business

capabilities that the system

will provide

Examples of business requirements

- Provide online access to information

- Capture customer demographic information

- Include product search capabilities

- Produce performance reports

- Enhance online user support

Business Value

The benefits that the system will

create for the organization

Examples of business value

3% increase in sales

1% increase in market share

Reduction in headcount by 5 FTEs

$200,000 cost savings from decreased

supply costs

$150,000 savings from removal of outdated

technology

Special issues or constraints

Issues that pertain to the approval committee's decision

Examples of special issues or constraints

Government-mandated deadline for May 30

System needed in time for the Christmas

holiday season

Top-level security clearance needed by

project team to work with data

What is feasibility analysis?

feasibility analysis guies the organization in determining wehter to proceed with the project

Feasibility analysis also identifies the important ... associated with the project that must be managed if the project is approved

risks

feasibility study

The results of evaluating technical, economic, and organizational feasibility that is submitted to the approval committee

technical feasibility

the extent to which the system can be successfully designed, developed, and installed by the IT group

Technical feasibility analysis is, in essence...

a technical risk analysis that strives to answer the question: "Can we build it?"

Economic feasibility

The second element of a feasibility analysis, also called cost-benefit analysis

What question does economic feasibility attempt to answer?

"should we build the system?"

How is economic feasibility determined?

by identifying costs and benefits associated with the system, assigning values to them, calculating future cash flows, and measuring the worthiness of the project

What happens as a result of economic feasibility/cost-benefit analysis?

the financial opportunities and risks of the project can be understood

- organizations have limited capital resources

- mutliple projects will be competing for funding

- the more expensive the project, the more rigorous and detailed the analysis should be

Organizational feasibility

how well the system ultimately will be accepted by its users and incorporated into the ongoing operations of the organization

Developers know that ... feasibility can be the most difficult feasibility

dimension to assess.

organizational

In essence, an organizational feasibility analysis attempts to answer the question...

"If we build it, will they come?"

Strategic alignment

the fit between

the project and business strategy—the greater the alignment, the less risky the project will be,

from an organizational feasibility perspective.

A second way to assess organizational feasibility is to conduct a

stakeholder analysis

What is a stakeholder?

a person, group, or organization that can affect (or can be affected by) a new system

champion

a high-level executive and is usually, but not always, the project sponsor

who created the system request.

organizational management

Such management support conveys to the rest of the organization

the belief that the system will make a valuable contribution and that necessary resources will

be made available.

system users

A third important set of stakeholders is the system users who will ultimately use the system

once it has been installed in the organization

Tangible benefits

include revenue that the system enables the organization to collect, such as increased sales. In addition, the system may enable the organization to avoid certain costs, leading to another type of tangible benefit: cost savings.

** Tangible benefits - example of cost savings

- if the system produces a

reduction in needed staff, lower salary costs result.

- a reduction in required inventory levels due to the new system produces lower inventory costs

Why are intangible costs and benefits more difficult to incorporate into the economic feasibility analysis?

they are based on intuition and belief rather than

on “hard numbers.”

- Nonetheless, they should be listed in the spreadsheet along with the tangible items

Examples of tangible benefits

- increased sales

- reduced staff

- reductions in inventory

- reductions in IT costs

- better supplier prices

Intangible benfits

- increased market share

- increased brand recognition

- higher quality products

- improved customer service

- better supplier relations

Development costs

Development costs are those tangible expenses

that are incurred during the creation of the system

Examples of development costs

salaries for the project team, hardware

and software expenses, consultant fees, training, and office space and equipment

- usually thought of as one-time costs

operational costs

those tangible costs that

are required to operate the system

Examples of operational costs

salaries for operations staff, software licensing

fees, equipment upgrades, and cloud vendor fees.

- usually thought of as ongoing costs

List of project characteristics that will affect the methodology selection decision

- Clarity of user requirements

- Familiarity with technology

- System complexity

- System reliability

- Short time schedukes

- Schedule visibility

Clarity of user requirements

How well do the users and analysts understand the functions

and capabilities needed from the new system?

Familiarity with technology

How much experience does the project team have with the

technology that will be used?

System complexity

How much complexity is anticipated in the new system? Does the new

system include a wide array of features? Will the system have to integrate with many existing

systems? Does it span multiple organizational units, or even multiple organizations?

System reliability

Will this system need to be highly reliable or is some downtime tolerable?

Short Time Schedule

Is the project time frame tight?

Schedule visibility

Are the project sponsors, users, or organizational managers anxious to see progress?

What is a project manager?

has the primary responsibility for managing the hundreds of tasks and roles that need to be carefully coordinated

A project manager chooses a system development methodology that...

fits the characteristics of the project

Project manager - based on the size of the system...

estimates of a time frame are made

Project manager - then a list of tasks to be performed is created that forms...

the basis of the project work plan

Project manager - staffing needs are determined, and the project manager sets in place mechanisms to,,,

coordinate the project team throughout the projecr

Finally, the project manager monitors...

the project and refines estimates as work proceeds

What are the 7 project methodology options?

waterfall development, rapid application development, agile development, parallel, v-model, iterative, system prototyping, throwaway prototyping

waterfall development methodology

the project team proceeds sequentially from one

phase to the next

What are the key deliverables for each phase of waterfall development?

Typically voluminous (hundreds of pages) and are presented to the approval committee and project sponsor for approval as the project moves from phase to phase

Waterfall development - Once the work produced in one phase is approved...

the phase ends and the next phase begins

Describe the movement of waterfall development

As the project progresses from phase to phase, it moves forward in the same manner as a waterfall

In waterfall development, is it possible to go backward through the phases (e.g. from design back to analysis)?

While it is possible to go backward

through the phases (e.g., from design back to analysis), it is quite difficult. (Imagine yourself as

a salmon trying to swim upstream in a waterfall.)

What are the advantages of waterfall development methodologies?

requirements are identified

long before programming begins, and requirement changes are limited as the project progresses.

What are key disadvantages of waterfall development methodologies?

the design must be completely specified before programming

begins, a long time elapses between the completion of the system proposal in the analysis phase

and the delivery of system, and testing may be treated almost as an afterthought in the implementation

phase.

- In addition, the deliverables are often a poor communication mechanism, so important requirements may be overlooked in the volumes of documentation

What is Rapid Application Development (RAD)?

a collection of methodologies that emerged in

response to the weaknesses of waterfall development and its variations.

What does the RAD methodology incorporate?

special techniques and computer tools to speed up the analysis, design, and implementation phases in order to get some portion of the system developed quickly and into the hands of users for evaluation and feedback

What may all play a role in RAD?

Computer-aided software engineering (CASE) tools, joint application

development (JAD) sessions, fourth-generation/visual programming languages (e.g., Visual

Basic.NET), and code generators

While RAD can improve the quality and speed of systems development, what problems may it introduce?

it may also introduce a problem in managing user

expectations. As systems are developed more quickly and users gain a better understanding of

information technology, user expectations may dramatically increase and system requirements

may expand during the project (sometimes known as scope creep or feature creep).