1 Identifying and selecting system Development project Chapter-4

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Identifying and selecting system Development project

Chapter-4

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The first phase of the SDLC is Identifying and selecting system Development project.

During this activity, a senior manger, a business group, an IS manager, or a steering committee identify and assess all possible system development projects that an organization unit could undertake.

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The Process of Identifying and Selecting IS Development Projects

1. Identifying potential development projects

2. Classifying and ranking projects

3. Selecting projects for development

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Potential development projects are identified by: A key member of top management.

CEO of small sized organization Senior executive in a large organization

A steering Committee: composed of a cross section of manager with an interest in systems

User department Head of the requesting unit Committee of from the requesting department

The development group or a senor IS manger

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Top-management Greater strategic focus Largest project size/duration

Steering Committee Cross-functional focus Greater organizational change Larger and riskier project

User development Faster development Fewer user

Development group Fewer development delays

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Top-Down Identification Senior management or steering committee Focus is on global needs of organization

Bottom-up Identification Business unit or IS group Don’t reflect overall goals of the organization

Top-down and bottom-up identification

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Classifying and Ranking IS development Projects : 2nd major activity in the project identification and selection process focuses

on assessing the relative merit of potential project. Performed by top management, steering committee, business units of IS

development group Value chain analysis is often used

Method to analyze an organization’s activities to determine where value is added and costs are incurred

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Evaluation criteria when classifying and ranking projects

1. Resources availability: amount and type of resources the project requires and their availability

2. Project size & duration: number of individuals and the length of time needed to complete the project

3. Value chain analysis: Extend to which activities add value and costs when developing product/services

4. Strategic Alignment: Extent to which the project is viewed as helping the organization achieve its strategic objectives and long-term goals.

5. Technical difficulty/risks: Level of technical difficulty to successfully complete the project which give time and resource constraint

6. Potential benefits: Extent to which the project is viewed as improving profits, customer service

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Identifying and Selecting IS Development Projects

Selecting IS Development Projects: project selection decision Process of considering short and long-term projects Projects most likely to achieve business objectives are

selected Decision requires consideration of:

Perceived and real needs Potential and ongoing projects Current organizational environment Existing and available resources Evaluation criteria

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Identifying and Selecting IS Development Projects

Selecting IS Development Projects Outcomes

Project Acceptance Project Rejection Delay Refocus End-User Development Proof of Concept

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Information Systems Planning Traditional Project

Identification and Selection

Solves isolated problems Focuses on business processes Does not easily allow for

organizational change

Planning-Based Approach to Project Identification and Selection Focuses on present and future

information needs Information needs change slower

than business processes

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Information Systems Planning Need for planning

Improperly planned projects result in systems that cannot be shared across an organization

As business processes change, lack of integration will hamper strategy and business process changes

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Information Systems Planning Information Systems Planning (ISP)

An orderly means of assessing the information needs of an organization and defining the systems, databases and technologies that will best satisfy those needs

Three key activities: Describe the Current Situation Describe the Target (or Future) Situation Develop a Transition Plan and Strategy

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Information Systems Planning Information Systems Planning1. Describing the Current Situation

Top-down Planning Generic methodology that attempts to gain a broad understanding

of the information system needs of the entire organization Bottom-up Planning

Generic methodology that identifies and defines IS development projects based upon solving operational business problems or taking advantage of some business opportunities

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Information Systems Planning Information Systems Planning

1. Describing the Current Situation (Continued) Planning team is chartered to model existing situation Identification of Organizational:

Locations Units Functions Processes Data

Information Systems

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Information Systems Planning Information Systems Planning

1. Describing the Current Situation (Continued) Matrices are developed to cross-reference units

Location-to-Function Location-to-Unit Unit-to-Function Function-to-Objective Function-to-Process Function-to-Data Entity Process-to-Data Entity Process-to-Information System Data Entity-to-Information System Information System-to-Objective

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Corporate and Information Systems Planning

Information Systems Planning2. Describing the Target Situation Update list of organizational locations,

functions, etc. to reflect desired locations, functions, etc.

Matrices are updated to reflect future states Planners focus on differences between current

lists and matrices and future lists and matrices

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Description of three process that play significant role in project selection

Value chain analysis Corporate Strategic Planning Information System Planning

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Value chain analysis Value Chain Analysis consists to analyse an

organisation’s activities to determine where value is added to products and or to services and the costs generated for doing so.

Purpose It enables to select projects that offer more support to key

activities with high costs Criteria can differ from organisation to

organisation E.g. criteria used by the EC

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Corporate Strategy Planning (CSP) Effective deployment of resources require clearly

understanding of organisational missions, objectives & strategy

Corporate Strategy Planning is a top-down process of three steps

CSP is an ongoing process that defines the mission, objectives and strategies of an organisation CSP is a process that is frequently subject to change It requires constant surveillance

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Process of corporate strategy planning

Analysis of strategic position: what is the current position?

Desired strategic position: what are the objectives

Design of the possible strategies to achieve desired goals

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Advantages of IS planning1. Allow to construct ISs that support the whole

organisation

2. Allow integration of different tools

3. Avoid data redundancy (process oriented approach vs data oriented approach)

4. Reduce maintenance costs because planned system will require less revision

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Information system planning (ISP) Information system planning” is different from “project

planning” Information System Planning (ISP) is the process by

which a company (organisation) analyses its information needs and plan its project carefully

ISP is an orderly means of assessing the information needs of an organisation and defining the systems, databases, and technologies that will best satisfy those needs

ISP is a top-down process that takes into account the outside forces that drive the business (need vigilance)

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ISP and Corporate Strategy Planning

Desired situation for informational needs•Listing of manual & automated processes•Listing of manual & automated data•Technology inventory•Human resources inventory

Schedule of projects to transit from current to desiredProject 1Project 2----

Current enterprise

Future enterprise

Strategic plan

Current situation for informational needs•Listing of manual & automated processes•Listing of manual & automated data•Technology inventory•Human resources inventory

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Information System Planning ISP requires support of top management and

itscommitment to reach desired objectives Description of the current requires a planning team Techniques used to capture information system needs,

include Interviewing managers and executives Reviewing corporate documents Analysing competitors, markets and products

There are two approaches to describe current situation needs

Top down planning Bottom-up planning

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Step 1: describing the current needs Top down planning is a generic methodology that

attempts to gain a broad understanding of the IS needs of the entire organisation

Bottom-up planning is a generic IS methodology that identifies and defines IS development project based upon solving operational business problem or taking advantages of some business opportunities

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Information collected about current situation

Locations where the company operates Business unit that operate within a company Functions = cross organisational collection of activities

used to perform day-to-day business operation. Processes of a company Data underlying processes Information system represent automated and non

automated systems used to support business processes.

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Outcome = mMatrix of Information systems (IS) * objectives

Information systems (IS)/ Objectives

IS1 IS2 IS3 … ISn

Objective 1

Objective 2

Objective 3

…

Objective j

X

X

X X

X

X

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Matrix of Information systems (IS) * processes

Information systems (IS)/ Processes (P)

IS1 IS2 IS3 … ISn

P 1

P 2

P 3

…

P j

X

X

X X

X

X

Several techniques of multi-criteria decision could be applied to select IS that satisfies the company’s current needs

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Step 2 and 3 of ISP Step 2: describing the target situation and constraints

Define situation of location, units , functions, processes, data and information system taking into account the trends and constraint of the organisation

Target situation could also be described in term of matrix

Step 3: developing a transition strategy and plans Plans reflect both short-term and long-term organisational development

needs Plans include organisational mission, information inventory, mission and

objectives of IS, constraints, long-term plans and short-term plans Selected projects are those derived from ISP and that fulfil the gap

between current and desired situation

Documents

1 Identifying and selecting system Development project Chapter-4