CHAPTER XII - Information Systems Development

Chapter 12
Information Systems Development

"We Think We  Example of decision making in small company
Can Open the 

Zev, owner and source of investment funds
Team presents options, he listens and makes a
Doors to an 
decision
Team not really sure what’s involved

Entirely New  Building Xbox prototype good, low cost way to
Market" learn
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Bottom Line
Startups can be fun and interesting places to work
Time and budgets limited
Decisions usually made more quickly, but risky if not well managed
Prototypes used to reduce front-end risk
Scrum ideal development process for creating prototypes

Q1: What is Q2: Why is systems Q3: What are the
systems development five phases of the
development? difficult and risky? SDLC?
Study Q4: How is system

definition
Q5: What is the
users’ role in the
Q6: How are the
five components
Questions
requirements
accomplished? designed?
phase?
Q7: How is an Q9: What are

Q8: What are the
information some of the
tasks for system
system problems with the
maintenance?
implemented? SDLC?
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Q1: What is Systems
Development?
• Process of creating and
maintaining information
systems
• Involves all five
components of IS model
 Requires
 Establishing system goals
 Setting up the project
 Determining requirements
 Business knowledge and
management skill
Q2: Why Is Systems Development Difficult and
Risky?
MANY PROJECTS NEVER SOME FINISH WITHIN BUDGET HIGH RISK OF FAILURE, EVEN WITH
FINISH. OFTEN 200-300% AND SCHEDULE, BUT DON'T COMPETENT PEOPLE FOLLOWING AN
APPROPRIATE METHODOLOGY
OVER BUDGET ACCOMPLISH GOALS

Major
Challenges
to System
Development

What
specifically
PRIDE system
do?
Difficulty of
Requirements
Determination
Organizations MUST create
an environment where
difficult questions are
asked and answered.

What are technical requirements in IT
project management?
Technical
(non- are the technical aspects considered to
successfully complete a project?
functional)
Requirements
Examples of technical aspects:
Determination performance, reliability, and availability
that your project must meet on in order
to proceed with a project.
In software projects, technical
requirements typically refer to:
 How the software is built, for example:

which language it’s programmed in Technical (non-
 Which operating system to be used functional)
 Which standards it must meet (including Requirements
security standard, ISO, technical criteria,
regulations, etc..)
Determination

Functional Requirements
Determination
What are functional requirements
in IT project management?
→ a functional
requirement defines a function
of a system or its component.
→ A function is described as a set of
inputs, the behavior, and
outputs.
(modules within an IS system:
CRM, ERP, Data warehouse, etc.)
→ The Functional Requirements
Specification documents the
operations and activities that a
system must be able to perform.
Determination
 The Functional Requirements Specification
document may include:
✓ - Descriptions of data to be entered into

the system
✓ - Descriptions of operations performed by
each screen
✓ - Descriptions of work-flows performed by
the system
✓ - Descriptions of system reports or other
outputs
✓ - Who can enter the data into the system
✓ - How the system meets applicable
regulatory requirements
Determination
 The Functional Requirements

Specification is designed to be read
by a general audience.
 Readers should understand the

system, but no particular technical
knowledge should be required to
understand the document.

Changes in
Requirements
• Systems development aims at a
moving target
• Bigger the system, longer the
project, the more requirements
change
• What should development team
do?
• Incorporate changes, build,
complete and make changes in
maintenance phase?

Scheduling and
Budgeting Difficulties
• How long to build it?
• How long to create data model?
• How long to build database
applications?
• How long to do testing?
• How long to develop and
document procedures?
• How long for training?
• How many labor hours? Labor
cost?
• What’s the rate of return on
investment?
Changing
Technology
• Do you want to stop your
development to switch to new
technology?
• Would it be better to finish
developing according to existing
plan?
• Why build an out-of-date system?
• Can you afford to keep changing
the project?

Diseconomies of
Scale
Brooks’ Law
 “Adding more people to a late
project makes the project later”
 New staff must be trained by
productive members who lose
productivity while training
 Schedules can be compressed

(techniques used in IT project
management)
 Once a project is late and over
budget, no good choices exist

Diseconomies of
Scale
 Human resource
management (HRM) focuses on
improvements in recruitment,
communication, training,
promotion, retention and support
of faculty and staff. This
becomes critical to a business
when the skilled workers it needs
are in short supply.
 This is what happens when you
introduce new IS.

Yes and No:
Is systems
development  Challenges exist
 IT project manager must overcome
really as
 Many methodologies exist to deal
unwelcoming as with these kinds of problems
the list of 
 Successfulmethodologies exist,
challenges makes when supported and managed
it sound? properly
 Systems development life cycle
(SDLC), most common methodology
1. System
definition
2. Requirements
Q3: What Are analysis
the Five
3. Component
Phases of design
the
4.
SDLC? Implementation
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What is the difference between PLC and SDLC ?
Five Phases in SDLC
Assign a few employees, possibly on
a part-time basis, to define the new
system, to assess its feasibility, and
Q4: How Is System to plan project
Definition
Accomplished?
Members of initial team are both
users and IS professionals

Define System Goals and Scope
How will the application contribute to
more ad revenue? Will the new system
enable the organization to earn more
from current clients? Will it attract new
clients?
Define
What major features of this application
System Goals need to be implemented?
and Scope
Scope might be defined by specifying
business activities, users, business
processes involved, plants, offices, and
factories will be involved.

Typical development team:
• Systems analyst and/or

business analyst
• Managers
Form a Project
• Programmers
Team
• Software testers
• Users
• Outside contractor

Requirements definition – team will be heavy
with business and systems analysts
Design and implementation – team will be

heavy with programmers, testers, and
database designers
Team Composition
Changes Over
Integrated testing and conversion – team will
Time be augmented with testers and business users
Important point: It is important that users have active

involvement and to take ownership of the project
throughout the entire development process (PLAN THE
PROJECT ), determine task dependencies, and set
schedules.

Five
Phases
in SDLC

Q5: What Is the Users’ Role in the Requirements Phase?
Interviewing skills
crucial

Approve
Requirements
➢ For all five IS

components, not just for
software and data:
 Communications and
network hardware
 Procedures and personnel
 Rules restricting activities for
certain categories of
employees

Role of a Prototype / POC (WATCH
VIDEO)
• Use when requirements difficult to specify
• To be useful, a prototype needs to work
• Can be expensive to create
• Provides direct experience for users
• Provides evidence to assess technical and
organizational feasibility
• Used to estimate development and operational
costs
• Greater clarity and completeness of
requirements
• Often re-used in operational system
• WATCH:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rxmz85JaJus

ADVICE: So What? Systems Development?
 You have great idea for an application system. What do you do with it?
 Idea better be consistent with your organization’s competitive strategy
 Apply your knowledge of the SDLC to produce a proposal for a new system to enhance its
chances of being approved and developed

Five
Phases
in SDLC

SDLC: Component Design Phase

Q6: How Are the Five Components to be Designed?
 Determine hardware specifications

 Determine software specifications
 Design database
 Design Procedures
 Normal, backup, and failure recovery procedures
 Design Job Descriptions

 Create and define new tasks and responsibilities

Hardware, Database, and Procedure Design
• Hardware design
 Determine specifications and source of hardware
 Purchase, lease, or lease time from a hosting service in the cloud
 Database design
 Convert data model to database design

Software Design
 Software design depends on
source of programs
 Off-the-shelf software
 Off-the-shelf-with-alteration
software
 Custom-developed programs
 Decide where application

processing will occur
 Mobile devices
➢ Processing can occur on cloud-
servers, or a mixture

Procedures Design

Design of Job
Descriptions
 Teams of systems analysts and
users determine job
descriptions, functions for
users and operations personnel
 New information systems may
require creating new jobs
 If so, duties and responsibilities
need to be defined in
accordance with human
resources policies
 More often, new duties and
responsibilities added to
existing jobs
Five
Phases
in SDLC

Q7: How Is an Information System Implemented?

Design VS. Implementation for the Five Components

System Testing
 Test plan
 Product Quality Assurance
(PQA)
 User testing: Develop test
plans and test cases.
 Beta testing: Users final say
on whether system is
“production ready”

System Conversion Approaches
• Implement entire system in limited portion of business.

Pilot
• Limits exposure to business if system fails.
• System installed in phases or modules. (AGILE)

Phased
• Each piece installed and tested.
• Complete new and old systems run simultaneously.

Parallel
• Very safe, but expensive.
Plunge (ALL AT
ONCE; move • High risk if new system fails.
• Only if new system not vital to company operations.
from old to
new)
Five
Phases
in SDLC

Q8: What Are the Tasks for System Maintenance?
Failure is a difference between

what system does and what it
is supposed to do.
SDLC Waterfall Method
Q9: What Are Business

requirements
Some of the Requirements

change
“Analysis
documentation paralysis” –
Problems difficult
projects spend
so much time on
documentation
with the it hampers

progress
SDLC? Time and cost

estimates for
Scheduling and large project
People who
budgeting make initial
estimates know
Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd. difficulties little about how
long it will take
or cost
How Does the Knowledge in This
Chapter Help You?
• Someday, you will be
running a business unit,
department, or project
that needs to develop
an information system
• You will need to know
how to proceed
• Knowledge in this
chapter will get you
started on right path
Ethics Guide: Estimation Ethics
 Estimating just a “theory”

 Average of many people’s guesses
 Buy-in game
 Projects start with overly optimistic schedules and cost estimates
 When is a buy-in within accepted boundaries of conduct?

Ethics Guide: Estimation Ethics (cont'd)
 Contractor agrees to produce system for less than what really costs
 Time and materials contract
 Fixed-cost contract
 In-house projects often start with buy-ins
 Start with hopes of more money later
 Team members disagree about costs. Do you report it?
 Not all costs included in initial estimates. Report it?
 Do you buy-in on project schedule if you know you can’t make that
schedule?

Ethics Guide: Estimation Ethics (cont'd)
 Be aware buy-ins occur and some vendors make a practice of bidding
projects with them
 Carefully scrutinize unbelievably low bids
 There is no substitute for experience

 Hire expertise to evaluate bids
 Consider your own position on buy-ins

 When can you ever justify one? If so, when?

Guide: Final, Final Word
• Learn to find, create, and manage innovative applications of IS technology
 Two important takeaways:
 Software developers are optimists

 Be aware of consequences of negotiating a schedule
 Large projects much harder to schedule than small ones
 Ifproject lasts longer than a year, watch out! Longer
projects mean more chance for technology change,
requirements change, and employee turnover.

Guide: The Final, Final Word (cont'd )
 Use what you’ve learned in this class to

obtain the job you really want!
 Do the exercises at the end of this guide,
and use the answers in your job interviews!

Active Review
Q1: What is systems development?
Q2: Why is systems development difficult and risky?
Q3: What are the five phases of the SDLC?
Q4: How is system definition accomplished?
Q5: What is the users’ role in the requirements
phase?
Q6: How are the five components designed?
Q7: How is an information system implemented?
Q8: What are the tasks for system maintenance?
Q9: What are some of the problems with the SDLC?

Case Study 12: When Will We Learn?
• 1974 - Number one reason for failure was a lack of user involvement in creating
and managing system requirements
• Access CT project (2013) successful
 If schedule fixed, funding nearly fixed, what factor can traded-off to reduce project
difficulty and risk?
 Requirements. Reduce to bare minimum, get system running. After some success, add to
it.

(cont'd)
 State of Oregon wasted more than $248 million to develop
information system to support its healthcare exchange
 Very early in project, Maximus Company, consulting firm
hired to provide quality assurance, warned that requirements
were vague, changing, and inconsistent
 Those warnings made no difference. Why?
 Software and systems are made of pure thought-stuff
 Easy to imagine a glorious future of amazing
capability, but subject to human frailties

(cont'd)
 “No Wrong Door” policy
 Everything for everyone
 If schedule and funding are fixed, what factor can be traded off to reduce
project difficulty and risk?
 Requirements


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Chapter 12

Information Systems Development

Can Open the 

Team not really sure what’s involved

Copyright © 2017 Pearson Education, Inc.

Startups can be fun and interesting places to work

Time and budgets limited

Prototypes used to reduce front-end risk

Scrum ideal development process for creating prototypes

Study Q4: How is system

Q7: How is an Q9: What are

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

 How the software is built, for example:

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

✓ - Descriptions of data to be entered into

 The Functional Requirements

 Readers should understand the

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

 Schedules can be compressed

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd. 5. Maintenance

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

• Systems analyst and/or

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Design and implementation – team will be

Important point: It is important that users have active

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

➢ For all five IS

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

 Determine hardware specifications

 Design Job Descriptions

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

 Decide where application

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.

• Implement entire system in limited portion of business.

• System installed in phases or modules. (AGILE)

• Complete new and old systems run simultaneously.

Copyright © 2016 Pearson Education, Ltd.