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PROCESS MODELS

The System Development Life Cycle (SDLC) process applies to information system development projects ensuring that all functional and user requirements and agency strategic goals and objectives are met. The SDLC provides a structured and standardized process for all phases of any system development effort. These phases track the development of a system through several development stages from feasibility analysis, system planning and concept development; to acquisition and requirements definition; design; development; integration and testing; deployment and acceptance; though deployment and production; and finally to system retirement.

The systems development life cycle (SDLC) is a conceptual model used in project management that describes the stages involved in an information system development project, from an initial feasibility study through maintenance of the completed application.

Various Systems Development Life Cycle methodologies have been developed to guide the processes involved, and these are the Software Process Models.

According to Kerem Kosaner (2008), Process models are processes of the same nature that are classified together into a model. Thus, a process model is a description of a process at the type level. Since the process model is at the type level, a process is an instantiation of it. The same process model is used repeatedly for the development of many applications and thus, has many instantiations. One possible use of a process model is to prescribe how things must/should/could is done in contrast to the process itself which is really what happens. A process model is roughly an anticipation of what the process will look like. What the process shall be will be determined during actual system development.

       A software process model is a development strategy that incorporates the development process, methods and tools used to design software. It is chosen based on the nature of the software and the methods and tools used in development. It often represent a networked sequence of activities, objects, transformations, and events that embody strategies for accomplishing software evolution. Such models can be used to develop more precise and formalized descriptions of software life cycle activities. A software process model is an abstract representation of a process. It presents a description of a process from some particular perspective.

These software models are classified as the traditional process models and the process models in recent times. There are many to mention software process models. So let me identify and discuss at least three of the systems development model.

      The waterfall modelThe waterfall model is a popular version of the systems development life cycle model for software engineering. Often considered the classic approach to the systems development life cycle, the waterfall model describes a development method that is linear and sequential. Waterfall development has distinct goals for each phase of development. Imagine a waterfall on the cliff of a steep mountain. Once the water has flowed over the edge of the cliff and has begun its journey down the side of the mountain, it cannot turn back. It is the same with waterfall development. Once a phase of development is completed, the development proceeds to the next phase and there is no turning back.

Waterfall model phases

Requirements analysis and definition

What is a requirement?  

It may range from a high-level abstract statement of a service or of a system constraint to a detailed mathematical functional specification. This is inevitable as requirements may serve a dual function and it may be the basis for a bid for a contract - therefore must be open to interpretation. Also may be the basis for the contract itself - therefore must be defined in detail. Both these statements may be called as a requirement.

Requirements definition: A statement in natural language plus diagrams of the services the system provides and its operational constraints. Written for customers

Requirements specification: A structured document setting out detailed descriptions of the system services. Written as a contract between client and contractor

Software specification: A detailed software description which can serve as a basis for a design or implementation. Written for developers

In this phase, establishing what the customer requires from a software system must the main concern. It is necessary to remember first the requirements needed in a systems development life cycle. The problem is specified along with the desired service objectives (goals) and the constraints are being identified.

 System and software design

In System Analysis and Design phase, the whole software development process, the overall software structure and its outlay are defined. In case of the client/server processing technology, the number of tiers required for the package architecture, the database design, the data structure design etc are all defined in this phase. After designing part a software development model is created. Analysis and Design are very important in the whole development cycle process. Any fault in the design phase could be very expensive to solve in the software development process. In this phase, the logical system of the product is developed. Software Requirement Analysis is also known as feasibility study. In this requirement analysis phase, the development team visits the customer and studies their system requirement. They examine the need for possible software automation in the given software system. After feasibility study, the development team provides a document that holds the different specific recommendations for the candidate system. It also consists of personnel assignments, costs of the system, project schedule and target dates.

The requirements analysis and information gathering process is intensified and focused specially on software. To understand what type of the programs to be built, the system analyst must study the information domain for the software as well as understand required function, behaviour, performance and interfacing. The main purpose of requirement analysis phase is to find the need and to define the problem that needs to be solved.

In the system and software design phase, the system specifications are translated into a software representation. The software engineer at this stage is concerned with Data structure, Software architecture, Algorithmic detail and Interface representations.

 The hardware requirements are also determined at this stage along with a picture of the overall system architecture. By the end of this stage the software engineer should be able to identify the relationship between the hardware, software and the associated interfaces. Any faults in the specification should ideally not be passed ‘down stream. It is the level of deriving a solution which satisfies software requirements.

Implementation and unit testing

            In the implementation and testing phase stage the designs are translated into the software domain into a detailed documentation from the design phase can significantly reduce the coding effort.  Testing at this stage focuses on making sure that any errors are identified and that the software meets its required specification. After code generation phase the software program testing begins. Different testing methods are available to detect the bugs that were committed during the previous phases. A number of testing tools and methods are already available for testing purpose.

Integration and system testing

  In the integration and system testing phase all the program units are integrated and tested to ensure that the complete system meets the software requirements. After this stage the software is delivered to the customer [Deliverable – The software product is delivered to the. In integration and system testing, the design must be decoded into a machine-readable form. If the design of software product is done in a detailed manner, code generation can be achieved without much complication. For generation of code, Programming tools like Compilers, Interpreters, and Debuggers are used. For coding purpose different high level programming languages like C, C++, Pascal and Java are used. The right programming language is chosen according to the type of application.

Operation and maintenance

The maintenance phase is usually the longest stage of the software. In this phase the software is updated to meet the changing customer needs, adapted to accommodate changes in the external environment, correct errors and oversights previously undetected in the testing phases and enhancing the efficiency of the software. Software will definitely go through change once when it is delivered to the customer. There are large numbers of reasons for the change. Change could happen due to some unpredicted input values into the system. In addition to this the changes in the system directly have an effect on the software operations. The software should be implemented to accommodate changes that could be happen during the post development period.

The waterfall model maintains that one should move to a phase only when its preceding phase is completed and perfected. Phases of development in the waterfall model are thus discrete, and there is no jumping back and forth or overlap between them

As many find this approach particularly rigid, modifications have been made over the years and new variants of the model have emerged

The drawback of the waterfall model is the difficulty of accommodating change after the process is underway.

 The advantage of waterfall development is that it allows for departmentalization and managerial control. A schedule can be set with deadlines for each stage of development and a product can proceed through the development process like a car in a carwash, and theoretically, be delivered on time. Development moves from concept, through design, implementation, testing, installation, troubleshooting, and ends up at operation and maintenance. Each phase of development proceeds in strict order, without any overlapping or iterative steps. 

The disadvantage of waterfall development is that it does not allow for much reflection or revision. Once an application is in the testing stage, it is very difficult to go back and change something that was not well-thought out in the concept stage. Alternatives to the waterfall model include joint application development (JAD), rapid application development (RAD), synch and stabilize, build and fix, and the spiral model. The waterfall model however is argued by many to be a bad idea in practice, mainly because of their belief that it is impossible to get one phase of a software product's lifecycle "perfected" before moving on to the next phases and learning from them. A typical problem is when requirements change midway through, resulting in a lot of time and effort being invalidated due to the "Big Design Up Front"

IIn summary, the criticisms of a non-iterative development approach (such as the waterfall model) are as follows:             

  Poor flexibility; the majority of software is written as part of a contract with a client, and clients are notorious for changing their stated requirements. Thus the software project must be adaptable, and spending considerable effort in design and implementation based on the idea that requirements will never change is neither adaptable nor realistic in these cases.

Unless those who specify requirements and those who design the software system in question are highly competent, it is difficult to know exactly what is needed in each phase of the software process before some time is spent in the phase "following" it.

Constant testing from the design, implementation and verification phases is required to validate the phases preceding them. Users of the waterfall model may argue that if designers follow a disciplined process and do not make mistakes that there is no need to constantly validate the preceding phases.

Frequent incremental builds (following the "release early, release often" philosophy) are often needed to build confidence for a software production team and their client.

It is difficult to estimate time and cost for each phase of the development process.

The waterfall model brings no formal means of exercising management control over a project and planning control and risk management are not covered within the model itself.

Only a certain number of team members will be qualified for each phase, which can lead at times to some team members being inactive.

 Prototyping Model

An easily modified and extensible model (representation, simulation or demonstration) of planned software system, likely including its interface and input/output functionality

The main focus of this model is to develop a prototype of the software. The client then evaluates the working prototype, and suggests improvements and corrections, which all go into developing the real application.

The prototyping model is used when the client is unsure about the exact specification but has a genuine need. Then the software engineers can develop a rough prototype to gain an approval of the customer. If the prototype developed is a working model, the developers may use code fragments of the prototype when developing the final application.

Of course, the developers must resist the temptation to extend a prototype into a full fledged application. Because if this is done, the quality will suffer in the long run. The prototype is only meant for evaluation purposes. Some code fragments may be used, but using the whole prototype is not generally a good idea.
The goal of prototyping based development is to counter the first two limitations of the waterfall model discussed earlier. The basic idea here is that instead of freezing the requirements before a design or coding can proceed, a throwaway prototype is built to understand the requirements. This prototype is developed based on the currently known requirements. Development of the prototype obviously undergoes design, coding and testing. But each of these phases is not done very formally or thoroughly. By using this prototype, the client can get an "actual feel" of the system, since the interactions with prototype can enable the client to better understand the requirements of the desired system.

Prototyping is an attractive idea for complicated and large systems for which there is no manual process or existing system to help determining the requirements. In such situations letting the client "plan" with the prototype provides invaluable and intangible inputs which helps in determining the requirements for the system. It is also an effective method to demonstrate the feasibility of a certain approach. This might be needed for novel systems where it is not clear that constraints can be met or that algorithms can be developed to implement the requirements.

•      gather requirements  
• developer & customer define overall objectives, identify areas needing more investigation – risky requiremnets

• quick design focusing on what will be visible to user – input & output formats
• use existing program fragments, program generators to throw together working version prototype evaluated and requirements refined

There are several steps in the Prototyping Model:

The requirements are being gathered for new system requirements are defined in as much detail as possible. This usually involves interviewing a number of users representing all the departments or aspects of the existing system.

A preliminary design is created for the new system.

A first prototype of the new system is constructed from the preliminary design. This is usually a scaled-down system, and represents an approximation of the characteristics of the final product.

The users thoroughly evaluate the first prototype, noting its strengths and weaknesses, what needs to be added, and what should to be removed. The developer collects and analyzes the remarks from the users.

The first prototype is modified, based on the comments supplied by the users, and a second prototype of the new system is constructed.

The second prototype is evaluated in the same manner as was the first prototype.

The preceding steps are iterated as many times as necessary, until the users are satisfied that the prototype represents the final product desired.

The final system is constructed, based on the final prototype.

The final system is thoroughly evaluated and tested. Routine maintenance is carried out on a continuing basis to prevent large-scale failures and to minimize downtime.

The process iterated until customer & developer satisfied

•   then throw away prototype and rebuild system to high quality

• alternatively can have evolutionary prototyping – start with well understood requirements.

 Advantages of Prototyping

Users are actively involved in the development. It provides a better system to users, as users have natural tendency to change their mind in specifying requirements and this method of developing systems supports this user tendency.

Since in this methodology a working model of the system is provided, the users get a better understanding of the system being developed.

Errors can be detected much earlier as the system is mode side by side.

Quicker user feedback is available leading to better solutions.

Disadvantages

 Leads to implementing and then repairing way of building systems.

Practically, this methodology may increase the complexity of the system as scope of the system may expand beyond original plans.

customer may want to hang onto first version, may want a few fixes rather than rebuild. First version will have compromises

developer may make implementation compromises to get prototype working quickly.  Later on developer may become comfortable with compromises and forget why they are inappropriate.

• customer may want to hang onto first version, may want a few fixes rather than rebuild. First version will have compromises

•  developer may make implementation compromises to get prototype working quickly.  Later on developer may become comfortable with compromises and forget why they are inappropriate. 

And last systems development life cycle would be the, The Capability Maturity Model (CMM) is a methodology used to develop and refine an organization's software development process. The model describes a five-level evolutionary path of increasingly organized and systematically more mature processes. CMM was developed and is promoted by the Software Engineering Institute (SEI), a research and development center sponsored by the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD). SEI was founded in 1984 to address software engineering issues and, in a broad sense, to advance software engineering methodologies. More specifically, SEI was established to optimize the process of developing, acquiring, and maintaining heavily software-reliant systems for the DoD. Because the processes involved are equally applicable to the software industry as a whole, SEI advocates industry-wide adoption of the CMM.

The CMM is similar to ISO 9001, one of the ISO 9000 series of standards specified by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). The ISO 9000 standards specify an effective quality system for manufacturing and service industries; ISO 9001 deals specifically with software development and maintenance. The main difference between the two systems lies in their respective purposes: ISO 9001 specifies a minimal acceptable quality level for software processes, while the CMM establishes a framework for continuous process improvement and is more explicit than the ISO standard in defining the means to be employed to that end.

CMM's Five Maturity Levels of Software Processes

• At the initial level, processes are disorganized, even chaotic. Success is likely to depend on individual efforts, and is not considered to be repeatable, because processes would not be sufficiently defined and documented to allow them to be replicated.
• At the repeatable level, basic project management techniques are established, and successes could be repeated, because the requisite processes would have been made established, defined, and documented.
• At the defined level, an organization has developed its own standard software process through greater attention to documentation, standardization, and integration.
• At the managed level, an organization monitors and controls its own processes through data collection and analysis.
• At the optimizing level, processes are constantly being improved through monitoring feedback from current processes and introducing innovative processes to better serve the organization's particular needs.

The Software development Life Cycle models could control, monitor large projects, can evaluate costs and completion targets, well defined user input, have ease of maintenance, there are standards in development and design. Nevertheless, it increased development time and cost, the systems used these models must be defined up front, user input is sometimes limited and it is really hard to estimate costs and sometimes project overruns.

At one time the model was beneficial mostly to the world of automating activities that were assigned to clerks and accountants. However, the world of technological evolution is demanding that systems have a greater functionality that would assist help desk technicians/administrators or information technology specialists/analysts.

References:

http://www.selectbs.com/adt/analysis-and-design/what-is-the-waterfall-model

http://searchcio-midmarket.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid183_gci755441,00.html

http://www.e-digg.com/services/software/sdlc-life-cycle.html

Kerem Kosaner (2008), Software Engineering.

http://www.Process Modeling  Definition « Software Engineering.htm

Critical Success Factors

In simple terms, any organization that produces products and/or delivers services should be viewed as a transformation mechanism requiring continuous process improvement and innovation. When appropriate events and conditions trigger action (process initiation), customer requirements and organizational resources such as raw materials, money, information, and yes, processes are transformed into goods, services, and business outcomes for the customers' benefit or for the process completion.

What is a Critical Success Factor?

Rockart defined CSFs as:

"The limited number of areas in which results, if they are satisfactory, will ensure successful competitive performance for the organization. They are the few key areas where things must go right for the business to flourish. If results in these areas are not adequate, the organization's efforts for the period will be less than desired."

He also concluded that CSFs are "areas of activity that should receive constant and careful attention from management."

Critical Success Factors (CSF’s) are the critical factors or activities required for ensuring the success your business. The term was initially used in the world of data analysis, and business analysis.

Most smaller and more pragmatic businesses can still use CSF’s but we need to take a different, more pragmatic approach.

Critical Success Factors have been used significantly to present or identify a few key factors that organizations should focus on to be successful.

As a definition, critical success factors refer to "the limited number of areas in which satisfactory results will ensure successful competitive performance for the individual, department, or organization”.

Critical success Factors define key areas of performance that are essential for the organization to accomplish its mission. Identifying the business drivers for change and the critical success factors is the most important element of any business transformations. John F. Rockart concludes that CSF’s are areas of activity that should receive constant and careful attention from management. Critical success factors are strongly related to the mission and strategic goals of your business project. Whereas the mission and goals focus on the aims and what is to be achieved. Critical success factors focus on the most important areas and get to the very heart of both what is to be achieved and how you will achieve it.

The critical success factor (CSF) approach is a technique that will aid health administrators, planners and managers to identify, specify and sort among the most relevant and critical factors determining an organization's survival and success. Following a top-down management perspective, this paper discusses the CSF methodology as a strategic information management process comprising several important phases: (i) understanding the external factors such as the organization's industry, market and environment; (ii) achieving strong support and championship from top management; (iii) encouraging the proactive involvement of management and staff in generic CSF identification; (iv) educating and directing the participation of staff members in CSF verification and further refinement of generic CSFs into specific CSFs; and (v) aggregating, prioritizing and translating activity-related CSFs into organizational information requirements for the design of the organization's management information infrastructure. The implementation of this CSF approach is illustrated in the context of a British Columbia community hospital, with insights provided into key issues for future health researchers and practitioners.

For most businesses, there are only a generally a limited number of areas – like sales or product development – which makes a business succeed. We can select critical success factor with insights and analysis. The success or failure of your business depends on how you approach your unique set of critical success factors. Understanding these factors and spending 100 percent attention to them is a sure way to add power to your efforts and jump start towards a new level of performance.

Identifying Critical Success Factors is important as it allows firms to focus their efforts on building their capabilities to meet the Critical Success Factor's, or even allow firms to decide if they have the capability to build the requirements necessary to meet Critical Success Factors (CSF's).

Critical Success Factors is identifying as a very iterative process. Every mission, strategic goals and Critical Success Factors are essentially linked and each will be refined as you develop them.

Here are five steps to Critical Success Factors that will directly affect your success in achieving any goal:

• Establish your businesses or project's mission and strategic goals.

In achieving a success for an organization it is always a must to identify your mission, goals and objectives because these will serve as a basis on how will you decide what could be the possible Critical Success Factors that you are going to apply.  You cannot skip on choosing your critical success factors unless you identify your mission and goals. In identifying your Critical Success Factors is just like identifying your plans or your ways of achieving your goals and objectives and making your mission possible to happen. For a project to have its significance and completion in due time, it would start with a mission and a set of goals. A project can also be done without these goals and mission but it is best for a team to be specific in what they would want to conquer within the whole development duration. It would also be easy for them to identify the activities that they will be dealing with towards the endpoint since a precise set of targets are known from the very beginning.

• For each strategic goal, ask yourself "what area of business or project activity is essential to achieve this goal?" The answers to the question are your candidate CSFs.

There are four basic types of Critical Success Factor's.

Industry Critical Success Factor's (CSF's) resulting from specific industry characteristics; these factors result from specific industry characteristics. These are the things that the organization must do to remain competitive.

Strategy Critical Success Factor's (CSF's) resulting from the chosen competitive strategy of the business; these factors result from the specific competitive strategy chosen by the organization. The way in which the company chooses to position themselves, market themselves, whether they are high volume low cost or low volume high cost producers, etc.

Environmental Critical Success Factor's (CSF's) resulting from economic or technological changes; these factors result from macro-environmental influences on an organization. Things like the business climate, the economy, competitors, and technological advancements are included in this category.

Temporal Critical Success Factor's (CSF's) resulting from internal organizational needs and changes; these factors result from the organization's internal forces. Specific barriers, challenges, directions, and influences will determine these CSFs.

Towards these given types of Critical Success Factors, you are then ready to answer the step two and would mainly used in the business process your organization operates.

• Evaluate the list of candidate CSFs to find the absolute essential elements for achieving success - these are your Critical Success Factors.

After it, you should have identify the resources, assistance, information or anything else that might be needed to reach the goal. As you identify and evaluate candidate CSFs, you may uncover some new strategic objectives or more detailed objectives. So you may need to define your mission, objectives and CSFs iteratively. Deriving other data or information about the subject of your project or goal is also important. After you have identified and specify your strategic goals and objectives, then you have to list down the possible Critical Success Factors that could be used to help that goals and objectives be achieved. This helps you maintain the impact of your Critical Success Factors, and so give good direction and prioritization to other elements of your business or project strategy.

• Identify how you will monitor and measure each of the CSFs.

The monitoring and measuring each CSF’s is effectively done during surveys, interviews and research toward the people. The most important data collection activity is conducting interviews with participants. In this activity, the participants have an opportunity to talk about their management challenges and their contributions to the organization and/or the operational unit’s successes and failures. The interactive nature of the interview process provides opportunities for clarification and for guiding the interview in areas that might expose particular barriers and obstacles to accomplishing the mission.

Step Five: Communicate your CSFs along with the other important elements of your business or project's strategy.

It is a basic thing that every element in an organization communicates with each other in order to organize all the data that work along with the business strategies.

Step Six: Keep monitoring and reevaluating your CSFs to ensure you keep moving towards your aims. Indeed, whilst CSFs are sometimes less tangible than measurable goals, it is useful to identify as specifically as possible how you can measure or monitor each one.

Critical Success Factor is a great element of an organizational activity which is central to its future success. Critical success factors may change over time, and may include items such as product quality, employee attitudes, manufacturing flexibility, and brand awareness. This can enable analysis. Thus giving any organization the courage to make plans and establishing business strategies according to the mission, vision, objectives and goals that set by the company. It is a nice start for every company so that every end of the day, they could see a beautiful result from all their hardships which is the great success they have made.

SYSTEM ANALYST

Last Friday, December 11, 2009, we had successfully interviewed a System Analyst from the Davao Light and Power Company at Bajada J.P. Laurel Ave., Davao City. It was a nice interview for they welcomed us very warm. They offer us all a seat to be comfortable throughout the interview. Before proceeding to the question, let me define first the real meaning and purpose of a System Analyst.

All organizations rely on computer and information technology to conduct business and operate efficiently. That is why in our generation for today would always need Systems Analyst. A System Analyst is a business professional who uses analysis and design techniques to solve business problems using information technology.

A System Analyst has three required skills to be considered. It includes the ability to work on the technical and business side and also the ability to handle people, which is the most important skill.

Out of the all the written purpose, skills and the job of a System Analyst, our interviewee have agreed that the very fundamental skill a System Analyst should well thought-out is the communication skill. Communication skill includes effective interpersonal communication (written, verbal, visual, electronic, face-to-face conversations, presentations in front of groups), listening, and group facilitation skills If a System Analyst possess this skill, according to him, and they could easily motivate people. And with the client's side it will not be hard for them to communicate with each other and would make their business work smoothly and well. Sometimes lack of communication leads to misunderstanding resulting to project failures later on. Because this communication and interpersonal skill is very crucial in obtaining information, in motivating the people around you or their clients that is why this skill should be use in the right way and be develop in order to expedite his role as a System Analyst. They should first and foremost have people skills. You have to be able to work with a variety of people and be able to work in teams. You should be an assertive person also. A good systems analysis should be able to take initiative and do things without being told. Also this person should have good reasoning and problem solving skills. These are all things that should be within the person naturally along with the actual computer skills necessary to analyze systems for a client. A systems analyst must possess good interpersonal communication skills because they must be able to converse back and forth with the client over what the problem is and how to go about finding the best solution.

The systems analyst (sometimes called systems architect or systems designer) orchestrates the effort. He starts by interviewing users, teasing out what they need as opposed to what they want—the nice-to-have things usually cost more than necessary. He often uses modeling software to evaluate what-ifs.

System Analysts need good speaking and writing skills, too, so that they can explain their systems and give good instructions to their clients.

Then, members of the team develop a shopping list, plot a step-by-step game plan, implement the system, test it, and troubleshoot. They also might supervise the trainers, who will try their best to convince everyone that the new system "really will make your life easier."

According to him, the understanding of the complexity and workings of an organization in order to provide necessary support is one of their tasks which are one of the issues a System Analyst encounter.

Another skill he thinks to be developed in order to be more effective in any modeling process is the technical skills. This includes the knowledge about the system application, administrative works, business functions, and technical functions. He should know about all the systems of the company. How it functions and what should be the proper things being processed by the company's system. 

· System Application

In some organizations, programmer-analysts design and update the software that runs a computer. They also create custom applications tailored to their organization’s tasks. Because they are responsible for both programming and systems analysis, these workers must be proficient in both areas. As this dual proficiency becomes more common, analysts are increasingly working with databases, object-oriented programming languages, client–server applications, and multimedia and Internet technology. Computer systems analysts start their work by asking people what they need their computers to do. Then, they plan a computer system that can do those tasks well. A system can include many computers working together and different types of software and tools.

After System analysts understand what the system needs to do, they break down the task into small steps. They draw diagrams and charts to show how information will get into the computers, how that information will be processed, and how it will get to the people who need it. For example, System analysts might decide how sales information will get into a store's computers and how the computer will add up the information in a way that makes it useful for store managers.

System Analysts experiment with different computer system plans. They try various tools and steps until they find the system that is fastest, easiest, and least expensive.

After planning a system, System analysts test it to make sure it works. They check to make sure that information is processed quickly and without mistakes. They also watch to see if the system is easy to use. Often, they have to change their plans to make the systems better.

· Business functions

Some analysts also have a master's degree in business. This helps them to understand the types of computers that businesses need. As a System Analyst you must know your business processes, know your customer interfaces, know your system interfaces, know your rules, regs and laws, know all there is to know about the data and put on your "real world glasses". If you want to encourage folks to take up this role/job, teach them about critical thinking. Learning about programming, modeling and architecture are fine but I'll guarantee you that even if you excel at all these skills, if you can't ferret out the real data requirements you'll never truly be a successful Analyst.

· Technical functions

When a system is approved, systems analysts determine what computer hardware and software will be needed to set it up. They coordinate tests and observe the initial use of the system to ensure that it performs as planned. They prepare specifications, flow charts, and process diagrams for computer programmers to follow; then they work with programmers to “debug,” or eliminate errors, from the system. Systems analysts who do more in-depth testing may be called software quality assurance analysts. In addition to running tests, these workers diagnose problems, recommend solutions, and determine whether program requirements have been met.

Next, System analysts decide which computers, software, and tools to buy. They also tell computer programmers how to make any new software that is needed. They give the programmers step-by-step instructions. Some analysts help make the software, too.

He also added the networking capabilities of the System Analyst to be developed. Because the main job for some systems analysts is getting computers to work together. They connect them into a network. Analysts decide how to get information from one computer to another. Many help people get data from the Internet. Systems analysts work to make the computer systems within an organization, or across organizations, compatible so that information can be shared. Many systems analysts are involved with these “networking” tasks, connecting all the computers internally, in an individual office, department, or establishment, or externally, as when setting up e-commerce networks to facilitate business among companies.

From our interviewee, logical thinking skills are also important. Because System Analysts need to understand computers, math, and planning in order to do his job well. They need to know math so that they can solve problems and figure out how much computer power different systems would use.

The last should be the wide knowledge on how to model data and processes. It is not necessary that a System Analysts is good in programming. Being a systems analyst requires programming skill, but as important is the ability to see the big picture: translate geek speak into plain English, identify the organization's needs, and get everybody on board. Creative liberal-arts types with computer expertise may make better systems analysts than pure techies.

To begin an assignment, systems analysts consult managers and users to define the goals of the system. Analysts then design a system to meet those goals. They specify the inputs that the system will access, decide how the inputs will be processed, and format the output to meet users needs. System Analysts use techniques such as structured analysis, data modeling, information engineering, mathematical model building, sampling, and cost accounting to make sure their plans are efficient and complete. They also may prepare cost-benefit and return-on-investment analyses to help management decide whether implementing the proposed technology would be financially feasible.

Listed above are the fundamental skills a System Analyst should be developing in order to maximize his role in an organization he will be working.

References:

http://www.systemsanalyst.com/

http://www.blurtit.com/q170760.html

http://www.umsl.edu/~sauterv/analysis/3skills.html

IS Plan

Being invited by the University President would really be a great pleasure. Since expediting the implementation is the main task to do, I assume that it refers only to the actual implementation of the Information System plan; hence it is a fact that we already have a background and a plan for the University.

Since planning is being the issue, let me state how strategic planning works. Strategic planning is an organization's process of defining its strategy, or direction, and making decisions on allocating its resources to pursue this strategy, including its capital and people. Various business analysis techniques can be used in strategic planning, including SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) and PEST analysis (Political, Economic, Social, and Technological analysis) or STEER analysis involving Socio-cultural, Technological, Economic, Ecological, and Regulatory factors. According to what I have researched, strategic plan is a document used by an organization to align its organization and budget structure with organizational priorities, missions, and objectives. As it says, it is also a process of comprehensive, integrative program planning that considers, at a minimum, the future of current decisions, overall policy, organizational development, and links to operational plans. Strategic planning is a basic document for planning of different projects of the program and their sub-projects; this is according to the project management club. It is based on the content of the Financing Memorandum and the Monitoring and Evaluation Matrix attached to the Financing Proposal and translates the two documents into detailed operational terms. A satisfactory strategic plan must be realistic and attainable so as to allow managers and entrepreneurs to think strategically and act operationally. In our Management Information Systems 1subject last semester, we are successfully done doing a business plan with our adopted company. With the help of the head officer in the department, all he information and other facts of that business plan was been discussed accordingly. As we always hear from our instructor, we the human resources or the IT personnel may lift up the company to its highest peak or eventually put it down depending on what we have wanted to. As what I have stated above, strategic planning must have the SWOT analysis. In to our preparation and to our research about the company, we have then listed some of the weaknesses and strength of the company. In such way we can decide how to build up a company.

In conducting strategic planning, each person or part of the organization that does the planning is really up into a purpose and what are those purposes in it. According to Field Marshal Helmuth Graf von Moltke “Planning is everything. Plans are nothing”. On what I have understood, it simply means that we can really plan for anything, for our future and for all the things that we ought to aspire. We can say that it is really easy to plan directly as it is in our hands and have the planning for ourselves. But in the end, after we have decided the planning, we cannot really have the activities to do the plan. Since I am going to be invited to speak out to the University president, lets me take the University of Southeastern Philippines as the subject. We all know that all the things, activities and transactions that happen within the school is done by the University professional professors and teachers. They do have their conference and meeting about the strategic planning for the school, but once it was been designed or talked properly, at the end of the discussion and after the technical paper was made, there are still no implementation for it. The words and discussions are being taken for granted. Meaning, the planning was still useless since it was not been implemented properly.

So what are the purposes of strategic planning? For example, in our own self, we do have dreams and visions in life. Before we are able to conquer those dreams and visions, we must first start by step by step process on it. We must have first decided on what our goals to achieve the dream. We must always think of planning as the first step. In strategic planning, especially in businesses and industry, the main purpose of it is to set the overall goals for the business and to develop a plan to achieve them. It involves stepping back from the day-to-day operations and asking where the business is headed and what its priorities should be. In the world market side, there are lots of purposes why strategic planning must be done.

First on the list, is the purpose on reducing the risks. Planning increases the likelihood of project success by providing insights into the project’s risks. Some projects are so risky that the business may choose not to start once they have learned about the risks. Other projects may contain features whose risks can be contained by early attention. The discussions that occur while estimating raise questions that expose potential dark corners of a project. Another is to reduce uncertainty within a team. A team is generating new capabilities and potentials about what is inside the business or the company throughout the whole project. They are also generating new knowledge—about it, the technologies in use, and themselves as a team. It is critical that this new knowledge be acknowledged and factored into an iterative planning process that is designed to help a team refine their vision. Next, is supporting in the decision making. Plans help the business to make decisions. How does an organization decide whether a particular project is worth doing if it does not have estimates of the value and the cost of the project? Beyond decisions about whether or not to start a project, estimates help them make sure that they are working on the most valuable projects possible. Strategic planning also helps in conveying information. A plan conveys expectations and describes one possibility of what may come to pass over the course of a project. A plan does not guarantee an exact set of features on an exact date at a specified cost. A plan does, however, communicate and establish a set of baseline expectations. Far too often a plan is reduced to a single date, and all of the assumptions and expectations that led to that date are forgotten. In relation with planning supports in decision making, it also acquires establishing trusts. Frequent reliable delivery of promised features builds trust between the developers and the customers. Reliable estimates enable reliable delivery. A customer needs estimates to make important prioritization and tradeoff decisions. Estimates also help a customer decide how much of a feature to develop. Customers are reluctant to make these types of tradeoff decisions early in a project unless the developers’ estimates have proved trustworthy.

Consequently, all of those things are being considered in order to have a very effective and successful Information System Plan (IS Plan). As a choice, I wanted to focus on the newly implemented University Registration Management Information System (USRMIS). Today, it is likely called as the Student Registration Management Information System (SRMIS). We all know that the University had just decided to in source the system and laid all their trust to our very own programmers. I would say to the University President, that in order to improve the services to its students, faculty, staff and stakeholders, it is very good to embark on the automation of its operation towards the institution’s system. Before deciding to pursue with this in source system, according to what I have interviewed with some personnel involve in this system, at present the University is leasing its enrolment system provided by ECPAC System (an outsource program) amounting to a very large amount that would be very costly to pay per month only. Considering that the University has a several colleges and at least two computers are utilizing the said ECPAC System per college in addition with the computer units being used in the office of the Registrar and the Accounting/Finance office. While ECPAC is providing these services, some problems arises for the reason that the system is not made and contextualized to cater the appropriate needs of the different offices and colleges of the University. In maintaining the program, the University had also encountered some difficulty since the customization is outsourced and there are some limitations that are not immediately address whenever there are changes in the procedures and policies in the University. Outsourced system also limiting the University on the source code, design and architecture of the ECPAC system because the University can never own these information. The University has also the restriction of opportunity to customize and repackage the system and eventually sell it for an income generating project later on.

I can proudly say that among all the Universities in the city, the University of Southeastern Philippines has the good programmers and IT people. When the Institute of Computing (IC) proposed about this Student Registration Management Information System (SRMIS), we could say that this project will soon address the issues in minimizing the operating procedures of the University in the proceeding years the system will be use. The in house development also gives enough liberty to customize these systems. It will also give the University an opportunity to have a stable and sustainable income generating project through these developed information systems. At present, the Institute of Computing (IC) has already developed the Students Registration Management Information System (SRMIS) for student and enrolment and registration system including the cashiering and collection system. The whole recently expanded Students Registration Management Information System (SRMIS), have aimed to develop an automated system for the registration and record keeping of the student’s records to be handled by the assigned office which is the Office of Admission and Student Records (OASR). It will also manage the student assessment in terms of how much number of units in total a student has enrolled and the corresponding fees associated with it. The additional fees such as laboratory, library, internet, insurance and other fees is being automated and will automatically reflect it on the Cashiering system. As of now, two faculty members of the Institute of Computing (IC) are the one in charge in developing the Students Registration Management Information System (SRMIS). Since, the programmers and the developers came from the University; it will not be costly later on with the maintenance of the said system considering that the rental of the ECPAC System cost too much. So, this time with this project the cost will be minimized and the University can save and eliminated expenditures related to the ECPAC System rental. Again, this project will be a great help for the faculty who were developing the system because they are given the chance for professional development. This project showcased the institute’s capability of developing information systems. Also it will advertise the University’s expertise in the field of Information Systems development. The project is under the Office of the President while the project development is under the direct supervision of the Institute of Computing.

A lot of things are being presented. We have seen the good side of it and also consider the disadvantage that it will bring to the University. But in order to expedite the implementation of the Students Registration Management Information System (SRMIS), here are the steps that I think will be a great aid for the success of the Information System.

Project Management is the first step they would do in order for the involving people be aware and understand what is all the Information System Plan (IS Plan) all about. Then it better for the people involve in the plan on what kind of involvement they will have in order for them to participate enthusiastically.
They would also coordinate with the parties involved in the IS implementation, since they will be the ones performing the roles in the IS plan.

In this step, it refers to considerations such as where would the project/system suitable to be implemented or placed in, budget on executing and maintaining it, who are going to manage it and are they suitable to handle implementation of the project? This also requires orienting the people involved about the different roles that need to be played in the IS plan. This is also in line with the employees that will be affected with the implementation of the Information System Plan (IS Plan). Their experiences must be noted for us to know how effective they can be in handling the implementation of the new Information System Plan (IS Plan). We must determine the strength in terms of time that is necessary for the implementation of the Information System Plan (IS Plan) and even the location variable. Through this information we could come up to reasonable activities and deadlines.

We must also consider the cost that is needed in the implementation of the system. It must be in relation to the overall budget the Information System Plan (IS Plan) have and the amount that is allotted in the implementation stage. And as said earlier the implementation plan must be within the allotted time. Also they should assign responsibilities and set timelines. This entails the development of efficient working plans that are constituted by the specific steps or action plans to implement the Information System Plan (IS Plan). Setting timelines for taking action in the Information System Plan (IS Plan) is very important to ensure that the plan is being carried out efficiently and productively and also to see results within a specified timeframe. We should determine the time to be allotted in order to complete the plan. With this we can utilize time management and other factors concerning schedules. Other than managing time we should also consider who will manage the plan and create planning teams that is capable in planning an IS. Project management must be properly supervised and development practices are also one most significant factor to be considered. We need to better understand the plan so that implementation won’t become more complicated. That is why such issues must be put into consideration.

The second step would be the Data Conversion. This includes analyzing the data that would be necessary for the system, the volume of the data to be converted and the issues involved in converting the data. Issues involving data conversion and allocation of resources must also be considered. Proper usage of resources must also be recognized because it might cause several failures, either when it comes to implementation or allocation of data. This will be applying for the change in information system development the University has decided. All the data from the past system must be properly transferred to the new one. This requires skilled personnel that know the previous system and persons that are also trained for the new system. Depending on the data that must be converted the personnel assigned must be reasonable in choosing the type of process in converting the data. The factors that must be considered includes the time and the percentage of error that my occur in the conversion process

To allocate resources is another step in order to expedite the implementation of the Information System Plan (IS Plan). This is a very critical part in the implementation of the Information System Plan (IS Plan) in the university where the budget for carrying out the ISP will be laid out in detail. A well-made IS plan will go to waste if the necessary resources are not allocated to it. Without resources, it is nearly impossible to expedite the implementation of the Information System Plan (IS Plan). Money is always involved and so even our university cannot escape from this fact. There are other necessary resources to expedite the Information System Plan (IS Plan). Some of these are people, time and physical resources. Resources not only of money but also of knowledge, of strength are needed to successfully implement the IS plan. It is of practical act to properly make use of all the resources available for the system. Analysis of the resources should be made. A university should look out for any source accessible. Overlooked resource could be a big lost for one’s organization. All these and more need to be properly and adequately allocated to ensure that the plan will not fail.


Next step is training of the people involve in the Information System Plan (IS Plan). Training is also the most important factor to be considered. IT staffs that are properly trained will make the project easily done. They need to have knowledge in terms of managing data and IS plan implementation. One of the things that are essential to successful continuous improvement in order to expedite implementation of IS plan are strongly matters on the people involve around the plan. User of the project are not IT professionals that is why time and training has to done to guide them in how to use and manipulate the project. If the person is knowledgeable or has received appropriate training then implementation if IS plan will be done faster. The people are the most fundamental resource of an Information System Plan (IS Plan). Since that they are the one who is using the systems the plan. They are the user or the client of the plan; it must be necessary that they have the knowledge about and how to deal with the change. There must be a necessary training for the IT staff and the general staff to run the information system in a smooth way. Since it is new system, a new way of operating the system and the function of the system must be utilize very well.

To monitor the progress of the new system should also be considered. The targeted task should be identified and the parties involved should see to it that the milestones are achieved. Milestones are very efficient measures of progress because it divides the whole project into smaller and more achievable tasks. Every milestone achieved can also motivate the people involved, as they are assured that they are making progress with the implementation of the ISP. Rather than setting a large and distant measure of progress, milestones can be used to keep track of progress in the smaller picture. To keep track with the project schedules they must observed the progress of the project development. Any progress should be made recognize. Updates and improvements must also be identified and evaluated if it has been going well with what has been planned for the system. They should evaluate if the desired outcomes had achieved, to see if still on the trail or if still following the timetable also to find out if there is a progress or not. By checking the details of each of the tasks or summary task we are better informed on the overall progress of the implementation. The programmers should submit a progress report on a monthly basis, in the progress report, programmers will be required to enumerate all deliverables expected from them and state the status of each deliverables required.

The compare and contrast of the actual implementation of the Information System Plan (IS Plan) to the original plan would be the final step. The original plan should be examined every now and then for detection of errors. Once errors are detected and revisions are made, the actual results of the revised action plans and the original plan should be compared or evaluated to look for the differences again for the errors, and to mull over what are the changes to be done, and what are the things to be added or subtracted. This would serve as a basis for revising the original action plan. Since it cannot be helped that the actual implementation of the Information System Plan (IS Plan) in the university would not follow the written plan exactly, it is necessary to compare how the plan is doing when it is carried out to how the plan is doing based on projections in the original plan.

With all those steps I have presented, I hope it could address the problems and solve it through expediting its implementation while utilizing the full potential of the university in delivering its services. Since we a state university, many opportunities may rise and make use of this and using it up to the maximum benefit would greatly improve the university. The foremost concern for this process of changing the information system is the willingness of the University for Implementation. We can never avoid a huge resistance for the implementation of an Information System Plan (IS Plan) would prove a huge risk and may cause the Information System Plan (IS Plan) to fail or never implemented. It would greatly help if the IS plan is backed and supported by the top university officials so that other parts of the university or colleges would have minimal amount of resistance. The IS plan with the acknowledgment from the university would be implemented faster if the university itself knows of the Information System Plan (IS Plan) so training and seminars are thereby held. The whole process of implementation would require much time and resources that focusing all efforts will be required for the implementation to go smoothly and immediately.

In our own self as well, we do have a strategic planning that was been planned accordingly. Now, it is our choice on how to implement it, how to maintain it and how to make it flexible in change without putting us into much cost.

References:

http://managementhelp.org/plan_dec/str_plan/basics.htm

http://www.tdan.com/view-articles/5262

http://entrepreneurs.about.com/od/businessplan/a/implementation.htm

http://www.thepbgrp.com/merger-acquisition-services/post.html