CHAPTER 14

CONSTRUCT, DELIVER, AND MAINTAIN SYSTEMS PROJECT

Commercial Packages
Well, aside from system construction and delivery activities
through in-house development, today’s trend is through purchased
commercial software. Such software is integrated with unique features
and attributes, wherein choosing the right system software that suit
the needs of the organization is indeed essential.
This phase will thoroughly focus on examining the commercial
packages with the technique that can help the structure to cope up
with the issues or factors concerning the system.
Trends in Commercial Packages
Four factors that affect the ascending market of Commercial Packages:

 Relatively low cost;

 The emergence of industry-specific vendors who target their
software to the needs of particular types of business;
 A growing demand from small businesses; and,
 The trend towards the downsizing of the organizational units and
the resulting move toward the distributed data processing
environment for larger organizations.
Commercial Software divided into a number of general groups:
TURNKEY SYSTEM
Turnkey system is finished and examined system which is prepared
for implementation. It is sold solely as compiled program module
wherein in the ability to customize such system is limited to the
specific need of the organization this includes the customization of
input, output and some processing through menu choices.
GENERAL ACCOOUNTING SYSTEM
It is designed in modules that meet the specific needs of the
user. Such module includes accounts payable, accounts receivable,
payroll processing, inventory control, general ledger, financial
reporting and fixed asset.
SPECIAL-PURPOSE SYSTEM
Such system is useful to selected segment of the economy or
fields (e.g. medical fields, banking industry, gov’t agencies) which
is have different guidelines so this kind of system is a standardized
system to deal with the industry-specific procedures.
OFFICE AUTOMATION SYSTEMS
It is the use of computer system to improve the productivity of
office workers. This include word processing packages, database
management system, spreadsheet programs, and desktop publishing
system.
BACKBONE SYSTEM
It provides a basic system structure wherein the primary
processing modules are programmed. It is designed by the vendors to
suit the user’s need. It can also be customized but customization is
quite expensive and time consuming. So many vendors employ object-
oriented system design, to reuse modules and to reduce the cost of
customizing the system to the user.
VENDOR-SUPPORTED SYSTEM
Vendor-supported system is the combination of a custom systems
and commercial software. The custom system was constructed by the
vendor for the intended use of its clients. The primary system are
custom products, but the systems development system is commercially
provided.
ERP SYSTEM
Enterprise resource planning (ERP) is kind of flexible system
since it also has the attributes of all the system discussed above.
It’s a prewritten system which are also employed as turnkey
applications. They can also be modified to suit the user’s need. It
can also be installed as a backbone system. Because of this ERP
systems are most supported packages that an outside service provider
installed.

ADVANTAGES and DISADVANTAGES of Commercial Packages

ADVANTAGES
 Small commercial system can
be implemented immediately
upon recognizing the need.
While, larger system can be
implemented in several
weeks.
 Cost is reduced.
 Commercial packages are
reliable because it is
thoroughly tested and
DISADVANTAGES
 It makes the firm dependent
on the vendor for
maintenance having the risk
of the vendor might cease to
operate.
 Sometimes the commercial
software do not fit the
user’s need because it is
too general.
 Having the fact that if the
 examined before their user’s need changes it can
release in the market. be difficult to modify.

Choosing a Package
Four-step procedure that can help the firm on decision making
regarding the best choice on choosing the package that suit its needs:
Step 1: Needs analysis
It begins with the analyzation of the organizations need or
systems requirement, may be to;
1. Support the accounting and reporting requirements of federal,
state and local agencies.
2. Provide access to information in a timely and efficient manner.
3. Simultaneously support both accrual accounting and fund
accounting.
4. Increase transaction processing capacity.
5. Reduce the cost of current operation.
6. Improve user productivity.
7. Reduce processing errors.
8. Support batch and real-time processing.
9. Provide automatic general ledger reconciliations.
10. Be expandable and flexible to accommodate growth and changes
in future needs.
“Detailed specifications enable users to narrow the search to only
those packages most likely to satisfy their needs.”
Step 2: Send out the request for proposal
Systems requirement is stated in request for proposal (RFP) that
should be sent to each prospective vendor. RFP is the vendor basis for
initial screening. The users should select from the responses given by
the vendor which are feasible alternatives.
Step 3: Gather Facts
Identify a relevant fact about each vendor’s system.
VENDOR PRESENTATION

 Vendors should present formally their system to the user.

 Technical demonstration of the packages is given to the user to
provide an opportunity to the user to ask question regarding the
packages on a hands-on demonstration.
 If the vendor refused to demonstrate and is not capable enough to
answer specific question, then this may indicate a functional
deficiency of the system.
BENCHMARK PROBLEMS
To measure the relative performance of the system is to establish
a benchmark problem for them to solve. The figure 14-22 stated that
same data and processing task are given to both systems. The results
of processing are compared on criteria such as speed, accuracy, and
efficiency in performing the task.
VENDOR SUPPORT
The desired level of support should be carefully considered
because it is the important criterion in system selection. Some
vendors provide full-service support, including:

 Client training
 User and technical documentation
 Warranties
 Maintenance programs to implement system enhancement
 Toll-free help numbers
 Annual seminar to obtain input from users and apprise them of the
latest developments
CONTRACT USER GROUPS
The following are the list of questions to be ask to the prospective
user for comparing packages:

 When did you purchased the packages?

 Which other vendors did you review?
 Why did you select this package?
 Are you satisfied with the package?
 Are you satisfied with the vendor support?
 Does the system perform as advertised?
 Were modifications required?
 What type of training did the vendor provide?
 What is the quality of the documentation?
 Have any major problems been encountered?
 Do you subscribe to the vendor’s maintenance program?
 If so, do you receive enhancements?
Step 4: Analyze the Findings and Make a Final Selection

 Analyze the facts and select the best package.

  Use the weighted factor matrix to analyze the quantitative
variables.
 This requires to construct a table to show comparison between
only two proposals those of vendor A and vendor B.
The table presents the relevant decision criteria under the
heading Factor. Each decision factor is assigned a weight that implies
its relative importance to the user. Two steps are critical to this
analysis technique: (1) identify all relevant decision factors and (2)
assign realistic weights to each factor. As these factors represent
all of the relevant decision criteria, their weights should total 100
percent. These weights will likely
vary among decision makers. One
reviewer may consider vendor
support an important factor and
thus assign a high numeric value to its
weight. Another decision maker may
give this a low weight because support is not important in his or her
firm, relative to other factors.

After assigning weights, each vendor package is evaluated

according to its performance in each factor category. Based upon the
facts gathered in the previous steps, each individual factor is scored
on a scale of 1 to 5, where 1 is poor performance and 5 is excellent.
The weighted scores are computed by multiplying the raw score by the
weight for each factor. Using the previous example, a weight of 15 for
vendor support is multiplied by a score of 4 for Vendor A and 3 for
Vendor B, yielding the weighted scores of 60 and 45, respectively. The
weighted scores are then totaled, and each vendor is assigned a
composite score. This is the vendor’s overall performance index. Table
14-2 shows a score for Vendor B of 391 and 372 for Vendor A. This
composite score suggests that Vendor B’s product is rated slightly
higher than Vendor A’s.
This analysis must be taken a step further to include financial
considerations. For example, assume Proposal A costs $150,000 and
Proposal B costs $190,000. An overall performance/cost index is
computed as follows.
This means that Proposal A provides 2.48 units of performance per
$1,000 versus only 2.06 units per $1,000 from Proposal B. Therefore,
Proposal A provides the greater value for the cost. The option with
the highest performance/cost ratio is the more economically feasible
choice. Of course, this analysis rests on the user’s ability to
identify all relevant decision factors and assign to them weights that
reflect their relative importance to the decision. If any relevant
factors are omitted or if their weights are misstated, the results of
the analysis will be misleading.
MAINTENANCE AND SUPPORT

 Implementing the latest software versions of commercial packages

and making in-house modifications to existing system to meet the
user’s need.
 Modifying an application to produce new report, or more extensive
such as programming new functionality into the system
 Outsourcing maintenance service

USER SUPPORT
Support function includes:

 Help desk services

 User training and education classes
 Documented user feedback pertaining to problems and systems error
KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT AND GROUP MEMORY
Knowledge management consist of:

 Gathering data.
 Organizing associate data items.
 Refining adds value by discovering relationships between data,
performing synthesis, and abstracting.
 Disseminating gets knowledge to the recipient in a usable form.
A knowledge management system can be used to create a group
memory, for the organization to be more effective to allow users,
developers, and the operations community to contribute to the group
memory. And this software uses a parsing utility that takes incoming
strings of data and infers relationships from them. The goal of the
system is also to analyze the heterogeneous data and disseminates
information to user and system management. Group memory is an
essential input to the organization’s evolving systems strategy.