Management Information Systems,

Sixth Edition

Chapter 12:
Systems Planning and Development
 Objectives
• Explain the importance of and steps in IT
planning
• Describe the systems development life cycle,
which is the traditional approach to systems
development
• Explain the challenges involved in systems
development
• List the advantages and disadvantages of
different system conversion strategies

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 Objectives (continued)

• Enumerate and explain the principles of agile

systems development methods
• Be able to contribute a meaningful set of
requirements when serving on a project
development team for a new or modified IS
• Explain the concept of systems integration
• Discuss whether IS professionals should be
certified

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 Planning Information Systems

• Enterprise ISs are gaining in popularity

• However, they:
– Require a substantial investment
– Carry a high risk in implementation
• Successful integration of the system is vital
– Must align IT strategies with the overall
organization strategies
• Careful planning of an IS implementation is
necessary

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Steps in Planning Information Systems
• IT planning includes several key steps:
– Create a corporate and IT mission statement
– Articulate the vision for IT within the organization
– Create IT strategic and tactical plans
– Create a plan for operations to achieve the
mission and vision
– Create a budget to ensure that resources are
available to achieve the mission and vision

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Steps in Planning Information Systems
(continued)
• Mission statement: communicates the most
important overarching goal of organization
– Includes how the goals will be achieved
• IS mission statement: describes the role of IT in
the organization
– Should be compatible with the organizational
mission statement
– Includes the ideal combination of hardware,
software, and networking to support the mission

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Steps in Planning Information Systems
(continued)
• CIO develops a strategic plan for implementation
of IT in the organization:
– What technology will be used by employees,
customers, and suppliers
• Goals in the plan are broken down into
objectives, such as:
– Resources to be acquired or developed
– Timetables for acquiring and implementing
resources
– Training
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Steps in Planning Information Systems
(continued)
• Objectives are broken down to operational
details
• IT planning is similar to planning of other
resource acquisitions
• Growing proportion of IT funds is spent on
software in recent years
– More purchasing and adapting of software
– Less developing in-house software

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 The Benefits of Standardization
in Planning
• One major goal and advantage of planning is
standardization
• Benefits include:
– Cost savings: better bargaining power in
purchasing and leasing hardware and software
– Efficient training: a smaller variety of software
reduces employee training needs
– Efficient support: enables more staff
specialization

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 From Planning to Development
• After planning, management must decide how to
obtain the systems (usually software)
• Approaches to systems development are the same
for in-house or purchased systems
• Two general approaches:
– Systems development life cycle (SDLC), the
traditional approach
– Nontraditional methods, including agile methods
• Prototyping: fast development of an application
based on initial user requirements

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 The Systems Development Life Cycle
• Large ISs are conceived, planned, and
developed within the systems development life
cycle (SDLC) framework
• Also known as waterfall development
• Consists of four major sequential phases:
– Analysis
– Design
– Implementation
– Support

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 Analysis

• Systems analysis: a five-step process

– Investigation
– Technical feasibility study
– Economic feasibility study
– Operational feasibility study
– Requirements definition

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 Analysis (continued)

• Investigation
– Is a system really necessary?
– Is the system, as conceived, feasible?
• Small ad hoc team usually performs a
preliminary investigation by interviewing
employees
• Feasibility studies: a larger analysis conducted
after preliminary results indicate an IS is
warranted

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 Analysis (continued)
• Technical feasibility study:
– Determines if components exist or can be developed
– Determines if the organization has adequate
hardware
• Economic feasibility study:
– Determines if the new IS is economically justified
– Cost/benefit analysis: spreadsheet showing all
costs and benefits of the proposed system
– Benefits must outweigh the costs over the life of the
system

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 Analysis (continued)
• Return on investment (ROI): most accurate
economic analysis
– Calculates the difference between the stream of
benefits and the stream of costs over the life of
the system
• May be difficult to justify the cost of a new IS
because many benefits are intangible and
cannot be quantified in dollar terms
– Examples: business intelligence (BI) and
knowledge management (KM) systems

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 Analysis (continued)
• Operational feasibility study:
– Determines how the new system will be used
• Organizational culture: general tone of the
corporate environment
– Must determine the new system’s compatibility with
the organizational culture
• Requirements definition: details what the
system should be able to do
• System requirements: detail the functions and
features expected from the new system

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 Design
• Design: the second phase in systems development
• Systems design: includes three steps for devising
the means to meet all the requirements
– Description of the components
– Construction
– Testing
• If purchasing a system:
– Design phase determines how to adapt the existing
software
– Construction: actual changes in program code

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 Design (continued)
• Symbols are used to communicate ideas about
data, processes, and information
– Visual information can be grasped more quickly
• Data flow diagram (DFD): describes the flow of
data in a business operation using four symbols
– External entities: individuals and groups external
to the system (customers, employees, etc.)
– Processes: an event or events that affect data
– Data store: any form of data at rest
– Direction of data flow: indicates how data moves

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 Design (continued)
• The simplicity of a DFD is its advantage
• DFD symbols are suitable for describing any IS,
including noncomputer-based ISs
• Can help pinpoint weaknesses:
– Where processes can be automated
– What is shared by different processes
– What can be changed to strengthen the IS
• A DFD cannot describe a system completely
– Does not depict computations within processes or
timing relationships among data flows
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 Design (continued)
• Unified modeling language (UML): de facto
standard for visualizing, specifying, and
documenting software
• Helps developers communicate and logically
validate desired features
• Is independent of programming languages
• Provides standard symbols and notations for
depicting object-oriented elements

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 Design (continued)
• UML consists of diagrams:
– Use case: an activity of the system in response to
the user (an actor)
– Class: describes class structure and contents
– Interaction: describes interactions of objects and the
sequence of their activities
– State charts: indicate the states through which
objects pass and their responses to stimuli
– Activity: represents highly active states triggered by
completion of other actions
– Physical diagrams: high-level descriptions of
software modules

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 Design (continued)
• Construction
– Consists of mostly programming activities
– May take months or years
– Completed modules are tested via a walk-
through of the program logic or a simulation of
actual program execution
• System testing
– Tests the entire integrated system, comparing
results to the system requirements
• Testing period often is the victim of schedule or
budget compression, resulting in poor testing
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 Implementation
• Implementation: delivery of a new system
– Consists of two steps:
• Conversion
• Training
– Training may or may not precede conversion
• Conversion: switching from the old system to
the new system
– Can be a very difficult time

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 Implementation (continued)
• Four basic conversion strategies:
– Parallel conversion: the old system is used
simultaneously with the new system at first
– Phased conversion: breaks the new IS into modules
and integrates one at a time
• Reduces risk but delays some benefits
– Cut-over conversion (or flash cut conversion):
immediately replaces all modules
• Risky but may be inexpensive
– Pilot conversion: introduces the IS into one business
unit at a time
• Beta site: a site that tests the new system

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 Support
• Support: begins after delivery, and includes two
responsibilities
– Maintenance: postimplementation debugging,
updates, and adding postponed features
– User help
• Maintenance comprises up to 80% of IS budgets
• Support is the longest phase of the system life
cycle
• Effective maintenance requires good system
documentation

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 Agile Methods

• Agile methods: alternative development

methods
– Treat software development as series of contacts
with users
– Goal: fast development of software
– Improve software after user requests for
modifications received
• Agile methods use iterative programming

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 Agile Methods (continued)

• Popular agile methods include:

– Extreme programming (XP)
– Adaptive software development (ASD)
– Lean development (LD)
– Rational unified process (RUP)
– Feature driven development (FDD)
– Dynamic systems development method (DSDM)
– Scrum
– Crystal

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 Agile Methods (continued)
• Major advantage of agile methods:
– Fast development of application software
• Agile method risks include:
– Analysis phase is limited or eliminated, increasing
the risk of incompatibilities
– More emphasis on programming, resulting in less
documentation, which may make it difficult or
impossible to make later modifications

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 Agile Methods (continued)
• Manifesto for Agile Software Development
expresses these priorities:
– Individuals and interactions over processes
– Working software over comprehensive
documentation
– Customer collaboration over contract negotiation
– Responding to change over following a plan
• Agile methods aim to have light but sufficient
development processes

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 Agile Methods (continued)
• User involvement is encouraged throughout the
process
• Modules are tested immediately after completion
• Communication with users is informal
• Extreme programming uses two programmers
per module working on the same computer
– Fosters constructive criticism and feedback
• Domino’s Pizza successfully implemented XP
method; DaimlerChrysler did not

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 When to Use Agile Methods
• Agile methods are best used:
– When a desired system is small
• Analysis is less important
• Requires a smaller investment of resources
– For unstructured problems
– For developing user interfaces
– When users cannot specify all requirements at
the start of the project
• They may be unfamiliar with the technology
• Requirements may be difficult to conceptualize
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 When Not to Use Agile Methods

• Do not use agile methods when:

– The desired system is large or complex
• System failure entails great financial loss
– The desired system must interface with other
systems
• SDLC recommended for complex systems
• Documentation is key for integration

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 Project Planning
and Management Tools
• Several tools exist to help plan and manage a
development project, including IS projects
• IBM’s Rational Portfolio Manager:
– Helps plan investment in a new system and
manage the development project and delivery
• Primavera’s ProSight:
– Helps plan and manage application portfolios,
resources, budgets, and compliance with
government regulations

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 Project Planning
and Management Tools (continued)
• Primavera’s eProject:
– Web-based tool that allows members and
customers to define tasks and manage projects

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 Systems Integration

• Systems integration:
– Examines the needs of entire organization
– Produces a plan to combine disparate systems to
allow data to flow between units
• Some service companies specialize in systems
integration
• Integration is more challenging than development
• Legacy systems may need to be interfaced with
new systems

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 Systems Integration (continued)

• Systems integrators must be skilled in hardware

and software
• May be difficult to overcome hardware and
software incompatibility issues between systems
• Systems integration may span several
organizations, requiring integration using
telecommunications

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 Summary

• IT planning is important because of high

investment costs and high risk in implementing
enterprise applications
• Standardization is an important part of IT planning
• Systems development life cycle (SDLC) has well-
defined phases: analysis, design, implementation,
and support
• Purpose of systems analysis is to determine what
needs the system will satisfy

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 Summary (continued)

• Feasibility studies determine if a proposed

system is possible and desirable
• System requirements detail the features needed
• Developers outline system components
graphically using tools like UML
• Unified Modeling Language (UML) is used to
create model of desired system
• Implementation includes training and conversion
from the old system to the new system

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 Summary (continued)
• Support entails maintenance and satisfying
changing needs
• Agile methods are a popular alternative to
traditional systems development life cycle
• Tools help plan and manage development
projects
• Systems integration may be more complicated
than systems development
• Great responsibility of IS professionals results in
the desirability of certification

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