Page 516 - Using MIS

484 Chapter 12 Information Systems Development

So
what? Systems Development?

Why bother learning about systems development? You’re an
accounting or finance or management major. Leave it to
someone else.
You sure can. Won’t help you career-wise and it might hurt
you, but most businesspeople today do leave it to someone else.
Which creates an opportunity for you, does it not?
Let’s say you have a great idea for an information system. What
do you do with it? As an idea it isn’t worth much. But can you put
some meat on the bones of your idea? Source: Hasloo Group Production Studio/Shutterstock
As you know by now, your idea better be consistent with your
organization’s competitive strategy. If your company is the cost
leader, your idea better save costs. But let’s say your employer
differentiates itself on customer service, and suppose you manage
the customer support department. You’ve been in this job 6
months, and you know that your customers are frustrated that
they must provide name, contact data, and product data before
they can be serviced, every time they call. You know that if your
company were to create an identifying tag and place it on its
products during manufacturing, then that tag could be affiliated 3. Given the description of the problem and your idea,
at the factory with the product’s data. If the customer registers the define the system goals and scope. Make assumptions as
product, then the tag could be affiliated with the customer’s data. necessary.
If the customer does not register the product, then the customer
data will be associated with the tag on the first call. After that, 4. Because your organization is not a cost leader, does this
when a customer calls, he or she just provides the tag number, system need to be cost feasible? Explain why or why not.
and all the data is available to the support rep. 5. Describe factors that affect:
You’ve got this idea. Now what? You could write up the idea a. schedule feasibility.
and send it to your boss or to the IS department in an email, but b. technical feasibility.
with the knowledge of this chapter, you can do much more than c. organizational feasibility.
that. You decide to apply your knowledge of the SDLC to produce 6. Suppose you document your answers to questions 1–5,
a proposal for a new system. along with your assessment of feasibility, in a report or
PowerPoint presentation. What will you do with that report?
Questions And why?
7. Suppose your idea is rejected by your organization’s decision
1. Briefly explain how the SDLC applies to this situation. makers. Have you wasted your time? What benefits will accrue
2. Summarize the work that needs to be done to define the to you from this effort? What risks do you run in allocating
new system. your time to developing this idea?

The second reason that the SDLC is falling out of favor is that it is very risky. The people
for whom the system is being constructed cannot see what they have until the very end. At that
point, if something is wrong, all the money and time has already been spent. Furthermore, what
if, as frequently happens, the project runs out of money or time before it is completed? The re-
sult is a form of management blackmail in which the developers say, “Well, it’s not done yet, but