INFORMATION SYSTEMS FOR MANAGEMENT

Agenda Information system project Organization analysis

Project orieneted management Organizations are changing The changes should be reflected in information systems How can we adjust information systems to changes?

System design processes - classification Designing systems supporting managers actions and reactions to changes. Designing passive systems, detecting problems in organizations and providing information on problems occuring (managers, after the information analysis make decisions).

Comment Designing passive systems, supporting passive management, focused on repetitive, schematic routines nowadays is less often used as dynamic market situation requires managing complex, unique processes (so called project management).

Information projects management: definitions Information system project is a documentation concerning new information system or existing system modernization. Project is a sequence ofunique, complex and related actions performed to achieve a common goal, limited with deadlines, budget, preliminary constraints.

Information projects management: definitions Project characteristics: Time (deadlines), Scope, Resources (human, capital, material, technology, information).

Information projects management: definitions Project management is a set of activities performed to achieved goals determined by managers in predefined time, using predefined resources. Information project management is to create a product – information system.

Information projects management: definitions Project methodologies: IPM: Institute of Project Management, IPMA: International Project Management Association Design Research Society, Design Methodology Group

Information projects management: definitions Project methodology: process of design organizing, approach to predefined problems solving. Methodology should be chosen with respect to: Management infrastructure, Resources accessible, Staff qualifications, Environment.

Information projects management: definitions Project management: Traditional project management (project realised according to a plan) Adaptive project framework (project is defined and realised after analysis) Extreme project management (management in extreme conditions, reaction to changes) Goal and solution definedGoal and solution unknown

Information projects management: definitions Project management stages: Analysis and defnition of a project Design, problem solving implementation Maintenance/ reengineeering

Project teams Creating and implementation is supervised by supervising team (supervising committee) Supervising team are: Users, Creators (makers), Experts.

Project team Superviving teams are making decisions at strategic level, including those concerning finances and staff:  Defining goals,  Defining implementation team,  Analyzing the company,  Defining implementation budget,  Choosing software provider,  Choosing a consulting company,  Providing top managers commitment,  Defining implementation schedule,  Appointing members of exective team,  Process verification,  Launching the system.

Project team Executive teams (executive committees) include users and make tactic decisions and project analysis: Jobs and responsibilities assignement, Implementation processmanagement, Implementation reports, Supervising, monitoring, reporting work in progress, Initiating corrective actions when necessary.

Project team Members features: competneces, motivation, communication (nets are better than hierarchy) In a net problems are easier to discover and find, project monitoring is easier, In a net communication is easier because there are no artificial barriers, In a net solving problems is easier, problems and conflicts are of smaller range.

Project categories Implementation of a system bought from a system provider Creating new, unique software

Information system lifecycle Analysis and defnition of a project Design, problem solving implementation Maintenance/ reengineeering

Analysis Analysis: Quantity, Quality. Analysis is crucial for project success because at analysis and design stage about 50% of mistakes is made. What is more, the later the mistake is discovered, the more expensive for company it is.

Analysis Analysis includes the following set of factors: A={S, G, M, C, H, R} S: subjects G: goals M: methods and technioques C: conditions H: hypothesis R: relations

Analysis: subjects Set of decisive subjects including subset of system users (in organization and inits environment). System is built to meet information requirements of its users, thus users identification is crucial for system quality.

Analysis: goals Set of goals including subsets of users requirements. The set includes both goals that can be measured and goals that can be described. When defining goals, it is necessary to define relations between them, to identify goals of primary and secondary importance.

Analisys: methods and techniques A set of methods which are used to define users requirements. Methods and techniques to be used can be based on intuition and common sense or include complex mathematical calculations. it is recommended to use different methods – to verify analysis results.

Analysis: conditions A set of conditions in which analysis is performed, there are internal and external conditions. Conditions have both positive and negative influence. Negative conditions are constraints. Conditions refer to socio-psychological, technical, economical and organizational problems.

Analisys: hypothesis Set of hypothesis refering to sets listed before. In dynamic conditions it is impossible to define all the sets elements, that is why some hypothesis are assumed,described by probabilities of actions to happen.

Analysis: relations Sets of relations between sets listed above.

Analysis procedure Analysis procedure includes: Definition of set of users, Definition of set of goals, Definition of set of conditions, Definition of set of hypothesis, Analysis of organization. Each analysis stage should include identification of a tool which is to be used to solve a problem.

System users System is designed for the organization as a whole, for a group of users or for individual users. System users are: External users (clients, cooperating organizations and other organizations), Internal users (managers of all organizational levels, operators).

System goals Information system is built and used to enable organization realize its goals, so analysis should translate organization goals to information system goals. Ingoal hierarchy there are goals of primary importance and goals of lesser importance as well.

Constraints Active constraints: influence conditions of analysis, they should be decreased Passive constraints: by making proper decisions their influence decreases False constraints: initially they seem to be important, then they appear not important

Organization analysis methods By product: Analysing requirements is side-effect, final product is analysed, Used when creating problem oriented subsystems, not labour-consuming, but information requirements are met only partially.

Organization analysis methods Total study: Analysis of large managers group, comparison (differnces between planned and existing system), Used to identify important domains, connected with risk (requirements may not be defined properly), it is cost- consuming

Organization analysis methods Critical Success Factors analysis: Definition of domains which should continuously controlled and supervised by managers, Analysis of tasks realization progress, allows to assess mangement efficiency, goals hierarchy should be correctly defined, labour-consuming

Organization analysis methods Key Indicator System analysis: Selecting set of indicators providing information on organization condition, Allows to identify functions requiring specific information, environment identification, goals hierarchy

Organization analysis methods Business Process Model analysis: Defining basic units, verification of business processes, Enables process models creation, requirememnts analysis, recognition of data transfered between business processes.

Organization analysis methods Enterprise Activity Matrix: Based on assumption that in a company there is a limited number of tasks, so it is possible to create a matrix including all the tasks (what, how and with what resources can be done), Gives a framework of is going on/ should be going on.

Analysis techniques Observation (direct, indirect, secret), Interviews, standardized and not-standardized, Surveys/ questionnaires, Discussions.

Approaches to analysis Socjo-psychological approach, according to which analysis is a social project, Structural approach, in which formal analysis of a system is conducted (result: hierarchical structure including data, functions and relations), Object-oriented approach, allows to combine data and processes into objects.