ICT393 Advanced Business Analysis and Design

Background

You should consider yourself to be an employee of a consulting firm called Innovative Solutions that specialises in systems analysis, design, and development services. The firm's services range from advising other organisations of how they can meet their own needs for system development through to providing direct development services. The clients of your firm range from very small businesses of only a few employees with very little in-house expertise, to large organisations with large in-house IT departments. Client organisations not only vary widely in terms of size, but also in terms of line of business, financial resources, IT infrastructure, and organisational culture. The required timeframe for developing and implementing a proposed system will also vary depending on both internal and external environmental factors.

There are a wide variety of possible approaches to the development of systems. These vary considerably in terms of factors such as whether they are:

• Sequential versus iterative
• Model driven versus product driven
• Prescriptive versus adaptive
• Proprietary versus in-house

Different approaches are suited to different types of projects in different types of organisations.

In this assignment you will write a business report on system development methodologies for employees of Innovative Solutions to use when selecting the optimal approach for clients. You will investigate what factors should be considered when deciding which development methodology to use to support development in a particular project, and present your findings in the form of a series of guidelines. The report will act as a guide for other consultants when selecting the optimal systems development methodology for clients.

To do

To successfully complete the assignment, you should:

• Identify factors that may determine the appropriateness of a particular development approach for an organisation - for example organisational size, team size and whether the system is mission-critical may be important. Use the literature to do this.
• Review the following two existing system development methodologies in terms of their characteristics, benefits and drawbacks:
  • Scrum
  • Rational Unified Process
• Consider when the use of each methodology is appropriate
• Propose guidelines to help assist in the selection of which of these system development methodologies to use
• Create a report based on what you have found out. It should include some information about the factors that determine choice of methodology, some information about the methodologies, and well explained guidelines. The report will be used by employees of the consulting firm, so should be written in a style that will be accessible to them.