The Analysis Phase

1
The Analysis Phase

• Objective
• To study the current system, organization, and
  problems to determine what changes need to be
  made in order to achieve the organizations
  goals.
• Thus, the focus of the analysis phase is the
  CURRENT situation, not the new system that will
  be implemented.

2
Steps in Analysis

• Requirements gathering
• using interviews, observations, documents, etc.
  to learn about the customers business, their
  current systems, and its problems
• Requirements structuring
• using DFDs, ERDs, logic models, etc., to
  represent and organize the information gathered
• Generation of alternatives
• based on the requirements, investigate possible
  changes that would achieve the customers
  objectives

3
Inputs to Analysis

• Customer information
• from interviews, observations, documents, etc.
• information about goals, objectives, problems,
  work processes, current systems, constraints,
  etc.
• Technical information
• from previous experience, web searches, vendor
  literature, previous education
• information about what technology is available,
  what it can do, how it works, and how much it
  costs

4
Output of Analysis

• The Systems Proposal
• summarizes all the information gathered and
  structured during analysis
• presents alternative solutions
• compares solutions in terms of costs, benefits,
  feasibility, ability to solve problems, etc.
• provides all the information the customer needs
  to make a decision
• recommends one solution

5
Steps in Analysis

• 3 steps
• gather requirements
• structure requirements
• generate alternatives

6
Gathering requirements

• When starting to gather information, you have to
  decide
• what information sources to consult
• what information gathering methods to use

7
Choosing information sources

• Problem too many information sources for the
  time and resources available
• Solution sampling
• Convenience - whoever shows up or responds
• Purposive - each information source individually
  selected
• Random - left completely to chance
• Stratified - randomly picked from specific
  categories

8
Sample size

• Heuristics
• make sure all functions are covered
• make sure both ends of system are covered
• try to get two sources for each piece of
  information triangulation

9
Information gathering methods

• Interviewing
• Questionnaires
• Observation
• Documents

10
Interviewing

• Focus on getting
• opinions
• feelings
• goals
• procedures (both formal and informal)
• not facts

11
Steps in interview preparation

• Read background material
• Establish objectives
• Decide who to interview
• Schedule
• Design interview guide

12
Interview Guide Logistical info record name,
office, date, time Organization How long
have you worked on project? At
company? Have you worked with any of the
project members before on other projects? Who
on the project team do you interact with
most? To whom do you report? To whom are you
responsible for your progress on
project? Inspection process Who chose the
inspectors? How long did it take? Why were
those ones chosen in particular? Which
inspectors inspected what? Who took care of
scheduling? Was it done via email or
face-to-face? How much time did it take? What
steps were involved in putting together the
inspection package? How much time did that
take? How are project inspections different
from inspections in other company projects
youve been on? How was this inspection
different from other project inspections youve
been involved with?
13
Interview questions

• Open vs. closed
• Probes
• Pitfalls
• leading questions
• double-barreled questions
• judgmental questions

14
Recording of interviews

• Audiorecording
• Notetaking
• Scribing

15
Interviewing pointers

• give clues about the level of detail you want
• no more than 45-60 minutes
• end with anything else I should know?
• dispel any notion of the right answer
• feign ignorance
• let interviewee know next steps
• say Thank you!

16
Writing up the interview

• ASAP!!!!

17
Questionnaires

• Most useful when you want an overall opinion from
  a wide variety of dispersed people
• Use to get the majority opinion
• Can be combined with interviews

18
Questionnaire questions

• Open (qualitative)
• richer data
• must be fairly specific to get comparable answers
• not useful with a very large number of
  respondents
• Closed (quantitative)
• easier to analyze
• use when all possible responses can be
  anticipated and are mutually exclusive
• Appropriate terminology
• Pilot use

19
Administering the questionnaire

• balance between your convenience and that of your
  subjects
• paper-based vs. electronic
• general availability vs. mail vs. personal
  delivery
• mandated vs. voluntary

20
Accuracy

• Triangulation gt sometimes youll get different
  answers to the same question
• different perspectives
• actual practice different from policy
• sometimes one source clearly more reliable
• Reconciling answers must be done sensitively
• ask a third person
• interview a group
• observation

21
Observation

• When you need to learn
• what is actually done, as opposed to what is
  described
• what interactions are going on
• what goes into decision-making
• Time sampling vs. event sampling
• Need both typical and atypical situations
• Very expensive

22
Observation methods

• Shadowing
• Participant observation
• Think-aloud protocols
• Prior ethnography

23
Documents

• Artifacts of paper-based system
• data collection forms - blank and used
• reports
• Procedure descriptions
• System documentation
• Policy handbooks
• Archival documents

24
Joint Application Design (JAD)

• Method for doing requirements and UI design with
  users
• Requires a 2-3 day meeting with users, analysts,
  senior people, technical consultants, etc.
• Useful when innovation is important and its
  feasible to get everyone together
• Benefits
• gets requirements over quickly
• user ownership
• creativity
• Drawbacks
• takes a big commitment
• dependent on administrative effectiveness
• can be political

25
Prototyping

• used iteratively to
• clarify what a user has said they wanted
• show a user what theyve suggested
• to compare different ways of implementing a
  users suggestion
• pitfalls
• design can become too tied to one users wishes
• user may be unwilling to give up the prototype
• later concerns may impact interface design
• prototyping may never end

26
Evolutionary vs. Revolutionary System Change

• SAD is an evolutionary process
• processes are changed in small ways
• changes are based on current practice
• analysis is of current processes
• revolutionary approach
• Business Process Reengineering (BPR)
• making radical changes without being inhibited by
  current practice
• motivated by
• drastic changes in the environment
• need to increase profits dramatically
• innovative and creative managers