Notes

Outline

Elements of Systems Development

Systems Approach Top Down Strategic Framework Analysis / Design Architecture

Top-Down Approach Ensure Essential Business Requirements are captured Minimize risk of solving the wrong problem Minimize risk of missing key requirements Minimize redundancies

System Development Life Cycle

Strategic Framework Industry Best Practice. Plan and prioritize based on essential objectives. Create plans based on factual information. Key Project Management Tool. Trace and manage impacts of all decisions. Manage Stakeholder Expectations.

Industry Best Practice    Variations of strategy planning have been the hallmark of systems development. The absence of a strategy (plan) has been a key contributor to project failure.

Plan and Prioritize Provides an shared understanding of planning and prioritization. Ensures the business agenda is in focus. Often, we prioritize based on inadequate or incorrect information.

Fact-based Project Planning Framework suggests priorities and dependencies which inform planning activities and tasks Easy to justify delivery decisions Easy to plan and justify resource requirements Control and confidence.

Key Project Management Tool Able to know what should be done - make sure sure the right things are happening. Able to predict resource requirements. Easily maps to the project plan - easy to justify management decisions.

Manage Impact of Decisions All decisions and the impacts of the decisions are traceable up-and-down the framework. Downstream problems/constraints are easily traced to objectives. Without these tools management makes decisions that can unknowingly contribute to failure.

Manage Stakeholder Expectations Since all decisions are traceable, all stakeholders are aware of impacts. Stakeholders are aware of solution roll-out dependencies. The framework provides a single reference point.

Strategic Framework Diagram

Strategic Framework Elements Mission Objectives Critical Success Factors Enablers      The following are more tactical, however, belong on the framework to demonstrate downstream and upstream impact: Enabling Process Use Case Process Context View Interaction Diagram

Mission / Vision The Mission and Vision articulate what the enterprise or project expects to achieve and why that achievement is necessary.  There is a distinction between the Mission and Vision. However, for in this context the author is treating them in the same manner  as an ideal or achievable status. Without a Mission or Vision there is no ultimate purpose and it is easy to lose focus, initiative, and momentum.

Objectives To achieve the Mission and/or Vision certain Objectives must be articulated to provide a path to achievement. These objectives are measurable in at least two dimensions: How much? By When? That is, an example of an Objective may be: “Sell 20% More Platinum Products By February 15, 2001”.  Here, How Much is 20% More; When is by February 15, 2001. This is the objective. Without objectives we have no way to to determine what we are trying to achieve nor be able to measure success.

Critical Success Factors Critical Success Factors (CSFs) are those things that ‘we need to do well’ in order to achieve the objective. CSFs can be shared (networked) to more than one objective. Often, this is a good indication of what you should focus on, that is, when an CSF affects many objectives, one should pay particular attention to that CSF. Without CSFs we do not know what we need to be able to do well in order to achieve our objective(s). That is, we do not have the tools to be able to control and measure success.

CSFs Continued An example CSF to the above example Objective may be: in order to sell 20% more Platinum Products by February 15, 2001 we must be good at: - Identifying Prospective Buyers - Identify Providers that provide the best and least expensive services

Enablers An Enabler enables us to be good at something. This enabler is the name of the process that ensures we meet the CSF. In the above example, the enablers may be: -Prospect Identification Process -Provider Management Process These are the names of the enabler functions whose purposes are to ensure that we are “good at” the CSF or CSFs to which they are associated. Enablers are often associated with several CSFs and, indirectly, associated with one or more Objectives. Without naming the enabler we have no focus for understanding the process we must analyze and design to be successful.

Tactical Elements    The following elements describe the more technical aspects of the business. These get into more concrete levels of detail and through this lower level of detail, begin to form the basis of candidate architectures and candidate solutions.

Enabling Process Graphical and textual representation of Actors (users or systems) and Workflow (Process Map). Provides contexts for use cases and process improvement. Informs the technical architecture. Provides opportunities for organizational change. Without process maps there is no way to determine if work is carried out in an effective manner and if resources are used efficiently.

Use Case A time-ordered sequence of events. An interaction between an Actor and a System. A description of the context and conditions under which actions occur in the business. Without use cases it is difficult to put business activities and business “things” (objects) into context.

Use Case Analysis Use case analysis results in two key deliverables: Process Context View Interaction Diagram(s) Other deliverables (as a result of analyzing the above deliverables) include: Information Architecture Application Architecture

Process Context View A static view of the things (object/entity types) that are used in the use case. Focuses the analysis activity and minimizes the risk of overlooking key business requirements. Informs the design structure and highlights development innovation and reuse opportunities.

Interaction Diagram Highlights the relationships and dependencies (measurable prioritization standards) for application development. Highlights opportunities for reuse. Informs data access patterns.

Architecture The framework elements define and/or affirm the various architectures that support the business objectives (and by definition - the business). The various aspects of the architecture provide a reference for understanding and evolving the business as well as providing a reference for developing solutions to meet the business (business and technology alignment).

Architecture