Ashley Hicks

Daniel Fang (Leader)

Jordan White
Ryan Bennett
Trevor Williams
Group 3 Discussion 1
1. How does strategic planning influence day-to-day business
operations? Why is it important for systems analysts to understand
a companys strategic plan? (Tenth Edition)
Strategic planning affects day to day business planning because companies
need to prepare themselves on a daily basis to support and posture
themselves towards their long term goals. Companies also have to deal with
rapidly changing technology when supporting their strategic goals. Strategic
planning focuses on several years in the future. Systems analysts should
focus understand the companys strategic plan because it shows them how to
succeed in their long term goals. They need to focus and understand the
larger and strategic big picture goal, even while carrying out daily tasks.
2. What is a SWOT analysis? Prepare a SWOT analysis of your school or
your employer. (Tenth Edition)
A SWOT analysis is a way to assess a group or individuals current state or
ability to accomplish a task. SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses,
Opportunities, and Threats. Strengths refer to any types of strengths that one
possesses. These can include manpower strengths or even resources.
Weaknesses are anything that is lacking. Opportunities are what is available,
and how one plans on taking advantage of them. Threats are any types of
potential problems, but this part of the SWOT analysis can also include how
one needs to manage, assess, and respond to future threats that may arise.
SWOT Analysis for Employer (Department of Defense/Air Force)
Strengths:
-Diverse workforce allows for multiple solutions to problems.
-Geographically dispersed throughout the world, allows for fast
reactions
-Able to react quickly to threats, allows for better defense of
United States

Weaknesses:
-Budget Cuts can lead to standstills when procuring new
technology. It can also severely impact manpower.
-Not decentralized enough for decision making, which impacts
making decisions in real time or near real time.
-Many rules and regulations limit what can and cannot be done.
This can add a significant amount of paperwork, as well as time
to any type of acquisition.
-Still using many old legacy systems with older technology (also
impacted by budget cuts).
Opportunities:
-Great benefits for employees, helps to keep a workforce, which
allows for better continuity in workplaces
-Potential to be first responders for humanitarian missions as a
result of geographic disposition.
Threats:
-Aggressive hacking/infiltration of government networks from
both nation states and non-state actors.
-Terrorist attacks
-Nation states that are unfriendly or confrontational
3. What is an effective way to assess user requests for additional
features and functions? (Tenth Edition)
Users rely more heavily on information systems to perform their jobs and are
therefore more likely to request even more services and support from IT.
These requests could come in many forms, from improving a companys web
site to a companys system may too hard for the average user to learn and
understand. There is a pecking order for user requests, every company wants
their users to have a work and a hand in developing the system, It starts out
with a strategic plan, then the top managers sets the overall direction for the
IT team and then the smaller issues are usually fixed from user requests.
4. What are four types of feasibility? Which type focuses on total cost
of ownership? Which type is influenced primarily by users? (Tenth
Edition)

The four types of feasibility are operational feasibility, technical feasibility,

economic feasibility, and schedule feasibility. Economic feasibility focuses on
determining and weighing the projected benefits versus estimated costs of a
given project, also known as the total cost of ownership. So, economic
feasibility focuses on total cost of ownership. Schedule feasibility determines
whether a project can be completed within a reasonable time frame and
whether the requirements can be reasonably achieved. As the users are the
ones completing the project and fulfilling the requirements, they have the
most direct influence over when the project is finished. Thus, schedule
feasibility is the type influenced primarily by users.
5. Describe the six steps in a typical preliminary investigation. Why
should an analyst be careful when using the word problem? (Tenth
Edition)
Step 1 : Understanding the problem or opportunity. A popular technique for
investigating a problem is the fishbone diagram. This diagram first states the
problem and draws a main bone with sub-bones that will represent possible
causes of the problem.
Step 2 : Define the project Scope and Constraints. Defining the boundaries
and purpose of the project. Creating a list with "Must do, Should do, Could do,
and Won't do, could be valuable and can be viewed throughout the project to
view what has been done and what is still needed to be done.
Step 3 : Performing Fact-Finding. The purpose of this is to gather information
about project usability, costs, benefits, and schedules. To do this there are
multiple methods including organization charts, conduct interviews, review
current documentation, observe operations, and carry out a user survey.
Step 4 : Analyze Project Usability, Cost Benefit, and Schedule Data. All the
information that was gathered in the previous step (Step 3 : Performing FactFinding) has to be carefully broken down and analyzed. Putting this
information into tables or graphs so that it is more easily understandable.
Step 5 : Evaluate Feasibility. Taking into account what your research and
previous steps you are to evaluate the feasibility of the project. The
Operational feasibility, Technical feasibility, Economic feasibility, and
Schedule feasibility should all be taken into to decide this step.
Step 6 : Present results and recommendations to Management. This is the
final step where you will present your plan to Management. You may find that
no action is going to be necessary or that just a simple solution is necessary
to fix the problem. A typical report will have the following sections :
Introduction-Overview of the project. Systems request summary-basis of
systems request. Findings- includes the scope, constraints, and feasibility.

Case for action- Summary of requests and recommendations. Projects RolesEach persons assigned role. Time and Cost estimates- All cost's that are
associated with the project. Expected benefits- anticipated tangible and
intangible benefits with a timetable. Appendix- In you need to attach any
supporting information.
When interacting with users you should be careful of using the word problem
because it has a negative meaning. If you ask users about problems they
may stress current system limitations rather than features they would like to
add.
Works Cited
Rosenblatt, H. J. (2014). Systems Analysis and Design (10th ed.). Boston, MA:
Cengage Learning.