SYSANAL Final Project (1st term, SY 2008-2009)

 

TITLE: “An Analysis on the [Name of the System Analyzed] of [Name of Company]”

I. Chapter 1

·          Company Background  à to be submitted, 1 company proposal, on July 3 (Thurs)

·          Statement of the Problem 

·          Objectives of the System

·          Significance of the Study

·          Scope and Limitation

 

II. Chapter 2

·          Use Case Diagram of the Existing System 

·          Process Walkthrough (with pictures)

·          Activity Diagrams of the Existing System

·          Process time vs. Cycle Time (based on process walkthrough)

·          Geographic flowchart 

 

III. Chapter 3

·          Table of Recommendations (based on Activity Diagram in Chapter 2)

·          Benchmarking

·          Streamlining

·          Use Case Diagram of the Proposed System

 

Appendices:

Interview Transcription

Existing Forms and Reports

Related Literature (mostly research for benchmarking)

Other important documents (company documents, brochures, etc.)

 

Guidelines to follow in the documentation:

 

I.                    Chapter 1 – Organizing for Improvement

·          Company Background

Should contain the following:

-          Company Overview (Official Name, Address, Line of Business of the company)

-          Company Logo (if applicable)

-          Mission/Vision of the organization (what are its major strategies/aims)

-          Company History

-          Products and Services

-          Number of Customers (regular customers or average number of customers)

-          Number of Transactions (estimated)

-          Organizational Chart (with number of personnel per Department if applicable)

 

·          Statement of the Problem

Ø        Point out the critical business process your study focuses on. 

Ø        Start this section with a paragraph containing the general problem followed by a bulleted list of specific problems.

Ø        Focus on the root problems and other consequences of these problems.

Ø        Explain why this process/system was selected in terms of its importance to the company or department in achieving its goals. 

Ø        Remember: This section should justify why you think this study is substantial.

 

·          Objectives of the System

Ø        This section should contain the goals of your study or proposed system.

Ø        Describe the improvement targets for effectiveness, efficiency and adaptability.

Ø        Start this section with a paragraph containing the general objective followed by a bulleted list of specific objectives.

Ø        Answer the question “How will you address your problems?” for your general and specific objectives.

Ø        Some aims you should keep in mind when formulating your objectives are given below.  For example, “How will we achieve cost reduction and avoidance?” or ”How will we reduce errors?”. The answers to these should be included in your objectives.

Tangible Benefits:

·         Cost reduction and avoidance

·         Error Reduction

·         Increased Flexibility

·         Increased speed of activity

·         Increased speed of reports

·         Improvement of management planning and control

·         Opening new markets and increasing sales opportunities

Intangible Benefits:

·         Competitive necessity

·         Improved organizational planning

·         Increased organizational flexibility

·         Promotion of organizational learning and understanding

·         Availability of new, better or more information

·         Ability to investigate more alternatives

·         Faster decision-making

·         Information processing efficiency

·         Improved asset utilization

·         Improved resource control

·         Increased accuracy in clerical operations

·         Improved work process that can in turn improve employee morale

·         Positive impacts on society

·          Significance of the Study

Ø        Explain the importance of the study in the critical processes pointed out in the Statement of the Problem.

Ø        Explain, in paragraph format, the significance of the study to the user, department, company, and to the group.

 

·          Scope and Limitation

Ø        Define the boundaries of your study.  Explain which general processes you examined and which related processes you did not include.  For example: say you are doing a patient monitoring system; indicate that you confined the study to the monitoring of patient appointments and payments, and the records of clinic fees and monthly dues are not included.

Ø        Define terms and acronyms used in your study. For example, the acronym NCR refers to National Capital Region; OCR refers to Official Customer Receipt.

 

II.                  Chapter 2 – System Analysis

 

·          Use Case Diagram

Ø        Describe the different scenarios (context of the existing system functions) by means of use case diagrams with corresponding narrative explanation.

Ø        Use Case Diagram should clearly depict all the needed actors (entities) and use cases.

Ø        All use cases should have corresponding narratives.

 

·          Process Walkthrough (Use Case Diagram with pictures)

Ø        Present a table wherein use case corresponds to a numbered step.

Ø        Pictures of the use cases should be included as much as possible.

 

 

·          Activity Diagrams

Ø        Present the detailed level the procedural flow of each of the specific use cases.

Ø        The activity diagram is done through observation, interviewing, sampling and note-taking, and by personally following the process steps.

Ø        Activity Diagram should clearly depict the swimlanes (entities + process owners), and action states (processes).

Ø        All activities should have corresponding narratives. Narratives of activities should be more detailed than narratives of the use-case diagram, with more focus on the information points (what particular data, forms and reports) and tools and storages (what files, file cabinets, logbooks, etc to store information), and what roles are involved per activity.

 

·          Process time vs. Cycle Time (Activity Diagram)

Ø        Each activity in the activity diagram should correspond to a numbered step. For example:

1.       Approve Order Slip

2.       Deliver Ordered Supplies to Requesting Department

Ø        Adopt the format of the Process Time vs. Cycle Time table in the presentation of Analyzing System Needs.

Ø        This section may be additional support that certain activities take too much time, or that the proposed system will minimize or lessen the cycle time of the critical process.

Ø        Indicate the unit of measure (seconds, minutes, hours, etc.) the group used in estimating the time.

Ø        Include the total at the bottom of the columns for both process and cycle time.

 

·          Geographic flowchart (Activity Diagram mapping)

Ø        Each activity in the activity diagram should correspond to a numbered step. For example:

1.       Approve Order Slip

2.       Deliver Ordered Supplies to Requesting Department

Ø        As much as possible, confine your geographic flowchart to one page only. 

Ø        Use separate pages and diagrams for different floors or office locations.

Ø        Use off-page connectors to connect steps on different pages.

 

 

III. Chapter 3 – System Design

·          Table of Recommendations

Ø       This section should be in table format with three(3) columns:

Ø       1^st column: Problem to be addressed (taken from the statement of the problem)

Ø       2^nd column: Recommended change needed to improve (which tools, roles, or methods should be changed?)

Ø       3^rd column: Which activities from Chapter II: Activity Diagrams will be affected by this change?

 

·          Use-Case Diagram of the Proposed System

Ø        This section should describe the phases of the entire PROPOSED system, highlighting your proposed changes to the current system.

Ø        Describe the different scenarios of your proposed system by means of use case diagrams with corresponding narrative explanation.

Ø        Use Case Diagram should clearly depict all the needed actors (entities) and use cases.

Ø        All use cases should have corresponding narratives.

 

·          Benchmarking

Ø       Present your DATA ANALYSIS (phase 4) findings.

Ø        Benchmark with at least 1 direct competitor. If no data on direct competitors are available, then world-class benchmarking should be done.  Refer to trade journals like Fortune 500 or research over the internet.

Ø        Before presenting your DATA ANALYSIS findings, you should provide a paragraph or two containing the background or overview of the competitor you used for your benchmarking (what kind of company, what line of business, etc.).

Ø        There should be at least seven metrics (7) for benchmarking.

Ø        You should derive the most of the metrics you will use for benchmarking from the Objectives of the Study.  For example, if one of your objectives is to reduce overall cycle time, then benchmark overall cycle time.  Other examples may include the number of approvals per form and the number of forms used.

Ø        You may also derive metrics from industry standards.  For example, the number of sandwich varieties may be a benchmark in the industry of fastfood chains.

Ø        Required benchmark metrics to include are: number of customers, number of transactions per day (or week or month, etc), number of branches, and type of information system (CBIS, semi-automated, manual).

 

 

·          Streamlining

Ø        Based on the changes you propose to the existing system, describe which of the 12 streamlining tools you used (I expect this to be more than one.  Automation should not be the only tool you used) and briefly describe how you applied it in your system design.

Ø        For example, if you say you applied Duplication Elimination, explain that instead of making 3 copies of a certain form, only one copy is needed in the new design.  Explain why you propose this change and the advantages of the new design.

 

 

 

 

Title page format:

(centered both horizontally and vertically)

A Systems Analysis Study on the

[Name of the System Analyzed]

of [Name of Company]

 

 

Presented to the

Computer Applications Program

School of Management and Information Technology

De La Salle – College of Saint Benilde

 

 

In Partial fulfillment of the

Requirements of the subject

Systems Analysis

 

 

 

Submitted By:

<Names of the project team members in LN, MN MI format>

<Subject and Section>

<Month, Year>

 

Submitted To:

<Name of the Subject Professor>

 

 

General Guidelines for Documentation:

1.       Use Arial 11, 1.5 spacing, short bond paper.

2.       Remember to have in the footer section, right justified: 

·    The Name of your System (on the first line)

·   Page x of y (on the second line; where x is the page number and y is the total number of pages)

3.       Black ink will do.  However, it is preferable if the pictures in the process walkthrough are in color. 

4.       Your documentation should be submitted in a clean sliding folder. Ring-bound projects should be considered for lengthy documentation. 

5.       Again: When in doubt, ASK!!  J  Please try to plan early, so that you can fully understand the guidelines.

 

Presentation Particulars: (30 min) à To be discussed further in class.

I.          Group Presentation (15 min)

·         Short introduction of the company and the group (1-2 slides)

·         Overview of the existing system (1 slide)

·         Bulleted list of the problems uncovered (1 slide)

·         Use-Case and Activity Diagrams of the Existing system

·         Bulleted list of present problems / specific problems (1 slide)

·         Use-Case Diagram of the Proposed System

 

II.          Q&A (15 min)