We were appointed as an Independent IT specialist group consultancy to serve Cybercation Cafe Project. We held a series of interviews with our Client group by adopting JAD (Joint Application Development) meetings to model their Value Chain and business processes of each operational work system activity in the organization. We also analyzed their Strategic Plan to determine what IT solutions that could add value to achieving their strategic and objectives.
'Cybercation' is a strategic plan to build an internet cafe in Auckland and intended to expand the business to wellington, even across New Zealand and Australia. They are not only providing internet connection but also offer other supporting services and education. Therefore our goal is simple to satisfy our clients' need and try the best to let them to select us as their project team to help them to manage the project.
According to their business requirement and weakness at the beginning stage of their business cycling stage our project team have made some recommendations through analyze, investigation and research of the plan. Based on 4 objectives we have made recommendation which are to improve customer services, improve quality of products, attract more customer, and easier for management. According to this 4 objective, we have made 6 program recommendations for this project such as:
1. Membership system
2. Build a company website
3. Human resource program
4. Accounting program
5. e-learning courses
6. Training program
However there are still some other problems that we couldn't have thought about and also there are some uncertain market reasons and unforeseen future trends in this market which make our project may not be as perfect as expected. According to all these problems I have start the project reflection statement to judge our weakness points and merit points in this project plan process.
What Went Well
The workload was fairly well balanced among the team members and tasks were matched well with personal preferences the skill levels of each team member. Each member also had the opportunity to participate in JAD process activities.
The work involved in this project was meaningful and directly appropriate to the content of the paper as well as some personal conducted research by each member for better solution and understanding.
There were a couple of revisions about the project requirements with stakeholders , A detailed project scope and requirements document were jointly developed during effective working sessions between our team and stakeholders .
What Went Wrong
The small amount of time that was spent in the planning process resulted in slow and hamper in some phases of the execution of the plan.
Since each member of the team was not located near the other members, communication with each other was difficult, which led to bad communication with the client. Finding suitable meeting times was difficult as well despite that we agreed that our weekly meeting will be after the lecture directly. The amount of work time of each task was underestimated which explains why some questions were raised when tasks were almost due. It therefore took extra time to prepare the reports containing all the detailed information.
Since there had been no commitment made in some cases there was not enough time to review new content that had been added to some documents, and the team was not aware and did not request a clarification about the exact deadline of the assignment which was by Monday of week 8 whereas the team thought it was the end of week 8.
Another issue was that our team did not assign a "facilitator/leader/manager" role, who would have empowered task to the team members to promote critical thinking as a team by using high commitment management (HCM) approach which emphasizes on the need to develop group commitment among team members (Heery and Noon, 2001). We can promote critical thinking only by improving commitment among team members, and make them feel they are an integral part of the group rather than individual tasks performed independently without real analyzing and criticizing each other work, because there was an atmosphere of overweening politeness (Robbins and Finley, 2000) during team meeting because I think this was hindering the quality of the final work. Less criticism among team members was the key to avoid conflict with each other (Robbins and Finley, 2000) beside that the meetings would take less time..
Lessons Learned From this Exercise
This project provided a great opportunity to learn about various aspects of JAD methodology process to involve the client in the required solution design and development to meet their exact requirements.
The experience of performing general Internet research looking for academic papers and samples of real work and solutions in IT industry was enhanced by coordinating and distributing the activities across the team. The actual research revealed the wealth of JAD and all required information available on the Internet and helped the team members recommend different solutions to our client and understand some techniques in various areas.
Working based on JAD methodology and with teamwork environment with the all preparation done for both SRS and RFP documents and other reports helped expand our verbal and non-verbal communication skills.
JAD methodology Review
When large systems are developed, gathering requirements is usually performed using specialized techniques, such as Joint Application Design (JAD), which involves the client in the design and development, at least one facilitator is needed to help the group stay on track , work well as a group, and achieve the required goals.
Furthermore, when conducting group activities, such as JAD, usually additional benefits are often gained when the team works together as a unit which is good in the end for the project. The main advantages of this approach are fast development, low turnaround time and business and developers are in the same room which leads to common understanding of requirements from all parties.
On the other hand, one of the most common and traditional techniques of requirement elicitation is Interviews Process, which is a synchronous method of analyzing the requirements and eliciting the details from the business, it allows the analyst to get view on the processes of the business as they are now, and get an idea of what is required and missing in the current system.
This method fits our case well because we could manage one-on-one interaction easily or with a group; it can be done combined with questionnaire either over the phone, emails or face to face. Excellent preparation for interviews with introduction questions that leads interviewee to focus on the main point being discussed. Interviewer needs to prepare for the interaction, constructing at least core specifications that need to be addressed. Open-ended questions in interviews are the most effective, allowing the participant to elaborate on the point he/she is making and giving insight into his/her feeling about the problem. Therefore, interviews also give an important emotional feedback to the interviewer (Kuchmistaya, 2001). However, in comparison with JAD methodology, interviewing is a long process and many follow-ups will be necessary to clarify some points, making the process long and more complicated, therefore, costly.
Unfortunately, we could not apply complete JADs sessions on this project despite we tried to cover all aspects of this methodology but the type of the project did not help as well as availability of all participants from stakeholders and the team members, it was hard sometimes to find an appropriate time with bad communication from both sides.
In conclusion, I cannot blame JAD methodology it did not work well with us because of lack of understanding and preparation from both parties. I will suggest JAD methodology is great requirement determination processes as a substitute of traditional requirements gathering techniques because it is at least will decrease project time and costs which are the main concern in most organizations.
COTS Model and Acquisition Plan Discussion
(COTS Vs MOTS)
Software componentry is based on the idea that software components, like the equivalent of hardware components, it can be made swappable so that composite software can be build using commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) components. The motivation for using COTS is to reduce the overall system development cost and time because the components is that they will reduce the overall system development cost and time because the components can be bought instead of being developed from scratch. However, it comes with a significant side effect that the software component integration work and dependency on a third party component from different vendor may incur significant additional cost to any project.
The model of COTS has extended further to the concept of Modifiable Off-The-Shelf (MOTS). MOTS software can be modified by the owner, supplier or even any cheaper third party to meet client needs. MOTS products are adopted for a specific purpose, but it can be purchased and used immediately. but, since MOTS application components are developed by external sources, this may create some kind of dependency on the MOTS component vendor and impose upgrade challenge as well. (Henry H. Liu, 2009)
Team Evaluation and CMM
I believe that my group have done a reasonable job on this project plan overall. Despite all weakness points and tasks we have not completed well, we strove to do our best to bring the best outcome with quality based on our limited resources and time.
Based on the CMM (Capability Maturity Model) level, there are 5 different levels for measuring the maturity of the development in organizations. Before I assess my group, Here is a brief definition for all SA-CMM five levels:
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Level 1: It is characteristic of processes at this level that they are undocumented and in a state of dynamic change, tending to be driven in an ad hoc, uncontrolled and reactive manner by users or events. This provides a chaotic or unstable environment for the processes.
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I believe the group still at the initial level because the project team did not provide stable environment for acquiring products which we can see easily through provided solutions. The team worked based on the availability of individuals and acquisition did not receive adequate management visibility which results in a random, low quality work.
The team could have achieved level 2 standards if these procedures have been taken:
The is planned well and tracked
Commitments are made and approved
State expectations for project behavior
Institute quality assurance and measurements
Institute baseline control
