System Analysis at Work - Case Study Example

Table of Contents a. Terms of Reference 1 b. Management Summary 2 c. Introduction 3 d. Background 4 e. System Findings 6 5.1 System Functions 6 5.2 System Data 7 5.3 Failings and constraints of existing system 8 f. Interaction design 9 6.1 User group analysis 9 6.2 Analysis of similar existing interfaces 10 g. Recommendations 10 Recommended Hardware options 10 Recommended Software options 11 Reasons for the Above Recommendations 12 h. Operational Costs for an Integrated system of Greenwich Carpentry 13 System Recommendations 14 References 17 a. Terms of Reference The objective of this investigation is to analyze the current system of Greenwich Carpentry Company and to recommend them the options that are worthy for their business procedures. The allowed expenditure by the company is up to USD 40,000 for all kinds of enhancement. The time allocated for this paper is till 18th of August 2008. The results will be presented in form of a written report. b. Management Summary The paper took into consideration Greenwich Carpentry Company, which designs, manufactures and installs bespoke kitchen cabinet furniture. The company is in need of integrated system and wants to enhance its website in terms of order acceptance and placement through the website. The company is also interested in enhanced networking that connects all the working areas of the company. The company currently makes use of Sage 50 Accounts 2008 software along with AutoCAD and MS Excel for their working. After analyzing their system, it is identified that their inputs and outputs are more in number and a proper documentation is needed by the company. The time needed for the completion of an order is more and the output is less due to which, the company is facing problems in terms of its expansion. Most of the users at the company concerned to the newly constructed system are in need of training but the current users of present system are aware of current procedures and work but their number is only ten and after system enhancement, their number will reach thirty-five. The recommendations to the company are to attain computer systems and to install software in order to facilitate their future procedures. With the help of a well-constructed website, the company will be able to monitor its progress on website and will be able to expand its market through the help of the website. c. Introduction Greenwich Carpentry Company is interested in enhancing its business proceedings by making its website enable to get orders online. Moreover, they are interested in an integrated system in their company. This paper takes into consideration the investigation of the current system of Greenwich Carpentry Company and recommendations required for the expansion of their system by making use of e-commerce option and integration of company’s procedures through enhanced networking. The paper starts with a background study of the company, Greenwich Carpentry Company, in which the company’s current procedures are identified along with the business functionalities of the company. The company’s currently employed hardware and software are analyzed and their need for enhancement is also identified under the title background. After background, the paper informs about the system findings, which is further divided into system functions, system data and failings and constraints of existing system of the company. Under the heading, system functions, the current working procedures with the help of context diagram are depicted. The flow of documentation and other working procedures from one entity to other entity are identified. In system data, the inputs and outputs are analyzed and informed and also their relationship to each other is identified under the heading, system data. Under the heading, failings and constraints of existing system, all the problems and limitations of the current system are identified. Interaction design is given after system findings, which is divided into two parts, user group analysis and analysis of similar existing interfaces. In user group analysis, the users of the current system are identified along with their skills at employing the current system. Moreover, the users who are going to use the newly constructed system are also identified along with their skills at computing technology. It has been found out that they are in need of training for learning the new business working. The last topic is that of recommendations. In recommendations, there are hardware recommendations as well as software recommendations. The operational costs that the company has to bear are also given in order to facilitate the company with the prices associated with newly constructed system. In addition, the company’s needs in terms of enhancement of their current system are identified and evaluated. d. Background The company, Greenwich Carpentry designs, manufactures and installs bespoke kitchen cabinet furniture. The company receives orders from its clients, which are usually shops, architects or designers. Occasionally, but rarely, they are members of the public. Orders are received by email or post, and include AutoCAD diagrams and an Excel spreadsheet. The spreadsheet contains the detailed specification and quotation, and is produced in a standard template. These details are filed both in hard copy and on the company server. (The company has networked 5 PCs.) The drawings are printed out and sent to the workshop, and material requisition lists are drawn up and sent to suppliers. The customer and order details are transferred manually from the spreadsheet to Sage. Customers pay a deposit, which goes straight to the bank with a notification being sent to the company. Sage 50 Accounts 2008 is used for normal accounting functions: • Storing customers’ names & addresses • Storing suppliers’ names & addresses • Raising invoices. • Recording deposits and payments and retentions by customers • Recording expenditure (materials and overheads) • Record payments to suppliers • Producing VAT returns • Producing regular profit and loss statements • Producing annual balance sheet • Recording money owing and payments to contractors There is no record of suppliers’ products. The company is considering putting its payroll into Sage. The company is currently handling around 2 – 3 jobs per month. There are around 10 major constituent parts that the company acquires from suppliers. Each job requires approximately 12 items of material acquisition. The company is interested in having an integrated system, allowing common sharing of information throughout the company. The company is also interested in expansion of their website. They would like to receive orders but not payments, over the web. Orders would be in the form of an invitation to tender and associated drawings. There will be no requirements to upload data onto the website apart from pictures of installations. It is a kind of e-commerce option without the payment facility. e. System Findings 5.1 System Functions Materials Deposit Invoice Order By email or post Quotation Materials Requisition Lists Payment Notification Order Details Printed Drawings Order Detailed Information Order Detailed Information Materials Requisition Lists Material Information Printed Drawings Customer Details Context Diagram The functionality of the system at Greenwich Carpentry is quite simple currently but a lot of documentation is required to be maintained in order to be aware of all the proceedings of the year. The functionality starts with the client’s booking of the order by the provision of all the order information through emailing or posting. Customer also provides a quotation. After obtainment of information from the customer’s side related to the placement of order, the order detailed information is shifted to the company server. The order detailed information is also forwarded to stock department in order to analyze that, which products or materials related to the carpentry of new order are already present and which are needed. After getting order detailed information, the stock department generates material information, which reports about the materials needed and the presence of materials. The company server keeps a record of customer details and order details for future procedures related to order processing. Company server generates the drawings by the help of help of printer and from the order detailed information provided by the order processing system. The printed drawings of designs obtained from the company server are sent to the workshop, which produces the materials requisition lists for the needed materials so that the central order processing system can further order the suppliers for the provision of materials needed for the carpentry. Material requisition lists are forwarded to the supplier after which, he provides the materials needed for carpentry designs. The client deposits the set amount in the bank, after which, the bank sends a payment notification to the company informing the company that the payment is provided by the customer. Invoice is also generated and provided to the customer after which, he pays through the bank. 5.2 System Data The company, Greenwich Carpentry has a number of inputs and outputs. The inputs of the company that are external are from clients and suppliers in form of documentation. Clients provide order information to the company along with quotation, while they provide the deposit to the bank after which, the bank inputs the payment notification to the company. The supplier only inputs material again with notification slip and afterwards, they are paid for their material supply. There are many internal inputs from departments and workshop. The stock department inputs the material information; workshop inputs material requisition lists and company server inputs printed drawings. All the inputs are in response of some outputs by the company’s main order processing system. All the inputs are processed by the company’s main order processing system, which is currently making use of Sage and manual proceedings. The company’s order processing system provides order details, customer details and order information details to the company server in response of which, the company server provides printed drawings by printing them at its attached printer. The central order processing system provides printed drawings to the workshop, in response of which, the workshop provides materials requisition lists. The order processing system provides order information details to the stock department, in response of which, the stock department provides material information to the central processing system. 5.3 Failings and constraints of existing system The company faces problems in many fields of business such as record maintenance, report generation, extra consumption of time because of lack of automation, slow working procedures, manual input of information. Due to manual input of information related to orders, there are chances of human errors and moreover sometimes, there are problems concerning wrong calculation. The existing system of the company is not perfect as the computers that are networked are only five in number, which is a low amount and they are not quite capable of managing big business transactions. Currently, they are handling only two to three orders per month that is not a very large amount. Because of their current proceedings, they are unable to compete in the business of carpentry designs because of lack of full-fledged automated systems. Half of their procedures make use of computing technology while half of the system makes use of manual procedures due to which, the effectiveness of their service provision is affected. f. Interaction design 6.1 User group analysis During system investigation, it is very important for the system analyst to understand in details about the users of the system along with their capabilities within the affected area of the organization (Mata, et. al 1995). Different types of users have different types of requirements and the system analyst has to make sure that all the requirements related to the users needs are fulfilled. The users of the current networked computer systems and those involved in printing are ten people but after expansion of the website, the number of users will change from ten to thirty-five, which is a large number as compared to previous number. Current users are well equipped with the present system. The users have knowledge about networking and computer usage and they are also aware of internet usage but their knowledge is not very vast. In case of e-commerce, there is a need of training that is compulsory for upgrading the current users and to accommodate the new users of the system. The new users of the system, which are going to be minimally thirty-five, are habitual of manual working. Out of thirty-five, twelve are able to use computers but the remaining users do not know the usage of computers. For all the users, a training program of six months is required to enable them to make use of newly developed system. 6.2 Analysis of similar existing interfaces Many companies all over the world have made use of e-commerce websites to enhance their business procedures and to globalize their company in order to expand their business and to generate more revenue (Mata, et. al 1995). There are many websites that make use of e-commerce for their business procedures. Amazon, which is an online company that provides books on many topics, runs an e-commerce site on which, all the business transactions are automated and are performed by computerized procedures. Business firms who have made use of website options for marketing and expansion of business are successful because of this option (Melville, et. al 2004). g. Recommendations Recommended Hardware options According to my recommendations, the Greenwich Carpentry can get new as well as used computer hardware systems, which will be suitable for all the software to run. First Option Acer Veriton 5900 Intel Core 2 Duo E4300 (1.8GHz 2M 800FSB) ,Q965 Chipset, 160 GB SATA, 512MB DDR2 Maximum supporting upto 2GB DDR II 667MHz RAM Dual Channels Supporting on Four DIMM, Embedded 10/100/1000 base TX Ethernet controller ,1 x Parallel, 1 x Serial , 8 x USB ports; 4 rear connectors and 4 front connectors , 1X VGA Port, PS/2Keyboard,PS/2 Mouse, DVD, Onboard VGA, Windows XP,3 years warranty. Second Option Acer Power FH Intel Dual Core 925 (3.0GHz 2X2MB 800FSB) ,Intel 946GZ / ICH7,80 GB SATA, 512MB DDR2 Maximum supporting upto 2GB DDR II 400/533/667MHz RAM Dual Channels Supporting on Four DIMM,, Intel Graphics Media Accelerator (GMA)3000 with Dynamic Video Memory Technology (DVMT) 3.0 PCI Express X 16 Graphic Card Support, 1 x Parallel, 1 x Serial , 8 x USB ports; 4 rear connectors and 4 front connectors , 1X VGA Port, PS/2Keyboard,PS/2 Mouse, COMBO, Onboard VGA, Windows Vista,1 years warranty. Third option Acer Power FH Intel Core 2 Duo (2.0GHz) ,Intel 946GZ / ICH7,160 GB SATA, 1GB DDR2 Maximum supporting upto 2GB DDR II 400/533/667MHz RAM Dual Channels Supporting on Four DIMM,, Intel Graphics Media Accelerator (GMA)3000 with Dynamic Video Memory Technology (DVMT) 3.0 PCI Express X 16 Graphic Card Support,, 1 x Parallel, 1 x Serial , 8 x USB ports; 4 rear connectors and 4 front connectors , 1X VGA Port, PS/2Keyboard,PS/2 Mouse, COMBO, Onboard VGA, Windows Vista,1 years warranty. Recommended Software options System software (Operating System) Windows Vista or Windows XP Utility Software MS Office 2007 including MS Word, MS Access and MS Excel Anti Virus (Norton anti virus) Scan Disk (for trouble shooting) Internet browser (Netscape Navigator) MS Outlook Sage 50 Accounts 2008 Reasons for the Above Recommendations The usage of above utilities will save time and cost because due to enhanced computerization in the whole company, people will work faster as before. Moreover, they can use the utilities to improve the performance of their company. According to my recommendations, the company should use MS Access for maintaining a database. For generating invoices and for bookkeeping, they are currently making use of Sage 50 Accounts 2008, which they should continue in order to work better. Due to computerization, they can do all their works efficiently. In place of MS Word, they should use MS Outlook for sending and receiving letters in form of emails. They should get access to internet to link with their customers and branches on online basis. The sales department can make use of MS Access for the maintaining and updating of sales records on daily basis. This will be far more appropriate as compared to manual processing. For the system’s security, the company can make use of Scan disk and Anti Virus, which need to be updated for working appropriately. The recommended hardware and software are the most up to date versions of their types and will support in fast service and saving of time. The operating system recommended is GUI (Graphic User Interface). Graphic user interface allows the user to work in a friendly environment due to which the user can easily access all the features provided by it. h. Operational Costs for an Integrated system of Greenwich Carpentry     Project: Recommendations for new Hardware, Software and Operational Costs Date: 17-August-08     Current state: 5 networked PCs with Sage 50 Accounts 2008, MS Excel, AutoCAD and two inkjet printers       Required Recommended costs Hardware Yes 2500   Rental or Purchase Purchase   Maintenance Yes 500   Network Yes 1500   Software Yes 1000   Rental or Purchase Purchase   Maintenance Yes 500   Manpower Yes 5000   User departments Yes 10,000   IT Department Yes 500   Operations 1500   Other No   Administration Yes 3000   Overheads 500   Materials Yes   Stationary Yes 1000   Consumables Yes 500   Training Yes 3000   Web costing Yes 2500                             Total Operating Cost   33,500             All the above recommendations come within the range of 33,500 along with the training costs and others shown in the operational costs. The company of Greenwich Carpentry is in need of more than five networked computer systems. The staff is also in need of training programs, which should be commenced for the guidance of staff members. The training should be given for the usage of website and enhanced networked computer systems. They should hire trainers who are skilled at using all the automated procedures. Training sessions should be conducted for the betterment of staff members. Training can be provided by the help of lectures and practical usage of networked computers. Training sessions should be there for at least two hours daily for a month. Training will include the usage of Windows vista environment, MS word, MS Access, MS Outlook, Sage 50 Accounts 2008, MS Excel, MIS and internet explorer. System Recommendations They are in need of a good networking by means of MIS (Management Information system). The company will be connected internally by means of MIS that will connect different computer systems located in the company. With the help of MIS, reports related to all processing will be generated for the management for evaluation of the current procedures of the company. The recommended option for the online order processing system of the company is e-commerce based website using Access as database and Dreamweaver for development, which will run the whole business procedures over internet. Online order processing and enquiries can be easily managed and controlled by the system administrator. The website will be accessed globally by the clients and suppliers, who are located all over the world. This means that it is not for any specific client area, this is for all levels of suppliers and customers. Anybody from anywhere can access the site and can get information about the required about the required products and the pricing conditions. If a customer is to place order, a secure method will be involved to make the transaction. A web address that is the domain name will be purchased from any ISP (Internet Service Provider) along with the hosting. The allocation of a web address and ISP support is very important in order to develop an online order processing system (Mata, et. al 1995). The ISP also provides SSI data transaction for the companies that wish to secure the transactions and their e-commerce based website will be saved from external threats (Melville, et. al 2004). The database hosting will also be taken in order to store sales and other information over the internet and get timely access to this information from that database. The MIS will be connected to online processing system due to which, the management and the employees will be able to use both the networks in form of one network. The new networking that is the online order processing system will reduce the time used in processing of an order till its completion and will also minimize the time for responses as the departments can interact with one another within very less time and can pass the needed information quickly. Currently, the order at Greenwich Carpentry takes enough time in terms of its processing and completion and many days are required in order to generate documents related to record and maintenance of orders. As these documents pass from one department to other for analysis, so, this also consumes time. This consumption of extra time will be reduced to minutes by the help of enhanced networking. The network will interconnect all the functional areas (departments) of the company and their interconnection will help in data communication process. Because of computerization of all the departmental procedures, all the data will be available on the computers and within very less time, it will be transferred from one department to the other. Because of this interconnectivity, the business functions will be able to deliver the information related to order of designing, manufacturing and installing of bespoke kitchen cabinet furniture. In addition, the personnel of different departments can interact with one another to know about the conditions of processing of transactions about orders, payments and stocks. With the establishment of company’s e-commerce website, there will be many promoting facilities available with the help of which, the company will be capable enough to enhance its business with the help of marketing facilities. The company’s website will help it to expand its business to international markets after which, there will be fair chances of expansion of the company’s business. With the help of their website, they will be able to conduct their marketing program through internet, which will reach not only to local market but also to international market as well. The development of enhanced networking in terms of online access enables any company in terms of expansion of their business procedures. References Mata, F., Fuerst, W.L. and Barney, J. B. Information Technology and Sustained Competitive Advantage: A Resource-Based Analysis. MIS Quarterly 19(4) 1995: 487-505. Melville, N., Kraemer, K., and Gurbaxani, V. Review: Information Technology and Organizational Performance: An Integrative Model of IT Business Value. MIS Quarterly 28(2) (2004): 283-322. Read More