INF 1341 代做、代写 java /Python 语言程序

日期：2024-09-16 01:19

University of Toronto Faculty of Information

INF 1341 Systems Analysis and Process Innovation

Assignment 1: Initial exploration of a study site

Due Date: Friday, Sept. 20, 11:59 pm

This assignment counts for 20% of the course grade.

(Individual work)

In this course, you will carry out a series of assignments to apply systems analysis techniques to

real world settings. As a preliminary step, in this Assignment 1, you will identify a suitable

organization as your primary study site. Your work in Assignment 2 will be based primarily on

information you collect about this site, and possibly prior knowledge you have about similar

organizational settings, as well as published literature.

In subsequent assignments, as you join others in a team, your primary site will be viewed as part of

a larger setting, which will allow your team to study interactions among information systems across

organizations. Thus, in selecting your primary site, you are also selecting the industry/business/

economic sector that it is associated with, e.g., healthcare, retail, financial services, etc.

I. Doing the Assignment

Find an organizational setting in which you expect information systems to have potential impact,

allowing you to explore opportunities for process automation, innovation, and fundamental

transformation. The organization can be one that you are already familiar with, for example, your

current or former place of work. You may also explore prospective sites through friends,

acquaintances, relatives, etc.

Typically, you will be looking for a work setting in which a number of people working in different

capacities produce some joint output or result, i.e., a “business process” or work process. This can

be a department or section in a large organization (e.g., customer relations) or a work process that

cuts across several departments (e.g., contract proposals in an engineering firm). The organization

can be a business corporation, or non-profit such as a hospital, a school, a university, a government

agency, etc. It can also be a small business (e.g., a retail store, a professional office, etc.) Volunteer

and community organizations often also have information systems needs, e.g., professional

associations, community centres, student organizations, clubs, etc. Each student should select a

different site – different organizations, or different parts within a larger organization.

The site should be able to provide you with the information you need to carry out your systems

analysis. Ideally, you should have contact(s) in the organization who you can interview. For

example, you will want to know what the perceived problems are in their current operations, and

what areas they believe offer opportunities for improvement. You will want to know their

organizational objectives, criteria or measures of success, and the basic ins and outs of their

operations. In this course, the emphasis will be on the early stage of systems analysis. You will not

be expected to produce a complete system specification.

The work process should contain some recurring tasks that are amenable to information systems

support, e.g., storing data in databases according to some data model, performing updates, queries,

calculations on the data, etc. As part of this initial exploration, you are required to develop a BPMN

model of the selected work process. It should show the main activities carried out by the

participants and their interactions. It should be at a level of detail where some issues and concerns

about the process can be revealed.

The site may contain some operations that are already computerized, and others that are not.

Consider sites that will potentially benefit from new technologies (e.g., use of mobile devices,

sensors), or business model change (e.g., disintermediation). Consider competitive or regulatory

pressures (e.g., legal compliance, environmental initiatives). Try to select a site of reasonable scope

– small enough to be manageable for an assignment, but large enough to exercise and demonstrate

the techniques you learn in the course. If you feel the need to adjust the scope of your site after you

have started, you may do so in consultation with the instructor.

In approaching an organization, you should talk to someone who has the authority to decide to assist

you. You may need to camouflage or alter some details to prevent disclosure of sensitive

information. This is fine as long as the objectives of the course can still be achieved. To facilitate

your subsequent assignments, it will be desirable to have access to someone in the organization who

can discuss possible changes in operations, and future directions for the sector. Your engagement

with the site organization should be mutually beneficial. You should outline the intent of your

project, what it involves, and also clarify mutual expectations. It may be helpful to provide a letter

to the prospective participant describing the nature of your project and mutual expectations. A draft

of such a letter is attached.

Project guidelines

You are required to obtain verbal consent from the participant, and to identify the following

information to participants:

that you are a University of Toronto graduate student

the Department and Program that you are enrolled in;

relationship (if any) of the student(s) to the organization/participant, e.g. employee, employees

of competitor or partner organizations;

purpose of interview or visit e.g. description of assignment/project;

length of interview;

how information will be used e.g., paper and/or oral presentation;

confidentiality and anonymity re key informants e.g., no informant will be identified by name,

position or area of responsibility unless they have expressly given permission to do so.

Your immediate contact may need to seek permission from higher authorities in the organization before

agreeing to participate. Allow time for this in your schedule.

Interviews with clients of the participant’s organization or with patients are not permitted.

The data collected for your project is not expected to be confidential. You are advised to avoid

projects that involve confidential information, such as trade secrets or proprietary work processes.

You will not collect personal information about participants. To minimize participant concerns, the

sources of raw data (e.g., interviewees) should be anonymized (replaced with fictitious names), or

the raw data will not be attributed to any source. The name of organization will also be anonymized.

In cases where the informant considers neither anonymity nor non-attribution to be providing

sufficient protection (e.g., when an employee has inadvertently disclosed information that he/she

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does not want his/her coworkers or management to know about), such information will be excluded

from in-class discussions and written reports.

Since you are expected to discuss assignment findings in class, it is best to avoid study sites that

require you to sign a non-disclosure agreement. If this is unavoidable, you should obtain written

permission that the information disclosed to you can be used in a course project that will be

discussed in class.

When a participant discloses information under condition of confidentiality, such conditions must

be fully respected (e.g., disclosure to the participant’s colleagues or management may have adverse

consequences for the participant.)

The participants should be informed, verbally or in writing, of their right to withdraw from the study

at any time. The participant’s data will be destroyed at the participant’s request upon their

withdrawal from the study.

All copies of the students’ reports—e.g., for circulation as courtesy copies, or future writing

samples—must clearly indicate on the cover page the instructor, course number, and department or

program at the University of Toronto that the report was prepared for.

II. What to Hand In

Each student is to submit a 3-page document outlining the proposed study site (including 1 page for

the BPMN model). The document should include, in this order, the following items.

1. Keywords short phrases identifying…

Name of organization: e.g., Prince George Hospital

Nature of business: e.g., cancer care hospital

Sector (one or more keywords): e.g., healthcare services

Business process description: e.g., patient discharge

2. The organization A paragraph providing general background, e.g., size, location, current

issues.

3. The business process This is the part of the organization you have chosen to focus on.

Provide a short description of what it entails – activity steps, who does what, issues and

concerns, policies and procedures, resources and constraints.

4. BPMN model of the business/work process.

5. Suitability Why this organization is a good choice. Some initial ideas about opportunities for

(i) automation, (ii) innovation, and (iii) transformation. You are not confined to these in your

subsequent assignments. Examples:

i Automation: maintain a database of patient discharge information to reduce paper work and

avoid duplication and errors.

ii Innovation: allow doctors, nurses, and social workers to update patient discharge information

directly so that delays can be avoided. Mobile Internet access via smart phones or tablets can be

used.

iii Transformation: earlier discharge can be achieved if patient can be monitored at home via online

instruments, and online help for family members or home care personnel.

6. Accessibility An indication of the contacts and the nature of access you have to the

organizational setting. (Names not required, positions/roles useful.)

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E-copy: An electronic copy must be submitted via the Quercus system. The filename must be

1341-A1-yourlastname-firstname. PDF file format is preferred; MS Word is acceptable.

Hardcopy: not required.

You must also provide an index entry for your submitted assignment on a designated online file,

location to be announced.

Formatting Requirements

Use letter size (8.5 x 11 inch) paper format. The preferred text format is 11-point font size, single

spaced. The header should have the course number and assignment number on the left, your name

in the middle, and the date on the right. Do not include a cover sheet with this Assignment.

Grading Criteria

Document (10% of grade)

Language should be clear and understandable. Uses logical statements and structuring of

arguments. Proofread carefully before submitting. Correct spelling and grammatical errors.

Document should be formatted properly and consistently (headers present, sectional headings

present, page margins, justifications, indentations, consistency)

BPMN model is legible and sized appropriately.

3-page document limit is recommended. Going over is okay if there was no unjustifiable need

(unnecessarily details, excessive narration, incorrect indentation or margins, large font size

etc.)

Assignment named correctly as per requirements. There should be only one file uploaded

(containing text + diagram). The document is in PDF format. Visio or Lucidchart files are not

accepted.

Organization Under Study (10% of grade)

Describe the organization in terms of size, location, and other quantitative measures.

What are the organizational goals and objectives?

What are the major organizational issues, problems and challenges?

Business Process (25% of grade)

Briefly describe the business process being considered. What is its objective?

Why is this business process important and considered and not others? What is its criticality

(i.e., is it a core business process)? Core business processes lead to more meaningful analysis.

What are the main activity steps? Note: The expectation is not to restate the BPMN diagram

but to complement that model.

Any main information systems? Online or offline processes? Manual passing of information /

data? Note: Should not be a technology-centric explanation analysis but rather from a business

impact viewpoint.

What are the main issues with the business process? Note: The issues should pertain to the

business process itself rather than organization or operational issues. Note2: Do not wait to get

to the solution section before describing the problem.

Is the size and scale of the business process appropriate for meaningful analysis. The business

process should not be too small or too large (i.e. many business processes being treated as

one).

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BPMN Model Diagram (25% of grade)

Is the BPMN model logically structured, including logical start and end events?

Appropriately demonstrates the use of a range of modeling concepts and constructs.

Does it capture the activities of the relevant organizational roles and/or systems? Are the

sequences correct and complete?

Does the BPMN model diagram stand on its own without having to rely on the text for

understanding? Note: This means that the BPMN diagram should not be confusing and

erroneous.

Suitability (30% of grade)

Clearly indicate what are the automation, innovation and transformations being proposed.

All three should relate to the business process under study and show a progression of analysis

and scope.

Problems should not be mentioned for the first time while a solution idea is being put forward.

Problems should be detailed in the previous section with the solutions coming later.

The three solutions should indicate the business impact that they are expected to have,

particularly with respect to the business and process issues stated previously.

A solution should not be stated in terms of a mere mention of a technology. Say why it will be

useful and what aspect of the problem will be addressed. For example: “By implementing

technology X…. we get these benefits … will solve this ….”

Template Letter to Prospective Project Participants

(( date ))

Dear Project Participant,

I am a graduate student enrolled in a course entitled “Systems Analysis and Process Innovation” at

the Faculty of Information, University of Toronto. The purpose of the course is to equip students

with the conceptual foundations and skills needed to analyze business processes in an organization

in order to explore opportunities for innovations and improvements, eventually leading to

requirements definition for information systems. Too often, computer systems are introduced into

an organization without an adequate understanding of the business and organizational environment,

resulting in systems that are ineffective or even counter-productive. This course emphasizes the

need to understand the organizational setting, analyze problems and needs, and to explore options

before proceeding to seek technology solutions.

A major component of the course is a project in which we apply the concepts and techniques we

learn in class to real-life work settings. Each student will study and analyze work processes and

information systems requirements for some portion of an organization. Later in the course, students

will work in small groups (typically three to four persons) to explore further innovation or

transformational opportunities for selected organizational settings. I am therefore looking for people

who are willing to cooperate by letting me (and possibly later my teammates) study and understand

how work is currently done, with a view towards exploring potential innovations using information

technologies and systems. The current work setting may of course already include various forms of

technologies and systems at various levels of sophistication. Overall this will mean a couple of

hours of someone's time talking with me, and possibly meeting together with my teammates later

once or twice. We will be careful not to impose beyond our welcome.

WHAT WE WILL DO

Mainly I will ask questions, take notes, and if circumstances permit, observe how things get done.

With permission, I may like to make audio recordings so I can check for things I forgot to write

down. If there are relevant documents that can facilitate our understanding of the work setting, we

would appreciate the opportunity to peruse them.

Our aim is to understand work objectives, workflows, processes, procedures, policies, and various

data and information relevant to the work. We will depict our understanding in diagrammatic

models to assist our analysis, and to use them to explore options.

WHAT YOU WILL GET

Hopefully, the time that you spend with me and my teammates will be enjoyable and perhaps

enlightening for you as well. We are well-motivated and eager to learn. We promise to share with

you any insights and materials we develop (including the written documentation that we will be

handing in with the project). We will attempt to do our best in the study. If, however, you feel that

the results of our study can be the starting point for making some changes in your organization, that

will be a bonus for everyone.

CONSIDERATIONS

You can expect us to act in a responsible and professional manner. This includes respecting any

conditions you or your managers set on the confidentiality of the materials we work with. However,

we want to avoid any projects that may involve material that is legally or institutionally restricted

(such as medical records, trade secrets, student grades and recommendations, etc.) since we do not

want to have to set up the formal agreements for ensuring accountability for these types of

information. Confidential information will not be used in our discussions or in written reports. In

the event that confidential information is recorded, such information will be kept in a secure

location and destroyed as soon as possible. We will replace the names of individuals and of your

organization with fictitious names. Once we have started, we will like to be able to continue through

the end of the project. However, according to research ethics protocols, participants have the right

to withdraw from the study at any time. If you have any concerns about the conduct of our research

team, please feel free to contact the University of Toronto Research Ethics Board at: Office of

Research Ethics, McMurrich Building, 12 Queens's Park Crescent West, Toronto ON M5S 1S8,

Tel: 416-978-2798, Fax: 416-946-5763, email: ethics.review@utoronto.ca.

I am very excited about this project. It is so much more interesting (and fun!) to work on

assignments that are rooted in real-life. I hope that this project will be a productive and rewarding

experience for everyone involved. If you have any questions about this project, please do not

hesitate to call me (email: ……….. phone: ............. ). Thanks in advance for your participation.

Sincerely,