chapter 2 (understanding and modeling organizational systems) Flashcards
1
Q
Three Main Forces Interacting to Shape Organizations
A
- Levels of management
- Design of organizations
- Organizational cultures
2
Q
Organizations are Composed of
Interrelated Subsystems
A
Influenced by organizational cultures and subcultures
3
Q
- Influenced by levels of management decision makers that
cut horizontally across the organizational system
A
– Operations
– Middle management
– Strategic management
4
Q
Organizations as Systems
A
- Conceptualized as systems designed to accomplish
predetermined goals and objectives - Composed of smaller, interrelated systems serving
specialized functions - Specialized functions are reintegrated to form an effective
organizational whole
5
Q
Interrelatedness and Independence of
Systems
A
- All systems and subsystems are interrelated and
interdependent - All systems process inputs from their environments
- All systems are contained by boundaries separating them
from their environments - System feedback for planning and control
- An ideal system self-corrects or self-regulates itself
6
Q
Organizational Environments (Community)
A
– Physical location
– Demographic profile (education, income)
7
Q
Organizational Environments (economic)
A
– Market factors
– Competition
8
Q
Organizational Environments (political)
A
– State and local government
9
Q
Organizational Environments (legal)
A
– Federal, state, regional, local laws, and guidelines
10
Q
Virtual Organizations and Virtual Teams
A
- A virtual organization has parts of the organization in
different physical locations - Computer networks and communications technology are
used to bring virtual teams together to work on projects
11
Q
Benefits of Virtual Organizations and
Teams
A
- Possibility of reducing costs of physical facilities
- More rapid response to customer needs
- Helping virtual employees to fulfill their familial obligations
to children or aging parents
12
Q
Taking a Systems Perspective
A
- Allows system analyst to understand businesses they will
come into contact with - It is important that members of subsystems realize that
they are interrelated with other subsystems - Problems occur when each manager thinks that his/her
department is the most important - Bigger problems may occur when that manager rises
through the ranks
13
Q
Enterprise Resource Planning
A
- Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) is an integrated
organizational information system - Software that helps the flow of information between the
functional areas within the organization - Recently ERP systems are moving to cloud computing
14
Q
ERP can affect every aspect of the organization,
including:
A
– Design of employees’ work
– Skills required for job competency
– Strategic positioning of the company
15
Q
Many issues must be overcome for the ERP installation is
to be declared a success:
A
– User acceptance
– Integration with legacy systems and the supply chain
– Upgrading functionality (and complexity) of ERP
modules
– Reorganizing work life of users and decision makers
– Expanded reach across several organizations
– Strategic repositioning of the company
16
Q
Depicting Systems Graphically
A
- Context-level data flow diagrams
- Entity-relationship model
- Use case modeling
17
Q
Context-Level Data Flow Diagrams
A
Focus is on the data flowing into and out of the system
and the processing of the data
18
Q
Shows the scope of the system:
A
– What is to be included in the system
– The external entities are outside the scope of the
system
19
Q
Entity-Relationship Model
A
- Focus is on the entities and their relationships within the
organizational system - Another way to show the scope of a system
20
Q
Relationships show how the entities are connected
* Three types of relationships:
A
– One-to-one
– One-to-many
– Many-to-many
21
Q
Entities
A
- Fundamental entity
- Associative entity
- Attributive entity
22
Q
Creating Entity-Relationship Diagrams
A
- List the entities in the organization
- Choose key entities to narrow the scope of the problem
- Identify what the primary entity should be
- Confirm the results of the above through data gathering
23
Q
Use Case Modeling
A
- Part of the unified modeling language (UML)
- Describes what a system does without describing how
the system works - A view of the system requirements
- Analyst works with business experts to develop
requirements
24
Q
Actor
A
– Refers to a particular role of a user of the system
– Similar to external entities; they exist outside of the
system
25
Use case symbols
– An oval indicating the task of the use case
26
Connecting lines
– Arrows and lines used to diagram behavioral
relationships
27
Primary actors:
▪ Supply data or receive information from the system
▪ Provide details on what the use case should do
28
Supporting actors:
▪ Help to keep the system running or provide help
▪ The people who run the help desk, the analysts,
programmers, and so on
29
A Use Case Always Provides Three
Things
* An actor that initiates an event
* The event that triggers a use case
* The use case that performs the actions triggered by the
event
30
Use Case Relations
Behavioral relationships
– Communicates
▪ Used to connect an actor to a use case
– Includes
▪ Describes the situation in which a use case
contains behavior that is common to more than
one use case
– Extends
▪ Describes the situation in which one use case
possesses the behavior that allows the new case
to handle a variation or exception from the basic
use case
– Generalizes
▪ Implies that one thing is more typical than the other
thing
31
scope
- System scope defines its boundaries
-Actors are always outside of scope
-Communication lines are the boundaries and define the
scope
32
System scope defines its boundaries:
– What is in or outside the system
– Project has a budget that helps to define scope
– Project has a start and an end time
33
Developing Use Case Diagrams
* Review the business specifications and identify the actors
involved
* Identify the high-level events and develop the primary
use cases that describe those events and how the actors
initiate them
* Review each primary use case to determine the possible
variations of flow through the use case
* The context-level data flow diagram could act as a
starting point for creating a use case
34
Three main areas of developing the use case scenarios:
– Use case identifiers and initiators
– Steps performed
– Conditions, assumptions, and questions
35
Use Case Header Area
* Has a name and a unique ID
* Include application area
* List actors
* Include stakeholders
* Include the level
* Has a brief description of the use case
36
Use case levels describe how global or detailed the use
case description is:
– White (like clouds): enterprise level
– Kite: business unit or department level
– Blue (sea level): user goals
– Indigo (or fish): functional or subfunctional
– Black (or clam): most detailed
37
Alternative Scenarios
* Extensions or exceptions to the main use case
* Number with an integer, decimal point, integer
* Steps that may or may not always be used
38
Use Case Footer Area
* Preconditions—need to be met before use case can be
performed
* Postconditions or the state of the system after the use
case has finished
* Assumptions
* Minimal guarantee
* Success guarantee
* Outstanding issues
* Optional priority and risk
39
Four Steps Used to Create Use Cases
* Use agile stories, problem definition objectives, user
requirements, or a features list
* Ask about the tasks that must be done
* Determine if there are any iterative or looping actions
* The use case ends when the customer goal is complete
40
Why Use Case Diagrams Are Helpful
* Identify all the actors in the problem domain
* Actions that need to be completed are also clearly shown
on the use case diagram
* The use case scenario is also worthwhile
* Simplicity and lack of technical detail
41
Reasons for Writing Use
Cases
* Use cases effectively communicate systems requirements because
the diagrams are kept simple.
* Use cases allow people to tell stories.
* Use case stories make sense to nontechnical people.
* Use cases do not depend on a special language.
* Use cases can describe most functional requirements (such as
interactions between actors and applications).
* Use cases can describe nonfunctional requirements (such as
performance and maintainability) through the use of stereotypes.
* Use cases help analysts define boundaries.
* Use cases can be traceable, allowing analysts to identify links
between use cases and other design and documentation tools.
42
Management in Organizations
Exists on Three Horizontal Levels
3) Operational control
2) managerial planning and control
1) strategic management.
43
Operations Control
*Make decisions using predetermined rules that have
predictable outcomes
* Oversee the operating details of the organization
44
Managerial Planning and Control
* Make short-term planning and control decisions about
resources and organizational objectives
* Decisions may be partly operational and partly strategic
45
Strategic Management
* Look outward from the organization to the future
* Make decisions that will guide middle and operations
managers
* Work in highly uncertain decision-making environment
* Faced with semistructured problems
* Define the organization as a whole
46
Managerial Levels
* Different organization structure
* Leadership style
* Technological considerations
* Organization culture
* Human interaction
* All carry implications for the analysis and design of
information systems
47
Collaborative Design
* External and internal stakeholders follow processes to
share in designing a system to meet their goals
* Giving power to those who possess a technical or
strategic expertise
48
Organizational Culture
* Organizations have cultures and subcultures
* Learn from verbal and nonverbal symbolism
49
Technology Impact on Culture
* Technology is changing the culture of organizations and
teams
* Slack is an employer-sanctioned social media platform,
or workplace-messaging app
* Public and private channels
* Direct or group messages
