System Development Method

Cost efficiency is the main concern for Soliel Panel Distribution. Integrating technology into its operations will enhance internal capabilities and service delivery. Employees’ unproductive time will be reduced. There will be easier, the accurate passing of information to new employees, more collaboration between team members as well as employee engagement in projects and analyzing and tracking progress made by the team.As the organization grows, change is inevitable (Have & Have, 2017). With the crises the company is going through, the IT department should consider incorporating business process management (BPM), while developing SolDistHR. BPM gives an opportunity to look and control organizational processes. Effective implementation of BPM requires organizing the outcomes to ensure proper focus on the goals, correcting and enhancing processes before automation, standardizing processes, enabling continuous change, and improving the existing methods.

A2:

As the business grows, it brings new challenges, which make it critical to ensure effective change management. In the first stage, the IT teams should first understand the prevailing status quo within the organization and note that for operations to be smooth, a few things need to change. To apply this step, SolDistHR will have to make an argument for why things may need to change and why the status quo is unsustainable will be the reason that this has to be done (Have & Have, 2017). Making this argument could potentially make the process of bringing a difference easier. Creation of a compelling vision of the future is the second stage. To apply the second stage, this is for SolDistHR you have each employee participate, to make them appreciate the need for a change and to guarantee smooth organizational operation.

In the third stage, there is the need for formal approval, in which the SolDistHR has to be well approved and budget scheduled. There will be building a change coalition and the IT team will need to ensure that they buy the rationale for change as well as getting the backing of senior members of the organization. As a team, IT should understand well the need for a change and be full support of the change. A way to apply this step may include making presentations to other members of the team on why SolDistHR is required and the advantages it will bring. In step four, the team mobilizes its commitment and ensuring that there is adequate support for the change. To apply this stage, SolDistHR should find the best person to handle a specific section as this is a key factor to bring out the best of the team and its new development. The fifth and final stage is the evaluation of programs to ensure everything is in order. To apply this step, SolDistHR will need to make more people appreciate it, use every opportunity to share what has been done and praise the team for the progress made thus far.

A3:

For the 4 main contributors, the IT team should include finance manager responsible for budgeting and forecasting project activities. Two IT professionals are responsible for designing the program to ensure it meets the needed specifications and developing software compatible with other programs. Legal officer ensures that all contractual obligations are met and overseeing all the copyright issues. A project manager oversees the whole project and defines the scope and schedules of the software.

Question B

System development method is a framework used in structuring, planning, and controlling various processes used to develop an information system. Different frameworks have evolved over the years with each having its strengths and weaknesses, which need to be considered when choosing a method. For SolDistHR system development, the IT team should consider Waterfall Method, which is a class approach to system development life cycle as describes both rigid and linear development methods. The strengths of Waterfall include being ideal for both experienced and inexperienced team members, measurable system development progress, and conservation of resources. Weaknesses of this system include large amount of risks and uncertainty involved. Due to the high risk involved, changes are not easily accommodated by this system.  

Project milestones include establishing the requirements, designing the system, implementation, integration and testing, deployment of the system, and system maintenance. For SolDistHR, requirements includeestablishing its purpose, specification for inputs and outputs, and understanding appropriate design. During system designing, the teams identify the most appropriate design by specifying both system and hardware requirement. At the implementation phase, inputs are used to develop software units, which are tested for functionality. Once functional and non-functional testing has been carried out, the system is ready for deployment.

Question C

In IT, threat means anything or anyone posing a danger to computer information or users. The treats can be from those within or outside the organization. For SolDistHR software, some of the external threats include criminal syndicates such as malicious professional attackers working in organized groups and state-sponsored actors in need of information but not money. Hacktivists are motivated by money, which makes them carry out malicious cyber activity for the promotion of political agenda, social ideology, and religious beliefs (Passerini, El, & Patten, 2012). Other external threats include weak security policies and administration. There are also internal sources of risk that could affect the performance SolDistHR. These sources including becoming a victim of phishing schemes, opening malicious emails, losing laptops, phones, and portable hard drives with information, insufficient vetting of workers, the introduction of corrupted devices into the corporate network, and accessing corporate system using untrusted sources.

Question D

For internal threats, Soliel Panel Distribution needs to have strict access to the systems and ensure only authorized personnel access the servers or critical information. The proxy should be activated to prevent accessing the system from unauthorized networks, sufficiently vetting the workers, and discouraging using portable storage devices on the computers (Passerini, El, & Patten, 2012). To prevent the attacks from external sources especially hackers, the company requires malware detector that alerts the IT team, when there is malicious access or activity on the server. Antivirus programs should also be installed into the system to help in detecting viruses.

Question E

Each software has fault tolerance, which is the ability of the program to detect and recover from a failure to provide services by the required specifications. There are many software fault tolerance including self-checking software, recovery blocks, and N-version programming. For SolDistHR, the recovery method is recovery blocks, which enable coping with occurrences and anticipated effects associated with faults and mistakes. There are also few challenges associated with the systems that could be resolvedthrough restarting the system.Other options for troubleshooting and recovery available for SolDistHR include checking for malware and viruses that may be leading to system failure. Recent hardware or software upgrade may conflict within the system leading to hardware or software malfunctioning. When the system fails, some information is likely to get lost; asystem diagnostic should be done to determine what files have been lost or destroyed. Recovery is then to be done through the manual systems back up after the restore point has been identified.The recovered datais then compared against the available data to resolve variations. The most important strategy is to maintain a manual backup of the files so that when the system fails, the lost data can be manually recovered.

Question F

In every organization, there are problems, which, if the management fails to manage, could lead to inefficiencies and reduction in employees’ productivity (Have & Have, 2017). Problem management is a process that involves managing life cycles of various problems. The existence of the issues after implementation of SolDistHR software could cause a decline in service delivery quality to the management. Thus, these problems must be appropriately managed with fix provided at the early stages to prevent the problems from escalating to the other departments.

Question G

Each business aims to make a profit as it grows. Since change is inevitable, business management needs to have strategic management plans to prevent challenges associated with the expansion of the business (Have & Have, 2017). Soliel Panel Distribution failed to consider these factors, which led to reduced productivity and inefficiency in some of its processes. To prevent such problems, the company should consider integrating an incident plan in its practices. An effective step includes problem detection where the problem leading to a breakdown is identified, prioritization and supportmeans that resources are dedicated to restoring the system to normal operations, investigation and diagnosis, resolutions to the problem the problem is solved, and incident closure. Constant communication with the affected team members to update and assure them that a solution is being sought to solve the problem is a great idea. To mitigate future breakdowns, the cause of the previous breakdowns should be identified and used to formulate a plan to prevent them from re-occurring in the future. System updates and regular checks should be carried out to ensure full functionality and eliminate any errors in time.

Successful management of incidents requires the development ofa repeatable process that involves incident detection, diagnosis, repair,and recovery.The first stage involvesdetection, where the specific problem is identified and resources for mitigating the issues such as disk space and memory. Diagnosis involving exploring options on how Soliel panel can be employed to mitigatedata losses and prevent future occurrences. The diagnosis has two critical components investigation and escalation. The repair stage involves fixing the problem. The repair process includes anything from service restart, hardware replacement or even software upgrade.Recovery consists analyzing notifications initially recorded about system failure and designing methods of preventing future occurrence.

References

Have, S., & Have, W. (2017). Reconsidering change management: Applying evidence-based insights in change management practice. Routledge, NY: Taylor & Francis Group.

Passerini, K., El, T. A. & Patten, K. (2012). Information Technology for Small Business: Managing the Digital Enterprise. New York, NY: Springer New York.