APPLYING MENTAL MODELS TO MAKING CONTROLLED CRITICALLY SAFE DECISIONS IN IT PROJECT MANAGEMENT

Abstract

Over the past decades, numerous researchers and practitioners have focused on the use case modeling for information technology project management. However, few studies have examined ways to improve the discovery phase of an information technology project through modifying use case diagrams. In this work, a mental model approach is suggested to integrate a visualization stage into the discovery phase by creating a conceptual mental model before constructing the use case diagram. It has been established that designing a mental model by visualizing the end user’s needs improves the ability of junior analysts to capture, analyze, and determine the user and functional requirements of information systems. Moreover, junior business analysts can extrapolate from the workflow presented in the conceptual mental model to determine the system’s actions to benefit the associated actor, which must appear in the use case diagram. The paper describes the design of user precedents through a conceptual mental model. Altogether, the proposed approach’s effectiveness in capturing, analyzing, and determining the requirements of information systems is measured in terms of accuracy, completeness, and simplicity.