Information Systems Development Approaches Research Articles

Overview of the Application of Computer-Aided Tools in Information Systems Development

Developing Information Systems (IS) using computer-aided tools (CATs) yields immense benefits realized by following a set of activities and techniques. Apart from revolutionizing IS development, another key benefit of computer-aided approach remains the improvement of the overall IS development process. While integrated CATs could be used throughout the phases of IS development life-cycle, others are only meant serve specific phases. The present paper provides a short review on the concepts in IS Development using CATs. Furthermore, the paper highlights the most prominent CATs that are widely used and how these tools fit into different phases of IS development. It also describes how using CATs paved the way to the recent trends in user-centred and end-user IS development approaches.

Information System Development Approaches and Organizational Competitive Advantage of Business Organizations in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria

The aim of every business organization is to survive amid the competition and the turbulent nature of business environment. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between information system development approaches and organizational competitive advantage of business organizations in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria. The study adopted the explanatory and quantitative method, hence correlational research design is employed to investigate the correlation between the study variables with target population of 45 respondents as the study population. Krejcie and Morgan determination table was used to derived the study sample size of (40) participants. The closed ended structured 4 points Likert scale Questionnaire was constructed for use in data gathering. Collected data were coded into a format and analysed with the aid of Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient Statistics and presented using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software package for ease of interpretations. The findings showed low and moderate significant relationship between the first dimension of information system development approaches -Waterfall approach and the two measures of organizational competitive advantage – customers’ requirement and business performance. The second dimension of information system development approaches – Agile Management Approach significantly correlates with the two measures of organizational competitive advantage – customers’ requirements and business performance. Therefore, we recommended that, when developing information system for business organizations, the aims and objectives should determine the recommended approach to be used by system developers. Keywords: Information System Development Approaches, Waterfall Approach, Agile Management Approach, Organizational Competitive Advantage

Selected Topics on Advances in Capability-Oriented Information Systems Development: Editorial Introduction to Issue 10 of CSIMQ

Modern organizations need to be sustainable in the presence of dynamically changing business conditions, which require from Information Systems (IS) to address complex challenges for being able to support organizations acting in varying business conditions – changing customer demands, new legislations, new customers, and emerging alliances. From a technical perspective, the gap between business requirements and supporting IS is still present, mostly due to the fact that current IS development approaches operate with artifacts defined on a relatively low abstraction level. To go beyond the state of the art, IS development frameworks used by enterprises need to be structured for solving emerging problems, and enterprises need to have efficient methods for the use of these frameworks to deliver the right IS solutions just-in-time and just-enough. The notion of capability emerged in the beginning of the nineties in the context of competence-based management, military frameworks, and developing organization’s competitive advantage – linguistically, it means the ability or qualities necessary to do something.

Emerging forms of inter-organizational and cross-sector collaborations in e-government initiatives

Purpose This study aims to explore recent public sector trends, inter-organizational and cross-sector collaborations, and analyzes these in terms of implications for participative development of information systems (IS). These trends are understood as being part of emerging forms of e-government. Initial suggestions for how to develop IS in the new contexts are provided. Design/methodology/approach Three cases involving the trends described above, taking place in the Swedish emergency response system, are studied and used as basis for identified participative IS development challenges and suggested adaptation needs. Data collection involves semi-structured interviews, focus groups and future workshops. Findings The identified challenges concern balancing ideological versus practical needs, lack of resources, lack of know-how and design techniques and tool challenges. Some practical implications for participative IS development include more extensive focus on stakeholder and legal analysis, need for interdisciplinary design teams, merging of task and needs analysis for yet-undefined user tasks and using on-line alternatives for interacting with users. Research implications/limitations The study is exploratory where the three cases are in different, but at the same time interrelated, collaboration contexts. The identified implications and challenges provide proposals that in future research can be applied, formalized and integrated when developing practically feasible participative IS development approaches. Originality/value It is argued that the results point toward a current emerging form of e-government initiatives directed toward certain demarcated groups of citizens actually carrying out certain tasks for their co-citizens and society rather than the broad masses, having far-reaching practical implications and complicating the issue of IS development.

Editorial

Editorial

Controlling information systems development: a new typology for an evolving field

AbstractThis study explores how and why information systems development (ISD) approaches differ in their tactics to control the behaviour of development teams. Drawing from prior research on organisational control, we conduct qualitative case studies at four organisations to examine the extent that traditional and contemporary systems development approaches can highlight a unique combination of control attributes. Based on the data collected, we build an ISD control typology that differentiates ISD approaches on the basis of control objectives (product or process focused) and control practices (preventive or detective/corrective focused). The proposed typology can be used by practitioners to inform and guide more effective systems development control choices while providing researchers with a new model that recognises the unique control aspects of today's systems development approaches.

A Conceptual Framework for Consumer Information Systems Development

Consumer information systems (CIS) are an emerging area of inquiry for information systems researchers. IS researchers have traditionally emphasized efficiency and effectiveness of organizational processes and system use. However, design for consumer information systems requires more attention to be paid to processes of value creation embedded in the consumer experience. This shift in focus demands a reconsideration of current information systems development approaches. In this paper we propose a conceptual framework for consumer information systems development. The framework includes six elements of co-creation of consumer value. The framework is illustrated by reviewing the findings from three case studies.

Ethical Information Systems Development: A Baumanian Postmodernist Perspective

The paper offers a critique of traditional methodical approaches to Information Systems Development (ISD), arguing that a number of assumptions (for example, universality and rationality) underlying these approaches lead to incomplete ontological and epistemological considerations, and thereby contribute to IS failures in many cases. The paper proposes that ethical analysis undertaken in conjunction with traditional ISD approaches may be a way to address some of the limitations experienced during traditional ISD. Drawing upon ideas from postmodern ethics formulated by Zygmunt Bauman, the paper argues that increased focus on the moral responsibility of key ISD players (such as the team of analysts) may improve the ISD process. Finally, this paper suggests how, consistent with the postmodern stance, such moral responsibility can be implemented in the context of ISD. The paper concludes with the contributions and future implications of this research.

Problems of information support of scientific innovation and industrial spheres: New conceptual approaches

The discrepancy between national information infrastructure capabilities and the present-day requirements of the new economic institutional environment is one of main causes of the gap between the significant volume of fundamental and applied innovation research results that have commercialization potential, and the actual abilities of our domestic industry to assimilate these results, which exists in Russia. The purpose of this article is to form at least a rough conceptual look at an effective information infrastructure for innovation and scientific and technical activities, which corresponds to the present-day requirements of the new economic institutional environment in Russia. To solve the problem of overcoming inertial trends in national information system development, new ideas and new conceptual approaches are required. The presented conceptual approaches are oriented toward solving the problems of modernization and the development of a qualitatively new structural and substantial organization of the national information system. Most of the critical phases of information support of the stages of technology transfer and the basic principles of information infrastructure development are shown. A brief enumeration of the set of key actions on the development of the information infrastructure of the scientific, technical, and industrial spheres is provided.

How can organisations learn: an information systems development perspective

This article sets out to argue that organisations can learn but that they cannot do so in their own right without infrastructural support. This article further examines the notion that individuals in organisations also require the cognitive participation of the organisation itself as a learning entity to learn. The close reliance and affiliation required between individuals and organisations to enable their learning from one another are discussed. In continuation of this, specific examples are provided through the industry sector of information systems development (ISD) projects to illustrate of how organisations can learn. Finally, the question of how one identifies organisational learning is analysed. Following on from the ISD and its use in the analogy of organisational learning, the article discusses an organisational empirical research project currently being undertaken by the authors, which utilises blogs. Though there are many potential organisational learning connotations associated with blogs, they could be perceived as a type of information system. The ongoing research being undertaken with the company using the blogs will attempt to identify indicators of learning at the individual, group and organisational levels. The significance of the issues explored in this article lies in the fact that it addresses an ISD approach to study how an organisation learns, and why this perspective is useful towards understanding the process of organisational learning. This article contributes to the organisational learning debate through an illustrative industry example of ISD projects. In doing so, we wish to argue that though individual learning can occur in ISD projects, the collective nature of projects primarily engenders the interpretive aspect of organisational learning. We further believe that it is the interactive nature of an ISD project that allows an organisation to learn in tandem with project members as exemplified through the stages of a project life cycle. We feel that this article contributes to the ISD and organisational learning literature in terms of linking both concepts together.

Roles in the ISD process: a collaborative approach

PurposeLooking at the Scandinavian information systems development (ISD) approach in contrast to more traditional ISD approaches, this paper reflects on experiences of the roles of the participants in an ISD process. The study aims to demonstrate how the theoretical knowledge of academic researchers together with the pragmatic approach of practitioners can be integrated in the ISD process – particularly in a new and more refined way, through a heightened awareness of the different roles.Design/methodology/approachBased on case study methodology, the study focuses on the roles of human resource academics and human resource practitioners in an ISD process developing an intra‐ and inter‐organizational web‐based knowledge‐sharing portal.FindingsThe study demonstrates that in order to secure the success of the ISD process, new roles must be performed and properly orchestrated. Also, the study demonstrates how a constant crosschecking of “real‐world” experiences against “the laboratory” in the ISD process can benefit the participating partners, the process, and the end‐product.Research limitations/implicationsBased on a single‐case study, the context and process imposed constraints. The findings are context specific with implications for the application of findings to other ISD processes.Originality/valueThe study highlights the human tasks in a particular ISD process and explains how insights from the Scandinavian and more traditional ISD approaches can be used to enhance the role identification and consequently help address the mediator problem. The study suggests that researchers act as mediators through the fulfillment of the roles, which naturally stem from the Scandinavian approach and the traditional software engineering approach to ISD.

BUSINESS KNOWLEDGE-BASED GENERATION OF THE SYSTEM CLASS MODEL

The article presents principles of the Enterprise model-based generation of the Class model of the system (on the Platform independent level). Enterprise model being an integral part of the Repository of a CASE system becomes a core structure (Knowledge base) for the accumulation of business domain knowledge. The purpose of this article is to show that the knowledge stored in the Knowledge base is enough to generate one of the main models of the object-oriented Information systems development approaches, namely, Class model on the Platform independent level. In order to show the basic principles of the Class model generation algorithm, Enterprise and Class metamodels as well as mappings between the corresponding elements of these metamodels are presented and briefly discussed. The algorithm of the Class model generation and a brief overview of its realization are also presented in this paper.

Business Process Simulation

This article discusses the idea that even though information systems development (ISD) approaches long have advocated the use of integrated organizational views, the modeling techniques used have not been adapted accordingly and remain focused on the automated information system (IS) solution. Existing research provides evidence that business process simulation (BPS) can be used at different points in the ISD process in order to provide better integrated organizational views that aid the design of appropriate IS solutions. Despite this fact, research in this area is not extensive, which suggests that the potential of using BPS for the ISD process is not yet well understood. The article uses the findings from three case studies in order to illustrate the ways that BPS has been used at different points in the ISD process. It compares the results against IS modeling techniques, highlighting the advantages and disadvantages that BPS has over the latter. The research necessary to develop appropriate BPS tools and give guidance on their use in the ISD process is discussed.

Is Extreme Programming Just Old Wine in New Bottles

This article explores extreme programming (XP) as an information systems development approach and argues that it is mainly old wine in new bottles. We take an interpretive and critical view of the phenomenon. We made an empirical study of two companies that apply an XP-style development approach throughout the information systems development life cycle. The results of our research suggest that XP is a combination of best practices of traditional information systems development methods. It is hindered by its reliance on talented individuals, which makes its large-scale deployment as a general-purpose method difficult. We claim that XP can be useful for small teams of domain experts who are physically close together and able to communicate well with the end users, and who are good designers and implementers. However, these skilled and motivated individuals with high working moral can exhibit high productivity regardless of the methods used if they are not overly constrained by bureaucracy.

Integrating Human-Computer Interaction Development into the Systems Development Life Cycle: A Methodology

Incorporating a human computer interaction (HCI) perspective into the systems development life cycle (SDLC) is necessary to information systems (IS) success and, in turn, to the success of businesses. However, modern SDLC models are based more on organizational needs than human needs. The human interaction aspect of an information system is usually considered far too little (only the screen interface) and far too late in the IS development process (only at the design stage). Thus, often a gap exists between satisfying organizational needs and supporting and enriching human users. This problem can be addressed by carefully integrating HCI development into the SDLC process to achieve a truly human-centered IS development approach. This paper examines the roles of HCI in systems development, justifies the importance of considering HCI through out the entire systems development life cycle, presents a methodology for human-centered IS development, and demonstrates how to apply this methodology to develop human-centered information systems.

Towards a distinctive body of knowledge for Information Systems experts: coding ISD process knowledge in two IS journals

Abstract. This paper introduces the idea of coding a practically relevant body of knowledge (BoK) in Information Systems (IS) that could have major benefits for the field. In its main part, the paper focuses on the question if and how an underlying body of action‐oriented knowledge for IS experts could be distilled from the IS research literature. For this purpose the paper identifies five knowledge areas as the most important parts for an IS expert's BoK. Two of these are claimed as distinct areas of competence for IS experts: IS application knowledge and IS development (ISD) process knowledge. The paper focuses particularly on ISD process knowledge because it allows the organizing of practically relevant IS knowledge in an action‐oriented way. The paper presents some evidence for the claim that a considerable body of practically relevant IS process knowledge might, indeed, exist, but also notes that it is highly dispersed in the IS literature. It then argues that the IS research community should take stock of this knowledge and organize it in an action‐oriented way. Based on results from prior work it proposes a four‐level hierarchical coding scheme for this purpose. In order to test the idea of coding action‐oriented knowledge for IS experts, the paper reports the results of a coded literature analysis of ISD research articles published from 1996 to 2000 in two leading IS journals – Information Systems Journal and MIS Quarterly. The results suggest that ISD approaches form a useful framework for organizing practically relevant IS knowledge.

A federation–agent–workflow simulation framework for virtual organisation development

Traditional information system development approaches separate the domain model from the system model and then focus on the transformation between them. They are not, however, useful in rapid development of virtual organisations. This paper proposes a simulation-based development framework for establishing such organisations. It consists of a federation–agent–workflow (FAW) model, a set of rules for establishing the mapping from the domain into the virtual organisation, a set of management services, and a macro development process. Basic elements of the model are agents, which can perform active domain behaviour, and they are organised as autonomous federations. Agents within the same federation perform relevant tasks according to an overall workflow. Domain organisation is simulated by the multi-level agents whose behaviour are driven by a nested-workflow mechanism. The framework unifies the traditional domain organisation and information system model into a virtual organisation model, and this allows users to develop intuitive virtual organisations from the viewpoint of the domain. A comparison between the framework and the traditional information system approaches shows that the framework provides a simpler development process, so it meets the needs of virtual organisations for rapid and mobile development.

Embedding security practices in contemporary information systems development approaches

As information and communication technologies become a critical component of firms’ infrastructures and information establishes itself as a key business resource as well as driver, people start to realise that there is more than the functionality of the new information systems that is significant. Business or organisational transactions over new media require stability, one factor of which is information security. Information systems development practices have changed in line with the evolution of technology offerings as well as the nature of systems developed. Nevertheless, as this paper establishes, most contemporary development practices do not accommodate sufficiently security concerns. Beyond the literature evidence, reports on empirical study results indicating that practitioners deal with security issues by applying conventional risk analysis practices after the system is developed. Addresses the lack of a defined discipline for security concerns integration in systems development by using field study results recording development practices that are currently in use to illustrate their deficiencies, to point to required enhancements of practice and to propose a list of desired features that contemporary development practices should incorporate to address security concerns.

A Paradigmatic Analysis Contrasting Information Systems Development Approaches and Methodologies

This paper analyses the fundamental philosophical assumptions of five “contrasting” information systems development (ISD) approaches: the interactionist approach, the speech act-based approach, the soft systems methodology approach, the trade unionist approach, and the professional work practice approach. These five approaches are selected for analysis because they illustrate alternative philosophical assumptions from the dominant “orthodoxy” identified in the research literature. The paper also proposes a distinction between “approach” and “methodology.” The analysis of the five approaches is organized around four basic questions: What is the assumed nature of an information system (ontology)? What is human knowledge and how can it be obtained (epistemology)? What are the preferred research methods for continuing the improvement of each approach (research methodology)? and what are the implied values of information system research (ethics)? Each of these questions is explored from the internal perspective of the particular ISD approach. The paper addresses these questions through a conceptual structure which is based on a paradigmatic framework for analyzing ISD approaches.

Information modelling: foundation, abstraction mechanisms and approach

This paper briefly presents a new information modelling methodology useful as an information systems development approach. The methodology is based on a set of fundamental abstraction mechanisms which provide the means for modelling on a number of abstraction levels and, on the highest levels, the most invariant components and structures of the information model can be identified and defined. It is also based on the object-oriented paradigm which is applied in harmony with the abstraction mechanisms. The methodology introduces an alternative to the traditional entity relationship technique with respect to modelling of information and on this basis it can support efforts to construct reusable, extensible and reliable information systems.