Gap Analysis

Attached

Case Study: Joe’s Supermarket

This local supermarket is located in an urban neighborhood and provides customers with a wide

array of products to choose from. Over time, the inventory has grown exponentially, but the

current information system is not equipped to handle the increase in purchase demand. The

company that owns the store opted to go with the “light” versions of the Purchasing and Point of

Sale (POS) modules used to manage inventory and request products from vendors. The owner of

the organization (Joe Russo) has emphasized that there are critical things on his “wish list” that

he believes will move the supermarket into “the new tech age,” but he is not sure where to start.

Here is some information he wants the IT consultant to know, but there is more likely additional

information he is unaware of:

• Other processes that are part of the enterprise resource planning system are becoming

slower, and some of the staff noticed errors in some of the product data coming into the

system.

• A centralized database supports the entire system but has not been reviewed or upgraded.

• The time spent on customer transactions is too long! Anyone in management should be

able to monitor transactions in real-time, but the point of sale system sends the data “over

the wire” to the database slower each day. Some days there is a 2-hour lag in the system

catching up on transactions!

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Assignment:

This week, you will use one of the critical business processes identified in last week for the

case study organization (Joe’s Supermarket) to perform a gap analysis that clearly shows the

difference between the “as-is” state of the specific information system to be changed and the

“to be” state of the system process planned for the future. Lucidchart or Draw.io can be used

to create the business process map and a data flow diagram for the systems project.

Include the following information and diagrams in your gap analysis:

1. Create a root cause analysis diagram (fishbone) to document “pain points” in the
problematic business process.

2. Document the business objectives, the scope of the project with qu antifiable key
performance indicators as metrics, a breakdown of goals with small measurable units,

and a specific plan (with steps to close the gaps) to get the organization to the desired

result.

3. Use the systems requirements plan created in last week for the organization and proper
notation (symbols) to create a business process map diagram for the system to create a

visualization of the current state of the business process for the organization system.

4. Use the proper notation to create a data flow diagram that clearly shows the current
flow of data throughout the organization as related to the business process.

5. Utilize the proper notation to create a business process map diagram of the system to
visualize the series of events that will produce the future state of the business

process in the organization system.

6. Use the proper notation to create a data flow diagram that clearly shows the future
flow of data throughout the organization as related to the business process.

7. Position the respective data flow and process model diagrams side-by-side to clearly
show the “before and after” for both the data flow in and out of the information system

and the changes to the business process.

8. Write a summary of the gap analysis and justification for business process selection,
while detailing the conclusions made and how those conclusions were derived.

Length: 6 to 7-page paper, not including title and reference pages (APA), plus 4

diagrams (data flow and process model) in the appendix.

References: Include a minimum of 3 scholarly references.

Readings:

• Dewey, J. (2020). McKinsey 7S Framework. Salem Press Encyclopedia.

• Draw.io (n.d.). Security-first diagramming for teams. Retrieved from
https://www.diagrams.net/

• Lucidchart.com. (2020). Free flowchart maker. Retrieved from
https://www.lucidchart.com/pages/examples/flowchart-maker

System Requirement Plan last week:

The first stage of Requirement analysis will be to identify every end user of the POS software,

and all the stakeholders of the supermarket. The stakeholders are the system sponsor’s, this

might include the management, executive or the owner. The end users are the cashiers and

anyone else who interacts with the system including the customers who are served through the

system, and they experience the first-hand effects of the system inconveniences and failures. All

these parties are important since the software end product needs to fulfill their requirements.

Second step is collection of the business system requirements, Software developer team have to

collect requirements from all the end users and supermarket stakeholders. Some of the best

techniques to collect system requirements include:

1. One on one interviews: The one-on-one interviews with end users (Cashiers and the

management) together with stakeholders and customers. Using these techniques, one will be able

to collect specific requirements from each party.

2. Using Focus groups( Böhm,2021): focus groups are number of people who serve the

supermarket in certain department or have a role in the business operations of the supermarket,

some focus groups may include cashiers, using focus group have an advantage of eliminating

conflict of interest later after the system is developed

3. Application of Use case: use case is an important methodology which can be applicable in

collecting requirements together with others, through use case the system analyst and developers

will be able to identify, analyze and organize the system requirements. Another advantage of

using use case diagrams is creating possible interactions and sequence of the system, this helps

identify possible bottlenecks and challenges in early stage before developing the final product

thus saving on time and other resources.

https://www.lucidchart.com/pages/examples/flowchart-maker

4. Prototypes: prototypes are the best since they allow the system developer to give the end user

an example of an actual product, End user interact with the prototype system, use it alongside the

existing one to avoid normal business operation, from the experience they highlight the

challenges and what requirements are not well addressed by the prototype. Prototype address

feasibility challenges and help solve problems earlier on bettering the system success rate.

Open ended questions are the best in conduction one on one interviews, it helps the system

analyst understand well the current systems, its challenges and help design system with best

functionalities, A good done survey and questionnaires plays an important role in helping the

analyst gather important and critical requirements of the system and thus avoiding problems in

the design and implementation phase (Banzhaf et al., 2016). For a successful system

requirements analysis an in-depth system requirement have to be done( Böhm,2021). Open

ended questions are the best since they give the research subject the freedom to articulate what

have not been asked, the maximum freedom accorded to the interviewee helps get a lot of

important information

These inquiries build trust, appear less intimidating, and allow for an unfettered or free answer.

Nevertheless, techniques may be time-consuming (7), and developing broad assertions or

generalizations can be challenging. There is also the possibility that the subject will drift off into

an ineffective response. Second type of quest closed end questions. The closed-ended inquiry is

brief and takes minimal thought. Such questions are especially effective for demographic

inquiries.

Nevertheless, statistical questions need to be asked at the conclusion of the interview to avoid

negatively impacting participants’ preparation to respond to questions owing to the sensation of

losing confidentiality, that might occur if such questions were raised at the beginning of the

questionnaire. (6) The disadvantage of this question type is that it may be leading, which can be

annoying or intimidating; it also discourages transparency because the viable replies are preset.

Step 3 is Categorizing the system requirements, there are multiple types of system users’

requirements and they must be grouped to allow better analysis and avoid confusion. There are

four categories of system requirement normally summarized to function and non-functional

requirements. Functional requirements are systems functionality which are critical for business

continuity example includes selling products, technical requirement is technical requirement

which defines success of the system in business delivery, example include the speed of the

system, other types of requirements include Transitional requirement and operational

requirements.

Functional requirements of the POS of the supermarket are the basic system functions that helps

the supermarket. The first functional requirement is system has some errors in products

information, Developer must ensure the new system have seamless data transfer with no errors.

The importance of this functionality will be to ease the struggles of doing transactions. Minimal

or no error in the system will help sell product faster and thus improve time of transaction.

Centralized database needs to be update to support the growing business. Supermarket is

currently growing, same with its customers, the current system is struggling to work with the

system.

Thus, the database must be updated to improve its capacity to support the new system and also

security measures. Third functional requirement is to change the system network cable, The

system can adopt new technology to communicate with the database such example might include

wireless dedicated network, this will ensure the system has a network channel that is not slow

and can be burstable with the demand. It is easier to request the network provider to increase the

network bandwidth rather than trying to change the cable of the whole network to increase the

speed of the system