Productivity Improvement Project

See also: Case Analysis General Guidance.

Select and assess, using both qualitative and quantitative techniques, an information systems process or set of processes that need improvement.

This will be a group project where possible, an individual project as needed.

You will submit a formal report on both the project and the method of determining the suggested improvements; i.e., your formal process improvement report will have both content area and methodological sections.

Your report will be fully documented and presented in technical report writing style.

 

In the last half of the course you will apply the techniques you have learned in a practical way. Select an information systems area known to you that needs improvement. Preview this area in Module 4, Exercise 5. Either as part of a group or individually (as approved), amplify your work for Module 4, Exercise 5. Incorporate a wide variety of process improvement analytical techniques. Emphasize decision-making based on data collection and analysis. Integrate both qualitative and quantitative techniques. Use team processes and document your methods Propose your topic and gain approval of it before midterm. Keep it in the information systems arena.

If possible, I would like to see teams from or similar work environments collaborate on a process improvement project. Yes, you would be a real team working in virtual space and that will take more effort on your part to understand and share each other’s perspectives. I want to have such teams formed by mid-term as well. You may self-select your teams. They will commonly have 5-9 members. Members may be voted on or off the team, but I must approve all such action. If your personal circumstances do not facilitate team participation, you may request an individual project. This will, nonetheless, still involve teamwork. Those not participating in group projects will help each other develop a process improvement plan, review implementation, and conduct analysis in advisory teams. You will, however, have individual reports for each project.

See the assignment schedule for key dates. Plan and work ahead, please.

I want your Course Project to focus on IT/IS processes in a work area to which you have current placement and access. You will need the cooperation of the supervisor and workers. If you are familiar with quality improvement methods, that will help you with the implementation and analysis of the project. If not, the Memory Jogger booklet will prove an early source of techniques. So think about IT/IS processes that do not work as well as you think they might.

If we can arrange it, I would like the Course Project conducted as a team with 5-9 students looking at the same type of situation in similar work environments. I suspect that will be tough, so I am prepared for individual projects as well. But even individual projects will have a team element - for I want each individual project to have an advisory team to discuss the improvement plan, data collection and analysis and the final report of results and method. (Typically members of each advisory team will share their individual projects with each other, solicit feedback and provide the same for each of the other members of that advisory group.)

Where to start?

Look around your current work area. There are probably information system process improvements that need to be researched very close to you. The project could be related to your primary job, a second job, volunteer work that you do, sports or hobbies that involved organizations which you could assist.

Spiral out from there. You want an IS project that is challenging but not so difficult that it cannot be successful. In fact you want the chances of success to be very high.

Pick a project that has sufficient visibility so that it will make a difference when it succeeds, that the boss (and her boss) become excited about positive results - and of course pick a project that you personally can investigate (i.e., you have both placement and access to the work area under study).

By the end of Week 2 I need a tentative Course Project topic. (Post in the Conference on WT set up for this purpose.) I have to approve your topic selection. You need to coordinate with the work center manager(s) and gain permission for the study. They will naturally have their own ideas and priorities for improvement which you will want to work into your project. So this part of your project development will be very fluid.

By the end of Week 3, I need a tentative Group Project Team (if you are going to work with other class members on the actual field phase of the project) or a tentative Project Advisory Team (if you are conducting a solo project). Note: All members of an Advisory Team will have solo projects and help each other in the planning, troubleshooting, analysis and review of project findings and recommendations. I have to approve your team selection.

Document your efforts. Your report must include an appendix that details your methodology.

By the end of Week 5, your Course Project topic and team should be finalized. I will give you permission to conduct your project. You will need to have final approval from the client for the full scope and timing of what you plan to do.

Group projects will normally be larger in scope than individual projects; hence you may need to begin your field work early.

If so, you could start as early as Week 6 (data collection); however, before you do, please read ahead and complete your study of the techniques in Memory Jogger II and Team Handbook Chapter 2 and Appendix B as a minimum. Also preview Module 4. You will find Exercise 5 serves as a small scale version of your course project. You can complete it prior to the assigned time if you have completed the assigned readings and module work leading up to it. (In the schedule, I have assigned Exercise 5 out of sequence to move it ahead one week.)

Exercise 5, Module 4, should allow you to pilot your research and analysis techniques and make adjustments. Indeed, one might consider Exercise 5 as Phase One of the Course Project field work.

By the end of Week 11, you should have all your planning steps complete. Your team should have validated your plan and suggested improvements to the plan itself. Projects which have grown too large to complete this term must be segmented so that a significant field work phase can be completed, data collected, an analysis conducted and a report of progress to date and the way forward produced. Remember, that you will have a client in the work area in which you have been researching who will expect some tangible result from your efforts. Of course, there is also the small matter of your instructor's expectations as well. (Heh, heh!)

Use Week 12 to wrap up any field work that remains incomplete and begin your analysis and draft report.

Use Week 13 to coordinate the results with your Project or Advisory Team for the last time. Finalize your formal technical report on your research results and methodology and submit your work.

Unless otherwise excused, use the MS Office suite of programs to prepare your report. Diagrams made in programs such as Visio or Inspiration must be converted to .gif or .png files before inclusion in your report. (Use .jpg for complex color pictures.) For ease of posting to WT or e-mailing to me, you may need to use several different files. If you do, make sure they are well referenced internally so that it is absolutely clear how the whole project comes together and interrelates.

Use as many of the tools and strategies that you already know or will learn in this course as possible. However, the intent of this productivity improvement project is for you to demonstrate what you will have learned from the concepts and techniques presented in this course. I want to see diagrams and charts, not just words. While TH Appendix B is less formal that we normally expect in a report, it summarizes the essence of that process improvement project. Note how words are used to amplify charts and diagrams - and diagrams are used to capture and communicate so much more than simple words can do. So use TH Appendix B as a guide for the integration of techniques and tools into your work.

Where sources other than your texts are used, please include a complete bibliographic reference and final summary of works cited. I should be able to find any quote or paraphrase with relative ease in the original source. Just as importantly, unless the idea, details, graphics, etc. are uniquely your own (and presented for the first time in this report) or in that body of knowledge termed 'general' by a non-specialist, make sure you cite your sources. If you use some else's idea, exact words, graphics, etc., give them credit. If you use a paper you or someone else has written for a prior class or purpose, include it in your references. Be careful. Do not unintentionally plagiarize what has been called 'intellectual property.'