Question

Choose an organization that you are familiar with and determine what is done to initiate information systems projects. Who is responsible for initiating projects? Is this process formal or informal? Does this appear to be a top- down or bottom-up process? How could this process be improved?

Answer 1

The organization that would be discussed is TATA Steel. In this organization, there is an elaborate IT function which caters to the requirement of its internal customers by delivering software solutions for scheduling production, maintenance of enterprise wide ERP or any upgradation that may be required.

Any information systems is typically borne out of requirement of a business function and hence the origination of the same is either done by a department or the business function needing the upgradation or the process improvement group responsible for enterprise wide process improvement. Obviously the IT department plays a role of co-owner in specifying the IT hardware and software and the resource requirement for the project.

Indeed the process of a new information systems project is a formal request to sanction resources for a capital project as usually it involves significant investment in terms of resources, acquisition of assets and time of the manpower involved. The process is a bottom up process wherein the functional group which has assessed the requirement of the project puts up a proposal which is reviewed by the departmental heads and then submitted to the capital project appraisal committee of the company for further review and sanction.

This process could be improved by making the appraisal process more faster and also flexible so as to add or remove features of a project which may seem not required at a later stage of the appraisal process. This would save considerable time and resources for the company.