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Unit 2: Managing Application Development Portfolio and Project Review & Selection

responsibility of the committee is to take decision, which often requires more information than Notes
the proposal provides. It is, therefore, desired to have preliminary investigation to gather more
details. The steering committee approach is generally favoured because systems projects are
considered as business investments. Management, not systems analysts or designers, selects
projects for development. Decisions are made on the basis of the cost of the project, its benefits
to the organization and the feasibility of accomplishing the development within the limits of
information systems technology.

2.4.2 Information Systems Committee Method

In some organization, the responsibility for reviewing project requests is entrusted to a committee
of managers and analysts in the information systems department. Under this method, all requests
for service and development are submitted directly to a review committee within the information
systems department. This committee approves or disapproves projects and sets priorities,
indicating which projects are most important and should receive immediate attention. This
method can be used when many requests are for routine services or maintenance of existing
applications. When major equipment decisions are required or when long-term development
commitments are needed to undertake a project, the decision authority decided whether a
project should proceed or not. So, the major functions of this committee are:
(i) To review the systems plan and approve/disapprove them.
(ii) To integrate the systems that share the input data.

(iii) To provide alternatives to the project.

Task Depict major functions of Information Systems Committee Method.

2.4.3 User Group Committee Method

In some organization, the responsibility for project decisions is entrusted to the users themselves.
Individual departments hire their own analysts and designers who handle project selection and
carry out development. Although the practice of having user committees for both choose and
develop systems does take some of the burden from the systems development group it can have
disadvantages for the users. Some users’ groups may find themselves with defective or poorly
designed systems that require additional time and effort to undo any damage caused by the
misinformation that such systems could generate.

Notes Although users groups may find the decisions of steering committees and
Information Systems Committees disappointing at times, the success rate for users who
undertake development job is not very encouraging.
Project Request Contents

The project proposals submitted by the users or the analysts to the Project Selection Committee
is a critical element in launching the systems study. There is a general agreement that a project
request form should contain the following:
 What is the problem?
 What are the details of the problem?

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