A Review On Stakeholder And Quality Needs Information Technology Essay

Stakeholders are an essential part of a project. They are End users or clients, the people who will collect the requirement, the people who will do project and finally the people who will obtain the benefits of the project. Napier, R. & McDaniel, R., (2006) Measuring what Matters describes that the three important stakeholder groups are owners, employees and customers. We can expand this stakeholder list to other groups. This other group may be valid in some organizations only but the principle remains same.

Organizations exist to serve to their customers or clients. If customers are not happy with the project then they will go elsewhere. Before start of project the Organization must understand the customer requirements. Communication is base and most effective tool in understanding customer needs. The goals of customer relations are to make the customer feel valued, identify possible issues and problems, and to find out dynamic needs that lead useful in future product developments.

Task 1

Stakeholders and their Expectations

Stakeholder expectations are the project management would review the project results positively. The path of meeting these expectations are just a matter of selecting the right stakeholders, collecting the requirements of those stakeholders, and translating those requirement into some form specification, finally developing the project from that specification.  Some stakeholders are influence considerably involved with the project, as the

Project may mean a great deal to them. In this case, we may potentially expect a great deal of feedback from such a stakeholder. We may expect a great deal of input when it comes to project requirements.

The flawless and quality project ensures the satisfaction of stakeholders. The project would tested by many techniques. The review of tested results could be validated by develop and test team. The quality of project should meet all quality standard measurements.

Communication is one of the effective element to target the audience. The management who posses deliberate communication in the stakeholder group they need to explains to unknown person. It will be tough when the important person in the project not receiving information about the project. There are two ways in communication. One is Formal communication and another one is Informal communication.

Meetings:

Face to face communication is one of the most effective communication. Every single minute would be utilize for the project. This could be a dialogue not a monologue. The requirement of stakeholders can be discuss with every team members in the project management. It is the best way as you have the verbal and non verbal cues that enhance the communication and avoid misinterpretation.

Conference Calls:

In this fast running world no one like spend time to travel. Significant growth in the Information Technology allows us to communicate with many people at a time. The dialogue can take place though its dependant on voice intonation and clarity of the verbal message. They only require cost of phone call and there are many paid and free services that will facilitate use of a conference call line for many people to dial into.

Email or Newsletters:

This is one way communication. Hi-Speed network speed up our communication way in order to done as soon as earlier. Utilizes emailed updates, hard copy brochures, posters, newsletters mailed or emailed. One of the weaknesses is that messages are delivered and you cannot measure if they were read and understood, deleted as sometimes there is no feedback. That immediate feedback is valuable for strengthening your message and making sure impacts and feedback are quickly received.

In HCL, the team member used to communicate by unified communications. The tools and products available with the UC practice are vice-based mailing system application, CTI application for emergency services, Appointment notification service, Visual voice mail and MMS application, Smart call convergence client, SIP-based IVR application server. These tools are effective in any way of formal communications.

Update the Stakeholder requirements at HCL

Pearce, L., & Carpenter, L., & Martin, R., (2003) Stakeholder Requirements for

Institutional Portals [Internet] London, FAIR Programme of the Joint Information Systems Committee. Available from <http:/www.fair-portal.hull.ac.uk/>[Accessed 27 March 2011] illustrates the dynamics in the requirements emphasis the future products or projects. There are some ways to update the requirements of stakeholder.

Online Survey

A paid survey is used to collect quantitative information about the participants’ personal and economic habits set against their particular demographic. Incentivized surveys are considered to be more likely to catch a wider and more representative range of respondents compared to unincentivised surveys.

Focus Groups

A focus group is a form of qualitative research in which a group of people are asked about their perceptions, opinions, beliefs and attitudes towards a product, service, concept, advertisement, idea, or packaging. Questions are asked in an interactive group setting where participants are free to talk with other group members.

Interviews

An interview is a conversation between two people (the interviewer and the interviewee) where questions are asked by the interviewer to obtain information from the interviewee.

Reusability implies some explicit management of build, packaging, distribution,  installation,configuration,deployment,maintenance and upgrade issues. If these issues are not considered, software may appear to be reusable from design point of view, but will not be reused in practice.

Task 2

Quality issues of Organization

Quality is determined by the product users, clients or customers, not by society in general. Two principles included in QA are: “Fit for purpose” – the product should be suitable for the intended purpose; and “Right first time” – mistakes should be eliminated. QA includes regulation of the quality of raw materials, assemblies, products and components, services related to production, and management, production and inspection processes. The CMMI (Capability Maturity Model Integration) model is widely used to implement Quality Assurance (PPQA) in an organization. The CMMI maturity levels can be divided in to 5 steps, which a company can achieve by performing specific activities within the organization.

HCL’s QMS

We shall deliver defect-free products, services and solutions to meet the requirements of our external and internal customers, the first time, every time. [1980] Quality at HCL [internet] London. Accessed from :< http://www.hclinfosystems.in/op_qlty.htm> [Accessed 27 Mar. 11]. Under HCL Quality Education System program, they train their employees on the basic concepts and tools of quality. A number of improvement projects have been undertaken by employees, whereby process deficiencies and bottlenecks are identified, and Corrective Action Projects (CAPs) are undertaken. This reduces defect rates and improves cycle times in various processes, including personal quality.

They have received MAIT’s ‘Level II recognition for Business Excellence’ for our initiatives in the Information Technology Industry, adding another commendation to our fold. MAIT’s Level II recognition is based on the ‘European Foundation for Quality Management’ (EFQM), for gaining quality leadership and business competitiveness. 

The OMS is developed around the principle of building Quality right through the development cycle facilitating continuous improvements to process and product. The use of Deming’s Plan, Do, Check, Act (PDCA) cycle is recommended and implemented for all activities.

Quality Systems at HCL

BS 7799

BS 7799 is a standard that in two parts guides how to deploy a comprehensive information security system covering all aspects.

BS7799 Part 1 gives best practice recommendations for information security management for use by those who are responsible for initiating, implementing or maintaining security in their organisation. It is intended to provide a common basis for developing effective security management practice and to provide confidence in inter-company trading agreements and business partnerships.

BS7799 Part 2 defines 127 security controls structured under 10 domains to identify the particular safeguards that are appropriate to their particular business or specific area of responsibility. These areas cover elements that can affect information security and business functioning – such as physical & environmental security or compliance to legal requirements.

ITIL

IT service management enterprises must focus on service by adopting a business and systematic approach to managing day-to-day operations. The underlying business processes should support the technical competence and experience of the enterprise. To achieve this objective, IT Infrastructure Library (ITIL) was established as the standard framework for IT Service Management enterprises that entailed a comprehensive, consistent and coherent set of best practices. 

ITIL introduces a process oriented way of working within IT, all focussed on delivering high quality and guaranteed IT services to the IT customer.

Ideas to improve Quality

Step back and Plan – Try to resist that support by stepping back and taking a bit of time to think about things before they start typing. Think about the problem are they demanding to answer, any problems that may occur and come up with a impending solution. Even better than idea about the problem and solution, write it down somewhere. If we start coding before you’ve completely got your head around the problem there’s a very good chance you will end up with little more than a mess.

Document before coding – Documentation is one more aspect of coding that is too frequently ignored. Some developers think it is not their job to document, others just don’t get about to it because of time constraint.

 Adopt a coding standard and stick to it – Use reliable groove, layout, naming conventions etc across all of your code. It not only makes it easier for you and other to read and modify but it will also make it much easier to debug when you come back to look at the code in a few months time. This is one of the most vital effects we can do to look up the quality of your code but is also one of the most beyond about or ignored.

Write test plans and make sure they are used – A lot of the time testing is performed very simply or in a chaotic way. This is bad because leaves us open to miss areas while testing or not discovering obvious problems because the tester does know understand how the software will be used. This is regrettably for all time a risk but it can be deeply minimised by writing various test plans and ensuring they are actually used. Test plans can be pretty composite and general or simple use cases that are followed by the tester.

Reviews – Developers are a lot afraid of peer reviews because they don’t like their code being criticised and other developers can often be quite cruel. It can be very useful to have someone else’s eyes spot things you missed and after a few reviews your code will more than likely start to improve in general. In addition to peer reviews, review your own code. Go back and have a quick read of what they’ve done in 1 week, 1 month, 4 months and 12 months later if they can.

Task 3

Continuous improvement for HCL

Kaizen, or ‘Continuous Improvement’ is a plan of continually introduce small dramatic changes in a business in order to progress quality and efficiency. This approach assumes that employees are the best people to recognize room for development, since they see the processes in action all the time. A firm that uses this approach therefore has to have a culture that encourages and rewards employees for their contribution to the process.

Improvements are based on many, small changes rather than the fundamental changes that might occur from Research and Development

As the information come from the employees themselves, they are less possible to be totally different, and so easier to implement.

Small improvements are less likely to require major fund investment than major process changes

The ideas come from the talents of the existing workforce, as opposed to using R&D, consultants or equipment – any of which could be very expensive.

All employees should repetitively be in search of ways to improve their own performance.

It helps persuade employees to take possession for their work, and can help strengthen team working, thereby getting your strength back employee incentive.

Using an Appropriate Tool

Strength

Global coverage in countries like U.S, Europe, Japan etc..

Strong employees base of up to 50000Pax.

Support sales activities by understanding the customer business better.

Keep up-to-date on what competition is doing.

Weakness

HCL has always a weakness in TIER 1 sector.

Lack of innovation and distribution network especially in case of Laptops has reflected HCL’s weakness.

Opportunity

Key opportunity lies in the countries like Eastern Europe and APAC.

Mid market segment opportunity area as fortune against 200 companies.

Increasing its market share from 9.8% V 19.7%

Threats

Small players and manufactures are trying to enter into the segment where they can provide much cheaper products then HCL which will be a rising competition for HCL to stand.