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What affected the functionality that was delivered?: Prototyping methodology

Overall the prototyping in phase I was judged a success because they achieved a lot in a short space of time (00333). They also came in under budget (00417). Prototyping is supposed to enhance business ownership of a system and there was greater commitment to this system than previous attempts at computerisation (00419, 00468, 00752) but despite this there was still resistance to using the system (00288).

As with most prototyping projects the impact of having a working system to comment on was much appreciated (00320) but expectations of the time taken to produce an operational system had to be managed (00397).

They had difficulty setting a reasonable boundary for phase I. This was partly because the initial scope was larger than they realised and also because they had difficulty stopping the prototyping process (00531). Given the existence of the Q&A system it is surprising that they were not more aware of the size of the scope (00815) but I think this reflects a lack clarity over the aims of the system (00750) combined with inexperience with the tools. There was also far more involved in implementing a system such as this than just writing the code (00279).

The workshops covered more than was implemented in phase I (00515) and it would have been more straightforward to concentrate on a more limited subset of the business (00367, 00262). However the fact that they went into the development with an open mind (00750) allowed it to be a catalyst for refining business processes (00396, 00370). One of the typical prototyping problems which all those involved reported was that the business users did not know when to stop and continued tweaking the screens (00371, 00431, 00320, 00393). This was magnified by the problem of a shifting population at the workshops (00515). One of the consequences of this was that there was not a clear cut off point followed by testing (00752) although the system was well used by David and Keith (00424, 00366). Another consequence was the stress it put on the development team who worked very hard to meet deadlines (00280).

Social influence:
Technical influence:
Process: Methodology

Commentary
Social influence
Technical influence

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© Clare Tagg 2000