System Analysis and Design Report on Grow Your Business Farm

This report provides a comprehensive system analysis and design for Grow Your Business Farm, addressing challenges related to inventory management, order tracking, and customer information. It includes an organizational chart, business function analysis, a system vision document, task dependencies using Gantt and PERT/CPM charts, and risk assessments. The report also covers fact-finding techniques like interviews and prototyping, offering recommendations for an improved information system with defined roles and use cases. The design incorporates an entity-relationship diagram and explores commercial software options, concluding with a cost-benefit analysis and recommendations for system implementation to enhance efficiency and meet evolving business needs. Desklib is a platform where you can find similar solved assignments and study tools.

System Analysis and Design Report
(Case of Grow Your Business Farm)
Student Name
Date

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 2
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Grow Your Business need to develop good farming practice codes. As such, production system,
diversifying market system and sustainable agricultural production standards systems need
implementation of more detailed strategies of management. These strategies should be flexible
and simple to adapt to the changing environmental or economic conditions and they require
evidence of their compliance. Besides, the need for data about the processes of production is
increasing, both from aspect of traceability (value-added chains) and regional shareholders to
accomplish multi-operational goals by farming. Grow Your Business should use of portal-based
information system. Portals can offer enhanced access to information services and resources and
increased functionalities to analysts within the company.

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 3
Table of Contents
Executive summary.........................................................................................................................2
1 Activity 1.................................................................................................................................5
1.1 Background Information...................................................................................................5
1.2 Organization chart.............................................................................................................5
1.3 Business functions.............................................................................................................6
2 Activity 2.................................................................................................................................7
2.1 Business functions.............................................................................................................7
2.1.1 Inventory management system..................................................................................7
2.1.2 Order Tracking System..............................................................................................8
2.1.3 Customer information systems (CIS)........................................................................8
2.2 System vision Document..................................................................................................9
3 Activity 3...............................................................................................................................12
3.1 Task Description.............................................................................................................12
3.2 Task Dependencies and Predecessors.............................................................................12
3.3 Gantt chart.......................................................................................................................13
3.4 PERT/CPM Chart...........................................................................................................13
4 Activity 4...............................................................................................................................15
4.1 Project Risks...................................................................................................................15
4.2 Benefits of new system...................................................................................................18
4.3 Expected Cost of the System..........................................................................................18
4.4 Cost Benefit Analysis......................................................................................................20
5 Activity 5...............................................................................................................................21
5.1 Fact-finding techniques...................................................................................................21
5.1.1 Sampling of existing forms, documentation and databases.....................................21

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 4
5.1.2 Site visits and Research...........................................................................................22
5.1.3 Observation of the work environment.....................................................................22
5.1.4 Questionnaires.........................................................................................................22
5.1.5 Prototyping..............................................................................................................23
5.1.6 Joint requirements planning (JRP)...........................................................................24
5.1.7 Conducting interviews.............................................................................................24
5.2 Recommendations...........................................................................................................25
6 Activity 6...............................................................................................................................26
6.1 Information System Main functions...............................................................................26
6.2 Information System Roles...............................................................................................27
6.3 Grow Your Business Information System Use Case......................................................28
6.3.1 Use case Description................................................................................................29
6.4 Activity Diagram.............................................................................................................30
7 Activity 7...............................................................................................................................31
7.1 Entity Relationship Diagram...........................................................................................31
7.2 Formats of codes.............................................................................................................32
7.3 Sample Data....................................................................................................................33
8 Activity 8...............................................................................................................................35
8.1 Sequence Diagram..........................................................................................................35
8.2 Commercial Software Packages......................................................................................35
8.3 New system options........................................................................................................36
9 Conclusion and Recommendation.........................................................................................37
Reference List................................................................................................................................38
Appendix A: Interview Plan..........................................................................................................41

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 5
1 ACTIVITY 1
1.1 Background Information
Grow Your Business is a company that produces foods that are organically certified. John is the
owner of the business. At its infancy, it made use of John’s backyard and unused land of the
neighbours. The vegetables produced are of high quality because organic fertilizer is used over
artificial fertilizer or pesticides to boost its growth. The organic fertilizer is acquired from John’s
cows and chicken. Companion planting is practiced to prevent crops from being attacked by
insects. Besides, different crops are cycled from year to year to sustain soil health. The produce
is not sold in the local vegetable market, rather, customers come to buy them in the farm. In the
recent years, the business outlook has grown considerably after John returned to the property of
his family that was originally utilized as a dairy farm. He has transformed the pasture land into a
garden of vegetables.
1.2 Organization chart
Grow Your Business has several workers. John who is the owner of the business attend to all
harvesting and production aspects. His wife Jane is in charge of all aspects of handling clients,
their payments, their orders and their order pick-ups. The number of individuals working in the
company has increased significantly. Christina, Charlie, Chris and Cathy deal with customers.
They take orders from clients by phone and report orders directly to Jane. They also help with
gardening activities. Marsha and Mark handle the pick-up services.
Customers are now not coming to pick up their orders, unless particularly pre-arranged, rather
their orders are delivered to their homes. Dirk act as an assistant to Marsha and Mark to carry out
sorting of the produce boxes of customers and do some of the heavy lifting. Tina and terry are
both experienced at managing different machinery and vehicles used on the farm. They report to
Tim who manages all farm machinery and tractors. Tim report to Jane on matters regarding to
clients, delivery and order issues, and to John on all aspects of production. Samantha and Sam
handle account aspects and also report directly to Jane. Noeletta, Netta, Noel and Nick offer
assistance on the production aspects. They all report directly to John. Their particular work is to
help in all manner of gardening such as planting, fertilizers, pruning, weeding, watering and
picking.

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 6
Figure 1: Farm Organization Structure
1.3 Business functions
The volume and range of produce and the increased number of clients has resulted to challenges
of keeping track of things. As such, an information system may offer a way to assist in managing
the growing complexities of business. The new information system will handle the following
functions:
Keeping and tracking orders: customers order their produce by phone a day before collection and
John works through a long vegetable list. It takes longer than expected since John goes through the
list from the beginning to the end, although there are certain goods that different customers never
purchase (Tripathi and Mishra, 2014. P. 213). John chats with every client and it is time consuming
and sometimes depriving him from attending to his fields. Many clients wish to have an easier and
quicker method of making orders.
Facilitating correct packaging of orders for home delivery: customers drop to pick up their orders
on a weekly basis. There were no challenges in the early days before expansion of the business.
However, things have intensified in the past few years. The produce has gained demand and
popularity causing crowdedness at the area of pick-up (Shah, 2011, p. 51). Quarrels have

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 7
ruptured over confusion on which customer to take which box of vegetable produce. A customer
home delivery services should therefore be considered.
Managing customer information: the customer’s personal information such as their phone
numbers, names and address are recorded in a customer book. Some practices of business that
deal with clients require documentation to allow standardization, and changed to be more
effective for customers and the farm (Suraj Nandiganahalli, Kwon and Hwang, 2018). An
Information system is needed to handle the client base, their bills and orders. It will assist in
easing their business operations.
Inventory management: The produce available weekly depend on harvest readiness and weather.
At times there are confusion about what available and what is not and as such, customers feel
disappointed when they come for their orders because sometimes they receive the unexpected
(Ainin et al., 2015, p. 9). Besides, there are confusion about which customers has partially payed,
not payed or payed. As the business grew, there were some noticeable inconsistencies evolving
in processes of payments, sometimes by credit and other times in cash.
2 ACTIVITY 2
2.1 Business functions
2.1.1 Inventory management system
Inventory management system will manage all the business stock items and inventory. It is a
database for administering and storing all kinds of data needed for accurate and efficient
warehouse inventory management (Thöle, Richter and Ehlert, 2013, 443). It may include fields
or modules for monitoring locations and all items, back orders, reorder points, inventory error
tracking, requisitions, lead times, among others. Inventory management system may interface
with other applications including ERP.
An inventory management system will assist Grow Your Business to be more organized.
Without managing and tracking the inventory, it is challenging to determine what is needed,
when it is needed and the quantity required (Wedderburn and Rickenbach, 2011). With an
inventory management system, the business will have comprehensive records of each business
asset. Besides, an inventory management system increases transparency and tracking. With all

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 8
property consistently being monitored, one can examine the weaknesses and strengths of the
business. In addition, it is easy to determine where the business inventory is and its worth.
2.1.2 Order Tracking System
An order tracking system will permit clients to monitor their orders, from the time an order is
made to its delivery. The customer will be able to know whether his or her order has been filled,
whether it is correct, whether there are items missing, or when it will be delivered (Ayanso and
Lertwachara, 2015, p. 78). For customers to gain knowledge about their orders, they need
visibility across systems and processes. Therefore, the order tracking system will need to offer
knowledge about order status through the whole journey to the client, from making order to
filling it in the warehouse and to logistics where the order will be acquired and taken to the
carrier.
The order tracking system will be connected with other fulfilment and management systems such
as warehouse management, carrier’s back-end tracking system, sales order management and
inventory. Connecting these systems permit the order tracking system to offer the visibility into
order location and status (Haji, Afzalabadi and Haji, 2018, p. 318). An order tracking system is
essential since it is a major component of the overall experience of the customer.
2.1.3 Customer information systems (CIS)
CIS is an open system that handles the entire communication of a firm with its clients. The client
system will be able to gather any details about clients, their functions toward the business and
must efficiently communicate with clients using channels of communication such as email, SMS,
web and voice services (Sanglee Cho, 2011). Customer information system includes several
functions of customer relationship management (CRM) systems.

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 9
Figure 2: Customer Information System
(Sources: Janssens, 2011, p. 2310)
Task of the customer system include:
 Gathering identities of consumers
 Additional sales management
 Communication management
 Profiling
 Service operations management.
2.2 System vision Document
Grow Your Business need to develop good farming practice codes. As such, production system,
diversifying market system and sustainable agricultural production standards systems need
implementation of more detailed strategies of management. These strategies should be flexible
and simple to adapt to the changing environmental or economic conditions and they require
evidence of their compliance (Jiang, Zuo and Zhang, 2013). Besides, the need for data about the
processes of production is increasing, both from aspect of traceability (value-added chains) and
regional shareholders to accomplish multi-operational goals by farming. An essential
requirement for Grow Your Business to adhere to these various needs is to easily have timely

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 10
and sufficient data available for offering documentary proof or decision making. The quick
evolution of technologies for communication and information, new sensors and massive
potentials for offering geo-referenced information (online sensors, remote-sensing, public
databases, among others) also allows Grow Your Business to access high quality and ne
information and apply them as particular data in process documentation or decision making
(Jongoh, 2010, p. 162). With automated information acquisition and managing a farm
management information system, Grow Your Business can be seen to adhere to the rapidly
increasing standards need in the production processes management.
Grow Your Business will practice precision farming (PF). PF utilizes emerging technologies in
information management and handling, and in handling temporal and spatial variability found in
all farms. Such use of accurate data minimizes environmental effect and boost economic returns.
Comprehensive data is needed in precision farming and is historically connected to particular
activities within different site on the field (Kang, Hahn and De, 2017). Site-specific farming does
not precision farming. The application of methods and techniques that make precision farming
can offer a wealth of tools and information to apply and manage information appropriately for
Grow Your Business. The data-driven strategy can be applied to assist in improving strategies of
crop management and evidence of compliance via documentation (Mohammadhossein et al.,
2014, p. 24).
The initiation of new ICT (information and communication technology) technologies in Grow
Your Business will be a substantial advancement in all undertakings for measurements oriented
payments within the programs of agro-environment and associated efforts to administer
environmentally effectual systems in land utilization (Khodakarami and Chan, 2014, p. 35).
Besides, crop products of Grow Your Business entering the food chain must demonstrate
certified source through accepted strategy of management. Therefore, there is need for an
integration of information system to advise directors of recommended guidelines, formal
recommendation and implications associated with various scenarios at decision making point
during crop cycle.
It can be brought to a successful conclusion by incorporating real-time modelling (a development
model and crop growth connected to sensors within the canopy of growth), with intelligent
systems that have been set up with instructions from a recommended strategy of management

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 11
such as organic, ICM (integrated crop management), factored risk, and legal instruction such as
safety, health and environmental protection (May, Atkinson and Ferrer, 2017, p. 68). It will
largely assist the farm manager to make sound decisions. Knowledge of the expert in expert
systems and models form can be written down and posted in web services or a device readable
form on the internet to be actively bound into the software of the consumer. As the required
information of Grow Your Business is already in the suggested information system, certification
of cross compliance and crop province of accepted standards can be created easily.
Besides, Grow Your Business crop products can remain in the farm. Apart from the use of
animal feeds to boost growth, the company will use bio-energy or bio-fuels. It will assist in
improving the likelihood of advancing to a highly energy-neutral and energy-efficient farm. It is
supported by the substantial decrease of energy needed by small smart machines that operate
independently focusing on inputs. The system vision document tried to concentrate on the
balance of opportunities in technologies put together with socioeconomic and environmental
needs with the major role of information management (Lin, 2010). Intensive application of
knowledge and information will be a significant activity of Grow Your Business in future.

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 12
3 ACTIVITY 3
3.1 Task Description
Task Description Duration
(days)
Predecessor
1 Meet farm staff 2
2 Conduct a series of staff interviews 5 1
3 Review farm records 2 2
4 Observe Farm/Business operations 2 2
5 Conduct customer Interviews 1 2
6 Analyse current accounting system 2 3,4
7 Examine sample of order and
payment transaction
2 3,4
8 Conduct field work regarding the
intended home delivery service
2 5
9 Prepare final report for the farm
owners (John and Jane)
1 6,7.8
Table 1: Task Description
3.2 Task Dependencies and Predecessors
Task 2 depends on task 1; task 1 is the predecessor of task 2
Task 3 depends on task 2; task 2 is the predecessor of task 3
Task 4 depends on task 2; task 2 is the predecessor of task 4
Task 5 depends on task 2; task 2 is the predecessor of task 5
Task 6 depends on task 3 and 4; task 3 and 4 is the predecessor of task 6

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 13
Task 7 depends on task 3 and 4; task 3 and 4 is the predecessor of task 7
Task 8 depends on task 5; task 5 is the predecessor of task 8
Task 9 depends on task 6,7 and 8; task 6,7 and 8 is the predecessor of task 9
3.3 Gantt chart
Figure 3: Gant Chart
3.4 PERT/CPM Chart
Figure 4: PERT/CPM Chart

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 14
The overall project duration 19 days. The critical path has been outlined in green colour
in the figure below.
Figure 5: Critical Path
Total project duration- 19 days
Critical path task 1-task 2-task 4-task 6- task 9.

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 15
4 ACTIVITY 4
4.1 Project Risks
Project risks are common setbacks to any project being carried out but the ability to manage
these risks is what makes the project successful (Abu-Samhadanh, 2015, p. 233). Implementing a
new information system for Grow Your Business may be faced with some risks that can be
managed. Some of the risks have been explained below.
Lack of management support- if the executive (for this case farm owners John and Jane) fail to
support the project fully, then the objective will not be achieved. Executive are integral part of
the project because they are the ones who fund the project and without their support then the
project will fail (Mihalache, 2011). Secondly, when the farm owners get disengaged from the
project and disregards project meetings and communications, project progress will stagnate.
Moreover, if John and Jane are conflicting on the overall project objectives, the project will be
greatly disrupted.
Ill-defined project scope- if the scope of the project is not well defined, omitted, of has errors,
there is a likelihood that the project may not meet the goals set (Al-Masree, 2015, p. 20). Also
continuous scope growth if not controlled may affect the requirements and the project may end
up delivering the wrong product. Inaccurate estimation is another common project risk and may
negatively affect project costs and schedule.
Cost Management risks- when the project team forecasts and estimates project costs
inaccurately, they may end up under budgeting the project which cause the project to halt
because of insufficient funds (Giraudeau, 2017, p. 209). Also, variations in exchange rate may
greatly impact the project.
Change management- when John and Jane keeps own making drastic changes to the initial
requirements, key project resources and activities are distracted and the project requirements are
made more complex (Gnip and Charvát, 2012, p. 416). If the farm owners appoint another
person to supervise the project, there are high chances that the new project manager will come
with new guidelines and requirements poses great risk to the project.

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 16
Stakeholders Involvement- when other major stakeholders within the farm ignore project
communications project timeline may be extended and deadline may not be met. Farm
employees such as those harvesting the farm products, those who package and label, those who
will receive orders, those making deliveries, and the person who will be in charge of ensuring
orders are important stakeholders because they have a say on how the information system will
work in their specific areas (Gnip and Kafka, 2012, p. 424). And if they disengage then major
objectives may not be achieved. Customers are also another major stakeholder because they will
use the information system to make orders and if the find the system too complex then there is a
possibility of the preferring the old way of making orders online.
Communication breakdown- project team may misinterpret the requirements, expectations, and
work packages if the farm owners don’t give proper communication (Grace and Bruderlein,
2012). The project will be lagged if there is communication overhead. Irregular communication
to those individuals impacted directly by the new information system may throw up project
roadblocks.
Resources and team- if the project team does not get enough resources for the project, then they
may fail to attain the objectives. Low productivity is also expected if the project team is required
to learn new skills that is needed to successfully accomplish project goals.
System design- the design may fail to support the requirements, costly, or impossible. Also, lack
of design flexibility also greatly affect the system outlook and functionality (Thamhain, 2013).
Another risk associated with system design is low design quality.
Technical requirements- technology evolves quickly and thus the system may fail to meet the
fast evolving technical requirements and may get outdated before it is implemented. The project
team may also use components that are not scalable and lack standard interface (Nardinelli,
2018, p. 7). Insecurity, instability, and unreliability are other risks related to technology that may
impact on the overall project success.
Integration- the information system may fail to integrate with the farm business functions. Lack
of platforms for integration testing and the failure of the information system to integrate with the
farm processes.
Very likely, likely, possible, unlikely, very unlikely

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 17
Risk Likelihood of Happening Impact
Lack of management support Possible 5
Ill-defined project scope Likely 5
Cost Management risks Likely 3
Change management Unlikely 2
Stakeholders Involvement Possible 1
Communication breakdown Possible 1
Resources and team Unlikely 4
System design Unlikely 3
Technical requirements Possible 2
Integration Very Unlikely 3
Table 2: Likelihood of the Risk occurring
Risk Impact Reference table

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 18
Table 3: Risk Impact Reference table
4.2 Benefits of new system
Benefits can be categorized as either tangible or intangible. Tangible benefits are those that can
be attached to a monetary value while intangible benefits are those that does not have monetary
value attached to them (White and VanLandingham, 2015, p. 378). Some of the tangible benefits
that the new information system will bring to the farm include improved business productivity,
reduced operational costs, increased efficiency from the farm employees, reduced lead time and
inventory, minimized paperwork, stock obsolescence is reduced, faster product look-up and
ordering, ordering and payment are automated the lowering paper costs and payment processing
(Whitehead and Costantino, 2009, p. 120). The intangible benefits that Grow Your Business will
enjoy include improve business responsibility and transparency, faster access to data for better
business decision making, enhanced customer response, more customers will be reached creating
more competitive bids, facilitates the farm owners to plan strategically, a lot of time and effort is
saved in entry of data, mismanagement of resources is reduced because the information system
offers more control of the resources and how they are used and facilitates timely reporting
(Hautala and Hakojärvi, 2010, p. 271).
4.3 Expected Cost of the System
Item No Item Name Quantity Cost of each item ($) Totals ($)
1 Desktop Computer 10 5500 55000
2 Laptop 10 3400 34000
3 Printer 2 2600 5200
4 System designer 3 8850 26550

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 19
Item No Item Name Quantity Cost of each item ($) Totals ($)
5 System developer 2 10000 20000
Total Expenses 140750

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 20
Cost Benefit
Benefit Benefit Within
12 Months
Revenue increases by 50% $195,00
Process automation saves $3500 of operational cost per month $42,000
There is 10% increase in productivity (weekly basis productivity is
$11,250, with 10% increase the productivity would be $12,375, 10
percent increase = $1,125/week.) $58,500
Improved customer service $10,000
Total $305,500
4.4 Cost Benefit Analysis
It is important to brainstorm on the overall cost of the system against the cost of benefits as listed
above. Also, it is important to try figure out any other unexpected cost. Secondly, attach money
value to the costs including the cost of human resource and physical resources required for the
successful implementation of the system (Husemann and Novkovic, 2014, p. 449). It is relatively
easy to estimate the cost compare to revenues. Additionally, attach monetary value to the
benefits, it can be a bit difficult to predict revenues for new information system accurately. But,
it is necessary to try and project the possible benefits both tangible and intangible. Finally,

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 21
compare the cost and benefits of the information system and use the results to make decision on
the next course of action, whether to continue with the project or terminate it (Ivanov, Bhargava
and Donnelly, 2015, p. 78). In this case, the expected revenue for 12 months after adopting the
system is calculated as follows
Benefits=cost of benefits – cost of information system
$305500-$140750=$164,750
The assumptions made include
 The farm owner received several orders and he cannot record all of them thus missing to
package for other customers.
 Employee productivity will increase by 10%.
 The farm revenue is expected to increase by 50 percent over a period of 12 months
From the calculations done above, the project is feasible and proposes a strong business case. As
such, John and Jane, the farm owners, should consider adopting the system. The information
system will bring numerous benefits to the farm and it is recommended that the farm implement
the new farm information system.
5 ACTIVITY 5
5.1 Fact-finding techniques
Apart from interviews the following are some the fact-finding techniques that can be used to find
out the new system requirements:
5.1.1 Sampling of existing forms, documentation and databases
The best method to evaluate the new system is to gather facts from current documentation. There
are different types of documents to gather facts from current documents. These consist of
customer complaints, some parts of completed manual reports and forms and samples of
completed computerized reports and forms, program documentation, e-mails, suggestion box
reports and notes that record the problem area, different types of diagrams and flowcharts, and
user training manuals (Kutter et al., 2009, p. 14). Sampling technique is the method of examining
a representative sample of form, documents and records. Stratification and randomization are the

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 22
two regularly used sampling methods. Randomization is the method of choosing a sample of
information randomly. Stratification, on the other hand, is the process of deducting the difference
of sampling data.
5.1.2 Site visits and Research
Research and site visits is the process of investigating issues which had been previously
addressed by other sources such as documents or human (Lovett and Perry, 2014). To address
the problem of requirements, the analyst visits other firms who had faced similar issues. Besides,
the analyst can look for information from reference books, internet, database and case studies.
Advantages of Research and Site visits
If the issue had already been addressed, it can save time. Analyst can learn how the same
problems were solved by different person
Disadvantages of Research and Site visits
Need permission to access the right source of data. Since problem documentation is unrecorded,
the problem becomes challenging to solve.
5.1.3 Observation of the work environment
In observation technique, system analyst take part in the company, reviews the document’s flow,
uses the current system and communicates with the users.
5.1.4 Questionnaires
Questionnaire is an important technique to gather information from many users. The system
analyst construct questions and hand them over to users for answering. Questionnaires do not
consume time as compared to interviews where the analyst has to chat with each user (Lowell et
al., 2012). Where interview time is short, questionnaires are more helpful. To achieve system
objective requirements, system analyst should be able to clearly define the frame and design of
questionnaires. The two types of questionnaires include:
Free-format questionnaires: users are permitted to freely answer questions without having to
respond immediately. Besides, the results are helpful in learning about respondent’s opinions,
feelings and experiences.

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 23
Fixed-format questionnaires: it helps in collecting data from predefined questions format. Users
are permitted to select the result from the presented answers. The three types of fixed-format
questions include: rating questions (Agree, Disagree, strongly agree, No opinion, strongly
disagree), multiple-choice questions (No or Yes type) and ranking questions.
Advantages of Questionnaires
 People can answer questions freely
 It is cost effective
 Responses can be analysed and calculated quickly.
Disadvantages of Questionnaires
 Users may fail to complete answers
 Incomplete or vague responses cannot be defined
 The body language of user responses is unrecognizable
5.1.5 Prototyping
Prototyping is examining a small working design and is more connected to pre-design of the
information system. Prototyping implementation can be established in earlier development life
cycle stages of the system when evaluating the facts (Matthews, 2013, p. 97).
Advantages of Prototyping
 Developers and users can understand and test the system early before carrying out final
implementation
 It helps understand the system before using high costs of development
 It is helpful in defining consistent and constant requirements.
 It consumes less time
 It offers training.
Disadvantages of Prototyping
 Users can sometime misunderstand the reliability, performance and features of prototype
as actual results
 Schedule and development cost may change

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 24
5.1.6 Joint requirements planning (JRP)
Joint requirement planning is the designed group work meeting to analyse, identify problems and
define system requirements. JRP is gaining popularity in system analysis and system planning to
acquire group consensus on objectives, problems and requirements. JRP can classify the
information effectively in a short time and can also be used in place of separate and numerous
interviews. JRP comprise of various participants with each unique role to conduct structured
meeting. They include, managers, users and IT staff. Users in sessions of JRP are responsible for
requirements and rules of prototype, business and satisfactory decisions (Sato and Nanseki,
2011, p. 57). Managers are liable for schedules, training, projects, and costs requirements. IT
staff is accountable for documentation and models regarding information during the meeting.
Advantages of JRP
 It consumes less time
 When JRP includes prototyping as a way of obtaining design approvals and confirming
requirements, the prototyping benefits are identified.
Disadvantages of JRP
 It requires extensive training
5.1.7 Conducting interviews
Grow Your Business is experiencing problems particularly in handling customers and accounts
aspects. As such, the two staff members identified are Christina and Sam. Christina together with
Charlie, Chris and Cathy deal with customers. Sam, on the other hand, works with Samantha on
all aspects of account.
Interview questions for Christina
1. Which is the highest level of service you have ever given a customer?
2. Have you attended to unreasonable clients? How did you deal with it and what would you
change today?
3. Have you ever compromised to help a client? What was the situation and the result?
4. During your stay in Grow Your Business, have you received any complaints from a
client? What actions did you take?

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 25
5. Have you had experiences where a customer is difficult to understand? How did you
resolve the interaction?
6. Have you ever rejected an essential customer’s request?
7. Has a customer ever reported a technical problem but you did not know how to resolve
it? How did you approach it?
8. Have you ever found yourself in a situation when there was unclear policy to apply, and
you were required to make a judgement call? How did you handle the situation?
9. Have experienced major issues with your service or product and you were required to
respond although you did not have all the answers?
10. When answering a client, what approach do you take in deciding what information to
include and which to leave out?
Interview questions for Sam
1. What is the most difficult accounting job you have ever solved?
2. How do you avoid mistakes in your work?
3. Are you aware of the existing accounting standards?
4. What is your take on creative accounting?
5. Have you ever used any accounting software?
6. Have you ever handled a challenging financial project with tight time frame that needed
precision?
7. How do you monitor things that need full attention?
8. What is the most substantial decision you have made regarding accounting?
9. Have you ever explained a complex financial or accounting process to a staff member?
What was the experience?
10. What method do you apply for assessing the reliability of the financial information you
receive?
5.2 Recommendations
A good analyst acquires facts from current documentation rather than from human sources. As
such, I would recommend sampling technique. An analyst is able to examine documents
describing the problem, reports and studies that record the problem area, customer complaint,
suggestion box notes, project requests regarding information system, files that define the

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 26
function of business being designed, organization’s objectives, mission and strategic plan, among
others (Spottswood, 2013). System analyst applies sampling methods to arrange the above
documentation. Therefore, a better understanding of the system is gained due to evaluation of
current forms, documents and files connected to the current system.
6 ACTIVITY 6
6.1 Information System Main functions
The following are some of the main functions that will be handled by the information system.
 To distinguish between standard and regular customers and to prioritize the orders based
on the availability of vegetables.
 To allow customers to order using an online web form, store each customer’s orders that
were made in the previous weeks and allow the customer to modify the order
 To allow customers to choose the type of delivery service they want, their order could be
delivered to their home precises or picked up from the farm. For the home delivery, the
system should be able to identify home address and other instructions concerning hazards
on homes.
 To record vegetables’ credit purchases and to allow customers to select their preferred
mode of payment
 To record credit charge amounts and EFTPOs/cash sales, daily cash takings and a report
of daily activity detailing with all sales transactions
 To transmits a summary of accounts receivable for each local farm owner and allow
members to choose their preferred method of payments, either through physical mail or
use an on-line credit card payment system
 To store information of the customer apart from their vegetable preference
 To produce a monthly report of customer sales, a unique report for late payers and
inactive customers and a quarterly report of profit and loss that demonstrates a
breakdown of costs and revenue for every vegetables’ separate line.
6.2 Information System Roles
The following are some of the roles that the system will be interacting with.
 Customer service role  Delivery service role

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 27
 Ordering service role
 Credit management role
 Sales role
 Reporting role

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 28
6.3 Grow Your Business Information System Use Case
Figure 6: Use Case Diagram

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 29
6.3.1 Use case Description
Customer- the customer is able to make orders, select preferred vegetable, modify the order
within 24 hours and view order status.
Sales Staff- Manage customer orders by confirming and marking them as received and notifying
the customer.
Packaging staff- views customer orders, package them and mark the orders as delivered.
Order database-update order details, customer information, farm information, staff information,
and sales transactions.
The customer upon loading the GYB website should be able to view various products available.
The customer makes the selection and proceed to check out. On the checkout window, the
customer has the ability to modify the order details either by removing some orders, changing
quantity, or add some more order. The customer on clicking check out, the system prompts to
select the payment type to make the payment, pay via credit card or cash on delivery. The system
records this transaction in the database. When the customer has finished making the order the
finance, sales, and packaging sections are notified accordingly. The finance records the payment
method and if the transaction has been successful, the sales section receives customer orders and
confirms it before forwarding it to packaging section for a go ahead to package and deliver. The
use case gives detailed picture of how the GYB information system actually operates.

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 30
6.4 Activity Diagram
Figure 7:Activity Diagram

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 31
7 ACTIVITY 7
7.1 Entity Relationship Diagram
Figure 8: ER Diagram

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 32
Database Design
Figure 9: Database Schema
7.2 Formats of codes
EmployeeID
CustomerID
OrderID
CategoryID
InvoiceID
VegID
FarmID
ShipperID

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 33
7.3 Sample Data
Customer Table
Figure 10: Customer Details
Farm Table
Figure 11: Farm Details
Vegetable table
Figure 12: Vegetable Information
Order Table
Figure 13: Order Information

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 34
Order Details Table
Figure 14: Order Details
Employee Table
Figure 15: Employee Information

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 35
8 ACTIVITY 8
8.1 Sequence Diagram
Figure 16: Customer Sequence Diagram
8.2 Commercial Software Packages
The following are some of the commercial software packages that can be used by Grow Your
Business:
 Cropio
 FarmBrite
 Agrivi
 cropTracker
 Plantator System
 AgriXP Farm LogBook & Weather

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 36
The identified two packages are:
Agrivi
Agrivi is a farm management software that offers knowledge and assist farmers in making
decisions using acquired data for boosting profitability and productivity. Most of Agrivi features
have been set on the market, as such it will empower Grow Your Business farmers to handle
inventory, all field operations, workforce, and finance, and gain better understanding into overall
performance of farming with one click (Brearcliffe, 2012). Agrivi is developed on top of a strong
agricultural knowledge base, as such, its automated disease and pest detection will alert farmers
of Grow Your Business to protect crops timely
CropTracker
CropTracker combines powerful capabilities of record-keeping, productivity-tracking and data
analysis to enhance food safety and boost user’s profit. It will help Grow Your Business to
record and track almost everything in the farm including harvests, storage, teams, sprays,
packing materials and shipping (Graham, 2016, p. 131). It has more than 50 reports that make
business audits easy and give an extensive operation view, permitting one to resolve and identify
problems quickly.
8.3 New system options
An in-house development options for the new system is developing portals. Portals have gained
popularity and corporate firms are developing them to attract clients to their websites and,
sometimes, to utilize them as channel for B2B (business-to-business) ecommerce tool (Thöle,
Richter and Ehlert, 2013, 443). Clients and staffs are accessing different kinds of information
created within the company, in external and internal information services and resources through
their corporate websites. Portals are useful applications and have great potential in farming
research companies, where generation and consumption of knowledge and information are
among their key operations.
The basic principle of the portal structure of data management is that access provision to web-
based information services and resources should connect to the data needs of consumers.
Besides, a portal application can keep track the consumer’s utilization of the available services

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 37
and resources (Wedderburn and Rickenbach, 2011). As such, it allows the system collect
different information resources and services and present them to the user through the portal. In
general, the portal structure of information distribution and management, besides its capability of
minimizing information burden in companies, it has great capability for application in
information services provision where data specialists focus on a single consumer.
9 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
I would recommend Grow Your Business to use of portal-based information system. Portals can
offer enhanced access to information services and resources and increased functionalities to
analysts within the company. Besides, portal can allow analysts, through one user interface to:
 Share knowledge and information with fellow workers outside and within the firm
 Cooperate on research projects with fellow staff members outside and within the
company
 Track and manage the progress of different research projects being put into effect by the
company
 Access different data resources such as full-text and bibliographic databases, video clips
and images created within the firm, tools and services essential to farming research work,
and data resources from the firm and external sources.

SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN REPORT 38
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APPENDIX A: INTERVIEW PLAN
Date: 10/09/2018
Compan
y: Grow Your Business
No. Start Time End Time Interviewee Position Interviewer
1 0800Hrs 0930Hrs Christina Customer Care John Doe
2 1030Hrs 1200Hrs Sam Accounts Assistant John Doe