DSS Discussion Question 2: Operational Concept
Initial Response due 12:00 AM September 10, 2006
Our objective this week is to achieve consensus on an operational
concept for a Plan of Study DSS. Buede (2000)
defines an operational concept as follows:
Operational Concept: vision for
what the system is
(in general terms), a statement of mission requirements, and a
description of how the system will be used. The shared vision
is
based on the perspective of the system's stakeholders of how the system
will be developed, produced, deployed, trained, operated and
maintained, refined, and retired to overcome some operational problem
and achieve the stakeholders' operational needs and
objectives. The mission requirements are stated in terms of
measures of effectiveness. The operational concept includes a
collection of scenarios;
one or more for each group of stakeholders in each relevant phase of
the
system's life cycle.
Assume that you work for an organization that has been
commissioned
to develop the DSS. You have been provided with the following
background information:
- A transcript of last
week's WebCT discussion and the minutes from the in-class
discussion.
- Guidance
from responsible university officials on resolution of key open issues
from the discussion. (Note: This
guidance is being posted because we need resolution to move forward,
but should not be regarded as "correct" answers to the open issues. In
particular, your content grade on your final submission will depend on
how well you justify the point of view you take, and not on
whether it agrees with this guidance. )
- A demonstration of the current registration and degree
audit process.
- Plan of study forms for several graduate and undergraduate
degree programs.
The objective of this week's discussion is to develop:
- A vision statement for the DSS. This should be a
one-paragraph description of the vision for the system as agreed upon
by the stakeholders.
- A set of usage scenarios. I am primarily interested in
usage
scenarios for the operational phase, but would also like to see at
least one usage scenario
for training. To keep the problem within bounds, we can ignore other
lifecycle
phases for now. Each student should submit one usage
scenario.
Among
the class, I hope to obtain a nice spectrum of usage scenarios.
A
usage
scenario is a brief description (1-2 paragraphs) of a user interacting
with
the system to perform some task.
- A set of mission requirements. The mission
requirements
should be few in number, ideally no more than six or seven, and should
include a description of metrics for establishing whether the
requirement has been met.
For examples of operational concepts, see
(Students may also want to choose a name for the system.)
Open discussion will be via WebCT.
Please post at least one message during the general discussion
period.
Be prepared to discuss the issues raised in the dialogue in class on
September 12. Your final response should address all the
questions
listed above.
Your final response is due by 5:00 PM September 15 in the
submissions area of WebCT or by email to the
instructor at klaskey@gmu.edu.
The general policy is that final responses should be less than one page
in length, but this week's submission may be up to two pages. Please
use the standard file naming and email header conventions.