Idea/Business Need/Problem
Statement
This week we are discussing the first step in the Design
Process. That step has the goal of defining what is really needed by the
business. In some cases it might just be an idea that someone has generated and
needs to know if it is feasible, economical, and hopefully profitable. It may be
a problem that needs to be solved within an existing product or solution.
The
input for this first step can come from any one of a number of places. There may
be some unique new technology (Google Glass and drones for example) that can be
used for improving service for the business, or business capability that arises
from a new area of risk (drone usage), or a deficiency in a current system that
has been detected (Whiteboards). Each of these events can be the start of a
systems design. An example of this for Erie Insurance would be “EIG needs to
communicate with Agents”. That is a very broad and general requirement but it is
definitely an idea. It can be modified to be more specific if the need dictates.
It also can be decomposed into discrete business requirements which we will
discuss next week.
The formal output of this step is a clear statement of
need from the business standpoint or a problem statement. The statement needs to
have enough detail to allow decomposition into the Business Requirements. It
should not have product or compute specifications included with it. Those will
be determined based on further analysis.
Informal outputs could be mind maps, structured
hierarchies,
ishikawa diagrams, unstructured
documents,
presentation
materials,
etc.
This step is probably the least structured of all the
design steps. Even though the step itself tends to be a bit free-form, in order
to properly communicate The Idea to the enterprise there needs to be some
structure around what gets produced.
The first three engineering principles support this phase
of the systems life cycle. Clearly Operational Need is the driver for the step.
Physical Realizability and Economic Worthwhileness are also drivers during this
period. We need to ensure that we propose building systems which have a chance
of being successful. A classic example for something that would not be
Physically Realizable would be finding a process to turn lead into gold.
The level of participation of the Engineer role in this
step is varied. If it truly just an idea that needs evaluation there might not
be any input from an Engineer during this step. However, typically we want to
have someone with design experience evaluate the idea in order to ensure that it
is something that can be done. In some cases, there could be a whole team of
individuals working to identify exactly what it is we are trying to accomplish
with the solution. The important thing with this step is to ensure the right
people are engaged.