e customer, the IT department, IT managers, and the systems analyst were in sync. The formal channel for concerns to be heard preexisted the project and consisted of weekly functional meetings attended by the IT manager supervising the project. This was a formal type of meeting, and the analyst found that she and the customer could work out concerns between them more easily than going through that channel.
During the analysis process, the customer had clear ideas from the beginning concerning what the systemÆs functionality should be. However, she revised these ideas on a daily basis. It became evident that the more she reflected on the new systemÆs potential, the more details she remembered concerning functions the system should have, and the more new ideas she had for additional capabilities that she would like it to have. As the analyst met with the customer on a daily basis, she fleshed out the new system design and the customerÆs concept began to firm up somewhat. As the system began to take shape, the analyst modeled the system on paper and walked the customer through the model for verification that the system would have the functionality needed.
After spending the initial days of the project with the customer, the analyst began interviewing her staff. This resulted in a number of discrepancies in which the staff performed tasks differently than the customer thought they did. The analyst brought the customer and her staff together and assisted them in sorting out the details until they were in accord regarding the systemÆs functionality requirements and the workflow process to be followed.
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