Week 2: Cases in Systems Engineering textbook reading or Rich-Con case 

1. submit your own original question and
2. submit a response to TWO other questions posed that week by your classmates

Here’s an important requirement – Your Curiosity Score:

Try to make your submissions achieve a curiosity score of at least an 80 out of a 100. Here are a few things to ensure that you reach 80:

• Dont have spelling errors
• Use paragraph breaks (and don’t type one long 350 word paragraph)
• Include a link to an external source
• Add a description (where you insert your text)

If your curiosity score is less than 80, just click on the options tab and edit your submission until you get it to an 80 or higher.

                                       Post of classmates to respond

Post 1:  

Would Rich-Con of been more successful if employees had proper training?

In the Rich-Con case Marty mentions that during implementation process that she was unhappy with the training resources provided but does not take any actions to address the issue. Also, longtime employee, Donna Ehlers, mentioned that they were not trained and that as soon as the system went live that the nothing went well. They had issues with order entries, operations, accounts receivable, and all other departments. This should have been an instant sign that this system was not ready to go live.

In the WorkFlow Max article, it discussed the importance of properly trained staff when implementing new software. Some of the key reasons for this include:

       Staffing training contributes to employee engagement

       Staff training adds to your bottom line

       Staff training will illuminate the full capabilities of your new software

       Staff training gives the opportunity for customized learning

Of these reasons, I believe that staff training relates the most to Rich-Con. Since there employee were not properly trained there were numerous mistakes made once the system went live. These mistakes ended up causing Rich-Con to develop a major crisis and putting Marty in the position of making some hard decision for the company. 

Post 2 to respond:  

Would the new system for Rich-Con been more successful with a dedicated project manager?

Importance of Having a Project Manager

Project management is key to implementing or integrating new systems within a company. Responsibility resides with the project manager and personnel know exactly who to contact with questions. Project managers serve many purposes. They are involved through all steps of the project. Ten key characteristics are shown in the list below.

1. Strategic Alignment
2. Leadership
3. Clear Focus and Objectives
4. Realistic Project Planning
5. Quality Control
6. Risk Management
7. Orderly Process
8. Continuous Oversight
9. Subject Expertise
10. Managing and Learning from Success and Failure

Several of the characteristics listed above were not evident in the Rich-Con case. There was no true subject-matter expert, quality control, or orderly process. How would the implementation looked different with an orderly process? Would there have been customer issues with more quality control? Several basic project management steps appeared to be skipped.