Benefast Partners indicated that they engaged in a lot of analysis conversations with its colleagues in another office, however looking at the results of the implementation of their system; their needs analysis attempt was inadequate.
The analysis stage of the system development life cycle centers on the detailed comparison of the current capabilities of the system, with the desired performance capabilities, resulting in an identification of what is needed to be done, in order to achieve what is desired.
Benefast Partners’ focus was on what could be done with a software platform purchased for processing small to midsized company 401 (k) plans. They then discovered that the platform was not sophisticated enough to deal with the complex calculations required by defined benefits plan. This system was purchased because the fees for use of the proprietary system proved to be impracticable.
There are five sub stages in the analysis stage of the SDLC, which comprises of:
Needs Assessment Planning
At this initial stage, a team is created with the objective of investigating the current capabilities of the organization and what is needed to achieve the desired system; which is done through four major activities: * Organize the needs analysis team – this requires determining the key personnel whose input will be of great value, and will therefore form the core team charged with working stakeholders to identify problems, solutions to these problems, and report findings to the Senior management. Benefast Partners did not indicate who their team was comprised of, however based on the information provided, no system user was included and/or consulted, and those were who involved may have been the decision makers.

* Determine management’s role – Senior management support will guide the team, resolve issues and set priorities. Seeing that they were able to launch