Development Of Online Portal For UNICEF

Objectives of the Project

The background of this project involves certain operational issues faced by UNICEF Child Care. Due to these issues, the organization faces significant amounts of losses caused by excess amount of supplies and also cannot provide the parents with verified and accurate payment invoices. Other technical aspects like management of the entire system, payment system, ordering system and others also require changes. Accordingly, this project has been designed to address these issues as much as possible.

The objectives of the project are as follows.

• To design an online portal system where the parents of the children can create their own accounts
• To include the option of online payment through the portal
• To develop an automated system that will take data regarding the number of accounts registered and order the products accordingly 

The main requirement for the project is to develop an online business portal that will have the following features.

Login System – In the proposed new portal, the parents of the children will be able to create their own profiles in which they will be able to login and logout any time they want. The login credential will include a unique username and a suitable password.

Online Payment – In this portal, there should be an online payment system through which the parents will be able to pay using credit and debit cards. The payment gateway should be secured in order to prevent data breach.

Digital Invoice – Each time a parent makes a payment, a digital invoice will be generated for him to download. Also at the end of the year, a digital invoice will be generated that will include all the payments made by the user throughout the year. The user will be able to access this invoice by logging in to his portal.

Automatic Ordering System – Based on the number of accounts through which the payments have been made within a certain period of time (say 15 days), the system will automatically send an order to supplier for providing supplies to the stock.

Judging by the requirements of the system, it can be suggested that the most suitable system development methodology will be Prototyping. 

With the help of the prototyping methodology, the entire project can be developed into different segments. In each of the segments, each one of the features can be developed separately and after all the segments are complete, the entire system will be connected, implemented and tested for further changes (Alsyouf, Al-Alami & Saidam, 2015). The path of the chosen methodology is shown in the following diagram.

There are two main types of requirements for this particular system, primary functional and non-functional. These requirements are discussed as follows.

Functional Requirements – The functional requirements for the system will include the features to be incorporated within the online portal. As per the proposed project requirement, the portal should have various features like online payment, automatic ordering system and others. All these requirements should work in a chain as per the requirements of the system (Son and Ryu 2015). The chain of the events for the required features is explained below.

Features of the Online Business Portal

Register – When a new parent enters the portal, he will be asked to register for an account. When he registers using his email id or phone number, his profile will be created along with a unique username and a password (Mahapatra & Goswami, 2015). For an existing user, he can simply just log in using his username and password.

Make Payment – After entering into the account, the user can simply check requirements and information and in case of due payments / new payment, there is an online payment option (Kashevnik et al., 2017). The user can pay through this gateway using a credit or debit card. An online invoice will be generated and provided to the user immediately.

Auto-Order – Whenever a payment is received, the system will automatically add one to the existing list of number of orders required. After 15 days, the system will forward the total amount of orders to the seller for supply.

Non-Functional Requirements – The non functional requirements of the system will include a secure online payment gateway through which the payments made by the user will be transmitted to the bank account of UNICEF (El Hameed, Latif and Kholief 2016). Another non functional requirement is a stable internet connection through which the user will be able to access the portal and a suitable windows configuration to support the running of the website. 

The cost benefit analysis for five years period is shown in the following table.

Project Cost-Benefit Analysis
Analysis Variables:
Discount Rate Used	6.00%
Annual Benefits	$   114,000.00
Annual Operational Costs	$     25,000.00
One-Time Development Cost	$   225,000.00
				Year of Project
		0	1	2	3	4	5	TOTALS
Economic Benefit		$0.00	$        114,000.00	$        114,000.00	$          114,000.00	$        114,000.00	$      114,000.00
Discount Rate		1.0000	0.9434	0.8900	0.8396	0.7921	0.7473
PV of Benefits		$0.00	$107,547.17	$101,459.59	$95,716.60	$90,298.68	$85,187.43
NPV of all BENEFITS		$0.00	$        107,547.17	$        209,006.76	$          304,723.36	$        395,022.04	$      480,209.47	$     480,209.47
One-Time COSTS		$(225,000.00)
Recurring Costs		$0.00	$         (25,000.00)	$         (25,000.00)	$           (25,000.00)	$         (25,000.00)	$       (25,000.00)
Discount Rate		1.0000	0.9434	0.8900	0.8396	0.7921	0.7473
PV of Recurring Costs		$0.00	$         (23,584.91)	$         (22,249.91)	$           (20,990.48)	$         (19,802.34)	$       (18,681.45)
NPV of all COSTS		$(225,000.00)	$       (248,584.91)	$       (270,834.82)	$         (291,825.30)	$       (311,627.64)	$     (330,309.09)	$    (330,309.09)
Overall NPV								$     149,900.38
Overall ROI
								0.4538

The estimated project schedule is shown in the following table.

Task Name	Duration	Start	Finish
Development of Online Portal for UNICEF	78 days	Mon 16-04-18	Wed 01-08-18
Project Initiation Phase	7 days	Mon 16-04-18	Tue 24-04-18
Identification of Current Issues	2 days	Mon 16-04-18	Tue 17-04-18
Discussion between Management Members	1 day	Wed 18-04-18	Wed 18-04-18
Reaching a Certain Solution	1 day	Thu 19-04-18	Thu 19-04-18
Approval for Developing an Online Portal	2 days	Fri 20-04-18	Mon 23-04-18
Finalization of the Project	1 day	Tue 24-04-18	Tue 24-04-18
Project Planning Phase	12 days	Wed 25-04-18	Thu 10-05-18
Develop Project Scope	2 days	Wed 25-04-18	Thu 26-04-18
Create Project Charter	2 days	Fri 27-04-18	Mon 30-04-18
Develop Project Schedule	0.5 days	Tue 01-05-18	Tue 01-05-18
Develop Project Budget	0.5 days	Tue 01-05-18	Tue 01-05-18
Contact Sponsor	2 days	Wed 02-05-18	Thu 03-05-18
Procure Budget	2 days	Fri 04-05-18	Mon 07-05-18
Allocate Duties to Stakeholders	2 days	Tue 08-05-18	Wed 09-05-18
Go Ahead for Project	1 day	Thu 10-05-18	Thu 10-05-18
Project Execution Phase	50 days	Fri 11-05-18	Thu 19-07-18
Hire Developer Team	5 days	Fri 11-05-18	Thu 17-05-18
Creation of Online Portal	10 days	Fri 18-05-18	Thu 31-05-18
Develop Online Payment Feature	5 days	Fri 01-06-18	Thu 07-06-18
Secure Payment Gateway	5 days	Fri 08-06-18	Thu 14-06-18
Develop Automated Ordering System	5 days	Fri 15-06-18	Thu 21-06-18
Develop Profile Login/Logout System	5 days	Fri 22-06-18	Thu 28-06-18
Test the Entire System	10 days	Fri 29-06-18	Thu 12-07-18
Risk Assessment	2 days	Fri 13-07-18	Mon 16-07-18
Risk Management	2 days	Tue 17-07-18	Wed 18-07-18
Project Handover	1 day	Thu 19-07-18	Thu 19-07-18
Project Closing Phase	9 days	Fri 20-07-18	Wed 01-08-18
Project Appraisal and Review	2 days	Fri 20-07-18	Mon 23-07-18
System Documentation	5 days	Tue 24-07-18	Mon 30-07-18
Sign Off from Stakeholders	1 day	Tue 31-07-18	Tue 31-07-18
Closing	1 day	Wed 01-08-18	Wed 01-08-18

Following the project schedule, the Gantt chart can be drawn as follows.

Accordingly, the work breakdown structure of the project can also be drawn as follows.

The Gantt chart is used to link each of the tasks of the project as per their schedule as well as dependencies. On the other hand, the work breakdown structure of the project shows the division of work packages in various phases of the project (Kerzner & Kerzner, 2017). Hence, work breakdown structure develops the work packages whereas the Gantt chart links these work packages to develop an appropriate schedule for project.

As per the estimated schedule, the project will require 78 days that will be sufficient and suitable for the company to develop the new system and apply it directly into the operations (Schwalbe, 2015). Due to the functional and non functional needs, the number of days cannot be further reduced. 

System Development Methodology

The stakeholders involved in the project are listed in the following table along with their roles in the project.

Stakeholder Name	Stakeholder Designation	Role
John Smith	Project Manager	Management, control and monitoring of the project
Sam Curran	Finance Manager	Determination of budget, management of funds
Adam Watkins	IT Manager	Management and monitoring of information system development
Walter Johnson	Developer	Development of the online portal
Matt Harvey	System Integrator	Integrate all features into one portal

Some of the useful investigation techniques used for understanding system information requirements are listed as follows.

1. Analysis of System Documentation– During the course of the project, a system documentation is to be developed and updated at the end of each phase of the project (Fleming & Koppelman, 2016). This document will include all relevant information including system specifications, patch information and others. This document can be analyzed in future for finding required pieces of information.
2. Interviews– Interviews is another effective investigation technique for gaining information. For this technique, a number of users are made to use the system for a certain period of time (Harrison & Lock, 2017). After that period, the users are interviewed to gather data points regarding system information.

• Observation of System in Operation– The final investigation technique to be used is observation of system during operation (Walker, 2015). In this technique, a certain technical expert will monitor the system during operation and provide data points for the required information.

All the three investigation techniques are effective in gathering system information as required. Each of the techniques involves points of views of different users and as a result, there will be diversity in the opinions (Heagney, 2016). Furthermore, involvement of more than one user will allow the organization to verify information judging by majority count and hence gather accurate information. 

Reflections and Conclusions

From this project, I have learnt a lot about various systems development methodologies and their applicability in various types of projects. I have also learnt about project management techniques by using project management tools and personal estimation skills. Finally, I have learnt about cost benefit analysis as well as various investigation techniques applied to understand information requirements. 

In the end, it can be concluded that this project will be feasible for UNICEF Child Care in terms of cost benefit as well as other operational benefits. If this project can be completed successfully, the new automated system will be able to address all the issues that the organization currently faces. 

References 

Alsyouf, I., Al-Alami, A. & Saidam, A., 2015. Implementing product design development methodology for assessing and improving the performance of products. International Journal on Interactive Design and Manufacturing (IJIDeM), 9(3), pp.225-234.

El Hameed, T.A., Latif, M.A.E. & Kholief, S., 2016. Identify and Classify Critical Success Factor of Agile Software Development Methodology Using Mind Map.

Fleming, Q.W. & Koppelman, J.M., 2016, December. Earned value project management. Project Management Institute.

Harrison, F. & Lock, D., 2017. Advanced project management: a structured approach. Routledge.

Heagney, J., 2016. Fundamentals of project management. AMACOM Div American Mgmt Assn.

Kashevnik, A., Lashkov, I., Parfenov, V., Mustafin, N. & Baraniuc, O., 2017, November. Context-based driver support system development: Methodology and case study. In Open Innovations Association (FRUCT), 2017 21st Conference of (pp. 162-171). IEEE.

Kerzner, H. & Kerzner, H.R., 2017. Project management: a systems approach to planning, scheduling, and controlling. John Wiley & Sons.

Mahapatra, H.B. & Goswami, B., 2015. Selection of software development methodology (SDM): a comparative approach. International Journal of Advanced Research in Computer Science and Software Engineering, 5(3).

Schwalbe, K., 2015. Information technology project management. Cengage Learning.

Son, K. & Ryu, H., 2015. Integrated system development methodology design and LCC (Life Cycle Cost) data process. Indian Journal of Science and Technology, 8(24), p.1.

Walker, A., 2015. Project management in construction. John Wiley & Sons.

Wasson, C.S., 2015. System engineering analysis, design, and development: Concepts, principles, and practices. John Wiley & Sons.