A Case Study of a Very Large Organization

Abstract

Very Large Organization (VLO) is an organization that produces hardware and software, which together form products. VLO granted access to data pertaining to seven different products and their development projects. One particular product is of interest to VLO since it was not as successful as the other products. The focus of this thesis is to study the problematic product and compare it to the other six products in order to draw some conclusions regarding the problematic product. The goal of this study is to indicate areas of improvement, which can help VLO improve future products. This thesis explores and answers the following research questions focused around the problematic product. Was the product indeed a failure? If so, what caused the product to fail? What indications that the product would fail were evident during the product’s development? What could VLO have done in order to prevent the product from becoming a failure? What can VLO learn from the failure? Are there data from the non-problematic products that indicate what VLO excels at? This thesis analyzes the data from all seven products and their projects in order to answer the research questions. Analyzing the non-problematic products is important in order to draw comparisons to the problematic product. As a result of this research, this thesis uncovers a variety of issues with the problematic product and identifies six areas for possible improvement. These six areas are: hardware research and development, decoupling of software from hardware, requirements management, maximal use of resources, developer order and priority of vital features, and schedule alignment. This thesis concludes that even though none of these six problematic areas can be pinpointed as the singular root cause of the problematic product’s failure, addressing these problems will improve the likelihood of product success.