Case study The article by Misra, Kumar and Kumar (2008) analysed the risks associated with Information Systems (IS) projects during the early stages of their implementation. Even though a fictitious case study was used, Misra, Kumar and Kumar (2008) designed a framework for modelling early-phase requirements of organisational risk management. The article provided background knowledge in understanding what constitutes ‘risk’ and emphasised on how Business Process Reengineering (BPR) remains an agent that triggers risk in many organisations. Overall, it was identified that when risks, whether in the form of goals or tasks are identified during project development, they can be easily modelled and controlled from the early stages of the project. In order to develop the proposed model that will assist analysts in identifying and mitigating these risks, the authors of this article (Misra, Kumar & Kumar, 2008) have fused two existing actor-dependency diagrams; strategic dependency (SD) model and strategic rationale (SR) model.
A crucial limitation to the methodology used in this article which Misra, Kumar & Kumar (2008) have admitted to, is the issue of risks that transcends the project development stage. For example, there are risks associated with the operational stages and actual implementation phases. Another limiting factor which constituted ‘muddy waters’ in the methodology adopted by this article is that even though it is useful in identifying risks in their early stages when carrying out a risk management of an IS project, it didn’t have the capacity to measure precision and completeness.
This article has been beneficial because it complemented the objectives of the lessons learnt in class particularly in areas such as identifying potential hazards to an organisation, the relevance of a framework/model for managing risk and linking risk identification to the project objectives.