Information gathering method: Interview

Introduction:
Interview is one of the most popular and effective way of gathering information. In general sense
the term “interview” applies to one-on-one private meeting or conversation conducted between
an interviewer and interviewee, where the interviewer seeks for a resources and answer to
question from the interviewee. According to Dr. S. M. Amunuzzaman, “Interview is a very
systematic method by which a person enters deeply into the life of even a stranger and can bring
out needed information and data for the research purpose”.
Benefits:
One of the advantages of conducting interview is Easy Correction of Speech. Any confusion and
error can be fixed quickly in an interview, since the interviewer and interviewee physically
present in the interview. In interview many kinds of questions both complex and simple
questions can be asked properly or flexibly. Additional questions can be tailored according to the
requirement and maximum details can be obtained.
Secondly, it can take long time to have a personal interview that helps the informant to
concentrate on the subject under investigation. Thus, recall of relevant information is facilitated.
The informant can be made to devote more time if, as is the case, the interviewer is present on
the spot to elicit and record the information. The interviewer’s presence is a double headed
weapon, the advantageous aspect of it being that face-to-face contact provides enough
stimulation to the respondent to probe deeper within himself.

Limitations:
In the first place, one main disadvantage of interview is imbalance position. When interviewing,
the interviewer is sure of his position. He may, therefore, ask any question to the interviewee but
interviewees are usually tensed during the interview. The interview cannot even be done well by
experienced and capable applicants. Hence an individual determines the quality and not all
qualities for which he should be ranked based on a single or few quality. It considers the person
in part and totally assesses him on this basis. The entire thing is like a sample evaluation. While
it can work for objects, the evaluation of people is not always accurate.
Moreover, limited sample size is also disadvantage of conducting interview. Interview is a long
information collecting process which require a bunch of time to conduct it. Having a limited
sample size does not fulfil all the requirement and conducting other interviews take time and
costs also. Therefore, interviewer can only collect limited data from interviewee.
b) Explain the conduct of the investigation method including how it will be carried-out, target
users, location, etc. Create a set of questions that you can use for your investigation. Display the
questions only related the system development project.

There are many steps required to carry out interview:

Step 1: Objectives for interview
Main objective of this interview is to collect information about recent and to propose solution for
existing problems of system.

Step 2: Selecting a person to interview

A person is selected from a list of targeted people of clinic in order to carry out interview by the
factors like age, gender.

Step 3: Creating questions for interview

The list of questions are mentioned below which are asked to interviewee:
1) What are the things you want to change?
2) What are the problems faced when using the manual system?
3) What benefits are expected from the new system?
4) What other systems are used before the current system?

Step 4: Interview planning

It is required to set a time, location and date for interview between interviewer and interviewee
by different means of communication such as phone call, e-mail, text message.

Step 5: Interview
Interview begins by greeting and introducing each other, conducted in quiet environment where
no disrupt occurs. Interviewer provides the question and give some time to explain interviewee
thoughts and opinion about question. Then, interviewer explaining the aim of proposed system.
After the interview is finished a summary of information is provided to interviewee in order to
confirm the data or information gathered.

Step 6: Documentation
 Information collected from interview are documented in official report instantly. The main
bullets points are summarized and offers any correction or addition of data to answer. A gratitude
is given to the interviewee for providing his/her important time for interview.

Context diagram:

Disease

Diagnosis
Sales

CLINIC MANAGEMENT
Doctor SYSTEM Patient

Procurement
Appointment
Medicine
System analysis
a) From the findings of ‘Requirement Gathering’ (Individual Component), creating a list
of Requirements (including functional and non-functional requirements) for the new
System.

Functional requirements:
Registration requirement
- Staff can add new patient into system after registration.
- Staff should fulfill details carefully in order to prevent from error or duplication of patient
data.
- Irreplaceable ID is generated for individual patient which will used for checking previous
visit.
Software requirement
- Operating system – Every computer will use latest windows

- Database- As for storing data, MYSQL will be used because it is free and can manage
easily.

Non-functional requirement:
Performance
- System should be able to respond or work fast and front-page load time for front-page
must not be longer than 3or 4 second.
Maintainability
- A time is set every week to go through maintenance to check bugs or error in system.
Reliability
- Data should be recover automatically after any bugs in the code, hardware faults, or
problems with other device component is fixed.
Security requirement
- Admin or owner should be able to enter new data of patient, see, or copy exiting data of
system and data removal is not allowed.
5) Feasibility study
The feasibility study is part of the main planning phase of any project or plan. It is carried
out with a view to critically uncovering the strengths and disadvantages of a potential
project or an operating company. It will help to recognize and evaluate the possibilities
and threats in the environment, the resources needed for the project and the prospects for
success of the project. It consists of:

Operational feasibility
3.3 Workload Matrix

Area Student 1 Student 2 Student 3 Student 4 Student 5 Student 6

Introduction 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667%

Problem & solution 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667%

Project Planning 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667%

Feasibility Report 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667%

Systems Analysis 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667%

Design Diagram 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667%

Interface Design 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667%

Overall 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667% 16.667%

Documentation
Standards

Signature
Problems and proposed solutions
Identify problem
The first problem found in existing system is data redundancy and inconsistency. This is the
result of recording data or information such as patient records, medical records and sales reports
in manual way. Every patients need to register before meeting the doctor. The staff does not
know whether the patient is already registered nor not so staff have to register patient as a new. If
they had already visited the clinic, patient will be registered twice or more which causes
redundancy of data. Due to this, a lot of time is consumed if patient record has to be check.

Another problem caused by manual system is to check prescribe medication and/or medical
leave repetitively. This will lead to an increasing workload on staff. In addition, staff needs to
calculate the price of medicine frequently which will take a bunch of time and there is a chance
of miscalculation of medicine price.

Last but not the least problem is the low efficiency of manual reports preparation and inventory
check. The staff needs to daily prepare report on number of patients and the sales. As the
number of patient increases the time and manpower to note down the list of patients will
increases, which result low efficiency. Along this, staff needs to check the medicine store daily
and to place order to supplier. If this manual system is eliminated then the manpower required
for this job can be utilized to perform other serious task.

3.0 Project planning

3.1 System development life cycle

3.1.1 System planning

The first stage of the System Development Life Cycle (SDLC) is System Planning. Throughout
this phase the priorities and goals have been established clearly because the main purpose of this
phase is to defining the complexity of the problem and seeking solutions. So, the team must
recognize the challenges that client meet, evaluate the opportunity to suggest solutions in order
to make product enhanced and to develop clinic management process and process data recording.
3.1.3 System Design
This is third stage of SDLC which defines the specifications, functionality and operations needed
to meet the functional requirement of the proposed framework. The design involves the user
interface, data storage, and design. The ERD is drawn and used to illustrate a relation between
systems. The entity relation diagram is used. Management and user engagement are essential to
this process because the system has to be design according to clinic management system.

3.1.5 Maintenance
The fifth and final stage consists of maintenance and daily required updates. If management
system wants to change the system parts to improve performance, add new features, this is done
at this stage.

References:
 WiseStep. (2018). Interview Methods and Types: Advantages and Disadvantages -
WiseStep. [online] Available at: https://content.wisestep.com/interview-methods-types-
advantages-disadvantages/.
 Your Article Library. (2016). The Interview Method: Advantages and Limitations | Social
Research. [online] Available at: https://www.yourarticlelibrary.com/social-research/the-
interview-method-advantages-and-limitations-social-research/92801.
 Corporate Finance Institute. (n.d.). Feasibility Study - Definition, How to Conduct,
Contents. [online] Available at:
https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/other/feasibility-study/.
 Innovativearchitects.com. (2010). SDLC: Seven Phases of the System Development Life
Cycle. [online] Available at:
https://www.innovativearchitects.com/KnowledgeCenter/basic-IT-systems/system-
development-life-cycle.aspx.

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