INFORMATION ENGINEERING: PLANNING SOUND SOLUTIONS

The Situation
Inherent to an organization’s ability to perform continuous and effective strategic planning is access to decision support data and information. Without establishing an information model that includes a definition of the technical architecture supporting the organization’s business functions, accurate planning information about the organization’s strategic business objectives cannot be obtained.

InterImage understands the elements comprising the information engineering model. Our expertise lies in the ability to glean pertinent attributes from this model, which then are used to identify opportunities for the insertion of web technologies.

Our Approach
Our approach to Information Engineering begins with the development of the Enterprise Model, which is used to describe and understand the mission and goals of the organization. The model establishes why actions are performed and how the organization’s goals are being accomplished. During this phase, we work with our customer to identify items critical to the success of the system. Information engineering continues with the data and process models being developed as the primary mechanisms used to communicate information system requirements and design concepts between users and developers.

During the system lifecycle, a series of data models are developed to convey and document system design information. These are the conceptual, logical, and physical models. Process models depicting the functionality of the system and the flow of its data are created and integrated with the data model to ensure creation of a stable information system. Information engineering methods also are used to establish a target architecture for a new system, and subsequent iterations of data and process models are created and analyzed to ensure graceful migration from the current environment to that target architecture.

By using this approach, a consistent method for preparing and updating system documentation, identifying alternatives, implementing architectural improvements, or improving the overall information architecture model can be successfully accomplished. It is by way of these near-term successes that progress towards strategic initiatives and goals to be seen and communicated.

Our Results
InterImage’s analytical and technical expertise combined with our focus on process and procedure guarantees solutions that increase productivity and improve work quality without requiring the organization to adopt completely new ways of executing work tasks. Our ability to quickly understand a customer's key business processes coupled with our software development experience makes us particularly adept at managing complex projects, performing analyses of systems, processes and new technologies, and creating dynamic solutions.

InterImage designed and developed a solution to integrate the diverse legacy systems of the several large telecommunications companies that had become part of Qwest to extend the life of these legacy systems, realize a quicker and greater return on investment, and enhance the productivity and efficiency of its staff. InterImage created a suite of applications to manage large-scale legacy data sources, handle the import and conversion of that data into state-of-the art databases, and create a series of applications to leverage the analysis, reporting and manipulation of this data for multiple business purposes.