The Systems Development Life Cycle: Generation and Evaluation of Alternatives

Three issues to consider when investigating alternatives:

• Technical assessment — "Can it be built?"
• Organizational assessment — "Will people use it?"
• Economic assessment — "Do the benefits outweigh the costs?"

When investigating alternative solutions, it is important to assess three main issues — technical feasibility, organizational feasibility, and economic feasibility. Technical feasibility examines how risky the technical aspects of the alternative are — "Can it be built?" Organizational feasibility examines if the alternative is useful for the organization — "Will people use it?" Economic feasibility assesses the costs and benefits of the alternative — "Do the benefits outweigh the costs?" Once these questions have been answered regarding each alternative, a final solution is selected, and the design phase begins.