Solution Evaluation
Assignment Summary
Due: Monday 22 May 2023, 11:55pm
Weighting: 35%
Links to Learning Outcomes: 3
Type: Individual assignment
Task Length: Up to 3000 words
Submit here: Solution Evaluation
View the marking rubric here also: Solution Evaluation
Intended Learning Outcome
This assignment will assess:
3. Evaluate suggested solutions to ensure that a project is selected for initiation
Assignment Details
Assignment Topic
In this assignment, you will analyse the assignment case study – Lonely Launceston – identify requirements,
prioritise them, and then present your preferred course of action as a business case.
Phase 1: Task prioritisation
The stakeholders in the assignment case study have a range of requirements. Prioritise the requirements based
upon what you perceive to be the most important considerations for the organisation.
Justify your decision for the priority that you have assigned to each requirement.
Phase 2: Business case
Based upon the prioritisation of requirements from Phase 1, write a business case for your recommended course
of action.
Your business case should:
1. Define the need identified by your analysis of the case
2. State the assumptions that you have made to analyse the case
3. Determine the desired outcomes identified by your analysis of the case
4. Assess the constraints, assumptions and risks associated with the case for making a change (or not making
a change)
5. Recommend a solution
Lonely Launceston Case Study
Lonely Launceston is a hyper-local dating service established in early 2022. It was a reaction to the isolation
and loneliness that COVID-19 lockdowns had created throughout 2020. People were not out at bars and clubs,
and if they were, they were out of practice. Desperation could only get relationships so far, and Lonely
Launceston stepped up to make things happen.
Nick Evans, CEO of Lonely Launceston, having had considerable success with online dating on the unpopular
movie Love, Guaranteed, realised that online dating didn’t work for everyone. He had friends who were too
intimidating for the men on Tinder, mates who were too alpha for the women on Bumble, and confidantes whose
standards were too high for the people on Grindr. And they were all single. But the hyper-local nature of
Lonely Launceston was very successful in making post-pandemic relationships work.
When asked about Lonely Launceston’s mission statement and vision, Nick provided the following mission
statement:
Lonely Launceston helps the good people of Launceston form meaningful relationships, whether that be
for five minutes, five years, or five lifetimes. We do this by providing a hyper-local meeting service for
Launcestonians, by Launcestonians.
And vision:
Once every Launcestonian has found love, then we’ll bring love to the whole world.
However, the process of Launcestonians finding love had slowed recently.
Recurring waves of COVID-19, virulent influenza and general winter lethargy was slowing love in the best of
the Tasmanian cities. Slowing love meant slowing profits for Lonely Launceston Pty Ltd.
Lonely Launceston members would pay a membership fee of $15 per month to access the dating service. With
people losing interest, Lonely Launceston Pty Ltd’s income was falling.
Nick knew that something had to be done to get the blood pumping in Launceston lovers’ cooling hearts again.
Currently, Lonely Launceston offers its services through a website hosted through Launtel. All of Launceston is
networked on optic fibre NBN services, meaning that the web is very fast and accessible in all of Launceston.
But people were using the internet differently from how they did during the pandemic, when most people were
at home. Websites weren’t as fashionable as they once had been.
Nick had a feeling that the future was in web apps. A web application would allow Lonely Launceston to be
accessed through any mobile phone, tablet or computer, and give everyone a fully integrated experience with
Lonely Launceston. It wasn’t a native app, which meant Lonely Launceston couldn’t be accessed offline, but
most people didn’t need their dating apps to be accessible offline. Clients can’t communicate with each other
when they’re offline, and communication is the whole point of a dating service. What functionality was actually
missing? Editing your profile while you’re sitting on the toilet? Nick knew that toilet time was for TikTok, not
selfies and editing your Lonely Launceston profile.
Lonely Launceston’s CFO, Susan Whitaker was confident that most modern relationships formed on mobile
phones nowadays, and the best way for their service to be discovered was to be on Google Play. Android was
clearly the market winner for operating systems, and having a Google Play app for Lonely Launceston would
ensure that the majority of the people of Launceston would be able to find love. Susan thought it would be good
to have an iOS app too if it were possible; sometimes wealthy people were interested in dating on the other side
of the tracks, she supposed.
Arianna Mononym was Lonely Launceston’s data analyst. She would plough through the data trying to work
out the most effective way to make Lonely Launceston profitable. She believed the only real way of being
profitable was to genuinely offer a service that led to love. She was confident that capturing data that, based
upon solid peer-reviewed evidence, would lead to soul mates meeting. Arianna needed standardised data entry
forms built into the website or app – she didn’t care which – that would allow her to analyse the data and create
evidence-based matches. She knew that love was in the data.
Denise DeNefew was Lonely Launceston’s part-time psychologist. The company would call Denise in for
advice on various parts of dating, with the aim of improving the service using some quality head-shrinking
science. Denise knew, based upon her extensive experience that the reason people couldn’t find love was
because they were fundamentally flawed, but fundamentally flawed people could still be fixed using quality
psychology techniques. Denise was trying to convince Nick to form a reciprocal relationship with her practice –
Downing Street – Elphin Road Psychology Services (DERPS). She would award loyalty points to DERPS
clients which could be traded in for free membership to Lonely Launceston. This would be good for her,
because it would help maintain repeat business, and it would be good for Lonely Launceston because the service
would inevitably be more successful if it were frequented by people whose psychological flaws had been fixed
through her services.
Roberto Mundungo was the ICT support for Lonely Launceston. He was quite capable of making a website, iOS
or Android apps, standard data entry forms, or even a loyalty points system if that was what the company
decided. He didn’t really care. His main focus was on why all of the singles in his area who wanted to meet him
would disappear when he turned on his VPN. It was very weird. Roberto’s concern was that, whatever was
happening to the singles in his area, might also be happening to Lonely Launceston’s clients. He hated to think
that people were going missing just because he was using a free VPN.
Tamara Taylor, the marketing manager for Lonely Launceston was confident that Lonely Launceston was going
in the wrong direction. Single people just needed to be with other single people for love to blossom. It had been
that way for ever and it continued to be that way now. The data that Tamara wanted from Lonely Launceston
was people’s common availability so that they could meet up in the same place, mingle and match. None of this
complicated stuff was necessary, people would fall in love, as long as they met enough other people. It was
inevitable. The Lonely Launceston database could probably already provide this information. Tamara thought it
was time to get going with group meetups.
Bill Jones had listened to Tamara’s rants about group meetups being sufficient, but he knew that not everyone
had the rizz to shine in a group that were just mingling. He liked Arianna’s idea of collecting standard data, but
not for the purpose of making perfect matches, but to identify group activities that people could do together.
Through common activities, people couldn’t help but fall in love. He wanted the system to identify small
groups of singletons to meet up and do traditional Launceston activities, like going rock climbing in the Cataract
Gorge, jumping from King’s Bridge, mountain biking in Trevallyn reserve, or shoplifting in the Launceston
Mall. These were all ways that people could get their adrenalin going which would help break down barriers
between individuals so that they could form lasting relationships. Even Denise thought that there was some
merit in this plan.
Hoegye Won was Lonely Launceston’s accountant. He’d recently been let go from a range of other ICT firms
where his opinions had generally been ignored, which made him even more vocal at Lonely Launceston board
meetings. Hoegye knew that the key to beating loneliness came from having someone to talk to. Just being able
to message people through the Lonely Launceston app was sufficient for him, and he thought for most other
people too. He didn’t really see a great need for actual meet-ups. The chatting was enough. And who could
provide a better service for chatting online than ChatGPT?! It was pretty cheap for access to the API. Roberto
was competent: he could create a range of AI profiles and people could chat with ChatGPT, thinking that they
were talking with other lonely people in Launceston. The AI could be tweaked to never be available for dates,
but still be endlessly charming and available online. Hoegye was very happy with his AI girlfriend. Surely the
rest of Launceston would be just as happy.
There were several different options that might be considered by Lonely Launceston to increase profitiability,
but it was fundamentally unclear what the best solution would be, so Lonely Launceston engaged a business
analyst…
Frequently Asked Questions
I’m putting some answers to frequently asked questions here. Perhaps you will find them helpful.
Do I need to specify the requirements as we did in the week 8 tutorial?
No. Specifying requirements is something that happens after a project has been selected. We are
looking at our business and our stakeholders’ requirements, and we’re trying to work out what
project to do.
Do I need to select one of the suggested requirements from the stakeholders as the solution for the
business case?
No. It would be sensible to try to satisfy all of the stakeholders, but that may not be possible.
Consider what the stakeholders want and prioritise those requirements. Then, you write a business
case that’s appropriate for satisfying the business and stakeholders’ needs.
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