Lessons Learned Report for ICT-enabled Initiatives

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Lessons Learned Report for ICT-enabled Initiatives

Nov 13, 2020

Extracts from “2018-19 Lessons Learned Report for ICT-enabled Initiatives”
Published by the State of Queensland (Queensland Health), November 2019

Key Foundational Themes

Leadership	Strong leadership is crucial to lay the foundation for success:
	Leadership time needs to be invested early to understand what business outcomes are being sought.
	The level and nature of resources needed must be very deliberately assessed and key senior roles established/acquired/deployed before commencing execution.
	Sound and clear governance structures and leadership accountabilities must be established.
	When concerns arise, quick responses are necessary.
	An agreed future operating model for the transformed business must be developed before solution/vendor selection and development of technology roadmaps.
Project management	Correct project management structure, and expertise is required from the very start including the use of appropriate fit-for-purpose, program and project methods.
Vendor management	Develop a vendor management and relationship strategy as part of initiating the program/project.
Effective relationships	Devote sufficient leadership resource and time to build effective relationships with internal business customers.
Scope	Constant attention to the management of scope.
Governance	Periodic reassessment of governance, leadership and program/project structure arrangements.
Benefits	Plan early for benefits which includes the transition of ownership to the business.

Good practices identified from the review

Initiatives strongly aligned with governance and organisation policies, strategies and goals. Initiatives documented the alignment of program or project vision, aims and objectives with Government and Departmental priorities and strategies
Demonstrated effective stakeholder engagement to help analyse, segment and appropriately engage the right people at the right time, with active management of critical stakeholder issues
Risk management is a focus and standing item on Governance committees for oversight and management
Effective planning of project structure and resource requirements as part of the initial stages of a project lay a foundational platform for success
Engagement between the project team and governance bodies of an initiative through gated assurance activity, lessons learned, and subsequent action plans support a platform for success.

Top three themes identified for potential improvement

Management control:

Lack of defined and/or approved scope	This includes discrepancies in scope definitions amongst key stakeholders and key project artefacts. Key artefacts outlining scope not finalised or approved by the appropriate governance bodies.
Lack of upfront program or project planning	This includes the identification of customer driven products, activities, dependencies and resources needed to inform the schedule and to successfully deliver the program or project business case objectives.
Lack of/incomplete evidence of transition planning	This includes undeveloped, incomplete, or unapproved support and operating models. There is also evidence of no contractual arrangements with vendors post Go-Live, No BAU support plans, poor articulation of fall- back/contingency plans, and transition to operational governance.
Lack of defined or adhered to internal controls	Particularly those specific controls that cater for changes when the program or project is forecast to progress outside of approved tolerances.
Inconsistent development and management - Business Case	Inconsistent program or project business case in terms of clearly defined whole of life program or project costs, benefits and risks.

Resource management:

Insufficient training and development activities	Training and development activities are inadequate and cannot be operationalised. Further it does not meet the expectations of the end-user cohort.
Lack of clearly articulated roles and responsibilities	Responsibilities are sometimes duplicated, unclear, or overlapping for positions which can lead to potential for conflict in responsibilities being executed.
Lack of early business engagement	The business and the initiative need to engage fully to get a thorough and early understanding of any requirements for obtaining expertise from the business.
Unclear operational requirements	The ability to fulfil Business as Usual (BAU) demands should be a prerequisite to business readiness for deployment. Operational requirements need to be well planned and align with the business’s overall capacity.
Lack of effective resource planning	Resource requirements are not always identified at the outset and that demand, supply and management of resource risks are not included in a resource management strategy or resource plan.
Recruitment timeframes and processes	Obtaining suitable human resources was identified as a challenge with delays in resource onboarding impacting on additional workloads for existing staff. This subsequently impacted functions and project artefacts.

Risk management:

Adherence to approved Risk Management Frameworks	Inconsistent and can vary even across an individual project with numerous registers in existence.
Inconsistencies with risk identification	There are inconsistencies noted between risks identified within project documentation such as Business Cases and within the actual project risk registers.
Systematic and regular reviews of risks andissues	There are inconsistencies noted with whether there are systematic and regular reviews of risks and issues at the initiative level.
Reporting, review and monitoring of risks	There is limited evidence that the reporting, review and monitoring of risks is occurring consistently at the appropriate governance forums.
Long-standing risks	Some long-standing risks have been identified that may need to be managed as issues to ensure positive attention and treatment.

Key Theme - Stakeholder Engagement & Communications

Key findings

There is no common understanding among stakeholders of the program or project scope, objectives, outcomes, critical success factors, roles and responsibilities, and/or delivery approach.
Program or project success definition or criteria (based upon program or project objectives), does not consider the effects of the project or program on the stakeholders (internal or external), culture or processes.
Stakeholders have expressed confusion and misinterpreted the Red, Amber and Green RAG status within the program or project report.
Insufficient consultation and engagement with stakeholders in multiple stages of the project or tranches of the program have resulted in a lack of stakeholder buy in.
Program or project has engaged late with governance stakeholders for investment and assurance, both internal and external to the agency based on a lack of knowledge and understanding of the processes.
Lack of continuous communication of program or project progress to relevant stakeholders, as well as ensuring the information is distributed to all levels (supervisor to personnel).
Stakeholder engagement and communication strategy and plan are not documented or properly tailored and shared with all stakeholders.
Highlighted variation in competence with how the programs or projects develop and manage the stakeholder management strategy and planning activities.
Highlighted concerns on how the relationships with other Departments, across Division within the Department of Health as well as HHSs are managed.
Highlighted concerns on how the program or project’s stakeholders were kept informed.
Highlighted concerns on how effective the delivery of the strategy and/or the plan was communicated to stakeholders.

Key lessons

Ensure communication activities are well resourced and located within the program/project.
Identify and understand the business’s key stakeholders and their information and engagement needs.
Tailor communications for specific audiences – a one size fits all approach is never as effective.
To minimise change fatigue on a lengthy change journey, be innovative and do not over-communicate – try to confine communications to points when there is something new and useful to say, rather than being locked in to regular output cycles that may lead to
scrambling for content.
Survey stakeholders regularly to test and refine communication activities.
The communication of operational changes should focus on “what does this mean for me?”.
Identify staff from different levels of the business to support the project/program life cycle at each stage.
Develop relationships with senior leaders, meet regularly, provide meaningful updates and seek their input to solutions.
Check in with the business regularly to test the effectiveness of engagement tools.
Impact assessments are not a one-time activity – they need to be done at various points during a program/project life cycle, to varying degrees of details.
Ensure tight management of review and approval processes within the business, as well as timely production of detailed operational information, so that staff can be properly trained before deployment.
Consider whether business needs require dedicated staff to manage post-implementation training and maintain training materials.
Consider a change champion model for major change initiatives to deliver training and ensure consistency while also taking account of the local context.
Training needs to be delivered “just in time” so that staff can apply the learning soon after completing training.
The business’s role in receiving and managing the new operating model must be clearly articulated and agreed.
Ensure that skills transfer from the program/project to business is well planned and delivered.