Agenda and minutes

None received.

None received.

To consider for approval the draft Public Minutes arising from the Resources and Delivering Value Scrutiny Board meeting held on 8^th March 2021.

The minutes of the meeting held on 8 March 2021 were presented for approval including the private minutes.

RESOLVED:

That the minutes of 8 March 2021 including those in private be approved as a correct record.

The purpose of the report is to:-

Ø  To provide the Resources and Delivering Value Scrutiny Board with an update on the final delivery phase of the programme and to support the programme closure;

Ø  To reflect on how the programme has remained aligned to the core principles and to review the benefits that are now being realised as reflected as part of the post implementation review; and

Ø  To acknowledge the budget position.

The Board was:

Ø  provided with an update on the final delivery phase of the programme and asked to support the programme closure;

Ø  invited to reflect on how the programme had remained aligned to the core principles and to review the benefits that were now being realised as reflected as part of the post implementation review; and

Ø  asked to acknowledge the budget position.

The Board had previously received five reports from 2017 to 2020 charting the progress of the project. The last report the Board received advised Members that the final phase of the programme to implement the self-service and professional portals had commenced in Adult Care and Support and was due to start in Children’s in July 2020. The Covid-19 pandemic had impacted on the final delivery plan, but progress had continued to be maintained with some adjustments to the plan and re-profiling of work. The whole programme was scheduled to be completed in early 2021 rather than the autumn of 2020.

Members were advised that the core case management systems had been delivered and were both live (Adults June 2019 & Children’s March 2020). A period to enable these to stabilise and bed in had gone well and both Directorates were now in the final stages of implementing the enhanced Portal functionality.

Since December 2020 the Programme Board had been overseeing the transition of the remaining components from the Programme Team into the Business as Usual (BAU) operational teams. This enabled the programme to close and for the solution to be fully handed over to the respective Directorates and support services.

As part of the programme closure both Directorates had been reflecting on the benefits the new solution had delivered. This had also been aligned to the original Principles agreed by the Scrutiny Board back in November 2016.

The programme had delivered within the budget agreed back in 2016 and had transferred over 50% of the contingency to the Oracle Cloud Programme. The overall programme status was shown as green. This appropriately aligned to the health of the programme and readiness to close.

The rest of the report before Members covered the following areas:

Ø  Programme Level Update which covered:

·  New Supplier Contract (Liquid Logic)

·  Previous Supplier (OLM Systems- Care First)

·  Archive Solution Supplier (ICT Revolutions Ltd

Ø  Governance

Ø  Programme Delivery Phases-Update

Ø  Work Stream Level Update

Ø  Programme Closure Reflections

Ø  Programme Benefits

Also in attendance at the meeting were two Officers who were service practioners from the children’s and adult’s service areas who were able to provide first hand testimony to the Board regarding their experience of the new system. Both Officers confirmed that Liquid Logic was far better than the previous system. Officers were better equipped to do their jobs and were working more efficiently, which also benefited the clients. The new system was reactive to changing situations, such as those experienced during Covid-19, which allowed for adaptations to be made quickly.

In considering the report Members asked a number of questions or  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.

The purpose of the report is to:

Ø  provide Resources and Delivering Value Scrutiny Board with an update on the progress of the Oracle Cloud Programme; and

Ø   present the Programme’s current risk register for comment.

The Board was:

Ø  provided with an update on the progress of the Oracle Cloud Programme; and

Ø   presented with the Programme’s current risk register for comment.

The report before Members detailed:

Ø  The background to the project (section 3.1)

Ø  Approach to implementation ( section 3.2)

Ø  Progress Report –November 2020 to March 2021 (section 3.3)

Ø  Workstream Updates (section 3.4) which included:

·  Finance – Workstream status = Amber

·  HR Workstream Status = Amber trending Red

·  Procurement Workstream = Amber trending Green

·  Accounts Receivable (Debtors) Workstream Status = Amber

·  ICT Workstream Status = Amber

·  Data Migration Workstream Status = Red

There were a number of areas of concern for the programme as a whole and these had the potential to affect timescales and/or costs. These areas included:

Ø  Data Migration (DM) The Council was responsible for DM. Version 1 had a tool (known as Maximise) that was adapted at every implementation to meet the customers’ needs. A lot of time and effort had been spent by both Council officers and Version 1 trying to utilise the tool that would simplify DM for the cutover process. It was understood that Maximise would not be usable for all data although it would provide a solution for a substantial portion. It was also apparent that whilst the Council officers were experts of the current Oracle e-business system, there was a skills and knowledge gap of what the Oracle Cloud system required. In order to move forward to the User Acceptance Testing (UAT) stage and maintain the current timeline, the Council was seeking to re-address this and for Version 1 to have more of a leading role in providing a successful DM outcome.

Ø  Archiving as with most implementations, the intention of the programme at cutover was for balances to be brought forward into the new system and transactional detail would be archived. The current Oracle e-business system was hosted on-site by the Council and the Council would have the ability to view transactional detail through the current system until 31 May 2022. Discussions were being held with Oracle to identify the longer term archive options available to the Council.

Ø  Reporting as part of the programme and the Council’s normal business, the Council was looking to ensure the Council retained the ability to produce reports on Council information for example, VAT information for HMRC VAT returns, payroll and pensions information for HMRC and the West Midland Pension Fund. The contract with Version 1 required them to provide 20 reports of which they would share learning with Council officers and the Council would prepare the rest. Before the programme began, the Council had a record of over 1,000 different reports that had been produced over the years. Some of the reports were no longer required and some would be replaced by the ability to interrogate the Oracle system as a user. In order to assess which reports were required the Council needed to understand how the Oracle Cloud system would function with loaded  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

The meeting is not open to the public during discussion of the following item because the report contains exempt information as defined in Schedule 12A to the Local Government Act 1972.

RESOLVED:

That, pursuant to Section 100A (4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the press and public be now excluded from the meeting for the remainder of the business to be transacted, on the grounds that there would be disclosure to them of exempt information in terms of paragraph 3 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A to the said Act.

To consider for approval the draft Private Minutes arising from the Resources and Delivering Value Scrutiny Board meeting held on 8^th March 2021.