IM&T Service Vision and Strategy

Introduction

The purpose of this document is to set out the strategic vision and direction for the

IM&T Service.This is in order to achieve and sustain ‘Service Excellence’ in the

provision of IM&T services to our customers and users by 2017. It is through this

achievement we will be able to greatly improve the productivity and effectiveness of

our staff working in the integrated care landscape support high quality, safe services

for the people of North, East and Mid Devon.

Our Vision Statement:

“To be the partner of choice for sourcing and providing digital services so that our

staff can improve the health and wellbeing of the people of North, East Devon”

In order to be the partner of choice IM&T Services will need to be Customer Focused

in order to provide the highest quality services possible within the funding envelope

available to us. The aspiration is that the experience of using digital services will

cover not only the core services but also result in customer loyalty that stems from

good service. This will be achieved through the development of partnerships with our

customers in order that we can understand and respond to their technology and

information needs.

The primary focus of the department will be service excellence which may be defined

as providing a high quality service for a good price. We will also listen to what our

customers tell us, offering tailored products and services and product assortment

where this is cost effective and in line with the Trusts strategic direction.

It is recognised that achieving service excellence requires accession through a series

of competency stages, each of which builds on what has gone before. Broadly the

stage through which IM&T Services will progress will be reflected in changes in the

relationship with the customer. In order to ensure we achieve these aims we will

develop robust plans and have nominated individuals within the service accountable

for progress against the plan.

This document sets out not only what we do – and why we do it - but also the

standards by which the department will operate and the plans over the next two years

in respect of the aforementioned competency stages and the implementation of a

culture of Continuous Service Improvement.

Why we do it

Within health and social care there are huge opportunities to harness the benefits of

digital services for organisational effectiveness and service transformation.

Through the knowledge & experience of our staff working in the integrated care

landscape we understand the importance that IM&T has in supporting the

organisation in the delivery of, and improvement to, high quality, safe services for the

people of North, East and Mid Devon.

The aspiration of the department is to move from being seen as a cost centre or

commodity to be managed; through being viewed as an essential and dependable

partner to other departments in the delivery of their own aspirations and objectives..

What we do

IM&T Services will formalise our Catalogue of Services that will clearly set out what

it is we offer, the means by which customers can access the services and the levels of

service that the customer can expect.

The service catalogue will be subject to continuous review in order to reflect not only

advances in technology but also the changing health and social care delivery setting.

The following are the key Service Catalgoue areas:

• Data Management & Business Intelligence

• Organisational Compliance and Risk Management

• Workplace Services for End Users

• Programme, Project & Change Management

• Hosting and Development of Solutions

• IM&T Strategy and Consultancy Services

The following value statements apply to these key areas:

Data Management

These services provide the organisation and its staff with the data, information,

intelligence and insight required to promote improvement and a culture of high

performance. This is achieved by working with customers to ensure that the outputs,

in addition to being timely, are accurate, empower the user to make decisions and take

action that will lead to improvement.

The services range from descriptive information (what has happened?), predictive

intelligence (what might happen?) and prescriptive insight (what should we do?). The

service encompasses the governance, capabilities and tools to help make better

decisions.

Compliance and risk management

These services provide the organisation, patients, staff, and the wider public with the

confidence that systematic controls are in place to ensure corporate information,

sensitive information and records - such as personal staff and patient/client details -

are protected and only shared with those that legitimately need to know.

This service helps the organisation to comply with government / NHS and legislative

frameworks for upholding information rights in the public interest, promoting

openness and data privacy.

Workplace services

These services provide a choice of modern IT solutions that enables users to work

anytime & anywhere. The solutions offered will enhance productivity by being easy

and flexible to use whilst remaining secure and compliant with governmental data

protection, security and other legislative requirements.

The services are tailored to the role of the individual and are provided from the point

at which a new starter is identified through to an individual leaving the organisation.

On-going technical support and advice to the user is provided to help make sure that

the service is always available when needed.

Programme and Change management

These services provide the organisation with the ability to successfully scope,

procure, implement and manage transition to achieve benefits for organisational

change projects. The typical projects that the service will support include IT enabled

change projects, clinical and business process redesign and support for moving

towards paperless ways of working.

The service will also support more traditional complimentary services such as

application development and application hosting. The service operates to best practice

methods and techniques (e.g. PRINCE, MSP, Lean / Six Sigma).

Hosting and development

Whilst increasing data volumes, more complex applications and the constant

challenge of security threats – combined with the demand for ‘Green IT’- are driving

hosting solutions out of the workplace and into data centres there remains a demand

for on-site hosting of applications. IM&T Services will support both internal and

externally hosted systems in order to ensure maximum availability of systems and to

minimise disruption to the users in the event of any system failure.

The department will also undertake bespoke development of systems in-house and

support the development and maintenance of interfaces to both organisational and

third-party systems in order to minimise, and where possible eliminate, the

requirements for duplicated data entry thereby saving time and reducing the

opportunities for transcription errors.

IM&T Strategy and Consultancy Services

These services are available to support managers and staff to find solutions to day-to-

day challenges and seek innovative strategic solutions to assist the organisation in the

wider goal of providing the best possible healthcare within the resources available.

Advice is both independent and solution-centric and may not necessarily result in new

‘technical’ solutions, but may result in better use of existing solutions and/or changes

to existing process and practice.

These services may also be used to assist in the production of business cases and in

conjunction with Procurement support the production of tender specifications and

subsequent evaluation stages of any procurement process.

How We Will Do It

Being a partner of choice naturally implies that the service is customer focused. This

will be achieved by aspiring to the UK government Customer Service Excellence

(CSE) standard. This standard, which is not specifically for the IT industry or NHS,

will act as a driver for continuous improvement; provide a framework for staff

development and potentially as an independent validation of achievement via formal

accreditation.

There are 5 elements to the CSE standard. These are:

Insight

Culture

Information and Access

Delivery

Timeliness and Quality

Key features of the above are described below.

Insight

IM&T Services will place an emphasis on developing customer insight by

consultation and via robust measurement of service satisfaction. Information gathered

will be used to design and provide services, build upon success and to ensure that our

customers are satisfied with the outcomes of the services offered. Customer insights

and experiences will be incorporated into internal processes.

Culture

A customer focused culture can be challenging. Both senior and middle management

will support the staff in the delivery by valuing the contribution our staff who will be

empowered and encouraged to actively promote and participate in the customer-

focused culture of the department. This commitment will be supported via the

departments’ recruitment, training and development policies.

All staff within IM&T services will be expected to demonstrate professionalism and

the necessary values and understanding required to meet the needs and expectations of

our customers and the management team will ensure that communication between the

wider organisation and between internal sections support this aim.

Information and Access

We recognise that information is vital to customers and that customers tell us that it is

particularly frustrating not being kept informed about what is happening.

Via the Service Catalogue we will make information about our full range of services

available to our customers and this will include how and when people can contact us,

how our services are run and who is in charge. Where there is a recharge for services,

we will tell our customers how much this will be.

We will make it easy for customers to contact us via a number of different channels

and ensure that the information we provide is up-to-date and accurate. Customers will

receive information about the progress of any request on a regular basis and will be

provided with a mechanism to find out the status of any request using web-based

technologies.

IM&T Services also have arrangements with other providers and partners in order to

supply co-ordinated services. Where this is the case we will ensure that customers

have clear lines of accountability for quality of service.

Delivery

IM&T Services will set itself challenging standards for the delivery of all its services

and via the Service Catalogue set out the levels of service that customers can expect.

We will aspire to operating to nationally recognised frameworks (e.g.ITIL).

We will actively seek and act on feedback – both positive and negative. We will have

an easy to use complaints procedure and will commit to deal with problems fully and

solve them wherever possible within a reasonable time limit. We will provide staff

training and guidance to investigate issues reported to them and empower staff to put

things right.

Timeliness and Quality

We will set appropriate and measurable standards for the timeliness of response for all

forms of customer contact including phone calls, letters, e-communications and

personal callers. In addition to timeliness we will set comprehensive standards for all

aspects of the quality of customer service to be expected in all dealings with the

organisation in order to ensure that quality is not compromised in the pursuit of a

speedy service.

The Service Catalogue will provide customers with an indication of how long they

will have to wait between a request for a service being made and the completion of

the request. We will respond to initial enquiries promptly, and if there is a delay we

will advise the customer and take action to rectify the problem.

We will publish information on regular feedback to the organisation as to how we are

performing against the standards and any steps that are being taken to address issues.

In addition to the 5 standards there will be a revised IM&T governance framework.

The purpose of this framework is to ensure there is a formal system in place to ensure

that the organisation can optimise the value of the portfolio of IM&T-related

investments, and to manage risk (see Figure 1)

Figure 1

The various aspects of the IM&T governance framework we will look to implement at

the very start of this transition are:

Restate the existing Business side governance (IM&T Committee and IG

committee)

Implement an internal IM&T governance model that addresses Service

Performance (Standing and Project governance) or formalise existing

arrangements.

Ensure there is an operating model in place at the outset that clearly sets our

departmental, team and role based accountabilities and responsibilities against

our service catalogue, ITIL processes frameworks, and performance reporting

HR policies, standard operating procedures and the accountability framework

are aligned to JDs/PSs and team structures for successful workforce

management and team learning and development.

These will be developed further in time to reflect the levels of maturity being

achieved (reviewed at least annually).