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Home > IT Governance Plan > Information Technology Management Plan Information Technology Management PlanApproved by the ISPB November 18, 2004 (IT Management Plan Worddoc) A framework to govern the acquisition, management, and use of communication and information resources in Maine state government Table of Contents
Richard B. Thompson The need to provide shared agency solutions at a statewide level is a key initiative for this administration. As the State's Chief Information Officer, I am dedicated to meeting this initiative, while aligning our IT resources organizationally to meet the business needs of the State. This plan provides a framework for the effective management of information technology with its primary role redirected to support the business objectives of agencies and facilitate efforts to provide efficient and effective services to the citizens of the State. Moving forward with the strategies and actions highlighted in this plan, which will be detailed in statewide and agency implementation plans, will allow for more extensive information sharing across agency levels and provide improved services to the public. This IT plan also provides a foundation for an enterprise wide approach to the management of information technology. The State of Maine needs to implement an organizational transition from functional silos to a process oriented environment. Many future technology efforts will cross multiple agencies with a single goal of providing services to the citizens of Maine . This environment requires technology which can communicate, interoperate and share data and resources while reducing the costs through the use of enterprise architecture and standards for IT. Additionally, the State should realize operational cost savings as we view IT services from an Enterprise perspective and work toward consolidation and collaboration of services where appropriate.
The Importance of an IT Management Plan An IT management plan is a tool that provides decision makers with the information they require to best allocate their IT resources and fund their investment. The plan provides a snapshot of the current IT environment (this plan refers to the Statewide Technical Architecture Document for that snapshot, http://www.maine.gov/cio/strategic/index.htm ) and documents overarching objectives that lay the foundation for the development of the architecture and standards that will ensure the delivery of quality, cost effective IT solutions. The plan includes short term goals and actionable strategies that support the mission of Maine 's major objectives and/or initiatives. There may be changes to these goals, or new goals added, and all changes must be tracked and performance measured to maintain the integrity and value of the IT Management Plan. Additionally, as goals are achieved the plan must be modified to reflect the outcomes. How we measure the value when goals are achieved is critical to those who utilize that plan as a tool to assist when making IT investments. The plan also ensures that we will meet the priorities of the Governor's Office that relate to information technology. They are as follows:
The summary of expected outcomes of the plan is:
State of Maine Information Technology Guiding Principles Maine State Government makes decisions based on these guiding principles.
Key Issues Identified in Current Environment Process for Addressing Identified Issues After the identification of issues, the OCIO developed a communication and planning process that would allow for the crafting of a statewide IT management plan. The Chief Information Officer chartered an executive group with the Commissioner of the Department of Administrative and Financial Services as the Executive Sponsor to provide guidance on improving the delivery of IT service delivery from the business perspective. Additionally, an IT Management Project Team and focus groups were organized to solicit input from a broad range of stakeholders on how IT services and service delivery could be optimized, while maintaining and/or reducing costs. Critical to the process was input from the Governor's Office on the top six priorities. They were as follows:
In order to achieve operational excellence this IT Management Plan recognizes the weight of complexity on efficiency. Much of Maine 's IT operations are not visible to the customer but are necessary activities in order to deliver government services. The IT Management Plan focuses on differentiating between common versus specialized services and then apportioning responsibilities between the enterprise and the agencies in a way that balances each of their respective strengths. Model for Delivery of IT Services
A key component of this plan is a change to the current model for delivery of IT services. The above diagram demonstrates the new model that we will utilize as more specific initiatives are established as an outcome of this plan. Currently many services that would fall under common and/or shared services in the new model are siloed within agencies. This model will ensure that we are utilizing our IT resources in the most efficient manner to provide quality, cost effective services. Development, management and support of agency applications is best suited at the agency level. Through strong oversight and project management, agencies can align their process in an effective manner, at the level close to the recipient of the service or system benefit. Shared services should be strongly encouraged and impediments to such activity analyzed and removed. Key issues within IT governance were identified as follows:
An enterprise must be well governed to be well managed. An enterprise, by the breadth and complexity of its nature, requires a more innovative and flexible approach to governing than provided by more traditional models which were developed to oversee the functions of a departmental IT organization. The feedback received by the OCIO made it clear that in order to adequately anticipate and react to the increased pace of current technology challenges, a revision of IT governance is necessary. The changes that will be sought to improve governance are as follows:
This new governance structure will provide effective counsel to guide the enterprise forward, improve collaboration to begin to break down silos and provide the opportunity to better leverage IT investments across all levels of government; critical gains given the current fis cal environment and increased security concerns. Office of Information Technology One of the most immediate actions of the IT plan related to Governance is the proposed merger of the Office of the Chief Information Officer with the Bureau of Information Services (BIS), creating the Office of Information Technology (OIT). The Office of Information Technology will be engineered to take a statewide strategic view of technology and deliver customer focused technology services thru Service Level Agreements.
The tactical role of the organization will continue within Operations and Production Services Divisions, but two new and critical functional divisions have been incorporated into OIT. New Divisions The Performance Management Division The first priority of the Performance Management Division will be to develop service excellence standards for the Office of Information Technology, and to cultivate strong partnerships with agencies. The PMD is directly integrated with the CIO with the authority to refocus priorities of both Strategic Management and Operations Divisions. Strategic Management Division The increasing frequency of change, the complexity of our technology, and the business dependence on IT has led to substantial increases in the typical size and risk of IT projects , inefficiencies accompanying distributed architecture, weakened security, absence of web management, and lack of identification of current and needed assets . A rigorous planning process is the first step to mitigate the risk of IT project failures, assure assets are managed effectively, as well as to ensure that the infrastructure continues to service the enterprise effectively. Key issues related to the IT strategies within Maine State Government:
The new governance model created during this process addresses many high level strategy issues by focusing on IT from an enterprise level. It is not always the cost of individual systems driving the need for an enterprise approach, but rather the cost of service delivery. Citizens demand quality service, accessibility, and value from government programs at all levels. The State's ability to recapture “enterprise-level thinking” regarding a common, shared infrastructure will be a critical success factor in accomplishing the goal of building the next generation's communications networks and data centers and meeting the needs of the State's constituents. Strategies that will address the identified issues are:
Key issues related to the IT Infrastructure were identified as follows:
The growing pains experienced by agencies as they transition from local to shared infrastructure needs to be eased. This IT Management Plan will facilitate decision making and dispute resolution surrounding such issues as defining the shared infrastructure, and determining when it should be deployed, how it should be paid for, and when its use is mandatory.
The plan also documents goals, actionable strategies and areas of opportunities identified during the planning process that we will expand to establish a long range technology strategic goals for the next three to five years by the end of this calendar year. Identified Goals and Actionable Strategies The following Goals and identified strategies represent the collective thinking of a cross section of IP professionals in state government. The first tasks of the CIO, Executive team, and the CIO Council are to prioritize and focus on the actions that will achieve the administration's expectations and improve the operation and use of IT across the spectrum of users and resulting services. 1. Goal: Simplify delivery of all government services and information to customers
2. Goal: Manage information technology from an enterprise (statewide) perspective, based on business needs.
3. Goal: Develop collaborative relationships among state agencies, public and higher education, local governments, federal government, private sector, and non-profits in order to improve service delivery.
4. Goal: Contain or reduce IT spending in State Government – providing the most effective and efficient service, while securing the best value for every IT dollar spent.
Areas of Opportunity Messaging (e-mail). The State messaging architecture contains no common mail directory and utilizes hosting servers in a dozen agencies. Standardization of the mail services is a next step and a central post office will be implemented this biennium to facilitate reduced support requirements for the state. Network Services. Intra-office connectivity and support must be accomplished even at the smallest agencies. A pool of network administrators from the Bureau of Information Services will provide network support to all agencies. This will increase standardization and interoperability while freeing agency resources for tasks specific to that agency. Procurement. IT Procurement is inefficient when done on an agency basis, “mass” buys are not leveraged and unnecessary duplication of effort occurs. The goal is to streamline and centralize IT Procurement as appropriate. Desktop Support. Desktop support is not uniform or equitable across the State. Support varies and agencies utilize different contracts or software to provide those services. Consolidated support, with adequate training for all users, and use of the same office automation, hardware and software will be evaluated. Hardware Maintenance. Hardware maintenance , purchases, and support are inconsistent and not leveraged across the state. Efforts are underway to consolidate maintenance contracts, make aggregated purchases, and provide support for all agencies, no matter how small. Adaptive Architecture. An Enterprise IT Architecture is critical to the state if we are to meet the challenge of e-Government successfully. The ability to use common solutions identified in the e-Government architecture, e.g., e-payment, is enhanced through an Adaptive Enterprise IT Architecture . This architecture is critical for the state to also realize effective disaster recovery and business continuity for IT resources. Review of the State's Enterprise Architecture is currently under way with a reengineering of DNS and DHCP. Anticipated reengineering in Active Directory Services will happen this biennium. Security. As the State moves into the e-Government arena, added pressure is applied to IT security and protection of information, twenty four hours a day seven days a week. IT security is not only provided by the technical capabilities of the software and networks the State implements, but also the policies, procedures, management controls, and audits must be in place. The State will continue to be diligent in IT security and the CIO will publish statewide guidance in this area to protect the information the State holds electronically after agencies submit their IT Security Plan at the end of this calendar year. This plan is intended to steer IT management in the State of Maine in a direction that results in business goals and cost savings that agencies can rapidly integrate. Upon approval of this plan a process will follow that charters the CIO Council to formulate an Implementation Plan to move forward with specific initiatives. By adopting a plan that reflects and supports enterprise business strategies, and supports agency management of applications, the State will be better positioned to immediately determine where short range savings can be discovered. Summary by Richard B. Thompson, CIO This management plan is not intended to limit or stifle department or agency creativity but instead to provide a stable infrastructure and environment in which to solve common business problems faced by many agencies and to allow agencies to collaborate on significant efforts. The plan is built on the foundation of a management model which utilizes the best features of both centralized and decentralized IT management, support and decision making. I recognize that some cultural changes are essential in order for us to be successful moving forward with this IT plan, but the benefits to the stakeholders (state government agencies, taxpayers and state IT employees) will be significant. State government agencies and employees will benefit as the technology they require to meet their business objectives is delivered to their desktops in a consistent and cost effective manner. Small and medium sized agencies that typically lack resources and depth of expertise will have access to skill sets and technologies not currently available to them, thus closing the gap between the technology “haves” and “have-nots.” Taxpayers and customers benefit from improvements in the deployment of seamless, integrated systems and services, particularly Web-enabled solutions promoting convenience and ease of use. In so doing, Maine is fulfilling the vision of a digital government, available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. Taxpayers will reap the benefits of the cost-savings over the long-term and these savings can be used to fund initiatives to improve citizens' lives in the areas of education, social services, health, public safety, and transportation. In closing I would like to thank everyone for their efforts in providing input on how Maine can move forward with initiatives that will allow us to deliver cost effective services to our citizens, businesses and government partners.
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