Matthew Peacock, manager of Vision in Print, advises on how to specify your MIS.
If births, deaths, divorce and changing job are the most stressful events in life then implementing a new MIS may be close to being added to the list. But it doesn’t have to be, and properly approached can lead to a more streamlined, effective and happier working environment. Success starts with the way in which a new MIS is specified, just as much as choosing the right system.
Too often a new MIS is chosen, with the best of intentions, by a select few individuals usually including finance and IT. The result may be an excellent choice, but implementation often founders when it is imposed on existing inefficient office procedures, and users fail to understand its purpose, how to apply it to their jobs and perhaps feel threatened by it.
The solution is to involve a small team of respected users, representing the main functions, to streamline their current working methods and then develop a functional specification and for the new system to support them. An independent professional facilitator will guide the user team and be able to ask challenging but tactful questions and coach them in the appropriate analytical tools and useful lean techniques. At key stages, the user team must confirm their suggestions with senior managers and then communicate project progress to their colleagues.
With effective facilitation the user team will identify shortcomings in their current processes and develop streamlined alternatives. An effective way to do this is using flipcharts and stick-it notes to produce a ‘multiple activity chart’ of current methods, and then facilitate the team using lean techniques to minimise wasteful steps.
Multiple activity charts show process steps, arranged in logical progression along ‘swim lanes’ for each person or department involved in the process. A 30% reduction in the number of process steps is not uncommon before even implementing a new MIS or upgrading an existing one! And often user team members are surprised how much better they understand the challenges and information needs of their colleagues by participating in the charting process.
The final flipcharted multiple activity chart can be transferred to Visio, or a spreadsheet, for ease of communication with MIS vendors and others. The team should also develop an ‘information matrix’ showing information required by each department and indication whether it is vital, important or useful and indication the information origins and use on essential documentation. The information matrix is best prepared on a spreadsheet projected onto a large screen so that the user team can agree its content by consensus.
Together with a wish list of non-specific system features for users, the streamlined multiple activity chart and information matrix provide checklists for evaluating and testing user functionality of prospective MIS packages. Prospective systems can be rated compared on each feature as ‘fully capable’, ‘partial capability’ or ‘requires bespoke software’. Of course, other factors such as cost, ability to share data with other commercial software must be identified as well as the vendor’s commercial stability, ability to provide good technical support, etc, must be added to the full specification.
With structured participation of users to specify their needs and gain their ‘buy in’ from the start of an MIS selection, successful implementation with minimum stress is much more likely.
Image: ©Petr Vaclavek – Fotolia.com
