Agenda item

To consider a report on the progress being made in implementing a replacement HR and Finance system for the Councils and their partners 

The Committee considered a report which detailed the progress being made in implementing a replacement HR and Finance system for the Councils and their partners.

The majority of the system build activity by Agilisys was now complete.  The Programme Board had signed off the major programme milestone – “build complete”, on 29 March, which was three weeks later than planned.  The delayed signoff was provided on a conditional basis, recognising that certain core processes were not yet in a position to be demonstrated to the Council to confirm that the requirements had been fully met.  A proportion of the value of the build complete milestone had been retained and would be paid to Agilisys upon demonstration of the outstanding elements.

The programme had targeted a go-live date of 3 September 2018 from the outset.  However, recognising the significant pressure that bot the Council and Agilisys were working under in order to meet scheduled deadlines and the slippage against certain deliverables, it was considered necessary to review the plan and deliverables and determine whether the go-live date remained achievable.  A review of the risks indicated a delay in the programme and a two month extension would provide time to complete the design and build activity alongside a more reasonable User Acceptance Testing Window. Any potential extension would also add additional cost to the programme.  A report would be brought to the next meeting on the review of the Project Plan and the financial position.

RESOLVED:

That the Committee

1        note the status of the programme, as detailed in section 5 of the report, including the conditional signoff of the “build complete” milestone and the approach to resolving outstanding issues and releasing the remainder of the milestone payment;

2        endorse and agree that the Council and Agilisys teams (the Programme) formally review the Project Plan together, as detailed in section 9 of the report, which highlights an emerging and indicative two month extension to the programme, to access and replan activity, risks, deliverables and benefits of the programme, reporting back to the Committee on the proposals in May 2018;

3        note the broad range of business engagement activities which have been undertaken since the last update to the Committee, as described in section of the report, and the outcome of the first of a series of “change readiness assessments”;

4        note and endorse the benefit realisation processes, described in section of the report, which is underway to assess and confirm the business savings which were set out in the July 2017 Cabinet reports;

5        note the key elements of the training strategy, set out in section 8 of the report, which has been developed jointly in support of the programme;

6        note the financial pressures on the programme, as noted in section 10 of the report, and endorse the proposal to bring a full update to the next meeting of the Committee; and

7        note the positive feedback arising from the Internal Audit report following completion of the design phase of this programme, as set out in section 11 of the report.