Completion Report

Project Summary

The project successfully managed the procurement process to acquire a SAM solution for the University.

• Various options and a recommendation for solutions were established (via an independent consultant)
• A framework to acquire the solution was chosen (Scottish Government, selecting Softcat)
• User requirements were captured and the selected software met these to a high degree
• Due diligence was carried out in regard to technical integration with our i/f
• The standard procurement questions sets were substantially put to supplier and vendor and met
• All with procurement guidance and approval
• Reference site visits carried out (UCL, Dundee and two large private companies)

However, the project also established that an additional two full time members of staff would be required to effectively run and maintain the SNOW application/SAM Service. This was put to ISG Management as a business case, but funding was not secured. Accordingly, the project will close.

Benefits

Benefits already enabled by the Project

We have established that SNOW will satisfy the university needs.  This will be useful for a future SAM procurement. We have a set of user requirements for future SAM procurement. We have avoided wasted cost and effort as we we have not purchased a product which we then cannot maintain and use effectively - we will implement SAM when we can run it properly.

Benefits management and realisation will be available on the ITI Sharepoint space.

Analysis of Resource Usage:

Staff Usage : Project Management Effort. 31 days.                                                      Desktop Effort. Not recorded.

Other Resource  :  Significant effort from SNOW and Softcat

Budget                   :  Budget expended on consultancy, site visits.  

Lessons Learned - Issues and Risks  

The use of an independent  consultant can be a useful route to procurement. However, by not going through the formal procurement some elements may be missed or not highlighted in a timely manner. In this project, the whole cost of life including staff resource to run the service was brought to focus very late in the day by management, compared to a typical procurement that would have naturally detailed this element. Time and effort could have been saved. Also note that many of the standard procurement question sets still need to be addressed by supplier anyway.

Project Audit

n/a

Outstanding issues

n/a