June 2009 Veterans Affairs Program Management Accountability System

Improving IT Systems Development at VA Presented By: Roger W. Baker, Assistant Secretary Date: June 15, 2009

Agenda
Background
Analysis of Ongoing Programs
Incremental Development
Milestone Management
Benefits
Implementation plan
Questions

Background
VA IT Consolidation initiated in 2007
Primary purpose is to improve the results of VA IT investments
Replacement Scheduling Application Failure
VA commitment to review all ongoing development programs
New Secretary/Deputy Secretary/CIO confirmed
Significant Senate questioning on how to address program issues

Analysis of Ongoing Programs
280+ programs reviewed to date
8 program attributes analyzed
Many programs exhibit signs of trouble
Greater than 13 months behind schedule
Greater than 50% over initial cost estimate
Decrease in software quality between releases
Inadequate skills to complete program
Substantial change is required

Incremental Development
All new VA IT projects/programs must use an incremental development approach
Frequent customer delivery milestones
At most every six months
Customer must test and accept functionality
To be approved for investment, a program or project must have:
An identified customer sponsor
Program plan that documents frequent delivery milestones
Documented, agreed to requirements for initial milestones
Clear plan for necessary program disciplines
Clear access to necessary program resources
Customer, program, and vendor acceptance of PMAS
Jointly established success criteria

Program Management Accountability System (PMAS)
All incremental development programs will be managed rigorously to schedule
A program/project will be halted on its third missed customer delivery milestone
Once halted, substantial changes must be made before the program can restart
Need for program/project will be re-assessed
Program approach will be re-assessed
Make/buy and program design decisions will be re-assessed
New Program Manager will be assigned (rotational/training assignment)
A portion of the government program staff will be reassigned (rotational/training)
All service contracts will be re-visited
New program plan must be approved
Flexibility can be earned
Multiple successful milestones between strikes
Clear improvement in management between first and second strike
Significant advance warning of missed milestone provided to CIO

Program Manager Benefits
Clear decision criteria
Impact on schedule will drive program choices
Better program control
Success factors must be in place before program start
Decreased requirements creep
Impact on schedule will force hard decisions
New requirements factored into later release schedules
Clear customer participation
Must test and approve each release
Clearly impacted by program halt
Clear vendor attention and participation
Motivated to help program meet milestones
Increased probability of successful program

VA Benefits
Eliminate “big bang” program/project failures
Near-term visibility into troubled programs
Able to provide help if possible
Avoid long-term failures
Better insight into scarce resources
Frequent deliveries to customer ensures program/project functionality is on track
Customer can best evaluate functionality, quality, response, etc.
Increased probability of successful programs

Implementation
Incremental development is required for all new IT programs/projects starting as of 6/15/2009
All incremental development programs will be managed to PMAS effective 6/15/2009
VA will pause a number of Programs/projects identified as in jeopardy
Program plan re-cast for incremental development
New plan must be PMAS compliant
New program plan must be approved by CIO before program resumes
Within one year, all VA IT programs and projects will be incremental development / PMAS compliant
Programs that remain within 10% of original program plan (schedule, cost, function) may be excepted

Questions?

June 2009 Veterans Affairs Program Management Accountability System

by Christopher Dorobek on Jun 19, 2009

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June 2009 Veterans Affairs Program Management Accountability System — Presentation Transcript