Please note: Our project finished at the end of the prototyping phase. The advice and guidance in this part of the toolkit is therefore based on our experience on other projects and best practice approaches to agile product development.
25. Agree ownership of product
By its nature, the Family Context tool is both accessed by and requires data from a range of services. It also involves stakeholders from across IT functions, digital transformation, information security, and information governance.
You should therefore try to outline who will take responsibility for ongoing support and management of the solution at the end of the project, which teams will have ultimate say in future changes, and how ongoing costs of the tool will be funded.
When considering ‘ownership’ there are broadly two options, with distinct benefits and constraints:
‘Service’ Owned | ‘Digital’ Owned |
Ownership sits within the Adult Social Care service | Ownership sits within the IT / Digital Transformation service |
Benefits:
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Benefits:
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Constraints:
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Constraints:
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Both are viable options but we have observed that it works best when the tool is managed by the digital functions. For this to be effective, however, close links should be maintained with the service to ensure that the tool is responsive to and able to meet the needs of users.
26. Introduce a change management process
As the tool starts to be used more widely across the service there will inevitably be requests to alter both its functionality and the information held within. You will not be able to respond to all requests at once so a clear change process should be introduced and a prioritised list created, which considers:
How the change will interface with existing functionality (e.g. if a new screen is added, do all previous links still function as expected?)
Top tip
Due to the way the Family Context tool is built, some elements are hard coded and not as easy to adapt if your team has limited developer experience. If you would like to discuss the tool, please contact the project manager at Social Finance (contact details in the Project Team section). |