Transition Preparation and Implementation
The objectives of the Implementation Phase is to collaborate with the DWR staff to perform training for business users, technical staff, and even external customers, conduct a readiness assessment to ensure department-wide preparation and ongoing support for Dam Safety, and complete all technical aspects related to go-live so that the resultant solution adequately meets DWR's needs. If the system Trinity develops is pristine, but the user community is not prepared to use it then Trinity has failed in its endeavor.
Customer Acceptance Testing occurs to validate the infrastructure from a usability standpoint. Training for the administration of the infrastructure also occurs as well as the requisite communication regarding production rollout. Our Team understands the importance of an effective system user guideline and user training procedures in the success of any implementation. Training will be designed and delivered in such a way that users will understand the system conceptually as well as at the level necessary to perform job responsibilities. Our goal for this phase of the project is to provide a documentation enabling users to understanding and succeed in the use of the application.
Training
Trinity's training specialists plan and prepare training materials and conduct testing for business users, analysts/researchers, and technical staff.
Deliverables include:
- Training Plan
- Training Materials
- User Guide and End user procedures.
The User Guide may also serve as a Quick Guide that we can have a version ready in time for User Acceptance Testing participants. We would like to test training materials during UAT to ensure the material effectiveness during training and as a reference for users once the system goes into production.
Other training materials will support inspectors, analysts, and technical users. We will share past training materials, other best practice examples, and examples that have worked well for the users involved. These include training plans and training materials prepared for the ARB's greenhouse gas reporting system, the OCIO's ARRA reporting system, and the Bay Area Air Quality Management District's grant management system. The BAAQMD training document is included as an Appendix at the end of the proposal. An example training approach document is included at the end of the Business Solution section of this proposal.
Technical training materials such as for application maintenance and system administration can follow established departmental standards or serve as proofs of concept for new standards the department wishes to establish.
The full training guide will be designed to support Train the Trainer approach. We did Train the Trainer program for the California Department of Justice for the sex offender registration system. This system required training over ten training specialists who in turn are responsible for training law enforcement personnel throughout the State of California. For that application, we prepared the script for a video for the end-to-end solution and did the on-air hands-on demonstration and narration.
We would like to explore preparation of a video for training that can be made available over the DWR web site to inspectors in regional offices. Such a training video enables staff to refresh their understanding of the system's capabilities. This recognizes that staff may rotate into and out of inspection duties. Also new staff to the Division will need training and an on-demand video would make it faster and easier for new staff to come up to speed on the system.
For the introduction to the system, we can either conduct training ourselves or do train the trainer preparation for DWR staff. The latter may make it feasible for trainers to visit regional offices rather than requiring staff to travel to Sacramento.
We recognize that training materials may need revision based on initial field usage. One of our firmâs principals volunteers to accompany any DWR inspectors who may need to conduct an inspection that entails hiking in the high Sierras. Even if a high Sierra field trip is not practical, we would like to accompany Dam Safety inspectors on a site visit to get a first-hand understanding of what activities occur in a dam inspection. This first-hand understanding may help in the design of the mobile application and in other ways aid in improving the ease of use and functionality of the mobile application and handheld computer.
For the Air Resources Board AB 32 greenhouse gas Low Carbon Fuel System, we prepared and delivered an on-demand web-based streaming video training course for the oil industry that must meet the law's reporting requirements through the LCFS system we developed.
Organizational Change Preparation
We recognize that you will update the Readiness Assessment during the course of User Acceptance Testing period. The Readiness Assessment was begun during Analysis and updated periodically throughout the project provides analysis and guidance on capabilities needed throughout DWR to support the operation of the Dam Safety system from a business and a technical perspective. Areas where capabilities typically needed for successful support of a new system include Help Desk and ongoing training of business users.
Release Management and Go-Live
We will follow the client's release management practices. We are accustomed to following strict release management standards based on principles found in ITIL and/or COBIT.
Release management activities include; establishing a calendar for the implementation activities and verifying that all systems, databases, networks, and other infrastructure that will be used directly or indirectly are prepared for the final testing and implementation of a new system. For example, we do not want to schedule rollout on the weekend that an upgrade is scheduled for related systems such as ArcInfo, Documentum, or other systems with which Dam Safety will integrate. An example of a release management calendar is provided below:
An initial version of the system manuals will be ready in advance of go-live. As part of training system staff, we may conduct a dry run implementation to give client staff more hands-on experience. The production environment may be used for some testing activities that can actively involve DWR technical staff.
Go-Live will include a defined scripts for smoke testing the system loaded to the production system. The smoke test will address integrations as well as the solution's application logic.
Activity overview
User Acceptance
- Application Developer Manual
- Operation Support Manual
- Deployment Plan
- System User Guides and End User Procedures
- Training Events
- Go-No-go Decision
- Knowledge Transfer Plan and Sign-Off
- Post Implementation Review Report
- Lessons Learned