4. In which ways is the initiative creative and innovative?
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While it would be tempting to outline and itemise the whole history of implementation from 2004 when the decision was made to automate, this would dilute the important elements which brought success to an otherwise mediocre system and which is, effectively the initiative that is being presented.
Although the Municipality is richly endowed with human resources, it did not have sufficient skills to design and implement the system to the required international standards and best practices. Therefore, the task was tendered and a contract awarded to the winning bidder, namely Esri Northeast Africa. In partnership with the Municipality and other key stakeholders (for example employees and users), this company was responsible for the implementation of the whole project. This main project and its project teams which carried out parts of the implementation was not managed in the form being a customer and service provider company but, rather, by the adoption of an agile software development approach, which was considered to be the most appropriate for this type of project. This is because it was more exploratory that iterative, where the project management team developed the system to the specific requirements of the Municipality, learning and exploring solutions as they created it in partnership with other stakeholders.
This approach not only meant that the requirements of the Planning and other departments could be accounted for but also those of users through collaboration and interchanges between the project teams and the project management.
The development steps can be divided into five and in chronological order were:
Stage 1
In this initial stage, there was a comprehensive analysis of the existing processes and the software that supported them. The duration of this stage was approximately 2 months.
Stage 2
The system was developed over a five month period during this second stage, which included testing and piloting what was called the ‘GIS for Building Permits’ system.
Stage 3
This stage was mainly concerned with data-related activities which included the standardisation of data and its migration to the system and it lasted for approximately 2 months.
Stage 4
This stage, which lasted for approximately one month, was mainly concerned with building the capacity of the new system to users, for example other departments internal to the Municipality and engineering offices.
Stage 5
The fifth stage involved the provision of operational support and lasted for 12 months.
Although these stages are self contained and were of a given duration, it is important to note that not only is monitoring an ongoing process but also that there was a monthly system for reporting as well as a number of workshops during the duration of the stages described above.
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5. Who implemented the initiative and what is the size of the population affected by this initiative?
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In a wider sense, there were a number of key stakeholders, the Government of Saudi Arabia and its ministries through which the original e-governance plan was developed, delegated and financed.
More directly, there were a number of groups of stakeholders who contributed to the design and/or implementation, including:
• The citizens of Saudi Arabia in the important sense that they created a demand for the building and development of the city
• Investors in land and building who recognised the demands of citizens and transformed them into concrete and financed plans
• The engineering offices who converted the plans into workable and practical designs that could be submitted to the municipal Planning office. This group had a further input in the design and implementation process as they were regularly consulted and their ideas and expectations were incorporated into the system as it evolved
• The management and employees of the Municipality generally and the Planning Office specifically as they were involved in and were a part of the team which, alongside their specialist partners from Esri Northeast Africa, created and implemented the system.
• Esri Northeast Africa was the company appointed to design and implement the whole project, albeit that this was done in constant consultation with the needs of the Municipality and of the engineering offices
• A further key stakeholder with a strong interest in the initiative and which was very much involved in the implementation and design of it is the Electric Authority. This company must not only have satisfactory plans for the provision of services within building designs and plans but must also be able to plan for future utilisation and demand and this can be optimally achieved by monitoring and being involved in the city planning processes.
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6. How was the strategy implemented and what resources were mobilized?
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With regard to financing, the initiative was funded through and therefore incorporated with the existing budgets of the Municipality.
The technical costs were the necessary infrastructure upgrades for the Municipality in order that the system could be technically enabled, hardware and software and the costs of providing technical and operational support and upgrades to the system as they were identified, created and installed.
Human resource costs can be divided across stakeholders and Esri Northeast Africa provided those that were necessary to manage the project through all of the phases of its development and implementation life cycles. This included project initiation, identifying the requirements of the project as well as its specifications, design, implementation, testing, installation and post implementation review. Alongside this, the company was closely involved in the identification of stakeholder requirements, in developing these as feedback loops so that adjustments could be made where necessary and in assisting with the training of Municipality and engineering office staff. Further human resource investments included the maintaining of seamless communications with the project awardees and periodically formally reporting progress via workshop presentations.
The Building Permits Department and the Municipality invested human resources in defining the project scope, monitoring the progress of it, coordinating and providing feedback and coordinating between internal and external stakeholders. They also liaised with stakeholders with regard to formal and informal (on the job) training and organised sessions where required.
Other departments of the Municipality and external stakeholders also invested considerable human resources in the initiative. These included the Information Technology Department, which coordinated the implementation of integration points between contractors and the IT systems and the GIS Centre, which was involved in the monitoring process as well as with the implementation of integration points between contractors and GIS data and systems. The engineering offices provided feedback and suggestions for enhancing the system as well as testing it and the relationship management of engineering offices coordinated training and workshops for engineering offices and were involved in publicising system inauguration announcements.
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7. Who were the stakeholders involved in the design of the initiative and in its implementation?
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A number of concrete outputs can be identified and five of the most significant are:
1. Prior to the implementation of the initiative, it could take lengths of time to issue permits which were a minimum of 15 days and a maximum that is hard to quantify (as delays due to failures within the system and errors could mean very lengthy times). The time now required for the issuing of permits is 4 days.
2. One significant problem in the past, and which has been noted in a previous section, was the quality of building permit requests and the fact that they were very prone to errors. The new system ensures that they are free from these and are submitted in a consistent and templated format.
3. The efficiency of the new system and the fact that it does not allow for substantial errors to exist or for bottlenecks to develop means that employee time is now spent much more gainfully and positively; therefore, employee productivity has been considerably enhanced.
4. The uniformity of the new system and its spatial data output means that different departments and entities, such as planners and property registration offices, do not have to rework plans and drawings and therefore considerable time is saved by them, also enhancing their productivity.
5. The use of electronic bar-coding for permits means that they can easily be tracked and can easily be converted across uses, which may vary as the process continues, for example from Auto CAD to GIS format and then to PDF.
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8. What were the most successful outputs and why was the initiative effective?
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The primary monitoring task was taken on by the Building Permits Department as it was felt that they were in the best position to take on this responsibility and had a primary interest in ensuring that the initiative was not only successfully implemented but also had the dynamics for ongoing improvements and updating.
Thus, a project implementation manager was appointed from the Department, with a coordinating role which entailed communicating with stakeholders and monitoring progress. In detail, this included the sending of a daily email asking for an update on work done (this did not mean that it was expected that there would be daily reporting but, rather, was an open invitation for feedback and the communication of any issues which may be impeding progress if project groups were off target with regard to reaching set milestones). Every two weeks this project implementation manager would convene a meeting to further discuss progress and to gain a good understanding of progress to date. Furthermore, Esri Northeast Africa held monthly meetings where they reported on and summarised activities and made recommendations with regard to the ongoing work.
The need to plan and implement formal and informal training was identified at an early stage and this was also organised through the Building Permit Department and the Project Implementation Manager. It was believed that while this would be a continuous and ongoing need, its intensity should be focused on the period prior to full implementation and the first few months after it, with ongoing monitoring and evaluation as well as training for the period of one full year, after which this would be scaled down to routine monitoring and evaluation so that the then mature system could be updated without causing any serious disruption. The focus on the early period was vindicated as it was during the first four months that some employees were challenged by the changes.
The above monitoring, evaluation and training activities were alongside the normal project contract requirements, where Esri Northeast Africa had a responsibility to regularly report to senior management, to formally report at the end of each milestone and to provide end of project implementation reports.
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9. What were the main obstacles encountered and how were they overcome?
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The main problems that were encountered as well as the steps to overcome them are shown below:
Adoption of new technology by employees
Employees, and particularly those in bureaucratic working environments and cultures, are often resistant to change; however, for this initiative they were generally enthusiastic and recognised that there was a strong need to make the necessary alterations. However, while this enthusiasm existed in the Building Permits Department, the nature of the new technology and the extent to which the new practices and systems differed from the old one meant that many members of staff struggled to cope, particularly with the change from a CAD culture to a GIS and spatial one.
This problem was overcome by the early recognition of it and the use of formal and informal training that was intensified as the implementation process proceeded. Alongside this, managers were encouraged to use their motivational and communication skills to encourage and reassure their staff.
Capacity building, orientation and external training
As the capacity of the system grew and was extended, staff members from other departments within the Municipality, as well as those at engineering offices, also had difficulties with their adaption to the new system.
There was a common interest in ensuring that external as well as internal staffs were able to work with and use the new system; therefore, formal and informal training was extended to include these stakeholder groups.
Infrastructure
Despite improvements made, the infrastructure was unable to cope with the change to GIS and therefore had to be further upgraded, which cost time.
Within the project timeframe was an allowance for unexpected events. Because of this, lost time was made up and the project remained on schedule.
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