GIS Implementation Planning

WLIA - 2003

Workshop Agenda

• Introductions

• Overview of the GIS Implementation Process

• Break

• Waukesha Case Study

• Wrap up

Introductions

• Don Dittmar

LIS Manager – Waukesha County

• Walter Potts

Professional Services Manager – Minneapolis Region

What’s the Purpose of this Workshop?

• Help GIS Managers and other decision makers plan for implementing GIS technology within their organizations.

– Provide a generic outline of the Implementation Planning process for you to follow.

– Provide examples of other organizations in Minnesota to see how they are implementing GIS.

Learning Objectives• Why is GIS Implementation Planning Necessary?

• What’s the difference between a Needs Assessment and Implementation Plan?

• What does a typical Implementation Model look like?

• What are the steps in the Implementation Planning process?

• How to translate business needs into measurable objectives ?

• What are the four categories of Implementation preparation tasks?

• What are some best practices for Implementation planning?

• What are some strategies to deal with resource constraints?

• What are the Next Steps for moving forward with the Implementation Plan?

• How do you validate the Implementation Plan before full deployment?

Why is Implementation Planning Necessary?

• A comprehensive GIS Implementation Plan allows you to prepare for:

– Budget Requests and expenditures– Human Resource Needs– Capital Resource Needs– Scheduling activities and tasks– Ensuring the entire organization’s business objectives are met– Managing Change (technology changes, management changes, business

changes)

• Now more than ever, short and long term planning are critical to successful on-going GIS Implementation– Technology has evolved and is now more integrated and

interdependent than ever before– Business needs have evolved and demand better planning to meet

those needs

What’s the Difference between Implementation Planning and a Needs Assessment

• Implementation planning has a different purpose and is a different process than a typical needs assessment.

• A Needs Assessment may seek to identify potential GIS solutions for current or future needs

• Implementation plan seeks to provide direction in the form of tasks and milestones for making the potential GIS solution a reality.

• Implementation Planning is proactive problem solving– Implementation: “to carry out: ACCOMPLISH: esp. to give practical effect to and

ensure of actual fulfillment by concrete measures.” - Webster

What does a typical GIS Implementation Model look like?

GISVision

TaskFocus

Project A

Plan• Task 1• Task 2• Task 3

Project B

Plan• Task 1• Task 2• Task 3

Project D Project “N”Project C

Plan• Task 1• Task 2• Task 3

Plan• Task 1• Task 2• Task 3

Plan• Task 1• Task 2• Task 3

ProjectFocus

Technology/Product Evolution; Data Availability; Budget; Management Change …Considerations and Influences

GIS Evolution and Progress

StrategicFocus

Milestone/Goal

Milestone/Goal

Milestone/Goal

Milestone/Goal

• Implementation planning is an incremental and on-going process

Overview of Implementation Planning Steps

1. Identify GIS Business Objectives and Business Processes

2. Determine the Technology Readiness to meet the GIS Business Objectives 

3. Determine GIS Database Readiness to meet the GIS Business Objectives

4. Determine Organization readiness to meet the GIS Business Objectives

5. Determine system Infrastructure readiness to meet the GIS Business Objectives

6. Develop Enterprise GIS Implementation Plan to meet the GIS Business Objectives

7. Validate the Implementation Plan can meet the GIS Business Objectives in R&D Lab

Scalable Implementations

• The steps outlined above can be abbreviated for smaller implementations.

• The entire implementation plan may be synthesized into a single document with a section for each step when appropriate.

• The scale of the implementation plan will be apparent after the overall GIS Business Objectives have been defined.

Step 1. Identify GIS Business Objectives and

Business Processes

• A successful implementation depends on a clear understanding of the organization’s GIS business needs, which must be met by the GIS.

• If the business needs are not met the entire implementation is at risk.

• While a Business Analyst usually performs these tasks using systematic and proven methods, it is possible to conduct in-house analysis.

Define the GIS Business Need

• What are the organizations Critical Success Factors?– Profitability– Public Facilities Stewardship– Public Safety

• What are the GIS Business Needs that support these Critical Success Factors?– We need to integrate our CIS with our GIS in order to stay

competitive and be more efficient.– We need web access to the same GIS database as desktop users – We need to provide remote field inspectors with up-to-date land

information– We need to integrate infrastructure planning with billing systems– We need the planning department, water and sewer departments to

share the same property and address information with transportation department.

Describe the current Business Process

• Customer numbers are printed out in tabular format to be compared with a plot of our customer locations.

• Remote field inspectors currently must make a request to GIS services that print a map of the most recent land data and give it to the field inspectors.

• Each department maintains their own property and address information

Examples

Expected Outcome for Step 1

• Document– GIS Business Needs

– Business Objectives

– GIS Business Procedures

– GIS Business Use Case Scenarios

Step 2. Determine the Technology Readiness to meet the Business Objectives

•  It is necessary to assess the readiness of available technology in order to accomplish the Business Objectives.

• The Technology Readiness Assessment should be driven from the Business Need perspective rather than from the technologies capability perspective.

• It is important to get the tasks in this step in the correct order to avoid confusion and project delays.

Technology Readiness Assessment Tasks

• Identify which Business Objectives the technology is intended to fulfill

• Determine if any existing technologies should be replaced

• Determine the type of technology needed based on the Use Case Scenarios

• Specify the Technology Requirements

• Document the Technology System Design for each technology identified

Expected Outcome for Step 2

• Document– Technology Readiness Assessment

– Functional Requirements

– System Design

Step 3. Determine Enterprise GIS Database

Readiness • Identify Geographic Data and other data to be used

• After the GIS data requirements have been identified, an assessment of “readiness” of the data to meet these requirements must be conducted.

• Prepare the Conceptual Database Design to support the data

requirements

• In addition, data preparation procedures should be identified to complete the GIS Database Readiness.

• Develop a Prototype Database to meet the GIS Business Objectives

Characteristics for Data Assessment

• Quantitative Assessment- Completeness of Geographic area- Completeness of Attribute data

• Qualitative Assessment - Geographic Resolution- Locational Accuracy- Compatible Format- Overall Usefulness

• Gap Analysis- Identify what geographic data is missing- Identify what attribute data is missing

• Identify format or structural changes• Shapefile• Geodatabase• Coverages, etc….

Expected Outcome for Step 3

• Document– Database Assessment

Step 4. Determine Organization readiness

• Organizational Readiness is the sufficient preparation of the organization to implement the GIS.

• This can mean changing current work processes that occur in isolation of each other, re-defining roles and responsibilities, skills assessment for technical staff and developing a training plan.

Characteristics of Organizational Readiness

• Prepare organization support structure– Leader/Director– Project Manager– Technical Analysts– Project Advisors, Technical Advisors

• Identify technical staff for each category– Viewers, Editors, Analysts, Database Manager, System Administrators,

Application Developers

• Assess user skill levels and identify Training needs

• Develop training plan to support the Enterprise GIS implementation– Classroom training, workshops, mentoring, virtual training, etc….

• Identify internal support procedures– Data Maintenance Support, Network/System Support, User Support

Expected Outcome for Step 4

• GIS Support Procedures

• Training Plan

Step 5. Determine system Infrastructure readiness

• The readiness of the system infrastructure (hardware, software and network), are also critical to the success of the implementation plan.

• This part of the plan addresses the size and number of data

servers, application servers, end-user desktops, and the expected network traffic or capacity.

• This step may require some server sizing and possibly purchase considerations.

Characteristics of System Infrastructure Readiness

• Determine the number of independent system environments necessary

– Development, Test and Production environments

• Develop data and application release procedures– Proof-of-Concept, Prototype lab, Pilot project, Production schedules

• Produce Development Decision Criteria– When to use COTS technology, custom-built, web, desktop solutions

• Develop a System Design Strategy– System Architecture, centralized data access, n-tier development

• Determine Hardware, Software, Network requirements to support GIS applications and procedures

– Data Server configuration, bandwidth, version compatibility, number of licenses, web server configuration, etc….

Expected Outcome for Step 5

• Hardware/Network configuration review and recommendations

Step 6. Develop GIS Implementation Plan

• The next step in preparing for implementation is to synthesize the information from the previous planning steps into a plan that can be implemented.

• This plan should provide management staff with the information necessary to make appropriate decisions during the deployment stage of the implementation.

Characteristics of a GIS Implementation Plan

• Document the results of each of the tasks previously identified in this implementation guide

• Prioritize resulting implementation tasks

• Identify any potential conflicts in the implementation tasks

• Identify critical path elements

• Identify resource constraints

• Create a Work Breakdown Structure

• Schedule the tasks

Expected Outcome for Step 6

•   Enterprise GIS Implementation Plan

Step 7. Validate the Implementation Plan can meet the GIS Business Objectives in R&D Lab

• All of the implementation planning previously completed needs to be validated in a Development or Test system environment.

• Validation can be focused on data, technology, organizational procedures, or the entire system design.

Methods for Validating the Implementation Plan

• Prepare test criteria based on defined GIS Business Objectives

• Prepare testing procedures

• Document test results

• Review results and incorporate changes to the implementation plan

Interactive Discussion of Real-World Scenarios

– Waukesha Case Study– Implementation Issues– Strategies– Q & A