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GM-14-007 Project Integrator Statement of Responsibilities

Issue Date:  11/01/2013

Revision Effective Date:  11/01/2013

PURPOSE

Many agencies have a need to work with multiple vendors and service providers as part of their IT project implementation.  As the owner of these projects, agencies must oversee and coordinate all activities across vendors and service providers to ensure the success of the project.  This document provides a guideline for job responsibilities of the Project Integrator that may not be fulfilled by the Project Manager.

GUIDELINE

Project Integrator - Statement of Responsibilities

  1. Establish a direct reporting relationship among all parties setting expectations that all project vendors and service providers are responsible for and must work together to achieve the final agency deliverables.
  2. Ensure the project communication plan includes integration across all parties.
  3. Establish, before project work begins, an integrated project management plan covering project activities of all project parties (agency, service providers and 3rd party vendors).  The plan shall be approved by and committed to by all project parties and include:
    1. Detailed descriptions of the activities necessary to define, prepare, integrate and coordinate all subsidiary plans into the project management plan.
    2. Description of work to be performed by each party, expected deliverables and results, deliverable dates and project milestones, stage gates, risks and cross-vendor dependencies.
    3. Meaningful service / performance levels
    4. Accurate metrics to measure vendor performance
    5. Maintenance / support levels   and response times
    6. Escalation provisions
    7. Mechanisms for objectively determining if a party has fully met their requirements.
  4. Facilitate review of agency procurement documents (including GETS Requests for Solutions) to ensure alignment with state technical standards and direction.  Engage infrastructure vendors and service providers involved in the software vendor procurement process as early as possible.
  5. Facilitate review and technical response to questions from bidders during the procurement process.
  6. Assure the completeness and clarity of the technical design of the solution.
  7. Facilitate a Technical Architecture Review that includes but is not limited to the following:
    1. Evaluate, critique and suggest improvements if necessary for the infrastructure design for development, test and production environments
    2. Evaluate the design in terms of reliability, availability, scalability, security, maintenance and performance
    3. Evaluate, critique and suggest improvements if necessary for the operations processes and procedures including Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery
    4. Evaluate the operational manual for industry best practices in terms of database and system backups, batch processes and other operational details as applicable for efficient operation of the system
  8. Ensure that issue tracking and problem resolution are following a standard process between all project parties.
  9. Ensure that a comprehensive testing plan clearly defines test scenarios, acceptance criteria, acceptable defect levels and is approved by all parties.
  10. Ensure that a comprehensive operational readiness and cutover plan is approved by all project parties.

TERMS and DEFINITIONS

Integration Management is a collection of processes required to ensure that the various elements of the projects are properly coordinated. It involves making trade-offs among competing objectives and alternatives to meet or exceed stakeholder needs and expectations. (Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) Guide 5th Edition)

RELATED PSGs

SM-14-006 - Project  Integrator