Clients

AdSum4 Ltd

At the end of July 2015, we ceased our Directorship responsibilities at

AdSum4. This business start-up was launched in October 2006, by

creating a company to provide schools office money management

solutions software for Dinners, Trips, Break, Wrap (around care), Extra

(curricular activities) and AdSum4-iPay enabling the opportunity for

schools to receive online payments. The business was developed from

the simple concept of interactively utilising schools daily registration

attendance data to improve the administration of school meals counts

and income into the schools office. Meals counts were immediately

available to the canteen within minutes of registration to permit

catering staff to prepare accurate count requirements for pupil’s

lunches. Initially designed for Serco Facility CMIS, but eventually all

schools MIS's including Capita SIMs, Pearson Phoenix, RM Integris,

Wauton Samuel, Scholarpack etc., were accommodated. Clients for the

software suite included Birmingham, Manchester, Sandwell, Thurrock,

Bradford and Yorkshire, with interest continually growing throughout

the UK via recommendations from hundreds of delighted

users........after almost 9 years of dedicated effort and sound business

practices, in mid 2015, we handed over a completely viable and

successful business, with a legacy and reputation for delivering

outstanding service levels. At a personal level, this gave me the

opportunity to spend more time with my wife and family, and our 7

delightful grandchildren.

Birmingham City Council

As an Approved Supplier to Birmingham City Council, we were pleased

to deliver significantly sized projects to the largest UK Local Authority

from 1997. Many repeat orders and recommendations were received

from these projects. We believe that this partnership with the City

Council acknowledged our high standards and our continuous

commitment to delivery of quality services. The following areas

benefitted from our services:-

Consultancy - Review of Business Transformation needs;

Education Service; Schools Effectiveness Division (SED);

This project's scope concentrated on reviewing the existing facilities

available to the SED (formerly BASS; Birmingham Advisory and Support

Services) for Administrative and ICT support, and investigated and

recommended opportunities for improving the effectiveness of service

delivery through the better use of ICT to ensure improved

communication and turnaround of assistance and recommendations

between the schools advisors and the schools and authorities to which

they offer support. Additional training linked to salary increments,

phased investment, standardisation, office locations and “drop-in”

centres, offering secure but flexible network access were all considered

in developing planned improvement over the next 3 years, and into the

21st century.

Project Management - Support to the Curriculum eDevelopment

Team; Education IT (EdIT)

The role concentrated on offering consultation, training and support to

the eDevelopment team in interpreting their responsibilities into

meaningful project plans, and to document the plans and processes

required towards timely delivery. Additionally, project management

reporting facilities for the team to the eDevelopment Manager, for

subsequent utilisation as a justification and change control procedure

to EdIT SMT were required towards obtaining funding and approval,

and offering subsequent improved managerial and financial control of

projects.

BGfLpluseComms - Project Reclamation Management; Education

IT (EdIT) and BGfLplus

This was a project reclamation process to address considerable

slippage in delivery with an associated redefinition of roles and

responsibilities in the implementation of effective eCommunications

within the Education Department, Schools and Services for

Birmingham City Council. The project was required to achieve the Chief

Education Officers targets for the removal of paper communication to

reduce the bureaucratic burden on both schools & the LEA to meet

corporate and legislative requirements for eCommunications by

September 2003. The identified benefits included for effective

eCommunications with LEA customers to ensure that all targeted

communication of information between the LEA & schools be sent

electronically, in a timely fashion, providing version control of

documentation and an accessible and searchable database of historical

and current published documents. Protocols and procedures were also

to be introduced to ensure standardisation of quality communications

with service users, resulting in the freeing up of disk and network

capacity by removing the need for several individuals to store the same

copy of a document. As an integral part of this process, it was decided

to enhance the current Birmingham Grid for Learning (BGfL) intranet

with an enhanced product (BGfLplus, with the further requirement that

all enhancements seamlessly integrated with the current corporate and

LEA use of Lotus Notes and the Birmingham Intranet (InLine). Our

involvement was commenced in October 2002 when it was found that

the project was running some 10 weeks behind target with

considerable confusion around priorities and action requirements for

the individuals involved. Our specified brief was met in April 2003, with

the project being back on course to meet the legislative requirement of

delivery before September 2003, with prospects looking very much

more likely to meet the Departments optimal installation targets.

Electronic Monitoring of Domiciliary Care - Feasibility Study; Social

Services Department (ISS)

This investigation and report was commissioned to identify the key

issues with regard to collecting Point of Service data from the 2100

Home Care Assistants (HCA’s) delivering services to over 9000 of

Birmingham’s citizens. The options available to Social Services were

identified, indicating the most appropriate and preferred method(s) of

collecting data and included for the provision of internal and external

suppliers purchased by the Department. The study identified the

electronic methods available, the scale of the data collection process;

the implications and influences for all areas of the Department, and

included the potential savings and quality improvements achievable as

a direct consequence of introducing an electronic monitoring (EM)

system. Throughout the study account was taken for the analyses and

reports required to be generated from the data; and links to other

Departmental systems and City wide applications; Human Resources,

Payroll, General Ledger, and Purchase Ordering and Payments,

together with the consideration required for interfacing to the principal

Social Services system; CareFirst ®. The study identified the actions,

strategies and methods required by the Department in order to ensure

Best Value in the monitoring and enforcement of any contracts for

Home Support, whether provided internally or externally, either

purchased outright or bought-in as a managed service. The resulting

data provided cost & budgetary control performance indicators to

effect improvement in the delivery of the HomeCare service, and would

assist in the collection of data for statutory performance indicators to

better inform the Best Value review process.

Pre Network Liaison Survey - Project Management; Social Services

Department (ISS)

An essential project to the strategy of the Social Services Department

across 11 area offices involving over 1000 professional and

administrative staff who were being introduced to the replacement of a

mainframe core records system by a Windows/NT client server

application. The work included taking on the role of project co-

ordinator to interactively enable solutions of the problems to be

overcome in the replacement, upgrade and cascade of equipment at

the desktop. Detailed worksheets were provided to enable effective

actions of follow-on network installation squads to roll-out the

replacement and movement of equipment with their minimum

attendance. Issues taken on board included for provision of additional

power and network outlets, office layout improvements and in

particular to attendance at meetings with Social Workers professional

groups to field and respond to their concerns and queries in the

strategic implementation of both the OLM “CareFirst” application

system, and Lotus Notes for this major department of the City of

Birmingham, and to determine the training requirements of each of

the staff affected. Over 200 hardware items of equipment were

affected by the project, the initial delivery of which proved so

successful that a revised target 7 weeks ahead of earlier planning was

adopted, and the completed project was delivered to this revised

tighter timescale ahead of original plans but within the original budget.

Project Management for Y2K compliance programme; Education IT

(EdIT)

The determination, development and continuous tracking of a project

plan to establish the process of ensuring that all desktop, laptop,

server and active network equipment met the standards required for

Y2K compliance across the Authority. Over 5000 PCs and servers were

tested for hardware, O/S and application compliance. Additionally, the

project plan included for establishment of an asset management

procedure and regular network data capture process to enable

enhanced service levels to the LEA through more effective control of IT

support and resource.

Implementation Management for EdIT "SuperProject"

This project was critical to the Education Department in providing the

client workstations, servers, and skills to facilitate access to the

improved network infrastructure being applied across the Authority to

utilise Microsoft Office 97 and Lotus Notes, Mail and Calendar, and to

assist with officer access to the Birmingham Grid for Learning (BGfL) as

a part of national initiatives. Responsible for the development of the

project plan, and continually tracking, co-ordinating & "stage

managing" the efforts, skills and resources from the existing Education

IT (EdIT) personnel and all involved parties into building an effective

partnership between suppliers, customers and users to establish an

enhanced ICT common platform across the Department. On

completion, on time and within budget, EdIT had the largest

departmental Notes integrated network in the City Council (1000+

users) and continue to pioneer the benefits to be gained from a

revitalised ICT Strategy.

Implementation Management for the University of the First Age

(UFA)

The UFA required upgrades and LAN integration to the corporate WAN.

The UFA offices had recently undergone relocation and they were

concerned that they would be isolated from their colleagues and

corporate systems. At short notice, Di-Graf ICT Services Ltd offered on

site surveys, financial advice and upgrade recommendations and

support, to ensure that the unit kept pace with the current standards

of ICT facilities on offer. The UFA was a unique experiment in learning

and focused at Key Stage 3 students. The underlying principles behind

the initial setting up of this venture, and a link to the UFA's own

presence can be seen by clicking here.

Becta (& the DCSF)

LA Implementation Consultant - Infrastructure Services

The earlier role with Becta highlighted the need for a consultative

process to be made available to support Local Authorities (LA's) wishing

to implement infrastructure solutions to their educational

establishments. This 15 month contract utilised an initial team of 3

consultants to cover the whole of the UK, concentrating in particular on

the London Boroughs and the London Grid for Learning (LGfL) as a

pilot area. These pioneering roles provided advice and support to LA's

by raising the awareness of the Strategic Technologies Programme,

promoting use of supporting tools such as the Framework for ICT

Technical Support (FITS) and the Self Review Framework, and generally

building and maintaining strong links with contacts in LA's and the

procurement framework suppliers who had been successful in the

earlier procurement project. Simultaneously the role involved support

for the personnel within Becta and the DfES (now the Department for

Children, Schools & Families - DCSF) in ensuring that programmes of

work were aligned to deliver strategic direction, requiring a broad

understanding of related issues in schools for LA ICT related issues,

with an awareness of the local impact of the introduction of change

towards improvement. In summary, the role primarily involved

encouraging the adoption of the previously established Becta/OJEU

approved frameworks for procurement and assisting LA's and schools

through the process. The original 3 individuals trained and mentored

an eventual team of over 25 individuals who became the Stakeholder

Engagement and Implementations team.

Project Manager - Infrastructure Services - Becta (British

Educational Communications and Technology Agency)

Becta was the Government's lead partner in the strategic development

and delivery of its e-strategy for the schools and their learning & skills

sectors and provides strategic leadership in the innovative and

effective use of ICT to enable the transformation of learning, teaching

and educational organisations for the benefit of every learner and is

funded directly by the Department for Education & Skills - DfES. This

full time 3-month contract provided Project Management to Prince2

standards towards an EU-compliant (OJEU with Gateway Reviews)

procurement of the infrastructure strand of a Managed Service

framework to provide Local Authorities and other educational

institutions with the opportunity to purchase high quality ICT support

to best suit local needs and circumstances. Becta is leading the work to

ensure that institutions have access to a reliable, coherent, affordable

and sustainable ICT infrastructure providing a wide range of choice and

access connectivity. Purchasing through Becta's framework will ensure

that the UK's 23,000 plus institutions can buy in confidence knowing

they are purchasing services which conform to Becta's Technical and

Functional standards, delivering quality services which are constantly

monitored. Additionally, they aim to provide best value through the

aggregation of regional demands from approved suppliers who are

regularly evaluated and signed up to Becta's advantageous terms and

conditions for ICT service management, and conform to Becta's

Framework for ICT Technical Support (FITS). The overall programme

addressed the additional strands of Connectivity, Data Services, and

Learning Services with a London pilot being run in 2006 to over 2200

schools to pioneer the way forward with the National Digital

Infrastructure programme planned for completion by 2010.

Warwickshire County Council *

Consultant Project Manager - Education Department - Strategic

Information Management Unit

The project was to assist WCC LEA - SIMU to develop a business case,

gain approval, procure and implement a replacement e-Admissions

facility software application by no later than 31st March 2006 to meet

the requirements of the e-Government programme. Due to the

increasing complexity of the Admissions process, together with the

burden of supporting ever-more sophisticated software, Warwickshire

will re-evaluate the purchase of a software package to replace the

current solution in a timescale which meets the demands of the e-

Government programme and provide for the core and co-ordinated

admissions requirements for school place applications received from

Summer 2006 onwards.

Sefton Metropolitan Borough Council *

Consultant Project Manager for Schools Network Integration

Project;

Sefton Council had implemented an authority wide Metropolitan Area

Network (MAN). Due to communication problems encountered and the

inability of the current infrastructure to meet the required needs of its

users, a network infrastructure review was undertaken. This initial

research identified potential weaknesses in the design with a need to

facilitate further integration to enable the requirements of the new

Children, Schools and Families (CSF) service, centred around the

creation of a single child record. The project roll-out over a 15-month

period provided for integration of the Curriculum and Administrative

networks for the provision of email and Internet access for the 124

high, primary and special schools within the area under the control of

Sefton MBC. The project management required adherence to existing

Corporate IS standards of security application and support and

involved the bringing together of in-house skills and facilities with

externally provided support contracts, such that relationships were

strengthened between the parties involved to provide a sounder basis

to build on for the future.

Wiltshire County Council *

Consultant Project Manager for Schools email Project;

The project required for the establishment and confirmation of funding

through the National Grid for Learning (NGfL) to provide a network

infrastructure for the provision of email and Internet access for the 261

secondary, middle, primary and special schools within the area under

the control of Wiltshire County Council. The work entailed adherence to

corporate standards of security and application and support and was

spread over two financial years. A number of solutions were trialled in

co-operation with selected establishments to prove/disprove the

technology of “Internet Server Appliances” and subsequently, an ITT

through OJEC procedure was issued for the supply, installation and

subsequent support of a suitable solution, together with the corporate

provision of Internet Service Provision, and for general ICT support to

schools in the County. The chosen solution was implemented over an

18-month roll-out split over 2 financial years. Close links were

maintained with all similarly affected initiatives taking place across the

authority, including the South West Grid for Learning, the roll-out of a

corporate email system, the replacement of the County Council’s

contract for the overall Facilities Management of ICT services, alongside

a phased introduction of Broadband internet access to selected

schools. Further co-operation and involvement was constantly sought

from new and incumbent suppliers of ICT systems to the Education

Department including RM (Research Machines) for their EasyMailPlus

and Smartcache solutions, and with Capita for their SIMs applications

which were required to work in harmony at all implemented schools.

The project was completed within budget and delivered in time to meet

the government’s target for 80% electronic communications by Sept

2002.

Chiltern Leisure Trust *

Consultant for the Development of ICT Strategy & Implementation

Programme;

The project required for facilitation of group sessions and detailed

interviews to determine the way forward with the District Councils

decision to externalise its leisure centres and associated facilities into a

non-profit making organisation; Chiltern Leisure Trust. The proposal

included for provision of the hardware, software and network

infrastructure to deliver local and wide area networks for voice and

data, with client server applications for Leisure Management systems

across multiple sites, with additional integrated proposals for

accounting, personnel, DTP, asset management, email and “Office”

systems. Additional phases of the project proposed the preparation of

specifications, invitations to tender and subsequent analysis towards

recommendations and installation of proposals with the appropriate

associated maintenance and support required for acceptable levels of

systems resilience. The Trust commenced trading in its own right at

new central premises in January 2001.

Working relationships with Business Partners

Partnerships and "Bringing IT all together"

Projects for major customers which, in particular, involved equipment

replacement and roll-out to the desktop required special co-ordination

skills to make things happen. The efforts of all major players in these

roles is acknowledged in bringing practical solutions together in a

timely, cost conscious and professional manner. Di-Graf worked closely

with Computacenter, SCC, Research Machines, Capita and GV

Technologies to ensure that the delivery of the above projects

exceeded customer expectations.

It's not just about playing with the big folks!

2 Hour Brake Service (in Birmingham)

Due to changes in management structure, improved data access to

company systems was required to ensure data access across different

locations. Di-Graf ICT Services provided the skills and expertise to

ensure that data integrity was maintained during transfers. Disaster

recovery procedures were implemented during the process through

common back up procedures to provide for restoration of data in the

event of system failure.

Central Methodist Church (in Birmingham)

The special significance of the 2nd Millennium to the Church was not

overshadowed by any computer system failures. The CMC

Management and administration staff were sufficiently concerned over

their Y2K compliance to request our help to undertake hardware and

software tests for them in the period up to the new millennium.

Hardware upgrades were recommended and software fixes were

applied to ensure a smooth, trouble-free beginning to the Year 2000.

Detailed reports were left with the customer to provide reference and

to cover for any further problems that may have been encountered on

29th February 2000, at financial year end, or at any time over the next

12 months. No such problems were reported.....

Di-Graf

Telephone:- 01981 540006 Mobile:- 0797 417 2745 email:- alane@di-graf.co.uk