Lesson learned from an effort to consolidate the management of information at EUMETSAT. The first phase surveyed the current state and identified options while the second phase explored selected options in more depth. The outcome of the study covered Strategy, Governance and Technology.

1. Strategy, Management &
Technology
Lessons learned for ECM at EUMETSAT
Slide: 1

2. Contents
• EUMETSAT
• The ECM Study
• Phase 1
• Phase 2
• Next Steps
• Lessons Learned
• Discussion
Slide: 2

3. EUMETSAT overview
Mission
... to deliver operational satellite
meteorological and climate data
and products that satisfy data
requirements of its Member
States – 24/7 hours a day, 365
days a year
Intergovernmental
21 Member States
550 employees
30+ nationalities
Slide: 3

4. ECM infrastructure
• Multiple ECM systems
–
–
–
–
–
Document management - Open Text (Hummingbird)
Web content mgt
- Stellent
Images
- Imagine
Bespoke applications
Large amount of information in GroupWise & File System (Tb)
• Fragmented information management approach
– Many local practices
– Limited awareness of overall policy
– Overall policy not kept up to date
Slide: 4

5. The ECM Study
• Identify options to better integrate current systems
– Enhance support for business processes
– Gain increased value from corporate information
– Better manage risks and uncertainties
• Phase 1: review current state & identify options
• Phase 2: explore selected options in more depth
• Constraints
– Operational systems and data out of scope
– Avoid major disruption to EUMETSAT staff
Slide: 5

6. Phase 1 - Approach
• Survey current information and systems
– Document review
– Interviews
(40+ docs defining systems and standards)
(29 people)
• Develop overview and refine via 2 workshops
– Content and systems matrices
– Key issues
• Analyse root causes & hence frame findings
Slide: 6

7. Information
Types
Systems
Slide: 7

8. Phase 1 - Hard to find information
“It’s hard to know where to go
to for the master version. i.e.
a lot of docs aren’t covered by
ECM.”
“I need some sort of mindmap to help me find the
information I’m looking for.”
“I lose a lot of time looking
for info – I may need to open
several docs to find one I’m
looking for.”
“Once a document is created
it goes into a black hole and
you find it by searching.”
General agreement on the
difficulty of assigning and
managing access permissions
Slide: 8
“Everyone creates their own
folder structure: there are no
clear rules”

9. Phase 1 - Inconsistent processes
Inconsistent processes across
different units
Inconsistent enforcement of
approval processes, e.g. due to
reliance on manual processes
Overheads of existing
processes (e.g. to walk
physical documents around
approvers)
Inconsistent use of document
versioning (eg. use of draft
documents)
Duplicate registration of
documents in Mail
Registration system
Reliance on manual processes
to ensure documents are
consistent across systems
Slide: 9

10. Phase 1 - Strengths & Weaknesses
Strengths
Areas for Improvement
Governance (Structures for decision making and alignment)
1) Alignment between Information Management and organisational objectives
Document management is embedded within
organisational processes and quality management
systems through ISO9001.
Web information is not covered – Stellent is not
a recognised system within the QMS.
2) Alignment between Information Management and ICT systems
Web management and document teams established
and functioning to make decisions about priorities for
systems development.
Organised by system, rather than having an
overview of broader objectives.
3) Management of policies and standards
Groups to discuss policies and standards (e.g. web and
document user groups) are established and meet
regularly.
Organised by system. Authority to define policy
is not clear. Would welcome training on
information management.
4) Operational management of information
Key roles are in place (e.g. document controllers) and
appear to be operating effectively.
Slide: 10
Processes are often manual, and differ across
divisions/units.

11. Phase 1 - Strengths & Weaknesses
Strengths
Areas for Improvement
Policies and Standards (Guidance on how to manage information)
1) File Plans (e.g. defined folder structures for storing records)
Well defined in programme document management
plans. Appear to be understood & adhered to.
Not defined at organisational level. Not
embedded in Hummingbird DMS.
2) Information types (e.g. definition of types & processes for managing them)
Are well defined for some information types (e.g. in
PRC001).
PRC001 out of date and incomplete. Differing
interpretations of its application.
3) Classification schema (e.g. controlled vocabularies, keywords, taxonomies, etc)
Some teams have keyword schemes for local use.
Generally very fragmented.
4) Confidentiality and security policies
Policies are documented and everyone appears to be
well aware of their existence.
Many people expressed difficulty in knowing
how to apply them.
5) Archiving and retention policies
Policies appear to exist, at least for some information
types.
As above, people expressed difficulty knowing
how to apply them.
6) Supporting training and guidance
Training courses for tools available & run regularly.
Slide: 11
Widespread desire for additional training.

12. Phase 1 - Strengths & Weaknesses
Strengths
Areas for Improvement
Systems and Tools
1) Repositories (e.g. databases and document stores)
Suite of enterprise-class applications are generally well
matched to functional requirements. EUMETSAT has a
good pool of skills to manage and extend these
systems.
Integration between Stellent and Hummingbird
could be improved (e.g. as being addressed by
current projects).
2) Business process (e.g. workflow and related logic)
ECM and ERP applications provide a suite of tools to
define and manage business processes. Again,
EUMETSAT has a good pool of skills to do this.
Not fully exploiting capabilities of existing tools.
Need to manage overlapping capabilities
across WCMS, DMS and SAP.
3) Search
Individual tools (Stellent, Hummingbird) have
reasonable search engines.
No enterprise-wide search facilities.
4) General adoption and development of ECM systems
DMS and WCMS are widely used.
DMS, in particular, is very widely used throughout the
organisation.
Slide: 12

13. Phase 1 - Technology risk
• Major concern for EUMETSAT and a key reason for
initiating the study – they had major commitment to 2
vendors, both of whom had subsequently been acquired.
• The study’s conclusion:
– Technology risk is manageable – evolve and integrate current
applications (unless/until vendors force change)
– Focus on information management policies and guidelines
Slide: 13

14. Phase 2 - Mandate
• Three out of four options
– Information Organisation Standards
– Workflow Architecture
– Collaborative Document Management pilot
– Workflow and Sign-off pilot
Slide: 14

15. Phase 2 - Organisation
Steering Committee
Florentin Albu
Project Manager
Project Support
Niklas Sinander
Paul Breindel
Paul Macneil
Graham Oakes
Sara Redin
Janus Boye
IO Ref Group
IO Team
Repr from Div x
Repr from Div y
Repr from Div z
.
.
.
Repr from Div a
Repr from Div b
Repr from Div c
.
.
Slide: 15

16. Phase 2 - Priorities
Classification Schemes
Simplify and reduce
duplication
Archiving Policies
Security & Access
Permissions
IO Documentation
External Access
Registration
Signatures and
VISA loops
Single Work Queue
•
Recommended approach:
– Subteams to refine the IO documentation
(1) Overview and type catalogue
(2) Classification
(3) One document type
– Pilot one of the other 4
Slide: 16

17. Planning
Tutorials
Homework
Homework
Homework
Workflow Pilot
Roadmap
Slide: 17

18. IO Documentation Structure
• Information types
• User documentation
– Summary of the information types
covered by the IO architecture
– Template for definition of
information types
– Detailed definitions (following the
template) for each information type
• Information organisation
– Glossary
– Reference guides
– How To’s
– Training
• Governance
– File plan
– Facets and keywords
• Processes
– Document generic processes
(applying to multiple information types)
– Workflow specification
Slide: 18
– Roles and Responsibilities
– Processes for maintaining IO policies
and standards
– Processes for ensuring IO policies and
standards are followed

19. Slide: 19

20. Governance Options
• Who defines policies and standards?
– Ad hoc
– Council
– Central
– individual units define their own standards
– members of individual units come together to decide
– central unit defines standards
• Who approves policies and standards?
– Devolved – whoever defines them is also empowered to approve them
– Executive – executive body oversees and approves
• Who enforces policies and standards?
– Self
– Audit
– Police
– people/units are assumed to follow them (really guidelines)
– audit function identifies breaches, for executive to deal with
– central unit audits and enforces
• Who implements policies and standards?
– Self
– Central
– people/units implement
– central support function implements stds (e,g, archivists)
Slide: 20

21. Typical Structures
Devolved
Implementation
IM Centre of
Excellence
IM Council
Anarchy
IM CoE
with Audit
Central
Processing Unit
Central IM Unit
Central
Definition
Slide: 21
Devolved

22. Slide: 22

23. Lessons: Three layers to delivering info
Layer
Strategic Mgt
Organisational
commitment and focus
Information Mgt
Appropriate policies,
processes & resources
Technology
Appropriate systems and
tools
Strengths
Weaknesses
 Recognise need to commit
resources
 Fragmented and highly
bureaucratic structure and culture
 Visibility of commitment?
 Strong commitment of
resources (people) to information
mgt, e.g. doc controllers
 Lack key skills and policies
(e.g. metadata)
 Policies and processes are
fragmented and weakly
disseminated
 Strong suite of systems
 Fit for purpose
 No major impl. issues
 Widely adopted
 Could make better use of
systems in some areas
(collaboration, workflow)
Slide: 23

24. Lessons
• The issues were primarily about policy and direction
• But the initial symptoms were in the technology
• It’s hard to work from the bottom up
–
–
–
–
–
Difficulty getting people’s time
Team not confident of their authority
Conflicting messages to team
Conflicting messages to rest of organisation
But this is often the way we need to work: gain evidence & build support
• Defining policy requires time and thought
• Managing upwards is essential
Slide: 24

25. Thank You
Niklas Sinander
Niklas.Sinander@eumetsat.int
Graham Oakes
graham@grahamoakes.co.uk
Slide: 25