NRF: Getting its IT house in order

THE WHOLE POINT of the National Research Foundation (NRF) is to fund and facilitate the creation of knowledge, innovation and research capacity in the natural and social sciences, humanities and technology. In so doing, it will improve the quality of life for all South Africans, rich or poor.

But it stands to reason that, in this knowledge economy we find ourselves in, if this government agency cannot collate this knowledge and render it within easy access to as many of the scientists and researchers it serves, then all this knowledge is for naught.

Ayanda Saki was headhunted to head the NRF`s IT department in early 2007, and she soon realised that the job was tantamount to starting an IT unit from scratch.

IT was merely a support function, and not a very effective one at that, says Saki of the division she has now, nearly two years later, managed to turn around.

PLAN OF ACTION

Saki says she initially used the Governance and Capability Maturity Model to evaluate the NRF, and focused her assessment on four key elements: the organisation, people, processes and technology. "I realised that the NRF was below the lowest level of maturity in terms of IT industry best practices and standards like CobIT, ITIL and related frameworks which the NRF is audited against. An audit report confirmed this finding, including various security issues, and a lack of a business continuity and disaster recovery plan," she notes.

But as the IT department had a grand total of six employees, with a limited budget to deliver on projects, support existing systems at the same time, and meet the applications and data needs of the NRF and its stakeholders, Saki had other fish to fry first.

Top of her to-do list was developing and implementing an IT governance and strategy plan for the agency`s IT function (which serves some 350 people), as there was no clear direction, or documented IT strategy and governance, technology roadmap, or processes and related decision-making structures. "We needed an IT department with a finger on the pulse of the organisation - IT needs to be able to evolve with the organisation," she notes.

Once she`d outlined strategies and processes for aligning IT with the business, she turned her attention to developing processes for managing the agency`s (under)investment in ICT, beefing up the department`s service levels and holding the NRF`s outsourced service providers accountable to specified turnaround times that had an impact on service delivery.

"Intellectual property, especially ownership of source code, was one of our biggest challenges because most of the NRF`s critical systems are outsourced. We struggled to meet SLAs and to ensure continuity for the NRF, and, in the end, we decided the best way to manage the risk of dependency for critical resources and technology products was to implement an escrow strategy."

BUILDING CAPACITY

Although the IT department managed to deliver 22 out of 66 business applications and systems in 2007 with input from just four developers, Saki has since beefed up the IT department to a team of 21 employees. This will significantly improve service and project delivery, strengthen business continuity and the quality of systems by the end of the current financial year, by way of new rigorous testing strategy and project prioritisation and management processes, she says.

"Because of the nature of our work, we can`t buy anything off the shelf," Saki points out.

Saki also persuaded the NRF executive to formally adopt CobIT, and its implementation was in line with the King Corporate Governance guidelines. She has also succeeded in getting the IT function elevated to the `corporate office`. In fact, the IT department`s project prioritisation committee is today made up of NRF executives and management. "The executive is not only embracing technology, but is also driving it," says Saki.

However, it isn`t just NRF staff who have noticed the difference in their IT department: Saki`s department is also overhauling the IT architecture and solutions for other NRF business units and facilities. The NRF was also requested to host the National Research Information Management System and to develop and host the National Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository and Portal, an open source initiative for all universities and the NRF`s national research and science partners.

What`s next, you might ask? Saki`s got her sights set on fine-tuning the NRF`s information and data management layer, and is currently investigating its business intelligence and enterprise content management management platform options.