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Though often criticized, government bodies are enthusiastic about managing programmes and projects, particularly those that impact the business of their department or ministry. Oversight is prescribed at executive level (often through initial use of good practices such as Gateway reviews and appointment of a Senior Responsible Officer (SRO). A steering committee is a body that provides guidance and can be prescribed at different points of execution of programmes and projects. Good practices from government examples are provided below, with generic terms of reference for guidance. These examples can be adopted and adapted for use for any project, also outside the government.
1. Terms of reference for an Executive/Board IS steering committee
• Ensure that business benefits are identified and tracked across all Lines off Business (LoB)
• Agree and review KPIs and CSFs relating to benefits, outcomes and measurements to be used in tracking
• Agree information needs of the enterprise top management and services required to deliver the information
• Agree common Policy frameworks for the enterprise covering management policies, technical policies and common services
• Agree enterprise wide prioritization policies and mechanisms and resolve any issues with regard to implementation
• Determine constraints to be imposed on the activities of LoB areas and Information System (IS) suppliers
• Ensure each LoB information strategy is consistent with enterprise strategy
• Set ToR for all LoB IS Steering committees and ToR for any Executive Committee (EC)
• Set ToR for other committees such as those set up to monitor compliance or benefit realization or to provide briefings to the EC on technical and IS issues. Such committees will exist where enterprises have many programmes and projects and where the EC would be unable to allot sufficient time to these important issues.
• Support LoB in progression of their IS strategies by resolving all IS/IT problems that cannot be resolved by a single supplier
• Recommend technical policies for the enterprise
• Direct and coordinate programme and project offices
• Direct and coordinate internal suppliers of services.
2. Terms of reference for LoB area IS steering committee
• Ensure that business benefits are identified and tracked across the LoB
• Agree and review KPIs and CSFs relating to benefits, outcomes and measurements to be used in tracking
• Ensure the outcomes and benefits in the enterprise IS strategy are being delivered and the Drivers met
• Ensure compliance with common Policy frameworks for the enterprise covering management policies, technical policies and common services
• Initiate and direct scoping and strategic studies and regular review of the IS strategy
• Select, formalize and publicize selected options for IS programmes and projects
• Ensure each LoB information service project is developed and progressed to delivery
• Provide a forum to resolve issues relating to studies or to programmes/projects
• Ensure that the strategy is directly harnessed to the needs of the LoB
• Liaise with other LoB to ensure dependencies have been managed properly and that common information needs are managed
• Liaise with internal and external suppliers of services and partners in the information chain
• Set ToR for other committees such as those set up to monitor compliance or benefit realization or to provide briefings to the LoB steering committee on technical and IS issues. Such committees will exist where enterprises have many programmes and projects and where the LoB would be unable to allot sufficient time to these important issues
• Contribute to the development of technical policies
• Assess and report on resources
• Assess and manage risk and opportunities.
3. Terms of Reference for an IS supplier planning unit
• Provide secretarial support for the EC and LoB committees.
• Monitor progress on all aspects of programmes of work undertaken by the supplier
• Ensure compliance to enterprise policy and any appropriate regulations
• Coordinate all information service planning activities within the supplier environment
• Publish a tactical plan for development of new data/information services
• Publish a tactical plan for improvements to existing data/information services
• Manage and contribute to technical policy development
• Advise both EC and LoB committees about resource implications of new or improved data/information services
• Provide central human and electronic support where appropriate.
Relevant reading
Title: BiSL® Next
ISBN: 9789401800396
Author: Brian Johnson, Gerard Wijers, Lucille van der Hagen
Price: € 42.35
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ITIL® , P3O®, MSP® and PRINCE2® are registered trademarks of AXELOS Limited. TOGAF® is a registered trademark of The Open Group.