Project Topic

I led the design and rapid development of a mission critical information system used to catalog project documents, track significant project decisions and events, and determine the specific status of key project activities.

Project Background

The Centers for Disease Control / National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) had a mandate to conduct a program that would allow special groups to petition for compensation from the U. S. government for injuries they received as workers in the nuclear industry. The timing of this mandate was uncertain and rested upon a “final rule” issued by Congress and published in the Federal Register.

Actions Taken

The scope and import of this effort grew quickly and ATL’s strategic position allowed us to provide guidance in the agency’s early efforts to establish procedures, administrative structures and work flows. I promoted an early, coordinated partnership and subsequently managed the development of the information system that would support this activity. Resources under my direction included a project manager, systems analyst, two software developers and an individual with skills in documentation writing and online help systems.

The first team meeting of the business group didn’t occur until three months after my initial contact. By that time, the IS team had been able to review the existing materials available and was able to sketch out the basic, though still developing, business rules and functional requirements. A rapid but traditional IS development process followed, with scoping, functional requirements and design documents created and refined over the compressed time frame.

Results

I led a development team from project conception to implementation, creating a functional information system in six months. The information system was developed using standard tools for software life cycle development and maintenance and included working in and with cross-functional teams. The development effort included several innovative strategies and combined several IS technologies. For example, both an SQL database and a coordinated set of files were continuously synchronized between the client agency and the project’s information systems. The organization’s Microsoft Outlook application was customized using “plug-in” software modules that allowed emails to be managed by, and available to, the information system application. Innovative cataloging procedures also allowed tracking and status to be driven by the upload of documents that were registered in and managed by the application. This provided a way for documents uploaded to the system to be used to track the progress and status of any particular submission to this government program.