2022/3: Q1 | Review#4 (2022-06-07 to 2022-06-21)

(the reason we include these is to be open and transparent about when our apps have been compromised, in order to confirm that we’re constantly iterating to improve performance, resilience and security of our Apps.)

We highlighted that we recently had an external review of how we work within the TIS team. From that review, a number of recommendations were put forward for how we can alter things going forward. The whole team is actively working towards implementing these recommendations. As we are a team that at its core believes in transparency and openness, we decided to give you a flavour of what we have been working on:

• We've created and published a Team charter. And we’ve completed initial work on adhering to the team Charter - a soft/supportive approach of using regular team health-checks against the Charter values: Empathy, Unity, Transparency and Collaboration.

• We're reviewing all our meetings and events with a view to rationalising them in the near future

• We're embarking on team training in User-Centred Design: Online, 15hrs over 5 days | On-site at one of our offices, 1 day. Some of the team attended the online GDS UCD training, others are booked to attend in Feb and Mar.

• Progressed work on standardising Job Descriptions / Job Summaries. We’ve identified the need for two roles we don’t currently have in the team: User Researcher and Performance Analyst.

• Debating sensible ways of splitting the team’s work up by Services and Products.

• Started the review of Stakeholder mapping.

• Had an end of Quarter Review and looked forward to Q4.

• Agreed we need to reach out to gain more context for what we do in TIS, within the wider HEE and NHS. And we’ve started having these sessions (one from Jon Howes on PGMDE and another on Digital First). If anyone reading this would like to volunteer to do a session, please let us know!

• Started the process of agreeing standard team events (TIS team meetings, stakeholder sessions etc), and central comms (Teams, Sharepoint, mailboxes, etc), so that communicating within the team is more efficient and communicating with us will be, too.

• Consultation completed - going through the HR process of confirming mappings of current to new roles, in advance of hiring to the vacancies we have.

• We will be making changes to the way we work, and the scheduled meetings we carry out (like this one) in support of that new way of working. This is to provide both us as a TIS programme, and you as stakeholders and users of the products we develop more focused in the way we are able to communicate and more targeted in that communication. Watch this space…

We have used this iteration, and probably next, to pause as far as is feasible Product Development work in order to give all members of the team time to transition to this new team structure:

• smaller Product Development teams, each more focused on a more limited number of Services and supporting Products.

• refocusing across the board on working to the NHS Service Standard, applying a User-Centred Design approach and using an Agile mindset, with associated Agile framework, to manage the day-to-day Product Development team working.

• determining a systematic approach to prioritisation and roadmapping

• we’ve concentrated on mapping the PGMDE Services we support to the Products that support those Services and then determining how we split into 3 Product Teams to focus on natural user-groupings of those Services and Products
  There’s some more mapping to complete, but to date we have mapped the following…

  • a Trainee-focused Product Team looking after:

    • Services: Trainee Requests, Study leave and Course management; and

    • Products: Accent Course Manager, TIS Self-Service, Accent Leave Manager, Form Rs submitted on TSS populating TIS, TIS-TSS data sync.

  • a Product Team focussed on internal HEE Administrators looking after:

    • Services: Assessments, Post Management, Programme Management, Revalidation; and

    • Products: TIS, Reval, Post employing body trust overnight data update, GMC data sync.

  • a Product Team focussed on external Administrators looking after:

    • Services: Trainee transfer between Eng and NI; and

    • Products: Digital Staff Passports, NIMDTA, Person placement training body trust overnight data update, Placement planning tool, Syncing of ESR data with TIS, TIS-ESR interface.

• started to agree how we will modify our Agile ways of working to optimise working in 3 Product Teams vs one large TIS Team.
  This will impact you, our stakeholders, as we refine the calendar events we need, determine who we need to encourage to attend which of them, within the overall umbrella of participation being open to all.

• prepping for a round of recruitment to fill vacancies in all three Product Teams, predominantly the external Administrators Product Team - the work of which will be covered by the other Product Teams in the interim.

As we split into initially 2 and eventually 3 Product Teams, each of those Product Teams will put together their own roadmaps. Watch this space.

We really do welcome any feedback you have for us - whether it be negative or positive, or whether it be a suggestion of something we could try/incorporate in a future Review. We absolutely don’t want to stand still. We’re very happy applying the 12th Agile principle of ‘becoming more productive’ to our Reviews themselves! Your contributions to this survey are entirely anonymous, should you wish to include anything others might perceive as controversial. We welcome any and all feedback, as long as it is constructive!