The goal of this project was to explore how the Environment Agency could improve the way it work with its supply chain, including but not limited to the data exchange process. Project Managers were experiencing communication and engagement issues, whilst implementing new technologies and ways of working.
Work done and value provided:
A series of engagement interviews about Environment Agency’s goals and objectives were conducted with suppliers who work for the Environment Agency, to assess if the Agency is achieving their goals and objectives. Then, a report was written to summarise the engagement, highlighting the areas for improvement and potential solutions:
• Transparent and open engagement between Flood and Coastal Risk Management (FCRM) and Operations Directorates could improve communication with the supply chain
• Upskilling employees to ensure that during supply chain engagement, they understand data enough to be able to have a conversation with them without having to continuously involve the data and systems team
• Precise and clear requirements for data need to be communicated to the supply chain, as well as the expected outcome, so that it can be consumed and used internally, avoiding re-work within the Environment Agency.
• Offer training to the supply chain project teams to ensure they know the Environment Agency’s minimum technical requirements and that they know where the standard project documentation is located
• Place trust on the supply chain: allow the supply chain to understand the existing challenges the Environment Agency faces and be open to solution options the supply chain provides
• A detailed cloud or premise strategy to positively impact the delivery of outcomes from the supply chain
• Inform the Digital, Data & Technology Services (DDTS) team (within DEFRA) what the business requirements are, so that they can proposed approaches to fulfil those requirements in a way that ensures data integrity and security