The Enterprise Journey

The following is a chronological view of the enterprise initiatives leading up to the establishment of the Roadmap Program.

1999 | BluePrint for Statewide Financial Systems

After a successful Y2K preparation in 1999, Washington State government began charting its direction into the new millennium.

The Office of Financial Management (OFM) and its partners, the departments of Personnel (DOP), General Administration (GA), and Information Services (DIS), as well as line agencies, joined forces to develop a BluePrint for Statewide Financial Systems.

This report identified the need for a new payroll system as the most significant and critical need for the state. It was also the vision behind the development of the suite of statewide financial tools available today.

2002-03 | Enterprise Strategies Committee

The Enterprise Strategies Committee (ESC) was formed to sponsor and lead the incremental implementation of the blueprint for financial and administrative systems.

The committee was led by the directors of the departments of OFM, DIS, DOP, GA, Community Trade and Economic Development (CTED), Retirement Systems (DRS), Labor and Industries (LNI) and the Health Care Authority (HCA).

In December 2002, the ESC published the Business Strategies Gap Analysis that described the value gained from making business improvements in the following areas:

2002 | Personnel System Reform Act

The Personnel System Reform Act (PSRA) of 2002 modernized the state’s personnel system laws and policies, established collective bargaining and competitive contracting, and approved the development of a new human resources management system to support the changes.

2003 | HRMS Project Begins

The Human Resource Management System (HRMS) feasibility study was completed. The state established contracts with SAP for vendor services and Accenture for consulting services, officially initiating the HRMS project.

2004 | Human Resources and Financial Baseline and Benchmark studies

The HRMS feasibility study recommended that the state conduct HR and Financial Baseline and Benchmark studies. The HR component was completed in December 2003. In January 2004, OFM teamed with the Governor's Office, DOP and consultants from Mercer and Sierra Systems to complete a baseline assessment of the state's current financial processes.

The purpose of the financial assessment was to identify processes that are overly complex, cumbersome, or duplicative. In addition, the project identified opportunities for improving financial processes and developing tighter integration among the state's "back office" systems.

On August 3, 2005, the National Association of State Auditors, Comptrollers and Treasurers (NASACT) signed a contract with The Hackett Group to offer baseline assessments and benchmarks to the 50 state governments, the District of Columbia and the U.S. territories. Click here to learn more about the services offered through NASACT.

2004 | Roadmap Project begins

In 2004, a new result was added to the "Priorities of Government" (POG) budget approach to address the critical issue of administrative efficiency:

“Strengthen government’s ability to achieve its results efficiently and effectively.”

Influenced by the work of the Enterprise Strategies Committee, the POG team recognized the opportunity to build on the promise of Civil Service Reform to continue improvements to state financial and administrative policies, processes and systems. They directed the Office of Financial Management, in partnership with other Roadmap agencies, to develop a proposal to address both short-term and long-term implementation plans and funding needs for a new statewide financial system.

Central service agencies GA, DIS, and DOP joined OFM in what was known as the Roadmap project to help guide major back office modernization. The first few months of the year were spent organizing the project – getting the executive sponsors on board and establishing the Agency Advisory Group.

November 2004 | Building A Business Case for the Roadmap

In November 2004, the Roadmap project team worked with the Agency Advisory Group to identify and prioritize common business problems and opportunities. About 40 agencies participated in the prioritization survey. Information from the survey was used to develop the high-level business case, which was delivered to the executive sponsors for their approval to continue the project.

2005 | Solutions Framework and Urgent Business Needs Strategy

The first project task was to lay out the solutions framework and enterprise service delivery model (discussion draft only - was not validated by the executive sponsors), and develop an urgent business needs strategy for agencies whose business needs couldn’t wait for an enterprise solution.

In addition, the Roadmap business initiatives chart was created to show the overall strategic direction of the Roadmap. This document is currently under review and a new version is planned for release in the coming months.

2006 | Enterprise Business Process Modeling and Scoping

In 2006, the project team, in partnership with Eclipse Solutions consulting, began modeling the state's enterprise business processes for the back office end-to-end business cycles. Over a year was spent working with agency content experts to provide the information needed to develop the following set of value propositions:

In 2006, the project also partnered with MA Cook Corporation consulting to better define what was in and out of scope of the Roadmap. The results of the business process modeling effort provided valuable input into the scoping effort, leading to the development of the Roadmap business process scope model.

2007 | Core Financials Feasibility Study

In June 2007, the Roadmap project again partnered with Eclipse Solutions to develop a feasibility study for replacing or modifying the state's core financials system.

Based on work completed, three alternatives were considered:

Each alternative was evaluated based on two types of assessment:

Leverage HRMS was found to best meet the enterprise objectives in positioning the state for the future and meeting resource challenges.  In particular, leverage HRMS has the best chance of significantly addressing broader functionality needs; eliminating silos of data and functionality; encouraging standard approaches; reducing technical complexity, and significantly increasing the degree to which Washington can leverage enterprise technology.

The feasibility study recommended that the state complete a set of twelve positioning activities to prepare for any changes to the core financials system.

Read the full study - Volume I, Volume II, and Next Steps for Consideration

2007 | Roadmap Program Begins

Based on the results of the feasibility study, the Roadmap established an Enterprise Program Office and began working on other positioning activities.