SA Water

End User Computing Strategy Sets Framework for Future

Background:

Owned by the Government of South Australia, SA Water delivers water and wastewater services to approximately 95% of the state’s population. It services 1.5 million people with 223,000 megalitres of water each year. Its water and wastewater networks span vast distances to meet the needs of regional, rural and metropolitan customers, and its water reuse initiatives result in the recycling of about 32% of wastewater  in metropolitan areas and 22% in rural areas, predominantly for irrigation.

SA Water has an important role in the development of SA’s water industry, and is subject to more than 120 Federal  and State Acts, along with regulations, codes, industry guidelines, internal policies and operating procedures.

“Using the EUC Capabilities Model we were able to quickly assess the state of our current state architecture”

Pete Calvert, SA Water, Senior IT Architect

The Challenge:

With more than 1,500 employees across a range of offices and in the field, and facing the end of life of its Windows XP desktop platform, SA Water needed to establish a new platform for service delivery. This would drive IT service provision across the coming years and provide overarching guidance for other IT strategies such as SA Water’s approach to cloud, mobility and portals.

SA Water identified that its current EUC environment restricted the ability to respond quickly to changing business requirements, as costly and disruptive major platform upgrades were the only way to introduce new capabilities. A new EUC strategy was needed to set the organisation up for the future.

SA Water’s Chief Technology Officer Abhishek Singh recognised an opportunity to tailor end users’ computing solutions to the needs of  their job role, including providing mobility solutions and support for ‘bring your own device’ (BYOD).

Abhishek and his team set out to build a three year roadmap and five year vision to support major changes in work practices and to support the next generation of SA Water worker.

“Previously, a transition from Windows  XP to Windows 7 would have just been a case of buying and deploying the newer operating system, however end user computing is changing and will continue to change across the coming 5-10 years,” Abhishek says. “The expectations of users, and the ways in which they work and engage with technology, will also continue to change.”

“The strategy is a living document, which we know will serve us well in a period of heavy regulation. We’ve needed to forecast capital projects over the coming years, and this document has really supported us in doing that with a high degree of confidence.”

Pete Calvert, SA Water, Senior IT Architect

The Solution:

SA Water and Data^#3 took a holistic approach, engaging with the business from the start of the project. A series of interviews with end users, and the knowledge of SA Water’s People and Culture (HR) team, provided insights into elements of the current system that were suboptimal, including a culture of workarounds due to a lack of suitably provisioned SA Water devices.

In addition to the extensive business interviews, the People and Culture team  provided  information  about  the responsibilities and work styles associated with different job roles. This information was crucial when applying the Data^#3 User Segmentation Model to create four user profiles (such as Field Engineer) as the basis for selecting technology  tools  and  packages.

SA Water’s process and technology current state was then mapped using the Data^#3 EUC Capabilities model to allow for the creation of the tools and packages for the four user profiles. The application mix of each group was also captured and used to support application portfolio management.

“The EUC strategy we developed with Data^#3’s assistance lets us provide much more targeted services to end users, for example by making sure that mobile users were provided with laptops or tablet devices, and providing secure, ‘always on’ VPN access to facilitate working from anywhere,” says Abhishek.

SA Water’s end users now see an environment that is constantly changing in order to support their changing needs. Rather than seeing a static operating system and environment rollout that does not change for years, the new EUC strategy supports the progressive rollout of applications and settings that enhance the working environment. It provides the flexibility to allow users to tailor their own environments within defined parameters – for example, users may choose to upgrade to a later version of office productivity applications that they are familiar with from home use.

Based on this comprehensive view of the business, users, technology and process, creating a future state and roadmap has been made substantially easier.

The Outcome:

SA Water now has an adaptable three year roadmap to guide investment in its largest IT service offering, and has been able to progress a major platform upgrade and provide guidance for mobility, security and IT Service Management (ITSM) strategies. SA Water now has a resilient, flexible and future-proof strategy.

A phased rollout of the new end user computing environment provided cost control and allowed comprehensive user support to occur in line with changes.

An additional benefit of developing an EUC strategy is a substantial reduction in the size of the application portfolio from about 1,600  supported applications to fewer than 400 which simplifies administration, offers significant licensing cost savings and improves licensing compliance with a consequent reduction in audit risk.

Download the Case Study – SA Water

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