A Report for The State Bar of California · 1.4 Anticipated Admissions Growth Trends The State Bar...

A Report for

The State Bar of California

High-Level Business Case for Admissions System

3 November 2006

Engagement: 221362660

The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page i

© 2006 Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Gartner is a trademark of Gartner, Inc. or its affiliates. For internal use of The State Bar of California only.


Table of Contents Section 1—Executive Summary .............................................................................. 1

1.0 Executive Summary ..................................................................................... 2

1.1 Purpose of the Business Case .................................................................................. 2

1.2 Project Approach ....................................................................................................... 3

1.3 Business and Technical Drivers ................................................................................ 3

1.4 Anticipated Admissions Growth Trends ..................................................................... 4

1.5 Summary of General Business and Technical Key Findings ..................................... 5

1.6 Business and Technical Recommendations .............................................................. 7

1.7 Identified Cost Savings .............................................................................................. 8

1.8 Recommendations ..................................................................................................... 8

1.9 Summary of Estimated Costs .................................................................................. 12

1.10 High-Level Schedule ............................................................................................... 12

1.11 Expected Business and Technical Benefits ............................................................. 13

Section 2—Introduction and Background ............................................................ 15

2.0 Introduction and Background ................................................................... 16

2.1 Purpose of the Business Case ................................................................................ 16

2.2 Project Approach ..................................................................................................... 16

2.3 Business Drivers and Technical Drivers .................................................................. 19

Section 3—Current Environment .......................................................................... 21

3.0 Current Environment ................................................................................. 22

3.1 Current Admissions Business Environment ............................................................ 22

3.2 Current Business Process Environment .................................................................. 26

3.3 Anticipated Admissions Growth Trends ................................................................... 29

3.4 Admissions System Current Technical Environment ............................................... 32

Section 4—Key Findings of Current Environment .............................................. 34

4.0 Key Findings of Current Environment ...................................................... 35

4.1 General Business Key Findings and Impacts .......................................................... 35

4.2 General Technical Key Findings and Impacts ......................................................... 41

Section 5—Conclusions and Recommendations ................................................ 44

5.0 Conclusions and Recommendations ....................................................... 45

5.1 Business Area Recommendations .......................................................................... 45

5.2 Technology Area Recommendations ...................................................................... 47

5.3 Identified Cost Savings ............................................................................................ 49

5.4 System Acquisition and Implementation Best-Practice Overview ........................... 50

5.5 Alternatives Analysis ............................................................................................... 52

5.6 High-Level Cost Estimate ........................................................................................ 63

The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page ii



Section 6—Project Implementation Plan .............................................................. 64

6.0 Project Implementation .............................................................................. 65

6.1 Project Schedule ..................................................................................................... 67

6.2 Project Team Organization ...................................................................................... 69

6.3 Implementation Planning ......................................................................................... 75

6.4 Acquisition Strategy ................................................................................................. 76

Section 7—Critical Project Risks and Mitigation Strategies .............................. 78

7.0 Critical Project Risks and Mitigation Strategies ...................................... 79

7.1 Key Risks Identified ................................................................................................. 79

7.2 Project Risk Details ................................................................................................. 80

Attachments ........................................................................................................... 88

Attachment 1—Cost-Savings Detail .................................................................................. 89

Attachment 2—Growth Projections ................................................................................... 93

Section 1—Executive Summary—The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page 1



Section 1—Executive Summary




1.0 Executive Summary The State Bar of California’s (State Bar’s) Office of Admissions (Admissions) is examining viable alternatives to replace its current automated systems that support Admissions and the services they deliver to applicants. The primary goal is to identify feasible options to enhance the quality and timeliness of the services provided by and within the State Bar and Admissions. The current Admissions systems rely on older technology, are insufficiently integrated, difficult to navigate, and do not support the required business processes and workflow necessary to aid in automating core activities such as tracking accommodations petitions, moral character determinations, and communicating with applicants, institutions and others involved in the admissions process. The State Bar is also looking to migrate off the current AS/400 technology platform and move to a more supportive and contemporary technical environment.

This business case examines and highlights Admissions’ current business and technical environment; identifies current and desired functional processes, and related gaps; key business and technical findings, conclusions and recommendations; identifies strategic technology directions and system execution alternatives; examines potential high-level one-time and recurring system costs; defines a project implementation plan and associated recommendations; and identifies critical project risks and mitigation strategies.

At this time, Gartner recommends that Admissions, with the approval of the State Bar, move forward with the process to implement an integrated and modern Admissions System to support the State Bar in the coming years.

1.1 Purpose of the Business Case The purpose of this business case is to provide the State Bar’s executive leadership team with an analysis of the benefits and costs associated with the implementation of a new Admissions system to help them make a more informed decision to move forward (or not) with a new system. The State Bar requested Gartner’s support in assessing the need (both business and technical) for a new Admissions system and to provide the documented rational justification, supported by quantifiable measures, to support a decision on whether the proposed project should move forward. To that end, this Business Case is designed to answer the following questions:

1. What are the tangible business benefits expected from implementing a new Administration System?

2. What are the business objectives for a new system (technical and functional requirements have already been documented and Gartner assumes these requirements accurately reflect State Bar needs)?

3. Which technology alternatives will meet the State Bar’s business and technical requirement for a new Admissions System?

4. What is the time frame (Project Schedule) for the selection, acquisition and implementation of the new system?

5. What will be the resource impacts associated with the acquisition and implementation of a new system?

6. What are the high-level estimates for one-time and recurring costs for a new system?

7. What are the major risks and issues associated with the acquisition and implementation of the new system and how can they be mitigated?




1.2 Project Approach Gartner’s approach to the Admissions System Business Case development included the review of existing materials and documents, interviews with key State Bar and Admissions staff and key stakeholders, an analysis and assessment of industry trends related to Admissions System Applications and technology, as well as the review and assessment of similar activities and lessons learned from other state bars of applicable size/scope. The figure below documents the high-level process steps Gartner completed during the development of the Business Case.

Figure 1. Project Approach and Steps

1.3 Business and Technical Drivers Below are the overall business and technical drivers that we identified for a new Admissions system based on our meetings, discussions and interviews with State Bar representatives during the course of our engagement activities.

1.3.1 Business Drivers

Improve service delivery to applicants through reduction in time frames (e.g., moral character processing, applications processing, grading and accreditation).

Provide enhanced service delivery to applicants through the creation of a level of applicant self-service that provides for the ability to enter all applications and information online; and to be able to view current application status; as well as view and review requests for information/clarification.

Provide for the timely development and delivery of system reports including:

Standard reports and customizable reports for management




Ability to generate ad hoc reports as needed

Provide for the ability to conduct real-time status on applicants

Provide the ability for current staffing levels to support the projected increase in workload and the expanding applicant/client base anticipated in the next five years (see Section 3.3, Anticipated Admissions Growth Trends).

Reduce the amount of status phone calls Admissions receives from/about applicants’ status to enable staff to concentrate on core business needs and improve overall responsiveness and time frames of service delivery.

Implement a system that utilizes defined workflow processes to “guide” applicants, through system and Admission staff functions, during the entire applicant process from first-year law student registration to Supreme Court Motions.

Provide for automated application error checking via online application entry to proactively identify and correct errors and gaps in information.

Through automation of business processes, workflow and reduced time frames, redeploy staff to provide enhanced applicant support and service delivery.

1.3.2 Technical Drivers

Implement contemporary technologies that provide for a robust and supportive system and technical environment.

Implement a system that provides for integration of Admissions business area functions that are currently disparate, stand-alone and do not share information, which results in duplicative efforts and information throughout the organization as well as data errors and applicant data inaccuracies.

Establish a 24/7 supported IT environment to support a new Admissions system, internal hosting of Web services and other State Bar applications/systems.

Implement an integrated, user-friendly and geographical user interface (GUI)-based system that includes updated business processes and defined workflow to provide for an easy-to-navigate Admissions system that provides for proactive actions, timely reports and applicant status.

Reduce costs through elimination of third-party provider vendors (e.g., XAP.com) and provide for internal support of those processes.

1.4 Anticipated Admissions Growth Trends The State Bar of California Admissions experiences continued growth year-over-year, and this trend is expected to continue in the near future. Gartner anticipates that Admissions will continue to experience overall growth and will need to develop strategies (e.g., improve system capabilities, improve/streamline business process, hire additional staff unless an improved system is implemented) to meet this anticipated growth. A growth percentage, based on previous-five-year data (see “Attachment 2—Growth Projections” for calculations), was determined for the following areas:

Applications (based on data from 2000–2005):

Registrations = 3.95%

First-Year Law Students’ Examinations = 11.80%




Bar Examination = 1.06%

Moral Character = 1.74%

Admissions Revenue (based on data from 2000–2006):


First-Year Law Students’ Examinations = 16.19%



Admissions Expenses Growth (based on data from 2000–2006):

7.33%

1.5 Summary of General Business and Technical Key Findings Based on our analysis of the information we obtained during our interviews conducted with State Bar representatives, documents we reviewed related to the State Bar’s business, technical and Admissions functions, research into Bar Admissions, and industry best practices, we documented the Key Business and Technology Findings below.

1.5.1 Summary of Key Business Findings

Below is a summary of the key business findings based on our analysis and research:

Current service delivery and business process areas are not integrated; Admissions needs to integrate Admissions, Examinations, Moral Character, Grading and Operations and Management, resulting in a comprehensive user-friendly service delivery model.

Business processes need to be re-engineered to reduce time, enhance staff efficiencies by reducing duplicative efforts, minimize hand-offs, perform operations in parallel (where feasible), streamline processes, and embrace an automated workflow-enabled business environment. Current business processes should not be mimicked within a new system, as it will only mimic old processes on new technology.

The Admissions business and service delivery environment is reactive to applicant needs and issues. Admissions needs to migrate to a more proactive approach utilizing automated workflow, status tracking and alerts, activity rescoring and scheduling, and robust reporting. In addition, this will help reduce the number of applicant inquiry calls, freeing up staff time to focus on core business needs and processes.

Implement robust reporting functionality that includes defined-standard and ad hoc report generation capability designed to provide timely standardized reports, real-time status and ad hoc reporting to meet specific staff needs and that affords management needed insight into the “daily business operations” of the Bar to allow for improved operations, and that enables staff to work proactively with applicants and their associated applications.

There are numerous areas where errors currently occur during application entry process, both online and within the back office. Admissions needs to reduce the number of generated errors through a defined full-feature online entry of all applications with error checking and flagging. This would significantly improve the overall applications processing, reduce repetitive activities and ultimately improve staff and applicant satisfaction.




Admissions needs to reduce the time staff spends producing, printing and filing hardcopy reports and various applicant forms of correspondence. The Bar should move toward a paper-sparse environment utilizing an integrated scanning/imaging system to reduce time frames and the need to correspond with hardcopy and labor-intensive approaches/processes.

Implement automated interfaces (data and document transfer) between external stakeholders (e.g., DMV, DoJ, educational institutions) to reduce the need to receive, copy, file and store documents within an applicant’s physical file. These documents and their related correspondence should be viewed within an applicant’s electronic file, reducing the need to “visit” physical files and manually enter or update information.

1.5.2 Summary of Key Technical Findings

Below is a summary of the key technical findings based on our analysis and research:

Multiple systems and databases exist within Admissions and related business areas. The consolidation to an integrated and scalable system (that meets future growth trends) with a master database would enhance the Admissions process and reduce system support costs.

Admissions needs to move to a new system that provides an improved level of applicant information, enables staff and applicants to view overall status online, and increases the robustness of a workflow system to enhance the effectiveness of Admissions’ business processes. In addition, a more contemporary system will aid staff in delivering accurate and timely service to applicants, reduce applicant confusion and frustration, and create a single, integrated, robust and non-conflicting set of information.

The Information Technology (IT) Department needs to embrace a 24/7 support posture for the Bar’s IT environment. The IT needs to implement supporting technology and processes to provide 24/7 support to all functions within the Bar. This is considered as a prerequisite to the deployment of any new system within the State Bar in support of the Admissions Department. Admissions will not be able to realize the full scope of the benefits from a new system or the cost savings (through elimination of third-party providers), and the IT will not be able to support a new system as required without enactments to its current environment in terms of providing a robust 24/7 support model.

A new system with automated interfaces would eliminate the need to manually analyze and enter data into the system, thus freeing up staff time and reducing potential errors. Automated interfaces with external entities (e.g., DMV, DoJ, educational institutions) will reduce the current “manual activities” associated with the incorporation of “outside” data in to State Bar systems, as well the corresponding storage and tracking of the associated hardcopy papers/files.

Existing systems are difficult to navigate; a new system that is integrated, operates off a single database, and is user-friendly with a graphical user interface (GUI) should be implemented.




1.6 Business and Technical Recommendations

1.6.1 Business Recommendations

Based on our findings and analysis, Gartner’s assessment documented in this business case is that the State Bar is in need of a new Admissions system that will enable Admissions to improve its ability to meet applicants’ needs, improve service time frames, improve reporting, meet future workload/growth, reduce applications processing errors and enhance the visibility, insight and status applicants have into their specific request/issue being address by the Bar. The State Bar staff and management are constrained by the current system and its associated business functions and processes; Admissions will not be able to move toward an enhanced business service delivery model or a technically robust (24/7) environment that will allow the Bar to reduce current operational costs and meet future Admissions business and applicant demands unless a new system is implemented.

A summation of core business needs and conclusions are below:

Implement an integrated system that includes Admissions, Examinations, Moral Character, Grading, and Operations and Management

Re-engineer business processes to meet business and system needs

Implement a system that has automated workflow

Improve applicant service through defined and structured workflow, tracking and scheduling

Reduce applicant inquiry calls to enable staff to focus on core business needs

Implement a system with robust reporting features that include defined-standard and ad hoc system-generated reports

Complete online application entry for all applications

Reduce and eventually eliminate producing, printing and filing hardcopy reports and various applicant forms of correspondence, including implementation of document management and scanning/imaging processes

Develop processes and interfaces with external stakeholders (e.g., DMV, DoJ, educational institutions)

1.6.2 Technology Recommendations

The current Admissions systems utilizes older technology (IBM’s AS/400 platform), are not based on a geographical user interface (GUI), are not user-friendly to operate/navigate in, and do not function as a workflow tool or utilize contemporary industry business best practices or processes. The current Admissions systems were developed more than 15 years ago and have been extensively modified over time to try to meet the needs of the users. With the continued growth in the number of law students, Bar examination applications and moral character applications, the current staff needs to be able to focus on their primary business objectives (e.g., processing exam applications, conducting moral character assessments, accrediting schools, grading exams, etc.) and not be required to spend their time working around the limitations of a system that does not provide defined workflow/business processes, is difficult to navigate and is dated in its technology. Admissions faces two very key technical requirements at this pivotal time for its system; they are:




Enhancement of the Bar’s IT environment to more-contemporary technologies to provide robust 24/7 operation and support that allow secure reliable system access for Bar staff as well as applicant access/use

Implement a new system that provides the foundation for a new service delivery model for Admissions that is workflow-focused and provides the needed flexibility and functionality to support current and future workload trends of the Bar and its associates

A summation of core technical needs and conclusions is documented below:

Existing systems are difficult to navigate, are not user-friendly and are not integrated; implement an integrated, user-friendly, easy-to-navigate, GUI-based system that includes automated workflow, scheduling and reporting

Implement a secure database and server-based environment that utilizes role-based access and usage based on responsibilities, permissions, job functions and qualifications

Move away from multiple systems and databases and consolidate to an integrated and scalable system

IT needs to move to a 24/7 supportive IT environment

Eliminate the need for third-party, external providers, to support Web-hosting in-house

Automate interfaces to external entities (e.g., DMV, DoJ, educational institutions) to reduce manual transfer of information and data, data entry and the number of hardcopy papers/files that require storage

1.7 Identified Cost Savings Gartner estimates that Admissions could save as much as $711,378 on an annual basis through enhanced business processes/automated workflow, elimination of third-party providers (e.g., first-year application provider XAP.com), automated system interfaces to government entities (DMV and DOJ) and educational institutions (for transcripts and accreditations), as well as automated error checking/correcting in applicant data that a new system would afford the Bar.

The majority of cost savings are in the area of business process improvement and cost avoidance driven by staff realignment to meet future service demands without the need to hire additional staff. It is estimated that, with improved business processes, Admissions could realign up to nine full-time equivalent (FTE) positions. This would enable Admissions to focus staff on reducing overall time frames, be more proactive as an organization and more responsive to its applicants, as well as meet projected growth trends in service delivery.

1.8 Recommendations Gartner recommends moving forward with the implementation of a new Admissions system. This recommendation is based on the prerequisite requirement of updating the current IT environment and supporting technology to provide a secure and supportable (24/7) systems environment, the identified cost savings that process re-engineering and the new system will bring to the Bar, an enhanced service delivery model it will provide, as well as the increased functionality to staff/end users and applicants it will offer.

Gartner strongly suggest three key prerequisites that Admissions, the State Bar and IT must meet to provide for a successful implementation of a new system; they include:




An improved IT infrastructure and environment in which to host and support the new system and provide secure and reliable system access and operation

A robust 24/7 IT support environment to afford users expanded access and use of the new system

Re-engineered Admissions business processes to enable the Department to take full advantage of the new system and technologies (e.g., workflow, automated alerts and triggers, automated interfaces, etc.)

1.8.1 Summary of Strategy Alternatives and Recommendations

Admissions must take action to improve both its underlying technology and admissions systems; it will not be able upgrade its system(s) to realize its business drivers or increased functionality without moving off the AS/400. Gartner suggest that the State Bar move to a server-based environment and update and/or purchase new applications to run its back-office operations and, more importantly for this business case, the Admissions system.

Gartner also recommends that the Admissions system should eventually be a part of a larger Bar system that integrates the State Bar’s other support systems, including membership, back-office applications (finance, HR), Court, DA, etc.

Gartner has divided our recommendations into, 1) Strategy Alternatives—the strategic direction alternatives for the technical environment; and 2) Execution Alternatives—the viable system options. Each is discussed below.

1.8.2 Strategic Alternatives Assessment

Gartner identified the following strategy alternatives for the technical environment:

Alternative I: Continue As Is (Status Quo)—This alternative entails continuing to maintain the AS/400 and related admission systems to provide current functionality. No significant enhancements would be made to the system with the exception of ongoing support and updating the operating system.

Alternative II: Convert Code to Contemporary Platform and Continue to Modify the Admissions Systems to Best Meet End-User Needs—This alternative entails making significant improvements to the platform, code, operating system and selected functionality. Given the significance and impact, Gartner would recommend these areas of functionality in the following prioritized order:

Streamline business process operations to reduce redundancy, gain efficiencies and better match system capabilities

Modify applications to better meet needs, including tracking applicants and providing for online application processes for all applications

Automate workflow that routes items to each “station” and accurately tracks time

Alternative III: Transition to Newer Technology and Implement a New Admissions System—This alternative entails replacement of platform and technology, and hosting a new Admissions system that provides for best practices in admissions systems including: workflow, online application entry, error reduction, reporting, etc. In addition, this alternative would enable a new Admissions system to function as a module of a future Bar system (e.g., a system encompassing membership, back-office applications, Court, DA).




In assessing each Strategy Alternative, Gartner used the rating scale of green, yellow or red defined in Table 1 below.

Table 1. Strategy Rating Scale

Rating Description

“Green Light” (Acceptable to Excellent): The alternative fully meets or exceeds Admissions’ business objectives.

“Yellow Light” (Caution): The alternative only partially meets Admissions’ business objectives.

“Red Light” (Poor): The alternative does not meet Admissions’ business objectives.

Below is a summary of the evaluation results for the identified Strategy Alternatives

Table 2. Summary of System Strategy Alternatives

Strategy Alternative

Address Immediate and Future

Needs

Ability to Address

Opportunities for

Improvement

Cost and Value

Applicant Satisfaction

Position for Addressing

Future Needs

Opportunity to

Leverage System

Risk

1) Continue As Is (Status Quo)

2) Convert Code to Contemporary Platform and Continue to Modify

3) Transition to a Contemporary IT Environment and Implement a New Admissions System

Based on the above ratings, Gartner recommends Alternative 3—that the State Bar transition to a contemporary IT environment and implement a new Admissions system.

1.8.3 Execution Alternatives Assessment

Gartner identified the following execution alternatives for an Admissions system:

Alternative A—Custom Solution: Contract with an application development vendor to custom-develop a new, comprehensive application to meet Admissions’ business and technical requirements.

Alternative B-1—Commercial Off-the-Shelf (COTS) System with Customization: Procure a COTS product and customize the product to meet business requirements that are not met off-the-shelf. No business policy, procedure or process change will occur.

Alternative B-2—Commercial Off-the-Shelf (COTS) System with Customization and Policy, Procedure and Process Change: Procure a COTS product and implement the




solution with some customization. Admissions’ business policy, procedure and processes will also be changed to match the COTS product workflow.

Alternative C—Transfer Solution: Transfer/purchase an existing custom solution developed for another state bar and modify the solution to meet Admissions’ business and technical requirements.

Each alternative was rated against seven major criteria and sub-criteria. The rating scale utilized (i.e., Green Light, Yellow Light and Red Light) is the same one used for the Strategy Alternatives.

Below is a summary of the evaluation results for the identified Execution Alternatives.

Table 3. Summary of Implementation Alternatives

Alternative A B-1 B-2 C

Criteria Custom Solution COTS (with

Customization)

COTS (with Customization and Policy, Procedure

and Process Change)

Transfer Solution (with

Customization and Policy, Procedure

and Process Change)

Business Value

TCO

ROI

Technical Fit

Maintainability

Schedule

Risk

Final Rating

Based on the strategic recommendation to transition to a contemporary IT environment and implement a new Admissions system (including re-engineering of business processes), we recommended Execution Alternative B-2—Admissions should purchase and implement an integrated commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) system and customize it to meet Admissions’ requirements. In addition, Admissions is in need of significant business process re-engineering that should serve as the foundation to an implementation of a new Admissions system. The




current business processes were developed more than 10 to 15 years ago and are based on antiquated technology and manual processes, with no insight into the pervasive nature and value the Internet offers the Admissions process.

Gartner recommends that the State Bar and Admissions utilize both the services of a system integrator and an outside project manager to review business processes, customize the COTS system, and implement and test the new Admissions System. The primary reasons for this recommendation is based on current staff responsibilities and their limited availability to manage a project of this magnitude; the complexity of customizing the system; and the need for standardized and rigorous project management methodologies and practices.

It is anticipated that it will take approximately six months to fully prepare for the Admissions System project, attain executive management buy-in, and select a system integrator and project manager. Gartner recommends that Admissions, with the assistance of the Information Technology Department, explore the benefit of implementing ‘quick wins’ during this timeframe to further assist Admissions with enhancing its service delivery. The following ‘quick wins’ were identified during discussion with Admissions:

Complete the online application for Moral Character

Improve the tracking and management of Testing Accommodations

Develop a secure web-based process/system to correspond, interact and share information between Admissions and law schools (e.g., applicant transcripts, references, certifications)

Develop a secure web-based process/system to aid Admissions and law schools in the accreditation process

1.9 Summary of Estimated Costs For the recommended execution strategy above, Table 4 illustrates the low and high estimates for one-time costs for the implementation of a typical system of similar scope to the Admissions system. Please note this does not include the costs to migrate the current IT environment to a more robust, secure and supportable 24/7 operation hosted on contemporary technology or hardware costs associated with the new Admissions System.

Table 4. One-Time Costs for the Admissions System

Admissions System Low High

One-Time Costs

Core Application Software $700,000 $1,100,000

Customization and Configuration $850,000 $1,300,000

System Integrator and Project Manager $550,000 $850,000

Contingency (10%) $210,000 $325,000

Total One-Time Costs $2,310,000 $3,575,000

1.10 High-Level Schedule The Gantt chart below illustrates a representative high-level schedule for the implementation of the new Admissions system. A detailed project schedule is included in Section 6—Project Implementation Plan. Please note this does not include the activities and time needed to




migrate the current IT environment to a more robust, secure and supportable 24/7 operation hosted on contemporary technology.

Figure 2. High-Level Project Implementation Schedule

1.11 Expected Business and Technical Benefits

1.11.1 Business Benefits

Improved and enhanced service delivery to applicants through:

Applicant self-service to provide for the ability to enter all applications and information online thus freeing up 2 full-time positions or approximately $145k annually

View current application status to improve applicant satisfaction and reduce phone calls for status

View, review and reply to Admissions’ requests for information/clarification

Timely development and delivery of system reports, freeing up 2 full time positions or approximately $148k, including:




Ability for staff to meet and support increasing workload and an expanding client base, reducing the need to hire additional staff in the future (saving approximately $70k annually for 1 analyst position)

Reduction in the number of status phone calls Admissions receives from/about applicants’ status, saving between 5-15% of staffs time

Enablement of staff to concentrate on core business needs and improve overall responsiveness and time frames

Implementation of a system with defined workflow processes to “guide” applicants through the system and Admissions staff functions during the entire applicant process from first-year law student registration to Supreme Court Motions

Reduction in errors through automated application error checking via online application entry, saving $107k annually in moral character alone




Reduction/redeployment of staff through automation of business processes, workflow and reduced time frames

1.11.2 Technical Benefits

Implementation of contemporary technologies that provide for a robust and supportive system and technical environment

Implementation of a system that provides for integration of Admissions’ business areas functions

Establishment of a 24/7 supported IT environment to support a new Admissions system, internal hosting of Web services and other State Bar applications/systems

Implementation of an integrated, user-friendly and geographical user interface (GUI)-based system, which includes updated business processes and defined workflow to provide for an easy-to-navigate Admissions system that provides for proactive actions, timely reports and applicant status

Implementation of system interfaces with DMV, DoJ and educational institution to reduce/eliminate manually entry saving a potential $180k annually

Reduction in costs through elimination of third-party provider vendors and provision of internal support of those processes, saving $20k annually for first year law student registration alone

Section 2—Introduction and Background—The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page 15



Section 2—Introduction and Background




2.0 Introduction and Background The State Bar of California (State Bar) is seeking to replace the automated systems that currently support the Office of Admissions (Admissions) to enhance the quality and timeliness of the services provided by the State Bar. The current systems make use of older technology and are inconsistent with the State Bar’s strategic technology plan to migrate off the current AS/400 system environment to a more contemporary technology. In addition, the systems are insufficiently integrated, difficult to navigate, and do not support the required business processes and workflow necessary to aid in automating core activities such as tracking accommodations petitions, moral character determinations, and communicating with applicants, institutions and others involved in the admissions process. Finally, the business rules underpinning the existing systems were developed more than 10 years ago and need to be reassessed in light of current requirements and future business trends.

2.1 Purpose of the Business Case The purpose of this Business Case is to provide the State Bar’s executive leadership team with an analysis of the benefits and costs associated with the implementation of a new Admissions system to help them make a more informed decision to move forward (or not) with a new system. The State Bar requested Gartner’s support in assessing the need (both business and technical) for a new Admissions system and to provide the documented rational justification, supported by quantifiable measures, to support a decision on whether the proposed project should move forward. To that end, this Business Case is designed to answer the following questions:

1. What are the tangible business benefits expected from implementing a new Administration system?

2. What are the business objectives for a new system (technical and functional requirements have already been documented and Gartner assumes these requirements accurately reflect State Bar needs)?

3. Which technology alternatives will meet the State Bar’s business and technical requirement for a new Admissions system?

4. What is the time frame (Project Schedule) for the selection, acquisition and implementation of the new system?

5. What will be the resource impacts associated with the acquisition and implementation of a new system?

6. What are the high-level estimates for one-time and recurring costs for a new system?

7. What are the major risks and issues associated with the acquisition and implementation of the new system and how can they be mitigated?

Documented below is Gartner’s approach to the development of the Business Case for a new Admission System for the Bar.

2.2 Project Approach The scope of the Admissions System Business Case development included the review of existing materials and documents, interviews with key State Bar and Admissions staff and key stakeholders, an analysis and assessment of industry trends related to admission system applications and technology, as well as the review and assessment of similar activities and




lessons learned from other state bars of applicable size/scope. Figure 3 and the discussion that follows document the key process steps Gartner completed during the development of the Business case.

Figure 3. Project Approach and Steps

Step 1. Project Planning and Initiation

At the initiation of the engagement, Gartner conducted a Project Planning Meeting (via teleconference) to ensure our overall understanding of the team’s roles, responsibilities and key activities associated with this engagement. During that meeting, we reviewed the draft project plan and approach, discussed roles and responsibilities, discussed key dates and milestones, and organized any additional project logistics. From that meeting, we prepared a project work plan and schedule that included tasks, duration, work efforts and assignments for the all engagement activities.

Step 2. Data Gathering

To obtain the information necessary for the development of the Business Case, Gartner conducted a data-collection effort that provided thorough, yet expedited coverage of system needs and potential commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) solutions. This data-collection effort involved the review of existing State Bar documentation and interviews of key stakeholders, and the research of current market trends related to admissions system technology delivery. The following data and documentation were reviewed:

Organization Chart

Admissions System Menu and Record Layout

Business Case—Department of Admissions




Monthly Salary Ranges and Executive Salaries

Bar Alliance

Consortium Proposal

Bar Alliance Manuals

iMIS Business Process Review

LRIS Functional Specifications

Bar Association Management Overview

Moral Character Applications Cleared in 2006

Operating Statement—For Six Months Ending 30 June 2006

Moral Character Application

Diagonal Group Documents

Project Summary

Interview Notes

Use Cases

Workflows

Other State Bar System Documentation/Information

In addition to the above, Gartner conducted eleven (11) structured interviews with key State Bar business and technology staff and stakeholders to obtain a high-level understanding of the State Bar’s current Admissions business processes and to understand any issues and functionality limitations associated with the current Admission systems. In addition, we used these interview sessions to validate key stakeholder expectations for the new application, both from the business process as well as technology perspectives. These interviews covered the main organizational units within the State Bar’s Office of Admissions, and documented their issues/needs regarding the current and future system requirements. In addition, we explored the following topics during our interviews:

Vision for the new Admissions system

Current business problems and opportunities

Business objectives to be met through system implementation

Current technical environment

Administrative, budget and technical issues

Specifically, Gartner conducted and documented interviews with the following individuals:

Judy Johnson, Executive Director

Gary Clark, Chief Information Officer

Jonathon Angle, CIO Partners (consulting position)

Ken Papai, IT Systems Development Manager

Gayle Murphy, Admissions Director

John Rodriquez, Operations and Management Director (×2)




Vanessa Poe, Operations and Management Deputy Director (×2)

Debra Lawson, Moral Character Director

Gina Crawford, Administration/Grading Deputy Director

As noted above, a second set of interviews (×2) was conducted with John Rodriquez and Vanessa Poe, which focused on developing and refining potential cost and personnel savings that a new Admissions system could provide.

Finally, Gartner conducted research into potential system solutions. As part of this effort, the engagement team leveraged Gartner Research and subject matter expertise related to admissions system technology and best practices, to provide the data necessary to effectively evaluate all viable solutions.

Step 3. Business Case Development

Gartner incorporated the information gathered during the prior two steps to develop and document the Business Case for the proposed solution. The Business Case was developed to include the business program background, goals and objectives, problem/opportunity statements and business requirements for the proposed system. Gartner confirmed the Business Case elements with key State Bar representatives to gain consensus regarding the fundamental business arguments that would frame the overall case for action.

Both the definition of the strategic direction of the technical environment and the system replacement strategy that meets the needs of the State Bar’s Office of Admissions were critical elements in our overall Business Case development activities. As such, Gartner sought to define both a technical environment strategic direction and an Admissions system replacement strategy that supported the goals and objectives of the State Bar and Admissions as discussed above. To this end, Gartner assessed three technical environment alternatives consisting of: 1) Maintain status quo, 2) Convert to a contemporary platform, and 3) Transition to newer technology. Gartner then analyzed the three candidate replacement strategies consisting of: 1) Custom solution, 2) Commercial off-the-shelf system, and 3) Transfer solution. The three candidate replacement strategies were then assessed based on:

Alignment with business needs and technology best practices

Relative costs of the different strategies

Degree of risk in terms of operational, financial, organizational and technical impact on the State Bar

Long-term viability of the solution

Ability to integrate into future State Bar enterprise initiatives and AS/400 migration

Finally, Gartner developed a high-level implementation schedule and a high-level cost estimate of the selected alternative.

2.3 Business Drivers and Technical Drivers This section addresses the overall business drivers and technical drivers for the Admissions system project. The drivers are a result of the meetings, discussions and interviews between Gartner and the State Bar, documented in Section 2.2 above.




2.3.1 Business Drivers


Provide enhanced service delivery to applicants through the creation of a level of applicant self-service that provides for the ability to enter all applications and information online; the ability to view current application status; as well as view and review requests for information/clarification.

Provide for the timely development and delivery of system reports including:




Provide the ability for current staffing levels to support the projected increase in workload and the expanding applicant/client base anticipated in the next five years (see Section 3.3—Anticipated Admissions Growth Trends).

Reduce the number of status phone calls Admissions receives from/about applicants’ status, to enable staff to concentrate on core business needs and improve overall responsiveness and time frames of service delivery.

Implement a system that utilizes defined workflow processes to “guide” applicants, through system and Admissions staff functions, during the entire applicant process from first-year law student registration to Supreme Court Motions.



2.3.2 Technical Drivers


Implement a system that provides for integration of Admissions business areas functions that are currently disparate, stand-alone and do not share information, which results in duplicative efforts and information throughout the organization as well as data errors and applicant data inaccuracies.


Implement an integrated, user-friendly and geographical user interface (GUI)-based system, which includes updated business processes and defined workflow to provide for an easy-to-navigate Admissions system that provides for proactive actions, timely reports and applicant status.


Section 3—Current Environment—The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page 21



Section 3—Current Environment




3.0 Current Environment This section documents Gartner’s overall understanding of the State Bar’s current “as-is” Admissions business processes and supporting information technical environment.

It is important to provide the background of the current business and technical environment to give an understanding of how the organizational structure and services affect current business area processes. This section details the current Admissions business environment, including operational structure, a description of its business areas, and a description of those business area processes.

This section includes anticipated Admissions’ growth trends, which show the potential growth in applications/applicants that the State Bar may experience in the next five years. Admissions will need to support this anticipated growth either through a new system and process approach or with an increase from the current staffing levels.

Lastly, this section describes the current technical environment within the State Bar and Admissions and its affect on Admissions, associated business areas and processes.

3.1 Current Admissions Business Environment The current business environment details the Admissions operational structure, its business areas and their associated responsibilities.

3.1.1 Office of Admissions: Operational Structure

Headquartered in San Francisco and led by a member of the State Bar’s senior management team, Admissions has 62 employees, including approximately three full-time temporaries, in San Francisco and Los Angeles. The staffing breakdown is as follows:

Senior Executive and Assistant—2

Examinations—2

Moral Character—12

Administration and Grading—18

Operations and Management—28

This staff assists the Committee of Bar Examiners of the State Bar to meet its statutory responsibilities:

Admissions determines the moral character of applicants for admission to practice law in California

Admissions develops, administers and grades the California Bar Examination

Admissions develops, administers and grades the First-Year Law Students’ Examination

Admissions oversees accreditation of 18 law schools in California that are not approved by the American Bar Association and an additional 12 unaccredited law schools and 12 correspondence law schools

To manage these responsibilities, Admissions has been organized into the following departments:

Administration




Educational Standards

Moral Character Determinations

Examinations

Operations and Management

Admissions, headed by a Director of Administration and located in San Francisco, coordinates the activities of the Committee of Bar Examiners with those of the Board of Governors and other State Bar departments. The department provides staff support to the committee (e.g., by organizing its agendas and producing minutes of its meetings) and provides staff support to bodies that serve as adjuncts to the Committee of Bar Examiners, including the Law School Council, the Law School Assembly and special task forces established by the Committee. The department also assists the Senior Executive for Admissions with managerial responsibilities for the Office of Admissions, particularly with regard to fiscal control and staffing; and oversees the processing of petitions for testing accommodations during the bar examination.

Using recently adopted guidelines and policies, department staff recommend granting, modifying or denying requests for testing accommodations. Consultants provide assistance as necessary. If the Senior Executive denies a petition, the petitioner has a right of appeal to the Committee of Bar Examiners through its Subcommittee on Testing Accommodations. Accommodations, granted to more than 600 applicants with disabilities, have ranged from allowing additional time to providing test questions in Braille and large print.

The Director for Administration, with the assistance of a Deputy Director, also has operational responsibility for grading the Bar Examination. Essay and performance questions are graded by a pool of approximately 140 examination readers who are organized into teams selected by the Administration staff. Each team is led by a member of the Board of Reappraisers, a body that reviews answers with borderline scores, and includes 11 experienced readers and three or four apprentice readers, all of whom must have passed the Bar Examination in their first two attempts. The grading process, which utilizes standards to ensure consistency in grading, generally takes three months for the February Bar Examination and four months for the July Bar Examination. The process concludes with the mailing of results and their simultaneous release on the Web. Grading of the First-Year Examination (internally known as the “FYLSX”) takes approximately one and one-half months from beginning of the grading process to the mailing of results, which are not posted on the State Bar’s Web site. The internal grading process is very manual and labor-intensive; it consists of the following:

Receive booklets and scantrons—have staff remove identifying info, assign an applicant/exam number (use code number to map applicant to identifying info). Booklets go to graders and get scored, and then graders fill in scantron for grades. Scan grades using CalBarGrader (outside consultant) then export score data file and scale grades. Receive a data file (on CD) for multiple-choice/scantron portion of exam. GANSK combines scores (results in three ranges: 1) pass, 2) fail, 3) midrange—test sent to a second and possibly third reader—these scores are then averaged).

Lastly, graders have to reapply each time to be graders. This results in a tedious process for graders whose information does not change from exam to exam.

The following subsections detail the business area functions and services that they provide within Admissions, the State Bar and to its applicants. This provides for the understanding of how the business areas function and interrelate to one another; and provides their background to help form an understanding of how a new system can accommodate their needs.




3.1.2 Educational Standards

The Director for Administration manages the Educational Standards department with the assistance of the Director for Examinations, both of whom are located in San Francisco. This department, assisted by two educational standards consultants retained by the Committee of Bar Examiners, is responsible for general oversight of law schools in California; registration of unaccredited and correspondence law schools; accreditation of California law schools pursuant to the Rules Regulating Accreditation of Law Schools in California (Accreditation Rules); and the pre-legal and legal education requirements for admission to practice law in California.

Nineteen (19) California law schools have been granted State accreditation by virtue of their being accredited by the American Bar Association; another 18 law schools, though not accredited by the ABA, have satisfied the Committee’s accreditation standards; and another 12 law schools have been authorized by the State to grant degrees but without Committee accreditation. Twelve correspondence law schools registered with the Committee conduct programs of legal education within the State.

3.1.3 Moral Character

The Moral Character Determinations Department, headed by a director located in San Francisco, is responsible for conducting moral character investigations of the approximately 7,500 individuals who apply for admission to practice in California each year.

To determine whether applicants have “good moral character,” as required by Business and Professions Code Section 6060, the staff of this Department consider fingerprint histories, driver’s license records, recommendations of character references and employers, and other information as deemed appropriate. If the character and fitness of an applicant to practice law appear to be problematic, his or her file is referred to the Committee of Bar Examiners’ Subcommittee on Moral Character. The Subcommittee may make a determination on the record or may invite the applicant to meet informally with the Subcommittee to discuss its concerns. Following such a meeting, the Subcommittee may make a positive or negative determination of moral character. It may also require a psychiatric evaluation or ask staff to further investigate an applicant, usually for problems of substance abuse, or make a positive determination subject to an applicant’s meeting specified conditions. Subcommittee recommendations are typically adopted by consent by the full Committee during one of its regular meetings, absent a request from a Committee member that an application be given further consideration.

An applicant who receives a negative moral character determination may apply to the State Bar Court for a formal de novo hearing with respect to his or her moral character. The applicant has the right to reapply for a moral character determination after the expiration of two years from the date the Committee initially denied his or her application.

Moral character final determination of positive is rarely denied an applicant—this negative determination happens on average less than five times per year (out of the nearly 7,500 total applicants).

3.1.4 Examinations

The California Bar Examination encompasses both a General Bar Examination (internally known as the “GBX”) and an Attorneys’ Examination. The General Bar Examination is a three-day test consisting of six one-hour essay questions, two three-hour performance tests, and the Multi-state Bar Examination, a 200-item multiple-choice test administered in two three-hour blocks. Given in February and July each year, the General Bar Examination is required of all applicants for admission to practice law in California. Attorneys in good standing who have been




admitted in another jurisdiction for the past four or more years may qualify to take the Attorneys’ Examination, which consists of the essay and performance test questions of the General Bar Examination.

The First-Year Law Students’ Examination (FYLSX), given in June and October each year, consists of four essay questions administered in a four-hour block and 100 multiple-choice questions administered in a three-hour block. Four categories of students must take the First-Year Law Students’ Examination upon completion of one year of law school study: those enrolled in residence law schools neither accredited by the Committee nor approved by the American Bar Association; those enrolled in correspondence law schools; those studying in law offices or judges’ chambers; and those lacking two years of college work prior to attending law school. These students must pass the examination within three attempts to receive credit for law study accumulated up to the point of passage. Those who pass the examination after four or more attempts receive credit for only one year of law study.

The Examinations Department, headed by a director in San Francisco, supervises the acquisition and development of the essay and performance test questions for all examinations other than the multiple-choice Multi-state Bar Examination, which is purchased from the National Conference of Bar Examiners. Essay questions for the California Bar Examination and the First-Year Law Students’ Examination and multiple-choice questions for the First-Year Law Students’ Examination are solicited from law professors. The Board of Reappraisers, a group of eight experienced examination readers appointed by the Committee of Bar Examiners, edits their submissions. Performance test questions are drafted and edited by a team of practitioners and academics in collaboration with a member of the Board of Reappraisers. All questions selected for examinations are pre-tested before being submitted to the Committee for review and approval during working sessions conducted in the spring and fall of each year.

A separate test answer booklet is used for each of the eight written questions of the General Bar Examination. After an examination, test books are collected, sorted by applicant number, and shipped to Admissions from test centers throughout the State. Upon receipt, the books are put into applicant order and coded for anonymity. Registrant information downloaded from the State Bar’s legacy IBM AS/400 system to a Microsoft Access grading system is used to create a record for each applicant who has taken the examination. Through the course of three grading sessions, graders receive instructions on grading and calibrating answers to a particular question. Each grader then receives multiple applicants’ answer books for the question. Graders submit scores manually and on a scantron sheet, and their scores are statistically validated to ensure that their assessments are comparable.

The multiple-choice examination answers are shipped to the National Conference of Bar Examiners for grading. Approximately one month after administration of the examination, the scores are reported back to Admissions electronically, downloaded into the grading system, and combined with the scores for the essay portions of the examination.

Through the use of a scaling formula, the grading system identifies applicants whose composite scores were sufficiently high or low to qualify as a clear pass or fail and those whose scores suggest that a second reading is appropriate. If applicants’ answers are read a second time, the scores from the second reading are averaged with the scores from the first reading; the average scores are scaled, and one of three dispositions is made: pass, fail or reappraisal. Reappraisal occurs when scaled scores total approximately 1,440 and is conducted by senior readers who determine whether an applicant should pass or fail on the basis of all written answers and the multiple-choice score. Following completion of this three-phased grading system, the results are uploaded to the AS/400 system and result letters are generated. Only failing applicants receive their scores including, if applicable, the average raw score for each question, raw scores and




sub-scores for the multiple-choice portion, and a scaled total score for the written and multiple-choice scores combined.

The Board of Reappraisers directs the grading of examination answers and makes final pass/fail decisions about examination papers that are very close to but below the final passing score. Once examination results are released, the Director for Examinations reviews and responds to applicants’ requests for reconsideration. The director also conducts ongoing audits of the examination process to ensure that the examination remains psychometrically sound and is meeting its testing objectives.

3.1.5 Operations and Management

The Operations and Management Department, headed by a director and assisted by a deputy director who are both located in Los Angeles, is responsible for budgeting; for receiving and initial processing of all registration, moral character and examination applications; for determining professional or educational eligibility to take Committee-administered examinations; and for administration of examinations.

The California Bar Examination is administered in 14 to 20 locations throughout the State twice a year: in late February to approximately 4,000 applicants and in late July to approximately 9,000 applicants. The First-Year Law Students’ Examination is administered in San Francisco and Los Angeles in June and in October.

3.2 Current Business Process Environment The current business process environment details business area processes within Admissions on a day-to-day basis and how those areas function within the current technical environment and with the current Admissions systems.

3.2.1 Overview of Business Process Environment

The existing systems assist the Admissions staff with registration of law students and attorneys; determination of pre-legal and legal education eligibility; applications for and administration of the California Bar Examination and First-Year Law Students’ Examination, including the processing petitions for testing accommodations filed by applicants with disabilities; production of examination results; processing of moral character determination applications; tracking scores on the Multi-state Professional Responsibility Examination, administered by the National Conference of Bar Examiners; and producing motions to the Supreme Court of California certifying the eligibility of candidates for admission. In addition, the system keeps records on unaccredited and correspondence law schools and provides law school information for eligibility determinations. System support for these operations is described below.

3.2.2 Registration

Law students intending to take the California Bar Examination are required to register with the State Bar within three months of entering law school, supplying name, address, undergraduate school, law school and similar information. This is the vehicle for establishing a permanent record for the applicant, which is primarily tracked through the use of a registration number, which in most cases is an applicant’s Social Security Number. The fact that an applicant is registered with the State Bar is considered confidential and is not generally available to other State Bar staff outside the Office of Admissions, nor is such information released to third parties except by court order. Law students have the option of registering in either of two ways. They may fill out a registration form and mail it to the State Bar, where its data is then entered by bar staff, or they may register online. The Office of Admissions has contracted with XAP




Corporation (www.XAP.com) to host the registration system online at calbar.xap.com. Data is batched and downloaded to a State Bar AS/400, where registrant records are created or updated.

3.2.3 Eligibility Determinations

Following receipt of a registration form, staff determines whether the applicant has met the pre-legal education requirement. The determination process begins with system-generated letters that are sent to law schools with certification forms, and concludes with the receipt of completed forms certifying that schools have confirmed eligibility. The forms are bar-coded and tracked through the system. When law students deemed eligible apply later to take the California Bar Examination or the First-Year Examination, computer-generated forms are mailed to law schools to confirm that the students have met educational requirements that qualify them to take the examinations. Eligibility confirmation is recorded electronically in an applicant’s permanent record.

3.2.4 Administration of Examinations

Applicants have the option of applying to take a bar examination online at the XAP site mentioned above or by downloading the examination forms from XAP and submitting them by mail. Late fees are incurred for missed deadlines, and applications filed after the final filing deadline are rejected. AS/400-based custom software tracks the receipt of transcripts and other data about an applicant’s educational and professional history, test site availability, test center assignment, requests for testing accommodations and the like. Staff reviews the petitions for testing accommodations and determines whether they should be granted, modified or denied. These determinations are communicated to test administrators throughout the State.

Acknowledgment letters are generated in response to all applications. If an application is incomplete, acknowledgment letters are generated at specified intervals until the application is complete. If an application is not complete by a specified time, a notice is generated that the application has been abandoned. All system-generated documents that applicants are expected to complete and return are bar-coded. Upon receipt, they are scanned to update the system. Approval letters or examination admittance tickets are generated for complete and approved applications. Operational reports advise staff regarding the status of applications, including those ready for final review.

Administration of examinations presents logistical challenges. Multiple test center sites must be rented throughout the State and applicants assigned to those sites. Assignments are made on a first-filed, first-served basis, except for those requesting testing accommodations. When applicants have been deemed to meet requirements for legal education or attorney status and have paid requisite fees, staff produces admissions tickets, bulletins and examination materials, which may include questions in special formats such as large print or audiotapes for applicants with disabilities. Applicants who want to use laptop computers for examinations must use vendor-supplied software that restricts use of the laptop to the test. Staff also recruits and hires test center proctors and other examination personnel, such as security guards, electricians and assistants for those granted testing accommodations.

3.2.5 Moral Character Determinations

Applicants must download bar-coded forms requesting information on applicants’ moral character from the State Bar Web site. Applicants send the forms to current and former employers, personal references and law schools. Online completion of the forms is desirable but currently not possible. Returned forms are scanned in batches to update a tracking system.




Admissions staff independently checks the background of applicants as well. Each month, the State Bar electronically sends a list of applicants to the State Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). The DMV then electronically updates the tracking system with any relevant information on applicants. Background checks, which may include review of fingerprint records, are also done with the FBI and the California Department of Justice. Once Admissions has received all references and background information, staff makes a determination regarding an applicant’s moral character. A favorable assessment is valid for two years. A letter notifies an applicant who has not been admitted after 18 months that an extension must be requested before the expiration of the two-year period. An applicant can file as many extensions as necessary.

3.2.6 Other Admission Requirements

In addition to passing the California Bar Examination and having a positive moral character determination, an applicant must take and pass the Multi-state Professional Responsibility Examination (MPRE) and not have outstanding family support payments. The Department of Social Services Children and Family Services Division, which tracks outstanding family support obligations using the State Licensing Matching System (SLMS), provides Admissions with a monthly electronic list of those who have outstanding family support obligations. An applicant whose name appears on the SLMS list receives no further consideration until the obligations have been discharged. An applicant with a passing MPRE score who does not appear on the SLMS list may have an incomplete application for some other reason. If so, the MPRE score is recorded and the components of the application are processed in the next batch of new registrants. If an applicant took the MRPE for another jurisdiction and never reported the score to California, Admissions receives an official record of the score and enters it into the system manually.

3.2.7 Supreme Court Motions

After cross-checking all components of an application for inconsistent data, the system generates a motion to the Supreme Court of California listing the names of all those who have passed the Bar Examination and have met all other requirements for admission. When Bar Examination results are released in May and November, the motions will list the names of all those who have passed and met other requirements for admission. These motions contain thousands of names. Motions with fewer names are generated weekly, more or less, as applicants who have passed the examination satisfy the remaining requirements.

3.2.8 Letters to Applicants

Applicants who have passed the Bar Examination, been deemed to have positive moral character, have received a scaled score of 79 or higher on the MPRE and have no record of outstanding family support obligations, are sent a letter advising them that they may take the attorney’s oath of office and become members of the State Bar. Applicants who passed the examination but have yet to meet one or more requirements for admissions are advised of their status and warned that the passing grade for the bar examination remains valid only for a period of five years from the date of the examination.

3.2.9 Bar Examination Reports

Extensive custom reports are used at all stages of the Admissions process to track individual applicants and generate statistics.




3.2.10 Law Schools

Admissions uses a database of undergraduate institutions and law schools to generate letters to deans to request comment on the good moral character of students who have attended their schools, certify that pre-legal and legal education requirements have been met by applicants registering and taking examinations, send pass lists, and track law schools that are registered with the Committee of Bar Examiners. The database is updated regularly to record changes in school administrators and to note whether a school is registered with the Committee of Bar Examiners as an unaccredited or correspondence law school, a California-accredited or candidate law school, or a school approved or provisionally approved by the American Bar Association. The database thus serves as a history of a school’s registration and/or accreditation status.

3.3 Anticipated Admissions Growth Trends The State Bar of California Admissions experiences continued growth year-over-year and this trend is expected to continue in the near future. Gartner anticipates that Admission will continue to experience overall growth and will need to develop strategies (e.g., improve system capabilities, improve/streamline business process, hire additional staff unless an improved system is implemented) to meet this anticipated growth. A growth percentage, based on previous-five-year data (see “Attachment 2—Growth Projections” for calculations), was determined for the following areas:

Applications (based on data from 2000–2005):


First-Year Law Student’s Examinations = 11.80%



Admissions Revenue (based on data from 2000–2006):


First-Year Law Student’s Examinations = 16.19%



Admissions Expenses Growth (based on data from 2000–2006):

7.33%




Figure 4. Applications Growth—the chart below depicts projected growth of the four application types during the next five years. Given current staffing levels and processes, it will become increasingly difficult to support the growth.

2006 - 2010 Growth in Applications

0

2,000

4,000

6,000

8,000

10,000

12,000

14,000

16,000

18,000

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

Year

Applic

atio

ns

Registrations

First-Year LawStudents' ExaminationBar Examination

Moral Character

Figure 5. Growth in Administration Revenues—Revenues are projected to continue to increase during the next five years, with Bar Examinations and Moral Character experiencing the greatest growth.

2007 - 2011 Growth in Revenues

$-

$2,000,000

$4,000,000

$6,000,000

$8,000,000

$10,000,000

$12,000,000

$14,000,000

$16,000,000

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011

Year

Dolla

rs

Registrations

First-Year LawStudents'Examination'Bar Examination

Moral Character

Miscellaneous




Figure 6. Growth in Administration Expenses—Expenses are projected to continue to increase during the next five years at a similar rate as revenue.

2007 - 2011 Growth in Expenses

$0

$5,000,000

$10,000,000

$15,000,000

$20,000,000

$25,000,000

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011

Year

Dollar

s

ExpensesTotal

Figure 7. Revenue to Expenses—Expenses and Revenue are projected to increase at a similar rate.

2007 - 2011 Revenues to Expenses Growth

$8,000,000

$9,000,000

$10,000,000

$11,000,000

$12,000,000

$13,000,000

$14,000,000

$15,000,000

$16,000,000

$17,000,000

$18,000,000

$19,000,000

$20,000,000

$21,000,000

$22,000,000

$23,000,000

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011Year

Do

llars

Expenses Total

Revenues Total




3.4 Admissions System Current Technical Environment

The current technical environment within the State Bar is composed of an IBM AS/400 running a V5 R2 operating system. The servers within the environment consist of 68 Intel windows (+ AS/400) servers. There are 650 Windows Xp-based desktops (60 within Admissions) and 75 Windows Xp-based laptops (10 within Admissions). Standard key desktop/laptop applications consist of MSOffice 2000 (SP3), AS/400 IBM Emulator (iSeries Access for Windows V5.5), Acrobat Reader 7.0, IE 6, WordPerfect 9 (changing to MSWord in 2007), Hummingbird, ProLaw, and AVR (internal for RPG). There are two T1 lines that provide connectivity between the San Francisco and Los Angeles offices.

Major issues with the applications hosted on the AS/400 are that they are difficult to navigate and are not functionally integrated. Most importantly, the AS/400 and its hardware are no longer supported, system programs are getting harder to find and will be more costly to maintain, and it is becoming increasingly difficult to find and retain knowledgeable IT support staff to maintain the system.

Current performance issues include low bandwidth (upgrade in process), DM application, and the need for upgrades of clients and servers.

The AS/400 hosts the Admissions systems used for:

Registration

Exam administration, exclusive of exam scoring

Moral character determination

Production of motion documents for the Supreme Court

Reporting

All key applications with the exception of HR and Finance are running on or interfaced with the AS/400. The AS/400 hosts the core applications of the State Bar.

The diagram below illustrates the current technical environment.




Admissions Workstations

Admissions Servers

State Bar Firewall

Applicants

Internet

ExamDevelopment

"Server"

AS/400

CalbarGraderServer

WebServer

TARTS

Section 4—Key Findings of Current Environment—The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page 34



Section 4—Key Findings of Current Environment




4.0 Key Findings of Current Environment As a result of Gartner’s meetings, interviews and the review of relevant background information as discussed above, we documented the key findings associated with the State Bar’s current environment within Admissions. These key findings help focus the critical shortcomings and issues that could be addressed by the implementation of a new Admissions system. Included are findings of both the business and technical environment. This section includes the following:

General Business Key Findings and Impacts

General Technical Key Findings and Impacts

4.1 General Business Key Findings and Impacts The general business key findings and related impacts were developed by Gartner primarily as a result of interviews with key business stakeholders within Admissions and the State Bar. Gartner determined, with assistance from interviewees, the associated business impacts of each of the themes and findings. Below are the general business themes and related impact(s) that were discovered as a result of Gartner’s interviews and data-collection efforts:

Admissions’ current business processes are highly labor-intensive, and require end-user manual data entry and heavy interaction for process flows. With this level of manual interaction and process flows, staff spends a great deal of time performing tasks that a “modern” system with defined business processes and workflow components could otherwise handle or greatly assist in. Staff needs to be able to be more proactive and focus on core Admissions processes. Without moving to a new system with the above attributes, Admissions will have to address future growth with current processes, which would result in increased time frames, need to hire more staff, and increased overall costs.

Existing staff, and Gartner concurs, are concerned that if a new system is implemented and that unless the needed business process re-engineering activities are addressed, the new system will only mimic the current redundant and inadequate business processes. This would limit the overall potential benefits a new system could bring to the State Bar in terms of mirroring current processes on new technology. This would not improve overall time frames and accuracy of information, nor would it result in an increase in applicant satisfaction. Admissions will need to revise business processes with a new system to best meet the system capabilities and reduce duplicative, redundant and inadequate processes. If the necessary process changes are not made, Admissions will incur the cost of a system and still have its same processes.

The Admissions staff functions in a highly reactive state when dealing with applicants, applications, moral character and requests for testing accommodations. Multiple individuals have stated that they want a new administration system to function as a workflow system and tracking system, to utilize scheduling and to offer robust standard and ad hoc reporting. This would move staff away from a reactive approach and enable them to not only focus on critical issues as they arise but also to reduce those critical issues and errors. This would enable staff to provide timely feedback to applicants, reduce the number of status calls, and reduce the overall life cycle of applications and applicant requests. The current systems do not have the capabilities to utilize workflow; a new system would greatly aid in the development and deployment of workflow that would save staff time and make them more proactive in meeting applicants’ needs.




Staff spends a significant amount of time (approximately one to two full-time equivalent positions) performing and documenting applicant status checks, including:

Fielding applicant phone calls for application status, error resolution and follow-up.

Documenting all correspondence (e.g., letters, copies of letters) with applicants. It is believed that many of these calls/issues could be resolved with improved process times, error reductions and proactive correspondence with applicants.

Overall, this means that staff is spending much of their time answering questions—not processing applications. A new system would free up staff by enabling applicants to check/monitor status online and would provide for overall reduced application time frames.

The reporting standards within the current systems are severely lacking. There is not a standard list of automated reports nor does the ability to produce ad hoc reports exist. Standard reports do not meet the current needs of staff, formatting is awkward and reports development is a labor-intensive process. This results in staff having to extract data out of reports that do not necessarily fit end-users’ needs, waste time for reports to be custom-generated, and creates a reactive organization. Admissions wants the ability for end users to generate and produce defined standard reports and ad hoc reports; currently, they must reach out to the Los Angeles office to request non-standard reports. With providing robust reporting functions, staff will be able to have timely information on applicants, to search/query for specific issues (e.g., accommodations) instantaneously, and have information regarding trends and overall status in the different business areas.

Within the Admissions Office, there are no standard processes for various business areas regarding position functions or activities; staff in the same role operate differently and perform their responsibilities according to their own process (e.g., Moral Character determination review/investigation). When different processes are followed to complete the same or similar tasks, it causes difficultly in measuring business results and creates a general misunderstanding/misinterpretation of business outcomes. In addition, with varying business processes, it causes difficulty for new staff training, filling in for staff on vacation/leave, and for management to have insight into general trends and statistics. A new system with newly defined business processes built into the system would streamline business area approaches, provide for overall understanding of processes, results and measurement, and reduce overall time frames.

The current master key index has been the applicant’s Social Security Number—Admissions is currently moving away from this to another identifier (i.e., file number). This is resulting in staff having to cross-reference file numbers to Social Security Numbers for hardcopy files vs. system files. This current process adds additional time to standard tasks, thus taking away from key roles and responsibilities. A new system would be able to bridge the numbers and provide for a standard master key index for all applicants’ electronic and hardcopy files, resulting in saved staff time and frustration.

There are approximately 259 duplicate online applicant entries that occur each year, which then need to be reversed. This reversal process includes:

Reviewing and backing out of the system the duplicate records.

Sending a letter to the applicant to notify him or her, which requires two staff to complete (write, review and approve).




Finance cutting a check to send refund to applicant—again, a two-person process (review, approve and sign). It is estimated that it costs $20 per check ($5K per year) to process.

This process utilizes valuable staff time (approximately 0.5 full-time equivalent) for which a robust online application process with error checking could eliminate, thus allowing staff to focus on value-added processes.

Within the current system, staff have to navigate back and forth between screens to access and view an applicant’s information. Not having all applicant information and/or links to it on the same screen creates user frustration, creates errors and wastes staff time. A new system could provide insight from a high-level overall status down to detailed individual applicant information without the need to back out of or drill down into screens to access data. By providing the ability to view the necessary information or direct links to it, staff will save a significant amount of time, provide for greater insight into applicant status, and understanding of where the applicant is in the “workflow” process.

Admissions staff want to be able to respond faster to test-takers’ needs and accommodations, including providing more-supportive technology taking the exam on a laptop, uploading of electronic exam answers to a server and ensuring all answers are complete. This will help improve applicant satisfaction and reduce “technical” errors on test days. Staff experience a great deal of frustration with technical compatibility issues at test sties. Test-takers utilize current technologies and hardware; however, there are often issues with uploading exam answers to servers. In addition, Admissions staff is unable to determine if a test-taker skipped a question or the system “missed” the answer. A more supportive system/environment would reduce staff frustrations, help ensure accurate exam results and improve applicant satisfaction.

Admissions spends a significant amount of time producing, printing and filing hardcopy application information (e.g., applications, letters, references). Staff have expressed a need to move from paper-based environment to paper-sparse/paperless environment. This would enable staff to see all relevant applicant information online within the system, saving time, paper and storage space, and would reduce errors and lost information.

Admissions does not want to be dependent on IT or third parties to conduct its business; it desires to have control over its environment and applicant data. By implementing a robust modern system that provides for Web hosting, Admissions would not be dependent on third parties and would have a much more supportive and reliable system. Additionally, Admissions would have a 24/7 IT support environment if issues did arise that could be resolved efficiently and expeditiously in-house.

Admissions conducts education completion/eligibility verification of applicants with educational institutions. Staff send hardcopy letters to schools to request completion of school and transcripts; upon receipt of the information from the schools, staff then have to enter data into the system. The letters need to partially developed and generated out of the current system; it involves heavy end-user involvement to develop and send letters, to track status and to enter data. Staff could save time by formalizing the process, including it as part of workflow, and creating automatic letters. In addition, Admissions can look at utilizing document management/scanning to enter information (off of pre-defined forms) received back from schools. In automating the education verification process and adding it as a workflow component, Admissions will save time and associated costs through reduced time frames, improved correspondence, and electronic document capturing and storing.




Admissions performs the accreditation process and tracking of law schools; currently, staff repeat the same processes each time a school is up for accreditation. Similar to the above, staff could save time by formalizing the process, including it as part of accreditation workflow, and creating automatic letters/forms. In addition, Admissions can look at utilizing document management/scanning to enter information (off of pre-defined forms) received back from schools. In automating the accreditation process and adding it as a workflow component, Admissions would save time and associated costs through reduced time frames, improved correspondence, and electronic document capturing and storing.

Testing Accommodations-Specific Business Themes and Impacts

Admissions has developed a system to track applicant accommodations; however, it is not very efficient. Staff receive many accommodations late and have to react quickly to ensure the testers will be set up accordingly. Staff have to review and read each letter for accommodations to ensure all accommodations are met. This is a redundant and time-consuming process (involves up to four individuals to write, review and approve each letter). Additionally, the current system is unable to track and report on accommodations. Admissions has a strong need to be able to track applicant testing accommodation requests and their status, and be able to generate reports. Staff desire a new system to help track applicants with accommodations more accurately/closely, maintain applicant needs, report on status and to reduce the correspondence time and the effort it takes to generate letters. A new system would track each applicant’s accommodation needs, be part of the workflow process and help ensure the “tasks” associated with accommodation are completed timely and efficiently.

Moral Character-Specific Business Themes and Impacts

The Moral Character process is a very manual and labor-intensive process, although it is the most complex application within Admissions and the Admissions process. Applicants fill out downloaded PDF document and send in hardcopy; Admissions then keys in the data. If the data are incorrect, staff need to document problems, draft and send letters to applicants, wait for corrections and re-key data.

This process is very redundant and time-consuming for staff, considering Admissions currently receives between 7,500–9,000 handwritten applications per year (all having to be keyed into the system).

The Moral Character pre-process area alone is six people, including: one supervisor, two staff to look at total apps when they come in, one person to focus on data entry, two staff to focus on problems/errors.

Use AS/400 system only to record notes, actions, status and progress in applicants’ files, resulting in disparate information.

Currently, only the first eight pages (personal information, history, education and references) of the application are planned to move online for completion by applicants.

Primary role for moral character analysts is to review each applicant’s history (look for holes in work and school history). About 30%–40% of analysts’ time is spent looking for these gaps.

The Moral Character process can be greatly enhanced and overall time frames drastically reduced from 180 days by moving the full Moral Character application online.




Gartner estimates that as many as two full-time equivalent positions are utilized to for non-value-added processes. Errors and gaps in history can be significantly reduced by moving the application online and providing for instantaneous online errors notification.

Admissions staff are unable to proactively monitor late files (e.g., files that need action) until the issue is raised by an applicant or as a result of the file being reviewed. This results in increased time durations, and staff and applicant frustrations. Integrating Moral Character as part of the overall Admissions system, defining processes and utilizing workflow would greatly reduce time frames, and increase accuracy and applicant satisfaction.

Moral Character is unable to run its own reports or view them online. Reports are hardcopy, many of which (e.g., monthly reports) are run in Los Angeles and sent to San Francisco. There are additional reports that are needed that do not exist or take a long to generate (e.g., applicants have five years from passing the Bar Exam to get sworn in—many wait until the last minute. It would be helpful to see who is coming up on the five-year mark and proactively contact them to start the process.). Standard and ad hoc reports would go a long way toward increasing visibility to the overall status, trends and needs of Moral Character applications and applicants.

The Los Angeles office ships negative references to San Francisco—analysts then review, sort and file. About 10% of an analyst’s time is spent with filing (getting files, reviewing files, filing application information); this is time that could be saved with an integrated system.

Grading-Specific Business Themes and Impacts

The Grading business area within Admissions does not directly utilize the AS/400 system (uses an Access database for grading). Grading does touch the AS/400 for a copy/snapshot of the system and to load grades into the system. This results in a two-week system freeze twice a year (four weeks annually) of activity, so no changes are made while exams are graded, scored and uploaded back to AS/400. While staff can view information, they cannot change records for each two-week period until grades are completed and uploaded. This results in four weeks of lost productivity, which is also during times that staff are gearing up for the summer exam. A new system would enable staff to continue utilizing the system during the grading process and eliminate the four weeks of downtime. In addition, Grading can, and Admissions should, look to add functionality to a new system that helps integrate the grading and grade-entry process. A new system will provide for seamless grade entry, no downtime as a result of system “freezes” and integrate the grading process and grade entry into a comprehensive system.

Letters to applicants that convey test result are not “attractive.” Staff have to change dates and add different paragraphs, depending on “results” and “needs.” Letters are pieced together, depending on need. The current system also generates some letters automatically, which can result in multiple letters with conflicting information. This causes an increase in staff time to customize each letter and for error resolution in fielding applicant inquiries. A new system would address the reporting needs through more-automated and custom letters, eliminate conflicting letters (as the system would be integrated), improve overall time frames and reduce errors.

4.1.1 Summary of General Business Key Findings and Impacts

Below is a summary of the key general business themes identified above:




Current service delivery and business process areas are not integrated; Admissions needs to integrate Admissions, Examinations, Moral Character, Grading, and Operations and Management, resulting in a comprehensive user-friendly service delivery model.

Business processes need to be re-engineered to reduce time, enhance staff efficacies by reducing duplicative efforts, minimizing hand-offs, performing operations in parallel (where feasible), streamlining processes, and embracing an automated workflow-enabled business environment. Current business processes should not be mimicked within a new system, as it will only mimic old processes on new technology.

The Admissions business and service delivery environment is reactive to applicant needs and issues. Admissions needs to migrate to a more proactive approach utilizing automated workflow, status tracking and alerts, activity rescoring and scheduling, and robust reporting. In addition, this will help reduce the number of applicant inquiry calls, freeing up staff time to focus on core business needs and processes.

Implement robust reporting functionality that includes defined standard and ad hoc report generation capability designed to provide timely standardized reports, real-time status and ad hoc reporting to meet specific staff needs, and that affords management needed insight into the “daily business operations” of the State Bar to allow for improved operations, and that enables staff to work proactively with applicants and their associated applications.

There are numerous areas where errors currently occur during application entry process, both online and within the back office. Admissions needs to reduce the number of generated errors through a defined full-feature online entry of all applications with error checking and flagging. This would significantly improve the overall applications processing, reduce repetitive activities, and ultimately improve staff and applicant satisfaction.

Admissions needs to reduce the time staff spend producing, printing and filing hardcopy reports and various applicant forms of correspondence. The State Bar should move toward a paper-sparse environment utilizing an integrated scanning/imaging system to reduce time frames and the need to correspond with hardcopy and labor-intensive approaches/processes.

Implement automated interfaces (data and document transfer) between external stakeholders (e.g., DMV, DoJ, educational institutions) to reduce the need to receive, copy, file and store documents within an applicant’s physical file. These documents and their related correspondence should be viewed within an applicant’s electronic file.

The matrix below identifies whether the key business findings and related impacts are supportive of the identified business drivers, and if the resolution of those findings and impacts will help meet or exceed those drivers.

Identified Business Drivers Key Findings Supportive of

Objectives

Improve service delivery to applicants through reduction in time frames (e.g., Moral Character processing, applications processing, grading and accreditation).

Yes

Provide enhanced service delivery to applicants through the creation of a level of applicant self-service that provides for the ability to enter all applications and information online, and to be able to view current application status, as well as view and review requests for information/clarification.

Yes




Provide for the timely development and delivery of system reports including: Standard reports and customizable reports for management Ability to generate ad hoc reports as needed Provide for the ability to conduct real-time status on

applicants

Yes


Yes


Yes

Implement a system that utilizes defined workflow processes to “guide” applicants, through system and Admission staff functions, during the entire applicant process from first-year law student registration to Supreme Court Motions.

Yes


Yes


Yes

4.2 General Technical Key Findings and Impacts Admissions’ systems utilize multiple databases for different business areas and

functions, which can result in variances of applicant status and level of applicant information. This results in a misunderstanding or poor insight as to where an applicant is in his or her “process” within the admissions system. Admissions needs to move to a new system that has one master database to improve the level of applicant information, view overall status and increase the robustness of a workflow system. This will aid staff in delivering accurate and timely service to applicants, reduce applicant confusion and frustration, and create a single, robust and non-conflicting system database.

Currently the IT environment is an 8:45 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Monday through Friday operation, meaning there is no technical support outside of normal business hours. This also results in the need to utilize external third-party providers for online applicant entry. The IT department needs to develop a plan to move to a 24/7 IT environment and associated support with a new system to bring third-party processes in-house, improve responsiveness to the technical environment and end-users, and provide for greater system capabilities. Admissions will not be able to realize cost savings (through elimination of third-party providers) and IT will not be able to support and host Web services to applicants without moving to a 24/7 support model.

The current AS/400 system is only able to support 10,000 Bar Exam applicants per exam; the State Bar, for the first time, has exceeded that number in exam applications; however, the total dropped back below 10,000 come test day. Admissions staff had to move to manual processes to address system shortcomings, resulting in staff spending time documenting applicants via hardcopy and softcopy (outside of the system) files. Manual processes include tracking applicants over 10,000 by hand and entering into the




system once the number dropped below 10,000 (as a result of applicants cancelling their exam). A new system would be expandable to meet Admissions’ needs, so it would eliminate the need to manually track applicants and applicant information that occur over 10,000 system entries. This would save staff time, would have a fully representative system with all applicants’ information, and would reduce the potential for errors.

Admissions currently spends $1,695 per month ($20,340 annually) for third-party online applicant registration with XAP.com. Admissions would save money and provide for a high level of integration by bringing these capabilities in-house with a new system. This would enable Admissions to move away from being dependent upon another provider for applicants’ information, reduce contracting costs, and improve overall system functionality and integration. A new system would enable Admissions and IT to support Web hosting of online application entry, enabling applicants to not only enter information for all applications, but also to view status/progress. This would in turn help reduce errors, costs and applicant status calls.

The AS/400 is viewed as an antiquated and “fragile system.” Admissions is not up to par with modern systems; some is third-party, some is AS/400, using un-supportive systems for grading. There is a mixture of technologies, creating a difficult system to manage, measure and modify to meet Admissions’ needs.

Admissions currently provides and receives applicant background information from the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and the Department of Justice (DoJ). The Admissions system would greatly benefit from the development of interfaces with these and future organizations. Currently, Admissions sends data to/from DMV via EDI a couple of times a week. DoJ does fingerprint processing; results come back via an e-mail attachment for each individual. Admissions staff have to match results to applicants in the system and enter the data. By developing interfaces, it would eliminate the need to match data and key data into the system, thus freeing up staff time and reducing potential errors.

The current systems are not adaptable and are nearly impossible to change/modify to fit changing business and process needs. This results in staff developing workarounds and increasing the overall time it takes to conduct business functions. Staff strongly desire a new system to be “adaptable” and flexibility in terms of dealing with new processes, additional and evolving regulatory changes, etc. (i.e., ability to easily and quickly change business rules, workflow and reporting as business needs change).

Admissions desires three high-level capabilities of a new system, including:

1. Improved technology

2. Modern tools, interface, usability, etc.

3. Improved security (exam questions, Social Security Numbers, etc.) to move away from XAP, third parties

4.2.1 Summary of General Technical Key Findings and Impacts

Below is a summary of the key general technical themes identified in the above:

Multiple systems and databases exist within Admissions and related business areas. The consolidation to an integrated and scalable system (that meets future growth trends) with a master database would enhance the Admissions process and reduce system support costs.




Admissions needs to move to a new system that provides an improved level of applicant information, enables staff and applicants to view overall status online, and increases the robustness of a workflow system to enhance the effectiveness of Admission’s business processes. In addition, a more contemporary system will aid staff in delivering accurate and timely service to applicants, reduce applicant confusion and frustration, and create a single, integrated, robust and non-conflicting set of information.

The Information Technology (IT) Department needs to embrace a 24/7 support posture for the State Bar’s IT environment. IT needs to implement supporting technology and processes to provide 24/7 support to all functions within the State Bar. This is considered as a prerequisite to the deployment of any new system within the State Bar in support of the Admissions Department. Admissions will not be able to realize the full scope of the benefits from a new system or the cost savings (through elimination of third-party providers), and the IT Department will not be able to support a new system as required without enactments to its current environment in terms of providing a robust 24/7 support model.

A new system with automated interfaces would eliminate the need to manually analyze and enter data into the system, thus freeing up staff time and reducing potential errors. Automated interfaces with external entities (e.g., DMV, DoJ, educational institutions) will reduce the current “manual activities” associated with the incorporation of “outside” data in to State Bar systems, as well the corresponding storage and tracking of the associated hardcopy papers/files.

Existing systems are difficult to navigate; a new system that is integrated, operates off a single database, and is user-friendly with a graphical user interface (GUI), should be implemented.

The matrix below identifies whether the key technical findings and related impacts are supportive of the identified technical drivers, and if the resolution of those findings and impacts will help meet or exceed those drivers.

Identified Technical Drivers Key Findings Supportive of

Objectives


Yes

Implement a system that provides for integration of Admissions’ business area functions that are currently disparate, stand-alone and do not share information, which results in duplicative efforts and information throughout the organization, as well as data errors and applicant data inaccuracies.

Yes


Yes


Yes


Yes

Section 5—Conclusions and Recommendations—The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page 44



Section 5—Conclusions and Recommendations




5.0 Conclusions and Recommendations This section details Gartner’s overall conclusions regarding the current Admissions business, business processes, supporting technology systems and platforms, and future direction. These conclusions are based on the findings documented in the above sections as a result of Gartner’s review of State Bar and Admissions documentation, meetings/discussions and interviews with stakeholders, industry best practices and a market survey of other state bars of comparable size and complexity.

Gartner has developed key recommendations to help guide the State Bar and Admissions in the necessary tasks, actions and processes to move to a new Admissions system.

This section includes the following areas:

Business Area Conclusions

Technical Area Conclusions

Identified Cost Savings

Recommendations

Key Opportunities for Improvement

Strategic Alternatives

Execution Alternatives

Future Functional Models

Project Stakeholders

High-Level Implementation Cost Estimate (One-Time and Recurring)

5.1 Business Area Recommendations The State Bar is in need of a new Admissions system that will enable Admissions to improve its ability to meet applicants’ needs, improve service time frames, improve reporting, meet future workload/growth, reduce errors and improve applicant insight and status. Staff and management are constrained by the current systems and the systems’ associated business functions and processes. Admissions will not be able to move toward an improved business and technical environment, while reducing costs, and will have a difficult time meeting future Admissions business and applicant needs if a new system is not implemented. It will be difficult to meet these needs with the current business environment, and it will likely be necessary to increase staffing and funding to do so. Gartner anticipates that Admissions will need to increase staff and funding within the next two years if no immediate action is taken.

The State Bar and Admissions should strongly consider moving forward with the implementation of a new Admissions system. It will not be able to meet the identified business drivers without doing so.

It is anticipated that it will take approximately six months to fully prepare for the Admissions System project, attain executive management buy-in, and select a system integrator and project manager. Gartner recommends that Admissions, with the assistance of the Information Technology Department, explore the benefit of implementing ‘quick wins’ during this timeframe to further assist Admissions with enhancing its service delivery. The following ‘quick wins’ were identified during discussion with Admissions:




Complete the online application for Moral Character

Improve the tracking and management of Testing Accommodations

Develop a secure web-based process/system to correspond, interact and share information between Admissions and law schools (e.g., applicant transcripts, references, certifications)

Develop a secure web-based process/system to aid Admissions and law schools in the accreditation process

Below is a matrix of the Business Drivers compared to the ability to meet them without moving to a new system.

Table 5. Business Area Drivers to No System Action

Business Drivers Ability to Meet Without a New System


Admissions will not be able to reduce time frames without: 1) redefined and integrated processes, and 2) an integrated system that provides insight into applicant status.

Provide enhanced service delivery to applicants through the creation of a level of applicant self-service that provides for the ability to enter all applications and information online, and to be able to view current application status, as well as view and review requests for information/clarification.

Service to applicants cannot be significantly improved, as the current systems are not integrated, complete/full applications are not online and still require data entry by staff, the systems do not provide external (and limited internal) insight into applicant status, and do not provide for timely response of applicant requests for information.

Provide for the timely development and delivery of system reports including: Standard reports and customizable reports for

management Ability to generate ad hoc reports as needed Provide for the ability to conduct real-time

status on applicants

Current reporting processes are highly manual and require significant entry or re-entry of data. Ad hoc reports are severely limited in information that can be provided and are not able to be run by “normal” end users. Management reports are not real-time and provide limited insight. Lastly, current processes and systems are unable to generate workflow status on applicants to view current status and needs, or where they are in the applicant “process.”


The current systems will not help staff meet an increase in workload or future applicant growth. It would be necessary to modify current processes and augment staff to meet future needs.


The number of status calls and checks will only increase if no action is taken, which will increase the current burden on staff. It will be increasingly difficult to concentrate on core business processes and needs without a new integrated system that provides for insight and responsiveness to and for applicant needs.

Implement a system that utilizes defined workflow processes to “guide” applicants, through system and Admissions staff functions, during the entire applicant process, from first-year law student registration to

The current systems will not support defined workflow (e.g., end-user notification, queuing, prioritizing, etc.).




Supreme Court Motions.


The current systems and infrastructure do not support Web hosting of application entry; therefore, nor do they identify errors or missing information on the front or back end of the system.


Staff levels will only increase, as the current systems do not support automation of current or desired business process and workflow, nor do they provide the ability to utilize those methods to reduce time frames.

A summation of core business needs and recommendations, as a result of the current findings, are below:

Implement an integrated system that includes Admissions, Examinations, Moral Character, Grading, and Operations and Management

Re-engineer business processes to meet business and system needs

Utilize both the services of a system integrator and an outside project manager to review business processes, customize the COTS system, and implement and test the new Admissions System

Implement a system that has automated workflow

Improve applicant service through defined and structured workflow, tracking and scheduling

Reduce applicant inquiry calls to enable staff to focus on core business needs

Implement a system with robust reporting feature that includes defined standard and ad hoc system-generated reports

Complete online application entry for all applications

Reduce and eventually eliminate producing, printing and filing hardcopy reports and various applicant forms of correspondence, including implementation of document management and scanning/imaging processes

Develop processes and interfaces with external stakeholders (e.g., DMV, DoJ, educational institutions)

5.2 Technology Area Recommendations The current Admissions systems utilize older technology (IBM’s AS/400 platform), are not based on a geographical user interface (GUI), are not user-friendly to operate/navigate in, and do not function as a workflow tool or utilize contemporary industry business best practices or processes. The current Admissions systems were developed more than 15 years ago and have been extensively modified over time to try to meet the needs of the users. With the continued growth in the number of law students, Bar Examination applications and Moral Character applications, the current staff need to be able to focus on their primary business objectives (e.g., processing exam applications, conducting moral character assessments, accrediting schools, grading exams, etc.) and not have to spend their time working around the limitations of a system that does not provide defined workflow/business processes, is difficult to navigate, and is dated in its technology. Admissions faces two very key technical requirements at this pivotal time for its system; they are:




Enhancement of the State Bar’s IT environment to more-contemporary technologies to provide robust 24/7 operation and support that allows secure, reliable system access for State Bar staff as well as applicant access/use

Implement a new system that provides the foundation for a new service delivery model for Admissions that is workflow-focused and provides the needed flexibility and functionality to support current and future workload trends of the State Bar and its associates

Admissions needs to move to more-contemporary technologies that support a process-driven environment, is more supportable and reliable, operates in a 24/7 environment, and enables integration with third parties (e.g., law schools, DMV and DoJ). Admissions needs to utilize the remaining viable time on the AS/400 to refine its business processes and implement updated technologies.

A new system will enable Admissions to refocus how it delivers its services to its applicants, enabling staff to save time, reduce costs and improve service-level expectations. Admissions is in a very advantageous situation to be able to implement a new system based on the need to improve service delivery and technology. Admissions needs to utilize the viable remaining time on the AS/400 to focus on adding improved process and functionality, integration of third-party systems and proactive workflow and reporting capabilities.

The State Bar and Admissions should strongly consider moving forward with the implementation of a new Admissions system. It will not be able to meet the identified technical drivers without doing so. Below is a matrix of the Technical Drivers compared to the ability to meet them without moving to a new system.

Table 6. Technical Drivers to No System Action

Technical Drivers Ability to Meet Without a New System


Current platform and technologies are not robust, are difficult to support both from a technical and IT staff standpoint, and are severely limited in their integration capabilities.

Implement a system that provides for integration of Admissions business area functions that are currently disparate and stand-alone, and do not share information, which results in duplicative efforts and information throughout the organization, as well as data errors and applicant data inaccuracies.

The current systems and platform technologies do not support or enable integration of the current disparate systems; therefore, duplicative efforts and information, as well as data errors and applicant data inaccuracies, will not be able to be reduced.


24/7 support would be able to be met without moving to a new system; however, the need would not be as urgent without a new system.


The current systems platform and operating systems are not capable of supporting a more user-friendly and GUI-based system, nor will it support defined process and workflow capabilities.

Reduce costs through elimination of third- Current server-based technologies do not exist




party provider vendors (e.g., XAP.com) and provide for internal support of those processes.

within the State Bar technical environment, and support of online applications entry would need the technical infrastructure implemented to support it.

A summation of core technical needs and recommendations is documented below:

Existing systems are difficult to navigate, are not user-friendly, and are not integrated; implement an integrated, user-friendly, easy-to-navigate, GUI-based system that includes automated workflow, scheduling and reporting

Implement a secure database and server-based environment that utilizes role-based access and usage based on responsibilities, permissions, job-functions and qualifications

Move away from multiple systems and databases and consolidate to an integrated and scalable system

IT needs to move to a 24/7 supportive IT environment

Eliminate the need for third-party external providers, to support Web-hosting in-house

Automate interfaces to external entities (e.g., DMV, DoJ, educational institutions) to reduce manual transfer of information and data, data entry and the number of hardcopy papers/files that require storage

5.3 Identified Cost Savings Gartner estimates that Admissions could save as much as $711,378 on an annual basis through enhanced business processes/automated workflow, elimination of third-party providers (e.g., first-year application provider XAP.com), automated system interfaces to government entities (DMV and DOJ) and educational institutions (for transcripts and accreditations), as well as automated error checking/correcting in applicant data, that a new system would afford the State Bar.

The majority of cost savings are in the area of business process improvement and cost avoidance driven by staff realignment to meet future service demands without the need to hire additional staff. It is estimated that, with improved business processes, Admissions could realign up to nine full-time equivalent positions. This would enable Admissions to focus staff on reducing overall time frames, be more proactive as an organization and more responsive to its applicants, as well as meet project growth trends in service delivery.

Admissions would greatly benefit from a new Admissions system in staff savings alone. There are multiple options that need to be reviewed and discussed. A balance needs to be established between re-engineering business processes prior to high-level business requirements of a new system and re-engineering processes as a result of the application(s).

Gartner suggests that Admissions closely examine its processes prior to implementation of a new system by identifying redundant (e.g., multiple data entry of same applicant information) and non-value-added (e.g., custom generation of standard reports) processes. In addition, identify processes that can be executed or streamlined by a new system (e.g., online applications, error prompts for online entry, application status). This will help transition Admissions from its current state to a desired state, with mapped to-be processes, and will help provide an understanding of what is desired out of a system.




Once a desired state is established, Admissions can look to balance the customization of a system and additional modification of business processes. This will help to further improve processes and decrease the potential level of application customization.

5.4 System Acquisition and Implementation Best-Practice Overview

Gartner defines a best practice as “an activity or procedure that has produced outstanding results in another situation and could be adapted to improve effectiveness, efficiency and/or innovativeness in another situation.”

For the purposes of this Business Case, we believe it is import to focus on two key best practices areas:

System acquisition best practices in use by other bar associations

Application implementation best practices and processes in use by the public sector and private sector

Each is discussed below in greater detail.

5.4.1 System Acquisition Best Practices Used by Other Bar Associations

There are currently 51 state bars or state bar associations in the United States—of those, 33 are mandatory and 18 are voluntary. CIO Partners and the State Bar Information Technology Department are in the process of conducting research with the top state bars of comparable size and complexity to the State Bar of California to identify feasible bar systems and admissions systems that could be purchased, configured and customized to the State Bar’s and Admissions’ needs.

Gartner recommends continuing this activity to survey those bars of similar size and complexity to determine the following:

What did the bar do internally to get ready for the project (i.e., assign a project manager—from where? Organize a project team? Did they develop a business case, etc.)?

Which current admissions systems and bar systems they are using.

If the current systems were developed in-house, custom-developed by a third party, or COTS.

If COTS, how much customization (in percent)?

Key features, functions, modules and processes of the system.

Purchase price (recurring and non-recurring costs).

Implementation time frame.

Application Technology Architecture

.NET

J2EE

Other

Database Technology

Oracle




SQL

Sybase

Other

Development and/or customization costs.

Satisfaction/issues with supporting vendor (i.e., systems integrators, COTS package providers, third-party technical professional services firm).

Key lessons learned.

While no one state bar is exactly alike and, noting that the California State Bar is unique in its functions, how it processes applications, conducts accreditation and conducts moral character assessments, it would be in the best interest of the State Bar to “harvest” these best practices and include them in the sourcing/RFP/agreement and vendor selection process, as well as internal program planning activities.

5.4.2 Application Implementation Best Practices and Processes

Gartner recommends that Admissions look to buy vs. build an application to reduce overall business, budget, schedule, operational and organizational risks. The purchased application should reside on a contemporary platform, and utilize contemporary languages and database technologies. In doing so, this will help in implementing a system that is integrated, supportive, highly configurable and customizable to meet Admissions’ needs.

Gartner recommends that the State Bar and Admissions utilize both the services of a system integrator and an outside project manager to review business processes, customize the COTS system, and implement and test the new Admissions System. The primary reasons for this recommendation is based on current staff responsibilities and their limited availability to manage a project of this magnitude; the complexity of customizing the system; and the need for standardized and rigorous project management methodologies and practices.

Admissions needs to take ownership and internally manage the project. It is crucial that the project and Admissions have high-level executive management support and that the Executive Director serve as the project sponsor. Admissions should select a project manager from within Admissions and internally manage the project and act as the single point of contact and oversight for the System Integrator and Project Manager. Information Technology should not be the project manager of the project but should be heavily involved on a daily basis. In addition, a project steering committee needs to be established to help ensure that the best all-around decisions are made and that there is complete and continued project buy-in.

Admissions needs to ensure that IT and any potential vendors follow best practices for application implementation. These best practices include:

Establishment of a defined governance process

Provide for project oversight or IV&V

Project Management Institute (PMI) best practices and processes used

Defined project schedule, project team organization, project team roles and responsibilities

Development of plans/processes for:

Configuration Management

Risk Management




Master Test Plan

Training Plan

Independent Validation and Verification Plan

Quality Assurance and Project Monitoring

Organizational Change Management

Implementation Planning

Knowledge Transfer Program

Data Conversion Plan

Deployment and Implementation Support

Acquisition Strategy

Establish a fully defined Project Management Plan (PMP) including the following components:

Deliverables Definition

Schedule and Timeline

Resource Planning

Internal Resource Plan

Project Information Toolbox (PIT)

Project Planning and Tracking

Each of the bulleted areas above has been described in Section 6—Project Implementation Plan.

5.5 Alternatives Analysis Gartner recommends moving forward with the implementation of a new Admissions system. The identified alternatives are based on the prerequisite requirement of updating the current IT environment and supporting technology to provide a secure and supportable (24/7) systems environment, identifying cost savings that process re-engineering and the new system will bring to the State Bar, enhancing the service delivery model it will provide, as well as increasing functionality to staff/end users and applicants that it will offer.

Gartner strongly suggest three key prerequisites that Admissions, the State Bar and IT must meet to provide for a successful implementation of a new system; they include:

An improved IT infrastructure and environment in which to host and support the new system and provide secure and reliable system access and operation

A robust 24/7 IT support environment to afford users expanded access and use of the new system.

Re-engineered Admissions business processes to enable the Department to take full advantage of the new system and technologies (e.g., workflow, automated alerts and triggers, automated interfaces, etc.)




5.5.1 Key Opportunities for Improvement

Admissions faces three primary issues impacting its ability to improve its current admissions systems to provide operational efficiencies and provide enhanced applicant service by moving to a new system.

1. Dated technology and environment

This issue is caused by the current system being on the AS/400, which is becoming increasingly difficult to support from both a labor and functionality standpoint. It is becoming increasingly difficult to find and retain key IT staff that possess the knowledge to continually maintain the AS/400 and provide enhancements to meet to the continuing needs of stakeholders. The functionality of the AS/400 is severely limited on the level of customization and end-user functionality (e.g., workflow, reports, interfaces/integration with other State Bar and third-party systems).

2. IT Support

The Information Technology Department needs to develop plans and migrate to a 24/7 support model. This will be necessary to support and maintain the updated technologies, infrastructure and Web hosting services.

3. Redundant and inadequate business processes

Admissions needs to thoroughly examine its business process (e.g., application data entry, moral character assessment, accommodations, grading) to: 1) improve process flow, reduce process steps and eliminate redundant processes; and 2) provide a re-engineered business approach to both enable admissions to balance the additional modification processes to more closely meet a new system’s needs and to customize the new system to match the existing business processes.

5.5.2 Strategic and Execution Alternatives

The following two sections identify strategic and execution alternatives, and evaluation and selection of the best alternatives. Gartner believes that Admissions needs to focus its activities first on strategic IT direction alternatives and then on system execution alternatives. It is important to identify the viable options, evaluate each option, and provide supporting recommendations for each selected strategy.

Strategic Alternatives will examine the option for the overall IT technical environment and ability to support a new system.

Execution Alternatives will examine the options for an actual Admissions system.

5.5.2.1 Strategic Alternatives

Prior to examining options for a new Admissions system, it is necessary to identify and evaluate the strategic direction alternatives for the technical environment and what the State Bar should do to address these issues.

Gartner has identified three potential alternatives for Admissions:

Alternative I: Continue As Is (status quo)

Alternative II: Update the AS/400 platform with current technologies, conduct business process re-engineering and continue to modify the Admissions system to best meet end-user needs




Alternative III: Transition to newer technology, conduct business process re-engineering and implement a new Admissions system

Regardless of the selected alternative, (with the exception of Alternative 1: Continue As Is) II or III, it is highly recommended that the State Bar move to updated technologies and a supportive platform, and provide 24/7 IT support for the enterprise.

Each of the alternatives is explained and defined below:

Alternative I: Continue As Is (Status Quo)

This alternative entails continuing to maintain the AS/400 and related Admissions system to provide current functionality.

No significant enhancements would be made to the system, with the exception of ongoing support and updating the operating system.

Alternative II: Convert code to contemporary platform and continue to modify the Admissions system to best meet end-user needs

This alternative entails making significant improvements to the platform, code, operating system and selected functionality.

Given the significance and impact, Gartner would recommend these areas of functionality in the following prioritized order:

– Streamline business process operations to reduce redundancy, gain efficiencies and better match system capabilities

– Modify applications to better meet needs, including tracking applicants and providing for an online application process for all applications

– Automate workflow, which routes items to each “station” and accurately tracks time.

Alternative III: Transition to newer technology and implement a new Admissions system

This alternative entails replacement of platform and technology, and hosting a new Admissions system that provides for best practices in admissions systems, including: workflow, online application entry, error reduction, reporting, etc. In addition, this alternative would enable a new Admissions system to function as a module of a future Bar System (e.g., a system encompassing membership, back-office applications, Court, DA).

5.5.2.1.1 How Should Admissions Select the Best Strategy Alternative?

In considering and selecting the optimum alternative, best practices and Gartner recommend that Admissions have the following business objectives in support of selecting the best alternative:

The selected alternative should address both the immediate and future needs of Admissions.

The desired alternative should address the opportunities for improvement discussed in this document and meet Admissions’ business needs.

Improved and more-supportive technology

Ability to reduce redundancies and focus staff on core job/admissions responsibilities




Support and ongoing customization of the application to meet current and future business needs

Reduce manual processing and operating costs

While cost is an important factor, it must be balanced with future cost savings and value of the alternative—not just upfront initial costs.

The alternative should have a positive impact on the applicants, resulting in higher applicant satisfaction.

The alternative should position Admissions for making operational improvements in the future and for meeting needs that have not yet been identified.

The alternative should support the potential for leveraging and expanding use of the resulting system to support the State Bar functions in other departments (non-admissions) such as Membership.

The risks associated with the alternative should be relatively low, including the financial, technical, organizational, operational and project management risks associated with implementing the alternative.

Gartner evaluated the Strategy Alternatives against the evaluation criteria, based on Admissions’ drivers, in the table below.

Table 7. Strategy Alternatives Evaluation Criteria

Evaluation Criteria Description

Address Immediate and Future Needs

How well does the alternative address both current system and future needs?

Ability to Address Opportunities for Improvement

How well does the alternative address opportunities for improvement and meet Admissions’ business needs?

Cost and Value How does the cost of this alternative compare with the value it will produce to the organization?

Applicant Satisfaction To what degree does this alternative impact Admissions’ ability to improve external applicant satisfaction?

Position for Addressing Future Needs

How well does this alternative position Admissions for addressing future needs that have not yet been defined?

Opportunity to Leverage System

How well does this alternative position the State Bar to use this system to support non-Admissions functions and other functions in other departments?

Risk

How significant are the key areas of risk associated with the alternative, including financial, technical, organizational, operational and project management risks associated with implementing the alternative?

In assessing each Strategy Alternative, Gartner used the rating scale of green, yellow or red, defined in the table below.




Table 8. Strategy Rating Scale

Rating Description

“Green Light” (Acceptable to Excellent): The alternative fully meets or exceeds Admissions’ business objectives.

“Yellow Light” (Caution): The alternative only partially meets Admissions’ business objectives.

“Red Light” (Poor): The alternative does not meet Admissions’ business objectives.

Alternative I—Continue As Is (Status Quo) evaluation ratings and descriptions are described in the table below.

Table 9. Evaluation Results for Alternative I

Evaluation Criteria

Rating Evaluation


This alternative will not provide for any increased functionality or improvement of end-user needs now or in the future.


Continuing as is will not enable Admissions to address opportunities for improvement or meet the changing or additional business needs.

Cost and Value

There is no cost associated with this alternative outside of ongoing maintenance and potential operating system upgrade; however, it will not provide value to the organization.


This alternative will not improve external applicant satisfaction; it may minimally improve satisfaction if business processes are modified to reduce times and redundancies.


Admissions will not be able to address future needs, as the system and underlying technology are severely limited.


This alternative does not provide any opportunity to be leveraged or combined with other systems within the State Bar.

Risk

There is limited to no risk in regard to financial and project management risk, moderate technical risk of eventual obsolescence, and high potential risk organizationally and operationally with this alternative.

Evaluation of Alternative II—Convert code to contemporary platform and continue to modify the Admissions system to best meet end-user needs evaluation ratings and descriptions are described in the table below.




Table 10. Evaluation Results for Alternative II

Evaluation Criteria

Rating Evaluation


This alternative will somewhat address the immediate technology platform need but will limit the extent of modifications to meet future needs.


This alternative will enable Admissions to address opportunities for improvement to a limited extent; business processes will need to be re-engineered to maximize the improvement of the system.

Cost and Value

The cost to convert the code to a contemporary platform is moderate, as is the value it will provide to the organization.


Applicant satisfaction will possibly improve; however, business process modifications would be necessary to realize any system benefits.


Admissions will be limited to what future needs the system will be able to address, based on the limited improvement in technology.


The State Bar may be able to leverage/interface information out of the system to a membership system.

Risk

Each of the risks is considered to be moderate (financial, technical, organizational, operational and project management).

Evaluation of Alternative III—Transition to newer technology and implement a new admissions system evaluation ratings and descriptions are described in the table below.

Table 11. Evaluation Results for Alternative III

Evaluation Criteria

Rating Evaluation


Immediate needs would partially need to be met by the current system until the new system is implemented, during which time business process changes should occur; future needs will be met by a new system.


This alternative will enable Admissions to address opportunities for improvement and meet Admissions’ business needs.

Cost and Value

The initial and ongoing cost of this alternative will be more; however, the organization will realize cost savings and increase in value through improved processes, reporting and workflow.


Applicant satisfaction should drastically improve, with Admissions being able to reduce time frames, provide automatic and timely updates and reduce errors.


Utilizing new technology and a new system will position Admissions to meet future needs.


The State Bar will be able to leverage the system to function as a module of an overall bar system and provide interfaces to outside parties.




Risk

This alternative has moderate financial, technical, organizational, operational and project management risks associated with implementing the alternative.

5.5.2.1.2 Summary of Evaluation Results

The table below summarizes Gartner’s evaluation of the three Strategy Alternatives.

Table 12. Summary of System Strategy Alternatives

Strategy Alternative

Address Immediate and Future

Needs

Ability to Address

Opportunities for

Improvement

Cost and Value


Position for Addressing

Future Needs

Opportunity to

Leverage System

Risk

Continue As Is (Status Quo)

Convert code to contemporary platform and continue to modify

Transition to newer technology and implement a new Admissions system

5.5.2.1.3 Strategic Alternatives Recommendations

Admissions must take action to improve both its underlying technology and admissions systems; it will not be able upgrade its system(s) to realize its business drivers or increased functionality without moving off the AS/400. Converting the code to a contemporary platform would only be a short-term resolution that will only provide marginal results with a limited increase in functionality. While the AS/400 is a robust platform, the State Bar needs to develop a migration path to more-current and supportive technologies. Gartner suggest that the State Bar move to a server-based environment and update and/or purchase new applications to run its back-office operations and, more importantly, for this business case, the Admissions system.

Again, for the State Bar to implement and manage a new suite of applications, specifically an Admissions system, the IT Department needs to move to 24/7 support. This is primarily a result of online application completion and online application status.

Based on Gartner’s evaluation of the Strategy Alternatives against Admissions’ business drivers, the State Bar should transition off the AS/400 and Admissions should implement a new system.

Gartner recommends that the Admissions system should eventually be a part of a larger Bar system that integrates the State Bar’s other support systems, including membership, back-office applications (finance, HR), Court, DA, etc. However, transitioning Admissions to a new system has many organizational and process change risks that need to be resolved through re-engineering and updating business processes. The State Bar should wait until the technical environment and new Admissions system are stable prior to moving to an overall “Bar System.”




5.5.2.2 Execution Alternatives

Upon recommendation of the strategic alternative, it is important to identify, evaluate and recommend an Admissions system execution alternative. The execution alternatives examine the viable options for selecting a new system for Admissions. Gartner has identified three broad potential alternatives for Admissions:

Alternative A: Custom-develop application with third party (Make).

Alternative B-1: Procure a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) system and customize to fit needs (Buy).

Alternative B-2: Procure a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) system, undertake moderate customization and implement policy, procedure and process changes.

Alternative C: Transfer a system and customize to fit needs from another state bar (Transfer).

The execution alternatives were based on best practices, data gathering and research into the marketplace. Gartner identified four (4) alternatives for replacing the State Bar’s Admissions system. Each of the execution alternatives is explained and defined in the table below:

Table 13. System Alternatives

Alt. # Alternative Name Alternative Definition

A Custom Solution Contract with an application development vendor to custom-develop a new, comprehensive application to meet Admissions’ business and technical requirements.

B-1 COTS (with customization) Procure a COTS product and customize the product to meet business requirements that are not met off-the-shelf. No business policy, procedure or process change will occur.

B-2 COTS (with customization and policy, procedure and process change)

Procure a COTS product and implement the solution with some customization. Admissions’ business policy, procedure and processes will also be changed to match the COTS product workflow.

C Transfer Solution Transfer/purchase an existing custom solution developed for another state bar and modify the solution to meet Admissions’ business and technical requirements.

5.5.2.2.1 How Should Admissions Select the Best Execution Alternative?

In considering and selecting the optimum alternative, best practices and Gartner recommend that Admissions have the following evaluation criteria in support of the selected the best alternative:

Gartner identified and used seven major criteria (which are each comprised of several sub-categories outlined on subsequent pages) to qualitatively assess each alternative. Alternatives were:

Evaluated on business value, technical fit, maintainability, schedule and risk, independent of one another

Comparatively evaluated against one another for total cost of ownership and return on investment

The seven major criteria are identified in the table below:




Table 14. Major Qualitative Assessment Categories

Criteria Criterion Description

Business Value Degree to which the solution is strategically aligned with Admissions’ business strategy and how well it addresses key functional requirements.

Total Cost of Ownership

Magnitude of cost for system design, implementation and oversight, plus ongoing maintenance and support.

Return on Investment

Measure of the cost-benefit of the solution, taking into account the initial and ongoing costs over the avoided cost of imminent enhancements and upgrades, and the expected financial benefits to the organization.

Technical Fit Degree to which the solution addresses critical technical requirements, including those related to technical architecture, system stability and reliability, and security.

Maintainability Measure of the solution’s scalability, adaptability and extensibility (i.e., how readily the system can be modified to accommodate changes in processes, statutes, policies, etc.).

Schedule Measure of how quickly the proposed strategy can be implemented to provide full business value to the organization (all modules implemented).

Risk High-level assessment of the financial, technical, business and project management risks associated with implementing the proposed strategy.

The sub-categories to the main seven criteria are outlined in the table below.

Table 15. Detail Subcriteria for Qualitative Assessment Categories

Evaluation Criteria Definition

Business Value A measure of the strategic and operational benefits from implementing the alternative.

Strategic Alignment How well does the alternative facilitate Admissions’ business strategy and the business objectives of the State Bar?

Addresses Functional Requirements

How well does the alternative meet Admissions’ business needs?

Total Cost of Ownership (TCO)

A measure of the total cost of ownership for the alternative. These costs include the price of software, hardware and implementation services, as well as personnel requirements to support the design, implementation and support of the alternative.

System Design Cost What is the cost of system design in comparison to other alternatives?

Implementation and Oversight Cost

What is the cost for implementation and oversight services in comparison to other alternatives?

Ongoing Maintenance and Support Cost

What are the ongoing maintenance and support costs in comparison to other alternatives?

Return on Investment (ROI)

A ratio of benefits to costs. Other factors include time to ROI realization.

Cost What are the total costs for the implementation of this alternative? How quickly are the costs incurred? How does this cost map to budget constraints or allocated funding?




Benefit What are the benefits gained (increased revenues, efficiencies gained, improved morale, etc.) via the implementation of this solution? How quickly are they achieved?

Technical Fit A measure of how well the solution alternative meets the State Bar’s and Admissions’ technical requirements.

Technical Architecture Constraints

Does the solution alternative avoid imposing any technical restrictions on the State Bar (i.e., open architecture, etc.)? Will the architecture and design operate in the technical environment?

Reliability Is the solution based on proven technology and will it provide adequate performance? Has the solution been implemented in environments similar to that of the State Bar?

Security Is the solution acceptable from a security and data integrity perspective?

Maintainability A measure of how adaptable the solution alternative is to changes in users’, transaction volume, business and maintenance requirements.

Scalability Can the solution accommodate a significant increase in users, deployment sites or transactions?

Adaptability and Extensibility

Can the solution be easily modified or enhanced to support new requirements or changing requirements?

Supportability Can the solution be easily maintained or supported or will specific expertise be required?

Schedule A measure of how quickly the solution will be implemented into the State Bar.

Risk A measure of how well the solution alternative mitigates overall risk.

Financial Risk Does the alternative carry any significant financial risk to Admissions or the State Bar (i.e., overall cost, contractual terms, support burden, etc.)?

Technical Risk Does the alternative carry any significant technical risk to Admissions or the State Bar (i.e., non-standard components, protocols, programming languages, bandwidth concerns, etc.)?

Operational Risk Does the alternative carry any significant operational risk to Admissions or the State Bar (i.e., interface, data conversion, resource constraint, deployment risks that could impact operations)?

In assessing each alternative, Gartner used the below rating scale of green, yellow and red.

Table 16. Alternative Rating Scale

Rating Description

“Green Light” (Acceptable to Excellent): The alternative rates very well for the evaluation criterion in question.

“Yellow Light” (Caution): The alternative rates adequately for the evaluation criterion in question.

“Red Light” (Poor): The alternative rates poorly for the evaluation criterion in question.




5.5.2.2.2 Summary of Execution Evaluation Results

The table below summarizes Gartner’s evaluation of the four system implementation alternatives and their related score/rating; a recommendation and discussion follow.

Table 17. Summary of Implementation Alternatives

Alternative A B-1 B-2 C

Criteria Custom Solution COTS (with

customization)

COTS (with customization and

policy, procedure and process change)

Transfer Solution(with customization

and policy, procedure and

process change)

Business Value

TCO

ROI

Technical Fit

Maintainability

Schedule

Risk

Final Rating

5.5.2.2.3 Recommended Execution Alternative

The recommended system implementation strategy is:

Alternative B-2—COTS with customization and policy, procedure and process changes.

Implement an integrated commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) Admissions system or system module solution with modification (customization) to the basic system to meet Admissions’ needs and uniqueness. The recommended approach includes the following:

Modify Admissions’ policies, procedures and processes to incorporate the best practices to:

1. Reduce inefficiencies and redundant processes

2. Align with policies, procedures and processes embedded within the purchased COTS package.




Based on the assessment above, best practices, and interviews that Gartner has conducted with staff, admissions and IT, Admissions should look to purchase an off-the-shelf application and customize to meet its needs. Admissions should assess the viability of other state bar applications as well as consider the use of human resource applications that could provide an application foundation for a new admission system. Gartner recommends minimizing customization as much as possible through alignment of Admissions’ processes to those of the purchased system.

The Admission’s Department is in need of significant business process re-engineering that should serve as the foundation for an implementation of a new Admissions system. The current business processes were developed more than 10 to 15 years ago and are based on antiquated technology and manual processes, and have no insight into the pervasive nature and value the Internet offers the Admissions process.

Based on the five-year growth projections in Section 3.3—Anticipated Admissions Growth Trends, Admissions will experience an increased demand on individual staff and supervisor time, putting an increased strain on an already resource-constrained organization. If business process improvements are not made and subsequent system enhancements are not accomplished within the next two to three years, Admissions will need to hire additional staff to meet the increased demand of new applicants/members to the California Bar. If changes are made (i.e., business process improvements supported by the acquisition and deployment of a new Admission system, and the enhancement to the current State Bar technical environment), existing staff will be able to support future workloads as well as proactively resolve issues/problems and focus on driving savings to the State Bar as a whole.

Admissions recognizes the need to change its processes with a new system—not to mimic its current processes. Improving admissions processes will result in a longer development, customization and implementation time frame; however, staff feel comfortable staying on the current system to ensure the appropriate and desired changes take place. Interviewees felt they could “limp” along on the current system for at least two more years.

5.6 High-Level Cost Estimate

5.6.1 One-Time Costs

For the recommended execution strategy above, Table 4 illustrates the low and high estimates for one-time costs for the implementation of a typical system of similar scope to the Admissions system. Please note this does not include the costs to migrate the current IT environment to a more robust, secure and supportable 24/7 operation hosted on contemporary technology or hardware costs associated with the new Admissions System.

Table 18. One-Time Costs for the Admissions System

Admissions System Low High

One-Time Costs

Core Application Software $700,000 $1,100,000

Customization and Configuration $850,000 $1,300,000

System Integrator and Project Manager $550,000 $850,000

Contingency (10%) $210,000 $325,000

Total One-Time Costs $2,310,000 $3,575,000

Section 6—Project Implementation Plan—The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page 64



Section 6—Project Implementation Plan




6.0 Project Implementation The implementation strategy was developed based on the selected strategy and execution alternatives, Gartner’s analysis of Admissions’ readiness for system implementation, the scope of the anticipated Admissions project, successful implementations of similar systems in other similar organizations, Gartner research, and Gartner experience with implementation of other similar types of systems.

This section includes the following key areas

Project Schedule

Project Team Organization

Project Team Roles and Responsibilities

Project Management

Key Aspects/Steps and Recommendations for the Development of:

Ancillary Program Plans

Configuration Management

Risk Management

Master Test Plan

Training Plan

Independent Validation and Verification Plan

Quality Assurance and Project Monitoring

Organizational Change Management

Implementation Planning

Deployment and Implementation Support

Acquisition Strategy

In addition, based on best practices and Gartner experience, it is highly recommended that the following project management practices occur:

Admissions needs to own the project and have representatives from each business area heavily involved

There must be high-level executive management support, with the Executive Director as the project sponsor

Utilize the services of a system integrator and an outside project manager to review business processes, customize the COTS system, and implement and test the new Admissions System.

Admissions shall project-manage the project and select a project manager from within Admissions’ management

Information Technology should not be the project manager of the project, but should be heavily involved on a daily basis




Following is a recommended project schedule that depicts key tasks, probable durations and related dependencies:




6.1 Project Schedule Anticipated project schedule from planning through implementation:




6.2 Project Team Organization The Admissions system implementation will need clear, formal project governance, and defined organizational roles and responsibilities, project management plans and project schedule prior to implementation. Management sponsorship, support and direction for the project within Admissions and within the State Bar will be critical to project success.

The chart below displays a representative organization for the proposed project team.

Project Sponsor

Project Steering Committee

Project Director – Project Manager (Admissions)

System Integrator / Project Manager

Business Unit Liasons IT Liason

Admissions Project TeamSystem Integrator Project

Team

Quality Assurance

Gartner recommends establishing a core project team of six individuals, plus the system integrator team and project manager, consisting of the following:

Project Manager (Admissions Internal)—1

Core Project Team Business Area—4, consisting of team members from:

Admissions—2

Moral Character Development—1

Operations and Management—1

Information Technology—1

Either to support or be a part of the core project team (inclusive of the above for Moral Character and Operations and Management), Business Unit Liaisons shall support the project team and consist of a representative from:




Administration

Educational Standards

Moral Character Determinations

Examinations

Operations and Management

Information Technology

6.2.1 Project Team Roles and Responsibilities

Since a project organization structure is so vital to success, Admissions must continue to define and develop a fully functional project organization structure, including:

Project Sponsor

Designate an executive-level stakeholder to be the Project Sponsor so as to assure that project ownership is at the highest level possible in the State Bar. The Sponsor will provide policy leadership and oversight, and review and resolve policy, fiscal and resource allocation issues that cannot be resolved at lower levels. It is important that the Project Sponsor have influence and control over the State Bar as a whole.

Project Steering Committee

Establish an active Project Steering Committee jointly, with business areas participating in the implementation. Membership should include senior managers from appropriate business units and information technology manager(s) for the State Bar.

Appoint a senior manager to chair the Steering Committee, which performs the following functions:

1. Responsibility for oversight of the project, ensuring that deliverables and functionality are achieved as defined in subsequent project plans

2. Ensures coordination by establishing and sponsoring collaboration across organizational boundaries

3. Reviews and resolves project issues not resolved at lower levels

4. Provides advice and insight into project management issues

5. Responsibility for executive-level oversight of control agency reviews and other observation processes to ensure that planned project objectives are achieved in accordance with the approved Project Plan.

Project Manager

Admissions Internal Project Manager – Charter a senior manager within Admissions as an internal Admissions Project Manager to give leadership and policy direction to project activities throughout the project life cycle. Direct the Project Manager to plan and direct the functions of the Admissions Project Team with responsibility for project progress.

Contracted Project Manager – Charter a contracted (external) Project Manager to provide leadership and direction to project activities throughout the project life cycle. Direct the Project Manager to plan and direct the functions of the entire Project Team with responsibility for project progress. The Project Manager will direct both Admissions and System Integrator project teams to provide operational direction in day-to-day management of project activities.




System Integrator

Contract with a system integrator to provide services to review business processes, customize a COTS system, and implement and test the new Admissions System.

Project Management Team

Establish the Project Management Team as a cooperative, working partnership unit comprised of Admissions and vendor Project Managers—both with clearly defined roles. They will be responsible for operational management of the project.

Assign clear responsibility for resource allocation and tracking, day-to-day operational direction, and overall implementation duties for all phases of the project to the Project Managers.

Assign responsibility to the Admissions Project Manager to ensure that Admissions and business units are fully represented throughout the project, that systems integration is accomplished, and that communication of issues and progress is maintained.

Project Team

The Admissions Project Team will be responsible for:

Carrying out day-to-day activities across all phases of the project

Conducting or directly managing daily operations such as specification development, quality control inspections, testing and other activities to ensure that planned project objectives are achieved in accordance with the approved Project Plan

The Project Team should be expanded as needed to include appropriate resources at various points in the project progress as needed.

Business Unit Liaisons

Designate business area experts for responsible positions on or in direct support of the Project Team. As knowledgeable staff from each unit/function, they will:

Provide business area expertise and maintain effective two-way communication with their business units

Serve in a hands-on capacity as team leads

Otherwise assist the Project Manager

IV&V Vendor

Contract with an independent project oversight vendor to work within the project to conduct validation and verification activities, including review of project processes and deliverables, and attendance at certain scheduled meetings.

6.2.2 Project Management

Establish a fully defined Project Management Plan (PMP) including the following components:

Project Oversight—Establish project oversight where the primary vehicle will be the skills and experience of the Project Director and Project Manager, supported by:

A robust project management toolkit founded on industry best practices

Involvement of the Project Steering Committee

Use of a robust project management methodology

Support of a qualified project IV&V vendor




Deliverables Definition

Define and specify deliverable goals as project benchmarks. Identify prerequisite and interdependent deliverables and establish priorities, along with the place in the project, for each deliverable. Define and document conditions and acceptance criteria for development and acceptance.

Schedule and Timeline

Develop an overall time frame and work plan early in the planning process for the anticipated project. Document a project schedule showing all major activities, order of priorities and concurrent activities as a guideline for project planning and coordination.

Resource Planning

Identify both external and internal resource needs for planned activities and anticipated schedule. Estimate cost for each factor in the acquisition schedule based on the definition of project deliverables. Establish and document a project budget as a basis for analysis of funding needs and timing of resource acquisition.

Internal Resource Plan

Define resource requirements to determine the need and timing for internal staffing, material and support. Indicate the quantity and timing for obtaining internal resources in project plans and schedule. Plan to assign personnel or obtain staffing and other resources from current or newly identified sources.

Project Information Toolbox (PIT)

Utilize any tools included in the current environment to create a single location to store, organize, track, control and disseminate all information and items produced by and delivered to the project. The PIT should include a file structure with defined access and permissions, as well as an interface such as the Web page in use for the project, where project information and the latest documentation can be obtained, and issues or comments input to the project.

Project Planning and Tracking

Educate all management, technical personnel, business staff and vendors on project management activities including:

Project initiation activities

Detailed role and responsibility definition

Issue tracking, escalation and resolution

Change request approval and tracking

Schedule/milestone tracking and resource allocation

Budget management and expenditure control

Deliverable/product review and approval and other acceptance criteria

Vendor management

Project success evaluation criteria and project close-out activities

Status and other reporting expectations

Relationships to other IT or business efforts




6.2.3 Ancillary Program Plans

Develop special ancillary program plans for implementation support including:

Requirements Capture and Management—Establish a formal requirements capture and management process to be responsive to needed changes and to be conscientious in managing the impact of change. Changes to business and technical requirements can occur anytime in the project, especially as a result of technology testing or implementation, revisions in project budget, and emerging needs. Key elements of the Requirements Capture and Management process will include:

Assumption Definition, Traceability and Tracking

Business and Technical Requirement Definition, Traceability, Verification and Tracking

Phase and Product Entry and Exit (Acceptance) Criteria Definition, Tracking and Signoff

Procurement and Contracts Management—Designate a Contract Manager on the project to ensure contracted agreements are fulfilled and change implications properly assessed, and to foster expeditious resolution of issues. Develop a formal Contract Management Plan to define the roles and responsibilities of all those involved in managing the procurement and contracts required. The Plan will document the specific roles, responsibilities and activities needed to manage all procurement activities associated with the proposed solution. Effective contract management is extremely important and will contribute substantially to successful delivery of Information Technology projects such as the proposed solution.

6.2.4 Configuration Management (CM)

Establish configuration management policies and practices as a key element in managing technical change, anticipating and mitigating implementation and migration issues, and ensuring that documentation is consistent and coherent, and reflects the current system baseline accurately.

Develop a formal Configuration Management Plan to define roles, responsibilities and procedures for use by management, technical staff ,business staff, and vendor personnel involved in the project, and to guide the production of configuration documentation consistent with established practices.

6.2.5 Risk Management Plan

Establish a formal Risk Management Plan for the proposed solution implementation and review the initial risks identified as outlined in the next section (Section 7—Critical Project Risks and Mitigation Strategies) and the mitigating action plans recommended in a Risk Management program.

Perform periodic, formal risk assessment activities, scheduled as appropriate, into the master project milestones and document the processes, roles, responsibilities and mitigation approach in the project’s Risk Management Plan.

6.2.6 Master Test Plan

Develop a Master Test Plan that describes the approach to fully test all components of the solution. This plan describes test control and approval processes, test participants, how testing




will interface with the configuration management process, and test documentation expectations. Additional test plans should be developed describing the detailed testing methodologies, requirements, schedules, test scripts and expected test results for each area of testing including unit, integration, interface, load, system (alpha), beta and user acceptance testing.

6.2.7 Training Plan

Develop a formal Training Plan to document training requirements and an approach for updating training requirements, developing training curricula, and deploying the training programs for both technical and business staff. The project will develop one or several training tracks for Admissions employees that will be specific to technical and business staff needs for development, implementation and system operations.

6.2.8 Independent Validation and Verification (IV&V) Plan

Employ an IV&V support vendor to provide third-party program oversight from an IT and industry-standards perspective. This third-party, independent review and assessment of the project’s work products and the overall system is intended to ensure compliance with system functional, performance, operational, legal and regulatory requirements. IV&V includes a review of the overall project performance, governance and management processes, as well project deliverables.

6.2.9 Quality Assurance and Project Monitoring

Develop a Quality Assurance Plan to ensure that the project meets identified business and technical objectives and requirements and, at a minimum, contains the following elements:

Measurable objectives and functional requirements

Acceptance testing plan

Regularly scheduled audits/reviews of key tasks

Identification of quality assurance responsibility with Project Steering Committee

Employ project monitoring that is well-defined and disciplined

Track and report project status on an ongoing basis

Hold regularly scheduled status meetings including the project managers, project team members and the development vendor to discuss project progress, issues/issue resolution and next steps

Conduct Project Steering Committee meetings regularly to discuss project progress, change requests and open issues

Provide independent, objective input to the Steering Committee from the project oversight consultant

Use standard reporting mechanisms for status reports, issues lists and risk management updates

6.2.10 Organizational Change Management

Given that a project of this magnitude will impose change in the environment and may cause a potentially negative reaction by employees to that change, Admissions needs to undertake a comprehensive set of organizational change management activities, including:




Development of a Change Management Plan

Involvement of people throughout Admissions and any other potential participating departments

Formal kickoffs of phases and celebrations of milestones

Clear, consistent and visible executive sponsorship

Train-the-trainer activities

End-user involvement and business process analysis will help with user acceptance and will ensure that broken processes aren’t simply automated

6.3 Implementation Planning Admissions needs to ensure that organizational, technical and operational readiness for system activation occurs with proactive implementation planning. The project team needs to begin planning for incremental implementation early in the project life cycle and prepare for system implementation with definition of priorities. In addition, Admissions needs to:

Establish implementation plans, priorities, schedules and timelines

Formulate plans for several discrete activities affecting implementation, including:

Knowledge transfer program

Data conversion program

System operation and support

User training program

6.3.1 Knowledge Transfer Program

Actively pursue a knowledge transfer program during implementation to:

Define vendor roles and responsibilities for guiding knowledge transfer

Develop knowledge transfer program in collaboration with vendor

Orient and familiarize both technical and functional personnel with the design, documentation and operation of the system. Convey to all affected departments how the system is built and will function. Develop a depth of systems understanding within Admissions staff being involved and observing the design and development activity of the project.

6.3.2 User Training

Start planning and developing plans for training well in advance of any actual training sessions to establish the correct focus in developing the training approach and materials. Timing and training format are important factors, whether by classroom or document-oriented training. Determine who will conduct training and develop a training program format and schedule to be completed for implementation.

6.3.3 Data Conversion

Initiate conversion planning well before implementation and assign responsibility so that critical and usually complicated action can be completed on time for implementation to accomplish the following:




Determine what historical information and updates are needed for implementation

Determine which data cleansing methods will be needed

Establish when conversion is to be accomplished

Integrate systems and maintenance into enterprise operations

Include systems interface and integration in implementation plans as requirements become known, and define vendor roles and responsibilities for them

Define, document and factor warranty and maintenance into implementation plans

Develop integration plans in conjunction with design and development, especially focused on incremental development of best-of-breed components

Accumulate implementation planning data from defining component implementation plans and schedules for development, testing and implementation phases

6.3.4 Deployment and Implementation Support

Proactively plan for deployment: analyze system, operations, environmental, staffing and infrastructure needs. Admissions needs to ensure it specifies participants and responsibility, communication channels and liaison, infrastructure requirements, priorities and timing. Allow enough lead time to coordinate all the complicated aspects of system and equipment deployment. Additionally, Admissions should:

Thoroughly plan and orchestrate the turnover to permit a smooth transition

Anticipate and coordinate database conversion in connection with initiating production

Turn over fully tested and accepted systems to production

Comprehend post-implementation activity and support

Validate systems performance and function, as well as support provided in accordance with contractual terms

Clearly define, document and confirm vendor roles and responsibilities regarding warranty and maintenance support for a specified time frame

6.4 Acquisition Strategy The State Bar and Admissions need to develop a comprehensive acquisition strategy to procure a COTS application. Tasks that need to be included in the acquisition strategy include the following:

Integrate the State Bar procurement group into the project team

Utilize a structured acquisition process to reduce risk and increase probability of success

Apply procurement best practices to define and acquire services and products

Develop a comprehensive list of viable vendors

Spell out in contractual arrangements, in as much detail as is feasible and possible, specific requirements and conditions to be met by the acquired product or service

Begin development of key procurement documents, including:

Background and objectives of the procurement

Application and technical systems architectures




Define requirements for vendor procurement and contract award

Use scripted scenarios to evaluate and test acquisition candidates

Hold discussions and meetings with each of the viable vendors to determine overall feasibility, business process matches and potential customization needs.

Develop detailed gap analysis

Develop vendor shortlist to enter into detailed process and cost discussions

Require and verify shortlisted vendor references for similar products and services

Negotiate purchase price and customization price with potential vendors

Determine best vendor fit

Develop Vendor statement of work (SOW) and service-level agreements (SLAs)

Define the role of the vendor partner to specify the:

Expected working and contractual relationship

Deliverables required and timing of milestones

Method of testing and acceptance for all products delivered

Expected post-implementation support

Finalize and complete the agreement with the desired vendor

Expect vendors to provide products and services that conform to project methodologies and management standards, and to produce specific project management documents and reports

The next section examines critical project risks and mitigation strategies that Admissions needs to consider and address throughout the project life cycle.

Section 7—Critical Project Risks and Mitigation Strategies—The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page 78



Section 7—Critical Project Risks and Mitigation Strategies




7.0 Critical Project Risks and Mitigation Strategies This section identifies key project risks that were identified as a result of the business interviews with key staff and Gartner’s independent assessment and review of project risks and mitigation strategies that focus on business value, budget, schedule, operational, organizational and external risk areas.

7.1 Key Risks Identified Below are key risks that were identified during Gartner’s interviews and meetings with Admissions representatives; they are divided between processes/people and technology.

7.1.1 Processes/People

The Admissions processes redesign and improvement should be addressed before a new system is put in place—many are broken or are not optimized from either a productivity or client-facing standpoint. To move to a new system without looking at how to improve the current processes will lead to automating poor processes and thus will not gain Admissions the needed (or expected) improvements articulated in this Business Case.

There is some perception that the organization is not ready for change. It has been indicated that certain staff may want to change their current processes. Getting staff engaged and involved on the project may be difficult; staff is hesitant to change and undergo new system training.

Those that do see the benefits to a new system want to be involved with priority setting and process changes.

Given current workloads and, depending on the time of year, some staff feel that Admissions does not have the bandwidth to assist with process mapping, process improvement and implementation assistance of a new system. Admissions’ ability to provide needed subject matter expertise to support the selection, development and deployment of a new system needs to be closely examined.

No one has indicated that they or any else would be willing to spearhead the effort as a project manager; most individuals envision looking to IT to manage. There needs to be a strong and skilled Project Manager and resources from within Admissions.

7.1.2 Technology

Admissions should buy vs. build a new application. There is no bandwidth within the organization to custom-develop an application, and there would be a tendency to maintain current processes. An off-the-shelf system will serve as a catalyst to change.

Admissions would not be able to support a full, one-time transition (“big bang”) to a new system; a phased/portfolio approach to a new system will reduce overall risk and improve adoption.

There is fear of IT not being able to parallel two systems during implementation and to run a system 24/7 “IT shop.” IT needs to proactively address concerns and communicate its directions, milestones and success within the organization.




7.2 Project Risk Details This section provides an independent review and assessment of the risks associated with the implementation and deployment of a new Admissions system for the State Bar. It further identifies and suggests mitigation strategies, and provides recommendations to ensure that the project meets schedule, scope and budget requirements.

The major elements considered in the assessment are:

Business Value Risk

Budget and Schedule Risk

Operational Risk

Organizational Risk

External Risk

Rating—Gartner’s rating of the approach is based upon Project Management Institute (PMI) standards. To highlight potential risks to the project for each project management knowledge area, Gartner uses a “Red Light/Yellow Light/Green Light” reporting strategy relative to the project as documented below:

Rating Description

“Green Light” (Acceptable to Excellent, i.e., “Low Risk”): The approach meets or exceeds solid project management and system implementation standards. To receive this ranking, the approach must present no significant risks to the project.

“Yellow Light” (Caution, i.e., “Medium Risk”): The approach is not clearly defined, and/or presents a risk to the project. Recommendations for risk areas assigned this rating are important to ensure optimal project operation.

“Red Light” (Risk Alert, i.e., “High Risk”): The approach presents serious risks to the project and requires immediate attention. Recommendations for risk areas assigned this rating are essential for mitigating project risk.

NA Not Applicable: The risk area does not apply to the project at this time.

Recommendations—Gartner’s recommendations for improvement and risk mitigation are presented in the following risk analysis.

Areas of Potential Risk Rating Comments

Business Benefit Risk

1. Benefit Specification

Develop specific, measurable business and system performance benefits (e.g., reduce Moral Character process to 80 days). Finalize the elements of the required system including architecture, system functional requirements, and desired strategy for a phased deployment of functionality to end users. Items that need to be finalized include: Business/Functional Requirements Technical Requirements System Interface Requirements Vendor Statement of Work Admissions Resource Commitments





2. Benefit Measurement

Formalize Benefits Metrics for the new system and establish a process to measure results to expectations. Ensure that the formal metrics are developed and measured during the phased implementation and deployment of the system. In addition, these metrics should be constructed as service levels within a service-level agreement (SLA) framework in the contract as an incentive to the vendor to meet Admissions’ business objectives. Ensure that implementation milestones/deliverables are established and linked to any vendor payment schedule.

3. Value Management

The scope of the Admissions system project needs to be solidified to determine what the system will completely encompass, including any additional areas outside of Admissions that it may need to support or provide information to (e.g., Membership, Finance). Need to finalize scope, determine process and criteria for scope change. A joint Change Control process within Admissions and any other potential business areas needs to be put in place regarding the management of system changes.

4. Planning for Future System Operational Costs

Ongoing costs need to be defined (e.g., ongoing in-house and vendor technical support, maintenance costs, ongoing training, future enhancements and interfaces). Ensure that vendor agreements include detailed vendor responsibilities for ongoing operational support, training and maintenance, including service-level agreements (SLAs) and performance metrics/measures for items such as bug fixes, system modifications and enhancements.

5. Project Cost Management

Define processes to ensure that project costs are managed throughout the project’s life cycle. Ensure that knowledge transfer and training from the vendor to the internal support staff have been developed and included in any vendor agreements, and are conducted early-on.

6. System Performance Management

Ensure a process is established to reconcile system capabilities (following deployment) with the business requirements and critical success factors and that a process is being established to resolve the differences between system capabilities and business requirements. The agreement should stipulate the vendor’s responsibilities for meeting the documented system performance requirements and the process to be used to mitigate issues that surface during deployment and operational use. Admissions needs to define its approach to system post-implementation performance validation and management. Items that need to be addressed include: Identification of Critical Business Process Success Factors Identification of Critical System Operational Success Factors The process to be used to measure and validate whether the

system has met the above success factors The arbitration and issues resolution process to be used in the

event of a disagreement between the vendor(s) and the State





Bar. Any penalties or “payment hold-backs” The above process needs to be included in the forthcoming agreement.

7. Project Prioritization

Management needs to hold regular meetings to check on progress of the project. The Project Team needs ongoing commitment from management in the form of additional resource and support when necessary. Also, that the Project Team is getting commitment from management in terms of active engagement and resolution of issues. Establishment of a joint Project Steering Committee comprised of representatives of Admissions, IT, executive management and other participating departments, is strongly recommended. The joint Steering Committee should meet regularly (i.e., monthly) to assess progress, address issues and make recommendations. Lastly, develop a governance process for the escalation and remediation of issues brought before the Steering Committee.

8. Complexity Management

Project scope must be clearly defined. All deliverables required to issue an agreement have been completed and reviewed and approved by the management team.All potentially impacted people are involved in the project. System design/configuration and contract documents are to be signed off by all business areas affected. Develop, in conjunction with participating business areas, needed key systems documentation such as the application architecture, phased deployment plan, etc., to ensure all areas have been addressed and there is consensus on the proposed solution.

Budget and Schedule Risk

9. Estimation Quality

Admissions has a high-level project implementation timeline and an associated estimated project budget based on the current scope of the project. Once the final scope of the project is known, the implementation plan and budget should be revisited, updated, developed at a more detailed level and vetted with key stakeholders. The process used to complete this final estimation should be based on proven approaches, and should include ample representation of all participating business areas. Once the final project scope is known, develop a detailed project plan with specific tasks, deliverables and critical milestones identified. The plan needs to encompass all tasks of the project team, selected vendor/implementer, as well as internal and external support organizations. This plan will serve as a key input into the agreement process as well. The above Project Plan and supporting Project Budget need to be vetted by all key stakeholders and the Steering Committee.





10. Contractual

As the agreement is developed, it should include a deliverables-based contract and payment structure, as well as the State Bar’s contract terms and conditions to help ensure early identification of potential contract issues. Joint review of the agreement and associated documentation should be done with Admissions, IT and any other participating business areas early in the agreement development process. Develop specific documentation for the agreement including a proposed project implementation plan, schedule and phased deployment plan, while being open to proposed implementation approaches by vendors. The agreement should include post-production support, knowledge transfer and training requirements, as well as all the associated SLAs for each. In addition, the agreement needs to define how the project will be managed, the metrics that will be used to grade success, the specific roles and responsibilities of the vendor during each phase of the project, and the deliverables (required format and content—review cycle and approval process) associated with each deliverable during each phase. Admissions should ensure that it acquires the assistance of skilled contract negotiators, either internally or externally, for negotiations with the selected vendor.

11. Project Management

The Admissions system replacement project is a major undertaking for the State Bar and will require strong and effective project, financial and vendor management. The State Bar is strongly encouraged to leverage internal project management expertise from within the State Bar or other business areas that can provide this expertise. As a supplement if needed, the State Bar should seek the services of support contractors to provide additional expertise, best practices and support. Admissions is strongly encouraged to formalize a joint Project Steering Committee that will monitor and assess progress as well as provide needed leadership to address enterprise support issues. Project staffing plans need to address the potential for project management staff turnover and identify additional skilled project management resources that may be called upon during the project if required. Admissions needs to establish a strong Project Management Process and Team to support this effort. This includes both the technical and business process elements of the project as well as a strong vendor management and oversight component. The definition of the project team roles and responsibilities, the acquisition of required project management tools and data repositories, the development of project governance and review processes, issues and schedule management processes all need to be defined and put in place as standard practices for the project. In addition, individuals need to be identified to address such key roles as Configuration Management, Quality Assurance, System Testing, Data Conversion Planning and Execution, Training and Knowledge Transfer, Organizational Change Management, Vendor Management, and Risk Management and





Reporting. Lastly, Admissions should strongly consider contracting with an independent project oversight vendor to work within the project, conducting validation and verification activities, including review of project processes and deliverables, and attendance at certain scheduled meetings.

12. Project Resources

Internal resources that require significant training need to be identified, and ensure that there are training plans in place. Identify key project roles that will require full-time resources or dedication of a significant portion of time. Potential key project roles for Admissions and IT to consider include: System Architect, Test Lead, DBA, Conversion Lead, Business Analyst, Business Process Change Lead and Organizational Change Lead. Define a Project Succession Plan for critical roles on the project.

13. Budget Management

Once the final project scope is known, develop a detailed Project Budget that is linked to the Project Plan and Schedule. Consider using Earned Value budget tracking to provide the ability to gauge team productivity vs. work accomplished. Admissions should ensure the budget contains a management reserve to address any contingencies that may arise over the life of the project. Admissions needs to ensure that an internal accounting system or process is capable of tracking the project at the task level, including time spent by internal team members and vendors, hardware costs and other project costs. The accounting system needs to provide required reports in a timely manner to support ongoing project budget management.

14. Scope Management

The scope of the Admissions project needs to be solidified to determine what, if anything, the system will encompass beyond supporting the Admissions process. A finalized scope will form the foundation for developing processes for changing scope, and criteria for evaluating proposed scope changes. The project scope change control process and criteria for any potential joint scope changes between Admissions, business areas and other participating departments needs to be developed and vetted with key stakeholders. Implement an integrated change management and project reporting process that all participating business areas will utilize.

Operational Risk

15. Customization

It will be necessary for Admissions to customize the new system to meet some of its unique business processes; however, it is recommended to match the COTS functionality as closely as possible and concentrate customization on areas the COTS application does not have. By minimizing customization, and modifying business processes to leverage best practices built into the system, the approach significantly reduces the risk related to customization. Finalize the system/component interface requirements,





complexity and development approach for all elements of the new system, and define for inclusion (as appropriate) into the forthcoming agreement. Document the design and performance specifications for interfaces that will be developed by the vendor, and include in the forthcoming agreement.

16. Conversion Planning

Data conversion will be a critical activity for the project and, therefore, requires a focused resource to ensure all elements of this upcoming activity are well-defined and the required processes are in place. Admissions needs to define the role that the selected vendor/implementer will play in data conversion planning, conversion routine development, execution and validation, as well as how converted data will be validated. The development of service-level agreements (SLAs) and/or penalties associated with non-performance needs to take place. All the above need to be vetted before inclusion in the agreement.It is imperative that the vendor’s roles, responsibilities and process in the project’s data conversion activities, including associated SLAs, be defined. Include the process Admissions will use to provide the vendor with “mock conversion data,” the process that will be used to validate that converted data is accurate and complete, the process and time frame required to convert “production data” during the pilot, and phased deployment process, as well as how Admissions will approach any data synchronization issues during the phased deployment process and the vendor’s role in that process, and rectification of any data consistency issues. Assign a specific project team resource to spearhead the Conversion Planning and Execution process.

17. Integration Test Planning

With the potential integration of other applications with COTS (commercial off-the-shelf) applications, it is critical that the technical requirements for interfaces be fully defined. In addition, an assessment of the risks associated with the development of any related custom code and interfaces should be completed as soon as possible and vetted to all key stakeholders. The roles and responsibilities of the selected vendor in the support and performance of integration testing needs to be detailed for the forthcoming agreement. Define the overall systems interfaces in detail and their associated testing requirements (functionality and performance). Develop the project’s integration test strategy. Define the roles and responsibilities of the vendor in integration testing, and document associated SLAs.

18. Performance Test Planning

Define the overall system performance testing strategy, including the roles and responsibilities of the selected vendor in the support and performance of Performance Testing. Define the roles and responsibilities the vendor has in the development and execution of the performance test plan, as well as the success metrics that will be used to evaluate system





performance during each phase of the deployment (Pilot, Phase I, Phase II, etc.) and associated SLAs the vendor will have to meet. In addition, Admissions needs to define the issues resolution process that will be used to address issues that may surface as a result of system performance testing and post-implementation assessment activities. These items (as appropriate) need to be included in the forthcoming agreement.

19. IT Operations Support

IT support resources (internal and the vendor) need to be identified and involved as early as possible in the project. Admissions needs to develop the system turnover-to-production process and ongoing operational support requirements. Admissions needs to define the project’s phased implementation approach—specifically, which features and functions will be incorporated into each phased release and the anticipated internal and vendor support each will require. Admissions needs to define the requirements, deliverables and performance metrics/SLAs that the vendor will be responsible to meet during the above activities. These items need to be documented in the forthcoming agreement. In concert with the above findings, the project team needs to define the system’s overall operational support requirements and associated resource needs (internal and vendor[s]).

20. Vendor Support Planning

The vendor’s responsibilities and deliverables need to be defined for a number of key areas including: knowledge transfer and training, turnover to production and operational support, post-go-live system assessment and problem remediation, as well as their support requirements for “break-fix,” system enhancements and related post-production support needs. The above requirements, associated deliverables and performance metrics (i.e., SLAs) as well as Admissions’ oversight and process for this area, need to be defined and documented in the forthcoming agreement. In concert with the above findings, define the required vendor support responsibilities and associated SLAs in: Knowledge Transfer and Training Turnover-to-Production Support Post-Go-Live System Support Problem Remediation

Organization Risk

21. Organizational Change Management

Participation and adoption of process changes and the new system by end users is critical to the project’s success. Admissions needs to ensure that frequent/consistent communication, meetings and feedback channels between the project team and end users take place. This should be done via a change management team and a communication program/plan.

22. User Involvement

End-user involvement is critical to the project’s success and must be accomplished. Ongoing meetings/briefings need to be set up and conducted on an ongoing basis to ensure constant communication and to enhance end-user involvement in all





phases of the project.

23. External Stakeholders

Stakeholder impact analysis must be conducted and stakeholder communication process need to be developed and in put place. Stakeholders should include other State Bar departments and current third-party providers.

24. Training

End-user involvement during training will be critical to project success; Admissions must set up a training program as part of the system implementation. Training procedures and processes need to be developed. A training lead should be identified who would be responsible for monitoring the development and implementation of a training plan, securing resources and tracking the process/progress to make changes accordingly. Additionally, define in the agreement/SOW vendor requirements for training.

External Risk

25. Due Diligence

Due diligence must be performed on key vendors or providers prior to contract signing. Selection criteria should focus on the following: Robust system functionality Proven system implementation methodology Extensive tools for project management, system configuration,

data conversion and testing Technical team certified in proposed product’s technical

platform References for work of similar scope and magnitude PMI-certified Project Manager(s) or equivalent Financially stable with an excellent Dun & Bradstreet rating or

equivalent

26. Risk Management Process

Admissions needs to develop processes for managing risk. This process should be integrated with any selected vendor procedures and include criteria for: Risk/issues identification Risk/issues quantification/ranking Risk/issues assessment Risk/issues trigger points Risk/issues mitigation Risk/issues management Risk/issues tracing and reporting Risk/issues resolution and escalation

Attachments—The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page 88



Attachments

—The State Bar of California 3 November 2006—Page 89



Attachment 1—Cost-Savings Detail

Cost Area/Issue/Problem Cost Area Cost-Savings Description Formula* Cost/Cost Savings

Detail Description

1) System cannot process/grade more than 10,000 applicants

Dollars Once 10,000 applicants occur, a workaround will need to occur. Cost savings are not quantifiable for this area.

NA NA 1) System cannot process/grade more than 10,000 applicants.

2) Master key index has been applicant’s Social Security Number

Dollars Move away from SSN to file number. Cost savings are not quantifiable for this area.

NA NA 2) Master key index has been applicant’s Social Security Number—moving away from this to another identifier. A great deal of time is spent by analysts to cross-reference to find hardcopy files.

3) Base Application—259 errors/duplicates per year (duplicate online applicant entries) that need to be reversed

Dollars 259 errors per year; each has to be refunded duplicated fee. Cost to cut check is $20.

$20 per check × 259 $5,180 3) 259 errors per year (duplicate online applicant entries) that need to be reversed. Process is to: 1) review and back out of system; 2) send letter to applicant to notify (two-person process); 3) Finance needs to cut a check to send refund to applicant (two-person process). It is estimated that it costs $20 per check to process. This takes about 0.5 FTE.

People FTE needed to review, reverse entries, draft and review letter, cut and verify check.

Annual salary for 0.5 FTE Analyst—Operations. (FTE reduction × Salary) = 0.5 FTE × $60,052

$30,021





Detail Description

4) Moral Character Application Process

People Time to key in application data, document problems, draft and mail correspondence. Two-FTE saving (Los Angeles).

Annual salary for two FTE Analysts—Moral Character. (FTE reduction × Salary) = 2 FTE × $72,984

$145,968 4) Moral Character process is manual. Applicants fill out downloaded PDF document and send in hardcopy. Admissions then has to key in the data. If the data are incorrect, need to document problems, draft and send letter to applicant, wait for corrections and re-key data. Primary role for analysts is to review applicant history (look for holes in work and school history). Would like online system to: 1) flag applicants during application entry process if there are time gaps and have them fix or explain; and 2) have system identity gaps for analysts to aid review. About 30%–40% of analysts’ time is spent looking for gaps. Analysts then assign a 0–4 score for each (4 being bad)—about 25–75 denied a year. Ten to 15 have to comply with intermediary actions/steps (counseling, etc.) to gain approval. Two FTEs per week could be potentially saved in error reduction.

People Time spent filing (getting files, reviewing files, filing supporting application information. 5-FTE saving.

(FTE reduction × Salary) = 0.5 FTE × $60,042

$30,021

People Online application reduces errors and time gap errors through: 1) screen prompts/errors for applicants and have them fix or explain, and 2) time savings to analysts in reduction of gap analysis and correspondence. 1-FTE savings (Los Angeles).

Annual salary for 1 FTE Analyst—Moral Character. (FTE reduction × Salary) = 1 FTE × $72,984

$72,984





Detail Description

5) Testing Accommodations Process and Tracking

People Automation of applicant accommodation needs would reduce time to redo repeat accommodation letters and write/revise/approve letters. 1-FTE savings.

Annual salary for 1 FTE Analyst—Operations. (FTE reduction × Salary) = 1 FTE × $60,042

$60,042 5) Testing Accommodations. Currently need to read each letter for accommodations to ensure all accommodations are met. Want to be able track applicant with accommodation needs more accurately/closely. It is a very people-intensive process (at least four people have to write and read each letter). Takes about 1.5–2 FTEs for accommodations plus Admin people, Gayle (for reviews). Need to confirm with Gayle to see improvements for tacking and alerts. Potential savings of 1 FTE.

6) Grading System Shutdown

People Time staff is “locked” out of system (can only view; cannot make changes) spend time “catching up” on other items. Four weeks per year (two weeks for each exam).

Annual salary for 4 FTEs for four weeks, Analyst—Operations. (Salary/52 weeks) × (weeks of lost productivity)) × FTE = (((60,042/52 weeks) × (4 weeks) × 4 FTEs).

$18,474 6) Grading System—Have to shut people out of the system (can view but cannot change records) for four weeks, twice a year, so grades can be completed and uploaded. Once Grading takes snapshot of system (Admin file), no changes to the system can be made. Results in significant loss in productivity.

7) Interfaces—(DMV and DoJ)

People Staff time spent manually matching fingerprint results with applicants and entering into system. Go to downloads instead of tapes and e-mails—would save 1–1.5 FTEs.


$90,063 7) Interfaces—DMV and DoJ. Send data to/from DMV via EDI (sent back via tape) a couple of times a week. DoJ does fingerprint processing; results come back via an e-mail attachment for each individual. Admissions has to match results to applicants in the system and enter data. Requires 1-2 FTEs. Need to develop cost measures.

8) Education Completion/Eligibility

People Want to be able to send electronic files and receive back from law schools (use servers). Document management could do. 1–1.5-FTE savings.


$90,063 8) Education completion/eligibility—Send letters to schools to request completion of school and transcripts. Have to enter data into system once letters come back. Potential interface or document management and scanning solution.





Detail Description

9) Exam Administration Tracking/Status

?? RFID or BARCODE to track people and exam answers. Not necessarily people savings, but issues/frustration savings.

NA NA 9) Exam Administration—Want to be able to see exam statistics in system. Want to be able to track testers (e.g., who, where, completion of exam, missed/incomplete questions) and how answered (e.g., handwritten or electronic). Currently know who was there but do not necessarily know what was turned in (part of answer could be turned in via laptop and handwritten, or not at all). Want to verify that State Bar has all the examinees’ answers. Want to be able to enter data about the exam real-time.

10) Reports—are run in system, can only be printed out (not viewed) and often re-keyed into WordPerfect for staff. Additional reports are also needed that can help staff be proactive.

People Productivity loss in not being able to run desired reports. Time spent placing calls, researching and documenting what automatic/ad hoc report could generate. Time spent keying in reports to send electronically. Perhaps 2-FTE savings.

Annual salary for 1 FTE Analyst—Operations and 1 FTE Supervisor. (1 Analyst Operations FTE reduction × Salary) + (1 Supervisor FTE reduction × Salary) = (1 FTE × $88180) + (1 FTE × $60,042) = (1 FTE × $$88,180 + (1 FTE × $60,042)

$148,222 10) Reports—want to be able to run own reports and view online. Reports are hardcopy, many of which (e.g., monthly reports) are run in LA and sent to SF. Sometimes hardcopy and/or re-keyed. There are additional standard and ad hoc reports that are needed. Do a great deal of downloading of data, then writing programs to get reports.

11) Conduct own first-year law students registration online that is currently conducted by XAP.com

Dollars Move to in-house as part of new Admissions system

Monthly cost × 12 = Annual Cost Savings. $1,695 × 12

$20,340

Total Potential Savings $711,378




Attachment 2—Growth Projections

2006–2010 Growth—Applications

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

Registrations 9,342 9,617 9,239 10,156 10,155 11,533 11,988 12,461 12,953 13,465 13,996 First-Year Law Students’ Examination 1,026 1,062 1,257 1,304 1,701 1,959 2,190 2,449 2,738 3,061 3,422

Bar Examination 14,449 14,667 14,123 14,462 14,862 15,266 15,428 15,592 15,758 15,926 16,095

Moral Character 7,769 7,527 7,451 7,191 7,650 8,551 8,700 8,851 9,004 9,161 9,320

Average Applications Growth 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 5-Year Average

Registrations 2.86% -4.09% 9.03% -0.01% 11.95% 3.95% First-Year Law Students’ Examination 3.39% 15.51% 3.60% 23.34% 13.17% 11.80%

Bar Examination 1.49% -3.85% 2.34% 2.69% 2.65% 1.06%

Moral Character -3.22% -1.02% -3.62% 6.00% 10.54% 1.74%

2007–2011 Growth—Revenue

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 Registrations $658,787 $852,423 $864,843 $1,008,474 $1,004,409 $1,189,237 $1,208,867 $1,319,993 $1,441,334 $1,573,829 $1,718,504 $1,876,479 First-Year Law Students’ Examination $309,921 $386,831 $468,474 $534,022 $767,915 $951,000 $931,179 $1,081,976 $1,257,194 $1,460,787 $1,697,350 $1,972,222

Bar Examination $5,794,500 $6,555,284 $6,620,484 $7,294,757 $7,997,044 $8,534,251 $9,452,041 $10,186,469 $10,977,962 $11,830,954 $12,750,224 $13,740,922

Moral Character $2,178,638 $2,311,586 $2,396,275 $2,456,377 $2,683,256 $3,140,103 $3,382,781 $3,619,071 $3,871,865 $4,142,318 $4,431,661 $4,741,216

Miscellaneous $567,693 $622,571 $453,418 $402,953 $368,993 $427,307 $408,892 $408,892 $408,892 $408,892 $408,892 $408,892

Total $9,509,539 $10,728,695 $10,803,494 $11,696,583 $12,821,617 $14,241,898 $15,383,760 $16,616,400 $17,957,246 $19,416,779 $21,006,631 $22,739,730

Average Revenue Growth 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 6-Year Average

Registrations 22.72% 1.44% 14.24% -0.40% 15.54% 1.62% 9.19% First-Year Law Students’ Examination 19.88% 17.43% 12.27% 30.46% 19.25% -2.13% 16.19%

Bar Examination 11.61% 0.98% 9.24% 8.78% 6.29% 9.71% 7.77%

Moral Character 5.75% 3.53% 2.45% 8.46% 14.55% 7.17% 6.99%




2007–2011 Growth—Expenses

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 Expenses Total $9,500,704 $10,497,066 $11,591,937 $12,031,264 $12,610,990 $13,824,150 $15,031,033 $16,237,916 $17,541,703 $18,950,175 $20,471,736 $22,115,468

Revenues Total $9,509,539 $10,728,695 $10,803,494 $11,696,583 $12,821,617 $14,241,898 $15,383,760 $16,616,400 $17,957,246 $19,416,779 $21,006,631 $22,739,730

Average Expense Growth 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 6-Year Average

9.49% 9.45% 3.65% 4.60% 8.78% 8.03% 7.33%


Any questions regarding this report should be addressed to:

Rich Flowerree Project Manager Gartner, Inc. Telephone: +1 619 542 4815 Facsimile: +1 619 542 4801 E-mail: [email protected]

A Report for The State Bar of California · 1.4 Anticipated Admissions Growth Trends The State Bar...

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