NHS Professionals Customer Engagement Programme; Development and Support Services Capability

Description

Summary of the work Proactive DevOps and 24x7 secure application support at 3rd level as part of the development and support stack for a suite of Customer Engagement products and services. We envisage that the successful supplier will field an output focused team of interchangeable resource to meet this need Expected Contract Length 24 months Latest start date Sunday 1 April 2018 Why the Work is Being Done NHS Professionals has a requirement for a Delivery and Support Partner to supplement existing resources and supply the capability to deliver and maintain phases of work aligned to the Customer Engagement Programme (CEP), and associated Programmes across the NHSP IT Portfolio. The CEP is an Agile programme within the NHSP 5-year strategy that is transforming the way NHSP manages flexible workers and client NHS Trusts. Problem to Be Solved A delivery partner is required who has specialist skills in the development, delivery and support of large scale digital services and capability to deliver outcome based work packages as part of the NHSP Customer Engagement Programme. Alongside delivery of new products, NHSP requires provision of a cost-effective, flexible development service that can meet the demands of NHSP's requirement to support and maintain the current applications services. The initial (but not limited to) work packages to be delivered: - Registration Management - Customer Data & Records - Compliance & Validation - Availability Management - Service & Case Management - Communications Management Who Are the Users Users include NHS flexible workers, citizens and NHSP corporate staff. Work Already Done There are currently resources in place on the programme and there are existing services that have already commenced work and are live. Existing Team The existing team consists of in-house and outsourced specialists. The support stack combines new in-house support capabilities with some components serviced by external partners. Current Phase Live Skills & Experience • Have knowledge of and experience with Microsoft Dynamics 365 • Have knowledge of and experience with ADXStudio Portal and CRM Portals • Have knowledge of and experience with ClickDimensions • Have knowledge of and experience with Azure B2C (identity access management) • Have knowledge of and experience with Social listening products • Have knowledge of and experience with Azure hosting, Logic Apps and solid understanding of cloud concepts • Have a solid understanding of CI and build engineering • Have knowledge of and experience with Visual Studio Team Services (VSTS), test automation and peformance testing • Have knowledge of and experience with Git, Github, Gitlab • Have knowledge and experience of Xamarin and other mobile technology products • Have experience deploying, profiling, and debugging distributed systems • Have recent demonstrable experience of successfully integrating systems via Azure Functions and other cloud-based services • Have demonstrable experience of successfully building secure web applications that collect/manage personal and/or sensitive information with appropriate controls • Have demonstrate experience in designing and delivering outcome based services that meet both user needs and business requirements. Includes delivering expected outcomes for the requirements gathering, prototyping and deployment/live phases. • Have proven recent experience of providing architects, functional specialists, solution experts and developers who have successful understood users’ needs to design and develop secure, scalable enterprise level applications • Demonstrate capacity and flexibility to deliver work packages providing multi-disciplinary teams with skills in Dynamics 365 and Technical Development, Solution Architecture, Functional Design, Development etc • Have experience of providing solutions using the most appropriate technology to meet the outcomes needed • Have experience in building citizen or staff facing digital services • Development services into an Agile /DevOps organisation. Working within Agile/Kanban frameworks within multi-skilled development teams; providing poly skilled individuals capable of contributing to the team beyond development • Have knowledge and demonstrable experience of Azure Service Bus Nice to Haves • Demonstrate recent experience of transitioning development services into an organisation with minimal impact to on-going services and outputs • Show experience of working within GDS standards • Display knowledge, experience and demonstrable ability with Test Driven Development practices using xUnit/MsTest/Moq/Effort/AutoPoco • Evidence a strong service culture with service improvement central to operations Work Location NHS Professionals, 3rd Floor, Edward Hyde Building, 38 Clarendon Road, Watford, Hertfordshire WD17 1JW. A combination of onsite and offshore (Remote working) is preferred. Working Arrangments Watford as well as other NHS Professionals locations on request and remote working for development capability. Support Services to provide 24x7x365 team at supplier's own location following runbook type activity - monitor applications, investigate incidents and problems, plan changes and fixes. A combination of onsite and offshore (Remote working) is preferred Security Clearance None Required No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 5 Proposal Criteria • Demonstrable • Documented • Previous experience of successful Dynamics 365 DevOps alongside ADXStudio portal and ClickDimensions developments • Migrations and upgrades • Sufficient resource capacity and flexibility (responsive) • Robust processes, including standards and best practice for incident management • Escalation and reporting; timely knowledge transfer capability Cultural Fit Criteria • Have a strong understanding of the needs, approach and working practices of NHS Professionals, its roadmap and business constraints • Have previous experience supporting Dynamics 365 applications in similar organisations with non-technical marketing users • Have good client management and communications • Work effectively and efficiently in a collaborative way with internal IT and Operations teams Payment Approach Time and materials Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 40% Cultural fit 15% Price 45% Questions from Suppliers 1. 1. We notice that you have suggested this will be a time and materials based service. Would you expect a minimum level of capacity 24 x 7? We require 24/7 application support – that would be for all customisations and configurations to Dynamics 365 (CRM) and ADX Portals, and or any other custom code. NHSP have 24/7 premium support with Microsoft for all Microsoft Azure hosted products. Suppliers could propose prices for both Monday to Friday, 8am-6pm support (including an on-call element for out of hours) as well as 24x7x365 2. 2. Do you have any KPI targets that need to be met? Nothing specific however, we expect standard best practice SLAs offered with regards to support options. 3. 3. Do you have any information on the existing and/or expected service workload with regards to changes, releases and incidents per month? Are there any peaks and troughs to be considered? Our current supplier provides, on average, 50 person-days per week. However, we are expecting that more development would be done in the first 18 months of the contract and then scaling down during the last 6 months. 4. 4. Although you have stated that no specific security clearance is required, as the notice mentions that this is a secure application service do you have any different security requirements that need to be met? Awareness of and compliance with DPA and GDPR, putting actions in place to ensure security of data, annual penetration test, Essentials Plus and NHS IG Toolkit 5. 5. How will this team fit into the wider NHS Professionals IT organisation? Can you explain how this project will work with existing work that is already in progress? Collaboration will be (where required) in solution architecture, particularly of custom components and sign off of security / non-functional requirements. Also, any infrastructure deliverables that are not automated i.e. not CI/CD will require collaboration with NHSP IT Infrastructure team, although this should be the exception not the norm. 6. 6. Is support needed 24/7 to the same level or will on-call suffice for any periods? We require 24x7x365 application support for custom components and integrations. We have Microsoft Premium support for standard Microsoft cloud products. We are happy to consider proposals with both 24x7x365 and 8am to 6pm Monday to Friday with an on-call element for out of hours. We won’t consider 8am to 6pm Monday to Friday without on call. On call as an option over 24x7x365 should NOT change standard SLAs. 7. 7. Who are the existing specialists supporting you (as we may want to partner in the 24/7 support)? Infosys currently provide development and support. 8. 8. Do you have a budget for this work? We have a roadmap we are trying to complete within a period of time. (see answer to “Do you have any information on the existing and/or expected service workload with regards to changes, releases and incidents per month? Are there any peaks and troughs to be considered?“) If the number of days multiplied by day rate becomes cost prohibitive then we would look to de-scope elements of our roadmap. 9. 9. Under the 'Cultural Fit' section there is a reference to the NHSP roadmap. Could you please provide a web link to this publication. Unfortunately at this point in time we have no documentation related to this on the web.