INVESTIGATING TUFS
There are number of problems that can be addressed from this case. The two main issues I noticed in this case is lack of communication and lack of interest shown by the underwriting managers. TUFS (Technical Underwriting Financial Systems) was a project that was going to help Northern Insurance transform their underwriting process and also provide strategic business capabilities. As, per the case there was a lot of excitement when the project begun two years ago but it looks like as the time passed by the focus from the project shifted as the interest kept getting lower from the all the team that were involved. Hence the project was completed on time and in budget but the TUFS system has turned into a nightmare in its first few months of operation and was not delivering what it was built for i.e. to streamline and transform their underwriting process.
Looking at the problem I think the issue started at a very early phase of the project where requirements for the project were not well-defined. Also as this project was the most highly invested project in IT interest and attention was required by the CIO and CFO all along the project. It seemed like the CIO Martin Drysdale who was in charge of this major project didn’t take that responsibility to track the project and keep everyone on their feet while completing the requirements that were needed for this project to be a success. Being in charge of a huge project that is going to effect the whole organization you have to make sure tasks are completed on time, and things are documented in case something goes wrong in the later process of the project. Nevertheless, the technicians did not get any participation from the underwriters, departments were not on the same page in the creation of the system, and as a result lot of money had to be spent on fixing those underwriting errors that kept appearing over and over again. Also, the senior underwriting managers had lost all their interest and insisted on old reports instead of just looking it online which was one of the benefits of TUFS system. Also, there was a lack of business involvement in decisions, which contributed to the disappointment of the system.
For Martin Drysdale this project was becoming his worst project as his job was on the line for not bringing the efficiency to the underwriting process and new opportunities for the company. Also Martin was not able to understand that “Why senior underwriting managers were still insisting on receiving the old reports when TUFS lets them look up the same information online anytime they want.” As, Martin was called up by the CFO Melissa Freeman to answer her questions on why are we not getting the result from this system after investing a lot of money and resources in it. And as martin went to answer her question saying “It’s true that there have been some unanticipated changes to the system that have cost us, but the underwriters have never bought into the system.” Also, they insist on following their old procedures and then using the system at the last possible moment as a double check process.
As, we know there is always problem on IT as well as business side when the project doesn’t give the result they were trying to achieve or whenever the project fails. In this case there is a lack of participation as no one really got engaged and made the project as their goal. This problem could have been avoided if Martin would had a system analyst a skillful guy who could speak both languages technical and business and use that to bring together the two sides all the way. Another thing that went wrong in the project is the imbalance between its scope and the scheduling of the project as result of the management pressure to produce fast result regardless of what feasible.At the start of the project it looked like everyone was working happily but they were just doing their part of work and not looking or thinking ahead which is why the project started to sink moving forward. Also, the people to be mainly blamed are the business people who didn’t really provide a better proof of concept on how they want the application to be designed and work for the end users. Also, Management is now asking for more requirements like user training on the TUFS and a help desk to handle questions that underwriters might face while using the system which is why the project is going way over budget as this part was not into included in the budget when they started the project. Also one thing that CIO said which really make sense is “They think we can just plug in the system and cost savings will appear like magic. And other parts of the system are going to take time to deliver benefits.”
The “other parts” that he referred to was the e-business capabilities that TUFS provided which was one of the reason why this project was done to keep up with the technology and also to be competitive. The IT people from the TUFS and the underwriter managers must get together and change the system so the whole situation with fixing one mistake and finding many others is prevented. Also, the system needs to be created in such a way that it is easy and comfortable for the underwriters to use. There are many things that can be done to avoid such problems in the future. Firstly, IT team that contains only pure technicians is not enough to address IT projects in business environment. The team must be accompanied with system analyst professional who has the capabilities to engage the business in all development stages of an IT project. A project manager is also required, as part of the team, to set up project mile stones and ensures that the team has perfectly meets these mile stones. Secondly, management must assess the expected result given the time and budget planned for a project before giving their green light to initiate it. In this case time was not an issue but budget really drove time going forward. Third, management must ensure the commitments of the users to a project before it start. This step will lead to their acceptance of the completed project even if it has fail. In this case the start and excitement was all there as we talked earlier but the management failed to keep that enthusiasm going as the project went along different phases and steps.
In conclusion, most of the resource of the company was spent on addressing underwriting issues that could have been prevented from the beginning if the underwriters and technicians had worked together.