RNIB Case study

ROYAL NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR THE BLIND PROGRAMME MANAGEMENT IMPLEMENTATION

The Company

Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB) is the UK’s leading charity offering information, support and advice to over two million people with sight loss. Among its many services, RNIB offers accessibility consultancy, training and audits for companies and other organisations to ensure that websites are accessible to blind and partially sighted users.

The Business Problem

RNIB wanted to improve the services it offers both internally and externally with a strong focus on ensuring that users with disabilities were able to access them. The trustees approved a programme of work with the aim of increasing knowledge sharing across the organisation and improving the end user experience for RNIB's current and potential customers. The "web strategy programme" encompassed the development of a new corporate intranet and external website and the introduction of a new e-commerce solution. These would all need to meet RNIB's accessibility criteria both at the front and back-end. The timeframe agreed for the programme was eighteen months and RNIB needed to deliver the benefits in the timescales agreed to ensure customer experience was improved as soon as possible and that the programme was delivered cost effectively.
RNIB selected Microsoft technology to provide the framework for the programme. A Microsoft Gold partner was appointed to develop the accessible interfaces to SharePoint which would provide the intranet and internet services. A key driver was to demonstrate that an accessible interface to SharePoint could be delivered to show other organisations that accessible technology was achievable.
The first project in the programme was to replace the existing intranet. The supplier adopted to use the Agile project management methodology, which had not previously been used within RNIB. RNIB therefore selected a programme manager with experience in this methodology in order to ensure the programme delivered the benefits required and the launch of the intranet in March and the website in September 2009 was achieved.

The Solution

XJC Consultants worked with RNIB to deliver the first two projects within the programme; developing a new intranet and external website.
Xanthe Childs was appointed to own and manage the relationship with the supplier and ensure that the RNIB client deliverables remained on track. With experience of iterative development using Agile methodologies, the consultant was able to provide coaching on how to manage requirements and deliverables, and ensure that testing and evaluation was carried out before acceptance. Engaging core members of RNIB’s Web Access Centre (WAC) to form part of the project team ensured that any deliverable was evaluated against RNIB’s accessibility framework. The requirements and acceptance criteria were base-lined, the management and communication processes were reviewed and regular checkpoints implemented with both RNIB’s team and with the supplier. In addition, and to encourage a closer working relationship between the parties, a schedule was produced with core programme team members working across the client and supplier sites. Forward planning provided the opportunity for all parties to be clear about the deliverables to be achieved within each sprint, and regular updates to the stakeholders ensured all parties were aware of the status and any issues.
During this time RNIB gained approval to build a programme delivery capability internally, recruiting project and programme managers to ensure that future programmes could be delivered with internal resource and not rely on external consultants. An RNIB programme manager was identified in May with a view to taking on the responsibility of the programme. It was agreed that the handover to the internal programme manager would take place as part of the planning for the final project, thus ensuring that continuity was maintained and providing an opportunity for experience to be utilised and transferred prior to completion of the handover.

The Benefits

The web strategy programme achieved the objectives set. The intranet was launched to schedule in March 2009.  It was positively received and a series of knowledge sharing pilots were initiated across RNIB.
The development and testing activities were completed in time for the website launch in September 2009. The revised website provided increased functionality, better governance and a more manageable solution for both RNIB customers and RNIB.
The website passed the See it Right audit, RNIB’s kite mark, which demonstrates that the core components of WCAG 1.0 standards have been achieved, thus ensuring that the website is accessible to anyone with a disability.

The initiation of the e-commerce project started ahead of schedule and the transfer to RNIB resource was carried out in August 2009.

 

 

Last updated: 25 Nov 2009