Design & Delivery Assurance

What is Design and Delivery Assurance?

IT change is complex and expensive.

Get it right and you’re the hero of your board and shareholders.

Get it wrong and it could be career threatening.

We understand that embarking on major change projects presents a range of challenges that you may not be familiar with.

But we are. It's what we do. Day in, day out.

Our Design and Delivery Assurance is a collection of services designed to ensure you achieve success through complex IT change.

We help you provide confidence to your stakeholders that projects, programmes and portfolios will achieve their scope, time, costs and quality objectives as well as delivering their desired business goals.

We provide two fundamental handrails that guarantee the effective realisation of your change efforts.

Design

we act as independent and expert custodians of your reference architecture.

Delivery

we provide a solid governance framework for your programme or project, with expert support for the duration of the initiative.

In short, we are there to support you as part of a winning formation to enable you to achieve your business objectives.

Why do you need Design and Delivery Assurance?

Business doesn’t sit still. Change presents both opportunities and risks.

Whatever your industry or job title, if you are responsible for transformation within your organization there are challenges hidden in large change initiatives which we can help you overcome.

Perhaps you'll recognise some of these:

Lack of confidence in the experience of a project/programme manager, or a history of failed initiatives

A program heading off the rails with missed milestones, spiraling costs and lack of direction

Short (or no) corporate memory for projects resulting in constant ‘wheel reinvention’ and wasted resources

Inappropriate or inconsistent application of delivery methodology compromising quality or putting milestones at risk

Conflicting technology choices in day to day activities or projects, causing unexpected costs, delays and eroding organizational goodwill

Multiple competing and politically charged stakeholders

Multiple delivery teams with multiple suppliers increase planning and communication complexities

The transformation of legacy systems is proving technically very challenging and impacting business as usual

Vendors designing in expensive, unnecessary and long term supplier dependencies

Scope creep, conflicting requirements and unclear objectives result in bottom line impacts

Any of these challenges can be potentially life threatening for your change initiative.

Indeed, in our experience many projects have failed because one or more of these issues were not recognized and addressed appropriately.

The result? Consequences range from career repercussions for the professional responsible for the project or programme, to serious reputational damage for the organization in question leading to profit erosion, loss of market share or decline in value.

Helping You Make the Business Case for Design and Delivery Assurance

Each organization will have different reasons and objectives for their IT change initiatives. Equally, each of your stakeholders will have a slightly different view and expectations.

No matter whether you are at the very early planning stages or are knee deep in an unravelling change project, we will assist you in putting forward a powerful Business Case to your Board and senior stakeholders.

Here are some examples of the benefits our services will deliver:

  • Reputational boost thanks to a successful transformation
  • Costs controlled and delivery achieved within budget
  • Strategic objectives achieved through successful digital transformation
  • Faster improvement to key organization metrics
  • Risks minimized / transformation challenges prevented or effectively addressed thanks to our knowledge and experience
  • Change successfully embedded in the organization thanks to effective change management and stakeholder involvement

Typical Design and Delivery Assurance
Service Outcomes

Our Design Assurance is focused on 3 main outcomes:

  • Design Authority set up and run - A dedicated Design governance body to be the custodian of your reference architecture, managed on your behalf by independent experts
  • Small Change Process set up and incubation - A tried and tested process for the management of small change and continuous improvement, set up and established for you
  • Architectural Alignment - An assessment of your architectural landscape to ensure that it is enabling your business objectives, complemented by a set of recommendations

Delivery Assurance is concerned with helping you achieve the following 7 outcomes:

  • Project/Programme governance design and support - A solid governance framework for your programme/project created and deployed, with expert support for the duration of the initiative
  • Project/Programme management - Key professional figures (project/program managers, architects, scrum masters etc) to ensure your initiative delivers the anticipated benefits
  • Project/Programme audit and rescue - A thorough review of your program, including governance, delivery approach, benefits management etc. We will provide recommendations and, if required, a detailed rescue plan
  • Project/Programme delivery methodology roll out - We will roll out the most appropriate delivery approach for your programme, and provide expert support up to completion
  • Vendor and Technology Selection - Experience support, templates and tools to run a successful vendor and technology selection process, ensuring you get the best possible outcome for your business
  • Requirements management - Independent and impartial support in the identification and management of requirements, expert assurance provided for the duration of the initiative
  • Mediation and arbitration - We will use our extensive experience to ensure you get the most value from your suppliers

How are Design and Delivery Assurance Services delivered?

Our Design and Delivery Assurance services can accompany you for the duration of your change initiatives, or for just part of the journey (for instance, in the case of an Audit & Rescue intervention).

The frequency/intensity of our presence throughout the transformation will depend on your needs and will be defined early on in an initial proposal.

Initially we will engage with senior stakeholders responsible for the transformation to set out clearly the terms of our engagement. This is generally achieved through interviews and workshops to ensure we have clearly identified the key areas you will need support with.

We will then work across the different layers of the project, engaging with relevant stakeholders as appropriate. Depending on the service agreed, Mosaic Island staff will either be fully embedded in the transformation or simply present in an advisory capacity at regular intervals throughout the initiative.

Assurance services scale according to the size of your initiative. We can either be deeply embedded in your team or act in a more hands-off capacity. Either way we will ensure that we will provide the appropriate level of assurance to guarantee the success of your complex change.

Why Should You Trust Mosaic Island with Design and Delivery Assurance?

We have built our reputation as being solid, dependable partners for large, fast moving and complex organizations.

We’re comfortable operating in complex, ultra-high transaction environments such as telecoms where volumes are counted in their trillions.

So we know our stuff and we’re very good at what we do.

Our services are underpinned by our company values of Integrity, Trust, Pragmatism, Simplicity and Fun and are further reinforced by our service principles:

  • Outcome Focused: we will work tirelessly to ensure that you achieve your outcomes, and support you along the way in making effective choices that will increase your chances of success
  • Fully Independent: our services are not tied to any specific tool or provider. This gives us full independence in our work and reassures you we will never deviate from focussing you the best outcome for you
  • Technology Agnostic: we have experience across a multitude of systems and vendors, and we will always recommend the best solution for you
  • Flexible and Tailored Approach: we do not simply 'copy-paste' an approach from one customer to another. Instead, we will invest time in knowing and understanding you, and adopt an approach that will work best for your type of organization and the problem at hand
  • Aligned to Best Practice: our team is passionate about what we do and actively researches the latest examples of best practice to adapt and adopt in our services. On the delivery front, our team is experienced and qualified in the traditional approaches to project, programme and portfolio management, as well as in Agile forms of delivery, including at scale (e.g.: SCRUM, SAFe)