Marine Accident Investigation Branch Compass Phase 3 Discovery

Tender description

Summary of the work Winning supplier required to undertake a GDS compliant discovery that: • Identifies and understands all users, their context/needs • Identifies constraints • Identifies improvements • Identifies mandatory reporting and releasable information • Identifies data requirements and performance metrics to measure success • Produces a detailed discovery report/roadmap for delivery. Expected Contract Length Approximately 6 to 7 weeks Latest start date Monday 12 September 2022 Budget Range Between £70k and £90k Why the Work is Being Done The MAIB require a supplier to undertake a ‘discovery phase’ as a first step towards the development of a UK, Microsoft Dynamics compatible, public-facing marine accident reporting service as well as a public-facing analytical data search interface, connected to the MAIB’s accident database, COMPASS. Under the UK’s Merchant Shipping Act there is a legal requirement to report accidents to the MAIB by the quickest means possible. The MAIB wish to develop a digital service that is accessible to all stakeholders across the industry. The MAIB also receives a significant number of requests each year for accident-related data, releasable under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (FoI). The releasable data is defined by regulations and the MAIB wish to make a subset of releasable data available to help reduce the workload of staff who prepare FoI responses. The discovery will engage with the MAIB, Users and stakeholders to identify user needs, key functions, and stakeholder requirements to help develop a service that is fit for purpose. Prior to BREXIT, the UK populated the European Marine Casualty Investigation Platform (EMCIP) This new service will also offer services and functionality to the public that they received from EMCIP. Problem to Be Solved The MAIB wish to develop this new service to make the process more compatible with current behaviours and technologies. Currently, stakeholders must access a personal computer and Microsoft Word, download an “Accident Report Form” (ARF), complete the ARF and attach and email it into a MAIB shared mailbox. Investigation Support Officers then review and triage and where necessary transpose this information into COMPASS. MAIB stakeholders required to report accidents come from a very wide-ranging demographic, from single-handed fishermen and blue-chip shipping companies, to port and harbour authorities. We wish to streamline the process by developing a web-based, Microsoft Dynamics compatible reporting service, which is compatible with mobile devices, allowing MAIB staff to triage, add, merge or log new reports directly into COMPASS. Through the discovery we also wish to understand the barriers users experience as there is a perception of underreporting of accidents due to the process of reporting to the MAIB being too difficult. The MAIB hold the national data of marine accidents and wish to make this data available to the public through a robust, secure, and user-friendly service. Doing so makes the rich data we hold more accessible to the public, helping to improve marine safety. Who Are the Users The core users for these services are split into two areas but are not mutually exclusive. For reporting of accidents, it will be the master/skipper of any ship, be that UK flagged or in UK waters, ship owners, harbour and inland waterway authorities and the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA). These have a legal requirement under The Merchant Shipping (Accident Reporting and Investigation) Regulation 2012 and shall notify the Chief Inspector as soon as is practicable following the accident and by the quickest means available. For data searches, the core users will be the MCA, safety organisations, consultants carrying out risk assessments and academia. For these, we wish to provide an intuitive solution for querying the releasable accident data we hold within our database. The discovery phase should identify and validate users and their needs, understand any constraints, and identify opportunities to improve things. It should establish the options available for meeting the user needs along with high-level risks of each and a recommended approach. The functional requirements, an initial roadmap/workplan and the resources required that could form the basis for the Alpha and Beta phases for both these applications should also be produced. Work Already Done We know who stakeholders are. For reporting accidents, they are asked to visit our website and download and submit an ARF: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/report-a-marine-accident There is no public-facing database search application available; however, we know what data we can release and the history of stakeholders that regularly ask for data under FoI. Existing Team Richard North – MAIB – Head of Technical Support James Bockett – MAIB – Investigation Support and Data Manager Cathy Pennock – MAIB – Database Administrator Current Phase Discovery Skills & Experience • Provide demonstrable evidence of delivery of a digital discovery • Demonstrable evidence of drawing up recommendations and options for alpha on successful digital projects • Demonstrable experience in conducting stakeholder analysis • Demonstrable experience of using a range of research methods • Demonstrable experience and working knowledge of Microsoft Dynamics and Azure applications • Demonstrable experience of working on a project with the integration of Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). • Demonstrable evidence of working with stakeholders from the maritime industry. Nice to Haves • Demonstrable experience of delivering GDS compliant discovery work • Demonstrable experience of working on a project that spans two (or more) government departments/public bodies as well as private sector companies • Experience of working with teams with no or limited experience of digital projects • Demonstrable experience of your ability to identify and make recommendations in respect of technology, legal and other constraints, relevant to delivering a CDDO compliant digital service • Recent (within 2 years) experience of working within the maritime industry or with maritime stakeholders Work Location Most of the work should be conducted at the supplier’s own site. However, we would expect the supplier to work at our offices as agreed and required, which could be 1 to 2 days per week. Exact days will be decided with the supplier at contract stage. Most engagement is likely to be over MS Teams. Address: Marine Accident Investigation Branch First Floor, Spring Place 105 Commercial Road Southampton SO15 1GH Working Arrangments The supplier is expected to be available and contactable during core hours of 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday. We expect the supplier to suggest a team that can complete the discovery phase in 6 to 7 weeks. This can include scaling the team up and down and part-time working when appropriate. Detailed working arrangements will be provided upon appointment of the supplier but will include, for example, adherence to DfT processes and standards. Expenses must align with the DfT Travel and Subsistence policy, with proposed travel approved by the buyer before mobilisation. Security Clearance All contract personnel should, as a minimum, be cleared to authority security clearance level of BPSS and must be available to begin work with immediate effect following contract award. CVs, including security clearance evidence required for resource to be assigned to project and will be evidenced at written proposal stage. Additional T&Cs Statements of Work (SoW) will be defined for the introduction into the discovery phase. IR35 is not in scope for this service. No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 6 Proposal Criteria • The approach and methodology to the discovery, including how priorities will be determined, problems approached, and emerging findings presented (25%) • A project plan with proposed timelines for delivery of the discovery stage (10%) • Value for money (5%) • The structure and high-level discovery report outputs/headings (5%) • How risks, assumptions, and dependencies will be identified and managed (5%) • The team structure, their technical skills and experience, including the estimated resource (10%). Cultural Fit Criteria • Experience of transparent and collaborative working to deliver outcomes (3%) • Experience of taking responsibility for work and resolving problems effectively (3%) • Demonstrate a user-centred approach, using research to present findings that all stakeholders/decision-makers can easily understand (4%). Payment Approach Capped time and materials Assessment Method • Case study • Presentation Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 60% Cultural fit 10% Price 30% Questions from Suppliers 1. Who from your team will be scoring applications for this opportunity and what positions do they hold? Richard North, MAIB, Head of Technical Support. Steve Fox, DfT, Digital Business Partner. Other panel member as yet undecided. 2. Has any external supplier been involved in the initial scoping work? If so, who? Tisski support the internal system. 3. Can you confirm if shortlisted suppliers will have the opportunity to present? Yes, presentations are optional. 4. Can you please provide an anticipated timeline for this procurement that includes dates for: 1) Shortlisting Notification for Stage 2 2) Submission Deadline for Stage 2 3) Presentation 4) Evaluation period 5) Award Notification This is an indicative timeline and may be adjusted dependant on staff availability/emergencies/amount of bidders: 1) Shortlisting Notification for Stage 2 - w/c 01/08/2022. 2) Submission Deadline for Stage 2 - 12/08/2022. 3) Presentation w/c 22/08/2022. 4) Evaluation period w/c 22/08/2022. 5) Award Notification - 26/08/2022. 5. What does “Microsoft Dynamics compatible” mean in this context? Does it mean it just has to be able to link to Dynamics application – which any open API applications should – or that the reporting application itself has to be implemented in Dynamics? Our Case Management System is built on Microsoft Dynamics and Azure platforms. Therefor the systems developed needs to be able to feed data to and from our existing Case Management System. 6. “Demonstrable experience of working on a project that spans two (or more) government departments/public bodies as well as private sector companies”Can the Authority please provide further clarity regarding the reference to “private sector companies”. Does this refer to working with other private sector suppliers on a public sector project, or experience working for clients in the private sector? Working with other private sector suppliers on a public sector project. 7. Please could you say what you are looking for from question 1, evidencing delivery of a digital discovery, that isn’t covered in question 8, delivery of GDS compliant discovery work? We require evidence demonstrating experience of completing a Digital Discovery but cannot ask for evidence demonstrating experience of delivering GDS compliant discovery work, as this would discriminate against those who have not had the opportunity to complete digital discoveries for UK Government in the past. We have therefore placed this in the “Nice-to-have skills and experience” 8. Please could you say what you are looking for from question 7, evidencing working with stakeholders from the maritime industry, that isn’t covered in the final question? We require evidence of working with stakeholders from the maritime industry. This is a way to separate similar bids during the evaluation stages who may have more recent experience in the last 2 years. 9. Are we able to have access to the European Marine Casualty Investigation Platform (EMCIP) in the Discovery phase? Yes but only the front end not the backend : https://portal.emsa.europa.eu/emcip-public/#/dashboard 10. Can you provide information on the scale/volume of inbound incident reports and FoI requests? Yes once the contract has been awarded 11. Is the role of the GOV.UK site for MAIB users (eg in searching for incident reporting forms/FoI request processes) part of the scope? The service will be accessible via a link from the MAIB website which is part of the GOV.UK domain: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/marine-accident-investigation-branchas However I suspect that the service will be hosted on the MAIB’s own instance and not hosted on the GOV.UK website. This is to be considered as part of the Discovery. 12. Can you provide any more detail on the key problem/s to be solved beyond digitising manual processes? There is very little problem to solve beyond the digitising. We want to make it easier to report the accidents for those that do not have access to a personal computer and we wish to consider automatic population of the database from the reported information. 13. Do you already have a strategy in place to reach service users? No strategy but have contact information that has been used recently for a Post Implementation Review of our regulations, which will cover a significant number of our users.