Backlog benefits without business change
Eastmere Courts Service is six months into tranche 2 of a £14m programme replacing paper case files with a digital case management system. The business case promises a 30% reduction in case backlog within 12 months of go-live. The system has been live in three of six courts for four months; backlog has fallen only 6%. Adoption logs show judges and clerks still print digital files before hearings and use the old paper routing sheet. The programme's benefits profile lists backlog reduction as a programme-level benefit owned by the operations director, but no business change manager was appointed for the courts. The tranche 2 gateway review is in five weeks. The sponsor wants to declare the benefit on track because the software is deployed. The programme manager has £300k left in the tranche contingency and a nervous steering group.
1. What should the programme manager do first to test whether the 30% backlog benefit is still achievable?
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Do not accept the sponsor's on-track label. The benefit is a business outcome, not a software deployment. First, reconstruct the benefits dependency: backlog reduction depends on digital case files, changed hearing preparation, and paper routing being retired. Adoption logs show two of those dependencies failing. Convene the operations director as benefit owner and appoint a named business change manager for the courts. Use the benefits profile to agree leading indicators: percentage of hearings prepared without printing, use of digital routing, and backlog per court. Compare the three live courts with the three not yet live to isolate whether the 6% fall is seasonal. Reforecast the benefit with a realistic adoption curve; if adoption remains at current levels, the 30% figure cannot be recovered in 12 months. Record the gap in the benefits realisation plan and take a decision to the gateway: invest in business change or rebaseline the benefit. The key judgement is that deploying capability is not the same as realising benefits.
2. The sponsor proposes spending £200k of contingency on additional software licences. Assess this proposal.
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The proposal addresses a symptom, not the evidence. Licence capacity is not the constraint: the system is live and accessible, but staff are printing and using paper routing. More licences would not change behaviour and would consume two-thirds of the remaining contingency. Test the proposal against the benefits dependency: which dependency does it strengthen? If the answer is none, reject it. A better use of the £200k is business change: protected time for court staff to redesign hearing preparation, floor-walking support, and a business change manager empowered to challenge paper-based workarounds. If the sponsor insists, ask for a written change request with an impact assessment showing how licences increase adoption and benefit realisation. Also check whether the original contract already includes sufficient licences; buying more could indicate a contract management issue. The programme manager should advise the steering group that contingency should be held for the tranche gateway and benefit recovery, not for a deployment-related purchase.
3. What should the programme manager take to the tranche 2 gateway review?
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Take a candid assessment, not a compliance pack. The gateway should see: (1) benefit confidence rated red or amber, with evidence from adoption logs and the 6% backlog reduction; (2) the blueprint gap - the target operating model assumes digital hearing preparation and paper routing retirement, neither of which is happening; (3) a corrective plan with named business change manager, cost, milestones and leading indicators; (4) a decision request: approve business-change funding from contingency, or rebaseline the 30% benefit and inform the business case owner; (5) the revised risk profile - reputational risk with the courts and sponsor pressure to misreport. The programme manager should also confirm that the three remaining court rollouts are gated on adoption in the first three, not just on technical deployment. The gateway is the right forum because the issue crosses projects and business operations; it is not a project-level defect. Recommend that the sponsor's on-track statement be replaced by an agreed RAG with evidence.