Attachment_8_-_BA_Segment_Blueprint_Final.pdf

Benefits Administration

Segment Architecture Blueprint (Final) November 24, 2010

Benefits Administration and Payment Department

Office of Information Technology

Benefits Administration Segment Blueprint i

Revision History

Version Date Change Description

0.1 01/18/2010 Draft revision

0.2 01/25/2010 Consolidated feedback from EA Team.

1.0 02/01/2010 Removed “Draft” from the title page (blueprint approved by the Core Team). Reformatted to use tabs for high-level sections.

1.1 10/05/2010 Added Segment Architecture Approval Page

1.2 11/24/2010 Added Segment Architecture approval signatures (Executive Sponsor and Chief Architect)

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the Executive Sponsors, the Core Team and interviewees from BAPD, OIT and throughout PBGC. Without their sharing of knowledge we would not have been able to attain this level of quality. The names of those who helped are in Appendix section 8.19, “BA Segment Contributors”.

Steve Finucane & the EA Team.

ii

Table of Contents

1 PBGC Segment Architecture Approval Form

2 Executive Summary

3 Introduction

3.1 Segment Scope

3.2 Background and Problem Statement

4 Recommendations

4.1 Summary of Recommendations

4.2 Improvement Area #1 – Data Quality and Migration to the Consolidated Customer Databases

4.3 Improvement Area #2 – Benefits Administration System Boundary Approach

4.4 Improvement Area #3 – Letter generation processes and supporting IT solutions

4.5 Improvement Area #4 – Customer Interaction Tracking and Telephony Support

4.6 Improvement Area #5 – Self‐Service Capabilities

4.7 Improvement Area #6 ‐ Participant Information Management and Payment Fulfillment

4.8 Improvement Area #7 – Participation in implementation of Business Intelligence

4.9 Improvement Area #8 – Reuse of Enterprise‐wide Services and Capabilities

4.10 Improvement Area #9 – BAPD manuals/references and training materials organization and search 44

4.11 For Business Consideration

5 Transition Strategy

5.1 High‐level Transition Sequence Plan

5.2 Transition Activities

6 Current State Analysis

6.1 Performance Gaps

6.2 Business Analysis Detail

6.3 Data Detail

6.4 Technology Detail

7 Target State

7.1 Target Analysis and Improvements Summary

7.2 Business Detail

7.3 Data Detail

7.4 Technology Detail

8 Appendices

8.1 Segments Overview

8.2 Segment Architecture Roles and Responsibilities

8.3 Segment Architecture Methodology

iii

8.4 Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats (SWOT)

8.5 SWOT Findings Summary

8.6 Goals and Objectives

8.7 Products and Services

8.8 Candidate Recommendation Owners

8.9 Interview Questions

8.10 Mapping of Goals to Top Weaknesses & Strengths

8.11 Mapping of Recommendations to Goals and Objectives

8.12 Mapping of Recommendations to Products and Services

8.13 Benefits Administration Performance Measures

8.14 Reference Model Mappings

8.15 Conceptual Data Model Information Object Definitions

8.16 Benefits Administration CRUD Matrix

8.17 Benefits Administration Target Logical Data Stores mapping to EDM

8.18 Benefits Administration Qualitative Analysis of Data

8.19 BA Segment Contributors

Executive Sponsors ‐ Rich Macy ‐ Bennie Hagans Resources ‐ Core Team of Business Representatives ‐ EA Team

2 Executive Summary

The Benefits Administration and Payment Department (BAPD) enables the

Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) to meet its mission by providing timely and uninterrupted payments to participants and alternate payees. In addition, BAPD provides customer service to the participants and alternate payees such as status updates, application for benefits and resolution of any inquiries regarding pension payments. The PBGC relies on

BAPD to meet performance measures for customer service as identified in the agency’s strategic plan and to directly support the President’s

Management Agenda initiatives.

The Benefits Administration (BA) Segment Architecture was performed by a cross‐organizational team comprised of BA and COO business representatives and the PBGC Enterprise Architecture (EA) team in order to define a set of recommendations for improving the administration of benefits at PBGC. The

Appendix contains complete descriptions of the effort’s approach, participants, and their roles.

Performance Gaps

The EA team used a number of sources and approaches to identify the following high priority performance gaps currently affecting the segment, including interviews, analysis, the GAO report GAO‐

09‐716, previous EA efforts, and the Independent Auditor’s Report AUD‐2010‐2/FA‐09‐64‐2 (Section 6.1 contains a detailed list of performance gaps and sources).

Gap Area: Data quality and organization issues; costly data synchronization and reconciliation

Data Collection process often gives incomplete results

Data discrepancy and duplication in several data stores lead to the need for synchronization and reconciliation

Lack of consistent and unique identifier of customer records for all PBGC systems

Gap Area: Lack of strategy and IT support for customer communication and self‐service

Template selection issues and insufficient IT support for template selection (given the number of templates available)

Significant number of Customer Contact Center (CCC) calls could be completed with the telephony‐based self‐service

Electronic communication mechanisms are severely underutilized (web site, Participant

Portal, email)

Gap Area: System design is inadequate for mitigating current risks or meeting future needs

Interdependencies between existing systems stall development

Processes and systems cannot scale out to keep up with additional workload

Elevated risk of system unavailability, data loss or unauthorized disclosure

Testing environment does not represent target environments

Gap Area: Performance monitoring and accountability challenges

Performance measures for contributing factors are not defined or tracked

Insufficient measurements for quality, efficiency and detailed workload

Gap Area: Lack of formal and standard mechanism for sharing of BA data and reports

No real‐time access to the plan, benefits and participant information outside of BA

Gap Area: Inadequate or inefficient implementation of security controls

User access provisioning and certification are time consuming

Gap Area: Missed opportunities in reuse of data and functionality among systems

Less than efficient functionality allocation among CRM, MyPBA, and Spectrum

Recommendations

To address these gaps, the Core Team developed and prioritized 33 recommendations by voting on groups of expected results or outcomes from these recommendations. Priorities of the recommendations were derived from the number of Core Team member votes that the corresponding result or outcome received. All recommendations are described in detail in Section 4

Recommendations.

Some recommendations, designated by an “Enterprise‐Wide Solution” badge as seen here on the right, are recognized to have a significant impact on PBGC as a whole, and thus, require enterprise‐wide coordination. Such recommendations present opportunities to control costs and improve the efficient stewardship of resources.

The information on the three top priority recommendations follows:

Improvement Area 1, Recommendation 1‐4:

De‐duplicate, consolidate and provide access to Customer information from the Genesis and BFI databases

Key Performance Gaps Addressed: Data discrepancy and duplication in several data stores; Need for synchronization and reconciliation; Interdependencies between existing systems stall development; Lack of consistent and unique identifier of customer records for all PBGC systems.

Owner: Genesis Business Representative ‐ Darlene McManus (BAPD)

Actions Required:

1. Conduct Alternatives Analysis to identify the technology for Master Data Management (MDM) and high‐volume Data Integration solutions using as an input:

Segment Architecture target state (Section 7.4.2.1) and the Recommendation description (Section 4.2.4)

Oracle Assessment Oracle Database recommendations and the BAPD Upgrade State presentation section1

2. Complete work on the recommendations:

Establish data quality maintenance processes for all Customer information

Implement the MDM and high‐volume Data Integration solutions

Remedy and maintain data quality in Genesis

Define per‐application migration path to the Customer Core, Benefit and Payment logical data stores for BA and BD applications

3. Gradually migrate applications to the Customer Core, Benefit and Payment logical data stores according to the migration path

4. Decommission the legacy databases as applications are migrated to the new data stores

Improvement Area 5, Recommendation 5‐1:

Enable Secure Online Portal to provide support for Plan Administrators, PBGC Auditors and plan participants to supply and verify participant information

Key Performance Gaps Addressed: Data Collection process often gives incomplete results; Quality of data is limited even after the data clean‐up efforts; No consistent storage of electronic Customer documents including PII; Elevated risk of system unavailability, data loss or unauthorized disclosure.

Owner: MyPBA Business Representative – Darlene McManus (BAPD)

Actions Required:

1. Conduct Alternatives Analysis to identify the path of evolution from MyPBA to the Secure Online Portal using as an input:

Segment Architecture target state (Section 7.4.2.2) and the Recommendation description (Section 4.6.1)

Oracle Assessment BAPD Upgrade State recommendation2

2. Complete work on the “Implement the Source Document Archive” recommendation

3. Develop or configure the system using the product identified by the Alternatives Analysis

Improvement Area 5, Recommendation 5‐4:

Implement self‐services in the Secure Online Portal and in the Enhanced Telephony System for requests accounting for most CCC calls

1 Oracle Assessment: Target State – V3.0. Final Draft, slides 20-23, 48-49 at http://pbgcportal.prod.ent.pbgc.gov:80/portal/server.pt/gateway/PTARGS_32_0_345_0_- 1_47/http;/pbgcportal2.prod.ent.pbgc.gov;11930/collab/do/document/overview?projID=2939&documentID=179365 2 Oracle Assessment: Target State – V3.0. Final Draft, slides 48-49 at

1_47/http;/pbgcportal2.prod.ent.pbgc.gov;11930/collab/do/document/overview?projID=2939&documentID=179365

Key Performance Gaps Addressed: Significant number of CCC calls could be completed with the Telephony‐based self‐service; Electronic communication mechanisms are severely underutilized.

Owner: Customer Contact Center Manager – Valerie Ramsey (BAPD)

Actions Required:

1. Conduct Alternatives Analysis to identify the path of evolution from MyPBA to the Secure Online Portal using as an input:

Segment Architecture target state (Section 7.4.2.2) and the Recommendation description (Section 4.6.4)

2. Complete work on the recommendations:

a. Implement an Enhanced Telephony System

b. Promote use of pbgc.gov and customer self‐service on all customer correspondence

(letter templates, checks, etc.)

3. Implement updates to the customer phone number, Electronic Direct Deposit (EDD), death notification, form requests, etc. using the Enhanced Telephony System.

4. Implement the Check Action operations in the Secure Online Portal and the Enhanced

Telephone System.

The rest of the 33 recommendations defined by the BA Core Team are grouped by improvement area and presented in the table below:

# Improvement Area # Recommendation Title

1 Data quality and migration to the

Consolidated Customer

Databases

1‐1 Remedy and maintain data quality in Genesis

1‐2 Define per‐application migration path to the Customer Core, Benefit and Payment logical data stores for BA and BD applications

1‐3 Implement the Master Data Management (MDM) and high‐volume

Data Integration solutions

1‐4 De‐duplicate, consolidate and provide access to Customer information from the Genesis and BFI databases

1‐5 Generate test data and re‐assess security controls for test data

1‐6 Establish data quality maintenance processes for all Customer information

2 Benefits

Administration system boundary approach

2‐1 Include entire scope of the Benefits Administration and enterprise impacts in consideration of future alternatives

2‐2 Consolidate redundant system functionality

3 Letter generation processes and supporting IT solutions

3‐1 Develop detailed business rules outside of the system to aid users in selecting the correct letter template and merge data validation rules

3‐2 Enhance existing eALG capabilities

3‐3 Implement Letter/Message Generation System (LGS) capabilities as enterprise‐wide services

3‐4 Promote use of pbgc.gov and customer self‐service on all customer correspondence

4 Customer interaction tracking and Telephony support

4‐1 Implement support for capturing and following customer communications preferences

4‐2 Implement an Enhanced Telephony System

4‐3 Enable tracking of fax, outgoing correspondence, Secure Online Portal events among all other interaction types. Track reasons for all calls.

4‐4 Perform Business Process Re‐engineering (BPR) to standardize business processes and fully utilize benefits of COTS

5 Self‐Service

Capabilities

5‐1 Enable Secure Online Portal to provide support for Plan

Administrators, PBGC Auditors and plan participants to supply and verify participant information

5‐2 Store plan and customer information submissions in the Source

Document Archive

5‐3 Implement ‘Secure Messaging Center’ functionality to allow PBGC to deliver notifications, requests for action, and status updates to customers via the Secure Online Portal

5‐4 Implement the self‐services in the Secure Online Portal and in the

Enhanced Telephony System

6 Participant Information

Management and

Payment Fulfillment

6‐1 Continue with planned improvements to Spectrum (Spectrum 2.1 and

3.0 efforts)

6‐2 Consolidate and Enhance functionality of the Participant Information

Management area systems

7 Participation in implementation of

Business Intelligence

7‐1 Populate and maintain BA business taxonomy in the Business

Intelligence (BI) platform

7‐2 Establish and maintain BA data services in the BI platform and assign data stewards

7‐3 Identify BAPD and corporate reporting requirements

7‐4 Develop and maintain BA enterprise reports

7‐5 Once available, configure data sources for the universal work queue, project or case management, and time management information

8 Reuse of the

Enterprise‐wide services and capabilities

8‐1 Use the corporate‐wide services in BA systems

8‐2 Implement inter‐system workflow support

8‐3 Use enterprise‐wide search capabilities

8‐4 Implement the Source Document Archive

8‐5 Consider corporate‐wide case management or project management solution for detailed planning and transparency of the case processing process

9 BAPD

manuals/references

9‐1 Organize the content of BAPD manuals/references in a manner that allows effective search, retrieval, presentation and use of the and training materials organization and search information contained in the manuals/references to increase efficiency and productivity of BAPD staff

Table 1: Benefits Administration Segment Recommendations

Before the recommendations were prioritized from a business perspective, the EA team derived a set of milestones or activities and identified natural or technology dependencies among them. The business priority and the dependency information determined the relative position of the activities and milestones on the Benefits Administration sequence diagram shown below.

Figure 1 depicts the major milestones that PBGC will need to achieve as recommendations are followed.

Each milestone is represented by a color‐coded horizontal arrow with the milestone title in the middle.

The color of the milestone arrow signifies the improvement area the milestone is in. The system names used in some of the milestone titles may change as Alternatives Analysis maps the functionality to systems. The EA team presented the sequence diagram to the Core Team and obtained approval.

Figure 1: High-level Activity Dependencies and Sequencing

3 Introduction

The Benefits Administration (BA) Segment Architecture was performed by a cross‐organizational team at

PBGC to define a set of recommendations for improving benefits administration within PBGC. This effort was sponsored by the Chief Operating Officer (COO), Rich Macy, in conjunction with the BAPD

Director, Bennie Hagans, and facilitated by the Office of Information Technology (OIT), Enterprise

Architecture (EA) team. The results of this effort will guide decisions about future investments and the

IT transformation of this segment. This effort supports PBGC’s approach to IT modernization as an

“Architect” portion of the “Architect – Invest – Implement” process.

3.1 Segment Scope

The scope of the segment is defined by the business functions that comprise this segment. The scope of the segment was validated and agreed upon by the Core Team. The functions comprising the BA segment scope depicted in the figure below are as follows:

Capture of customer information

Customer notifications and interactions

Maintenance of customer information

Alternate payees

Benefit payment calculation

Benefit payment/disbursment

Over/under‐payments

Payment processing

Business intelligence/reporting

Figure 2: Business Functions

3.2 Background and Problem Statement

The Benefits Administration (BA) Segment enables the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation to meet its core mission of assuring the timely and uninterrupted flow of payments to plan participants while maintaining and improving customer service. BA manages pension benefit accounts, delivers payments to participants, and manages participant correspondence. BA is supported by a collection of IT systems which help provide uninterrupted services to over a million participants in PBGC pension plans in a manner consistent with private sector financial services. This includes secure and accurate communication and transactions whenever the customer interacts with the agency by phone, mail, or through the internet. The

PBGC depends on BA to meet performance measures for customer service as identified in the agency’s strategic plan and to directly support the President’s Management Agenda initiatives.

Currently, the BA Segment relies on the inadequate systems and multiple manual processes. Users have to deal with too many systems in everyday job duties. The systems are approaching technological obsolescence, are lacking important functionality, and are not fully integrated.

Due to its strategic importance and projected increase in the number of pensioners relying on PBGC payments, the BA Segment was selected as a PBGC focus area for FY 2009‐2010. The PBGC executive management initiated the BA Segment Architecture to guide future decisions about IT investments by:

Evaluating the enterprise Benefits Administration business, data and technical requirements

Defining the target state

Providing recommendations and plan for transitioning to the target state.

Opportunities exist for BA to improve efficiencies through increased internet services, reduced call volume, technology that is aligned with business needs, and more efficient processes for both participants and PBGC staff. Modernization will improve BA’s ability to handle an increasing workload and changing requirements.

4 Recommendations

The following recommendations, made by the Core Team, describe business and technology changes required for transitioning to the target state. They are based on a comprehensive understanding of the challenges affecting the Benefits Administration Segment in the current business and technology environment. Implementation of the recommendations will enable PBGC to achieve its goals and objectives for Benefits Administration and provide target services to its stakeholders. While each recommendation represents a discrete set of activities, dependencies among the recommendations do exist and are taken into consideration in the Transition Strategy (Section 5). In addition, the estimated costs and benefits of each recommendation would, of course, also need to be considered at the appropriate point in the process.

Each recommendation is assigned to an owner, which is outlined in the Appendix Section 8.8, Recommendation Owners.

4.1 Summary of Recommendations

The Benefits Administration Core Team developed 33 recommendations grouped by the Improvement

Areas in the following table:

The Benefits Administration Core Team recommends that PBGC:

# Improvement Area # Recommendation Title

1 Data quality and migration to the

Consolidated Customer

Databases

1‐1 Remedy and maintain data quality in Genesis

1‐2 Define per‐application migration path to the Customer Core, Benefit and Payment logical data stores for BA and BD applications

1‐3 Implement the Master Data Management (MDM) and high‐volume

Data Integration solutions

1‐4 De‐duplicate, consolidate and provide access to Customer information from the Genesis and BFI databases

1‐5 Generate test data and re‐assess security controls for test data

1‐6 Establish data quality maintenance processes for all Customer information

2 Benefits

Administration system boundary approach

2‐1 Include entire scope of the Benefits Administration and enterprise impacts in consideration of future alternatives

2‐2 Consolidate redundant system functionality

3 Letter generation 3‐1 Develop detailed business rules outside of the system to aid users in processes and supporting IT solutions selecting the correct letter template and merge data validation rules

3‐2 Enhance existing eALG capabilities

3‐3 Implement Letter/Message Generation System (LGS) capabilities as enterprise‐wide services

3‐4 Promote use of pbgc.gov and customer self‐service on all customer correspondence

4 Customer interaction tracking and Telephony support

4‐1 Implement support for capturing and following customer communications preferences

4‐2 Implement an Enhanced Telephony System

4‐3 Enable tracking of fax, outgoing correspondence, Secure Online Portal events among all other interaction types. Track reasons for all calls.

4‐4 Perform Business Process Re‐engineering (BPR) to standardize business processes and fully utilize benefits of COTS

5 Self‐Service

5‐1 Enable Secure Online Portal to provide support for Plan

Administrators, PBGC Auditors and plan participants to supply and verify participant information

5‐2 Store plan and customer information submissions in the Source

Document Archive

5‐3 Implement ‘Secure Messaging Center’ functionality to allow PBGC to deliver notifications, requests for action, and status updates to customers via the Secure Online Portal

5‐4 Implement the self‐services in the Secure Online Portal and in the

Enhanced Telephony System

6 Participant Information

Management and

Payment Fulfillment

6‐1 Continue with planned improvements to Spectrum (Spectrum 2.1 and

3.0 efforts)

6‐2 Consolidate and Enhance functionality of the Participant Information

Management area systems

7 Participation in implementation of

Business Intelligence

7‐1 Populate and maintain BA business taxonomy in the Business

Intelligence (BI) platform

7‐2 Establish and maintain BA data services in the BI platform and assign data stewards

7‐3 Identify BAPD and corporate reporting requirements

7‐4 Develop and maintain BA enterprise reports

7‐5 Once available, configure data sources for the universal work queue, project or case management, and time management information

8 Reuse of the

Enterprise‐wide services and capabilities

8‐1 Use the corporate‐wide services in BA systems

8‐2 Implement inter‐system workflow support

8‐3 Use enterprise‐wide search capabilities

8‐4 Implement the Source Document Archive

8‐5 Consider corporate‐wide case management or project management solution for detailed planning and transparency of the case processing process

9 BAPD

manuals/references and training materials organization and search

9‐1 Organize the content of BAPD manuals/references in a manner that allows effective search, retrieval, presentation and use of the information contained in the manuals/references to increase efficiency and productivity of BAPD staff

Table 2: Benefits Administration segment recommendations

4.2 Improvement Area #1 – Data Quality and Migration to the Consolidated

Customer Databases

A number of data collection, data quality, and data management issues were identified during SWOT analysis and were fully supported by the results of analysis of Benefits Administration business, technology and data. The results of the segment business and data analysis suggest that Benefits

Administration is an event‐driven business revolving around participants’ information. Quality, organization and ease of access to participant information are prerequisites to improving efficiency of

Benefits Administration and Determination processes.

Below are key findings made during the analysis phase:

GENOWN entries with invalid or abbreviated customer name grew 17% between 2005 (71,023) and 2007 (83,044)3.

30% of CRM team’s effort is spent on supporting the customer information synchronization between Genesis and CRM

MyPBA, Spectrum and CRM maintain 5 schemas in 3 databases with duplicates of Core

Customer information

The recommendations described in the following subsections suggest coordinated activities, processes and supporting IT solutions to address the key findings and other weaknesses identified. These recommendations aim at improving the data quality currently in Benefit Administration data stores and restructuring these data stores. Such database restructuring is based on transitioning from the application‐centric view of the customer data to the realization that customer information is the data asset requested and used by many parts of the PBGC business. Therefore, customer information should be maintained at the level of quality inherent to a key enterprise‐wide resource and should not be

3 GENown Data Quality Monitoring. Baseline audit report, 2007 (most recent audit) owned by any one system, but rather shared by the entire PBGC. The recommendations described below set the roadmap for system migration to use the restructured data stores.

Expected key benefits from implementation of the recommendations described in this section include:

Consistency and integrity of the Core Customer Information available for use by all PBGC systems

Only anomalies and duplicates left out by the automated cleansing and matching rules are forwarded for Data Steward’s manual resolution (resolution by exception)

Improved system reliability due to elimination of data anomalies

Reduction of development cycle cost as the result of elimination of hidden dependencies

Elimination of costs associated with customer information synchronization among non‐COTS systems

Successors of the MyPBA, Spectrum and CRM (Participants Information Management System, Interactions Log and the Secure Online Portal) will have a single store of the Core Customer information to share.

4.2.1 Recommendation 1‐1 ‐ Remedy and maintain data quality in Genesis (and satellite databases)

It is recommended that PBGC improve the quality of the information in the Genesis database (with the focus on the customer information) before transitioning its information systems to the Consolidated

Customer Databases. Information anomalies should be identified, categorized and eliminated. It is also recommended that PBGC archive or move from the operational data stores the records which are not used or which are irreparable or unusable due to low quality or age as determined by the set of defined business rules and parameters.

The Genesis database is the authoritative source of the customer information with many data stores receiving feeds from it. It is essential to make sure that data stores and applications keeping replicas of the Genesis information obtain the cleansed version of the information once it is available in Genesis

(before these applications are migrated to the Consolidated Customer Databases).

Reducing the number of records in the operational databases by moving the irreparable or aged records to the archival data store will improve performance of the BA databases and quality of the production reports. PBGC may use the high‐level activities described in the section 6.3.2.4 to prepare for and perform data archival.

The scope and schedule of the data quality activities (including the first clean‐up of the data) should be determined by the data quality process (discussed more in the Recommendation 1‐6, section 4.2.6) created to ensure the proper level of quality of the Benefits Administration data.

4.2.2 Recommendation 1‐2 ‐ Define per‐application migration path to the Customer Core, Benefit and Payment logical data stores for BA and BD applications

It is recommended that PBGC develop a detailed migration plan to adopt use of the Consolidated

Customer Databases for each application that currently uses Genesis as well as an overall migration plan. PBGC should begin by assessing each connected application. The assessment should result in the migration path of all the impacted applications toward the new state in which they access the

Consolidated Customer Databases for Customer’s Core, Benefit and Payment Information and the redesigned application data stores for the application‐specific data.

Figure 15 depicts the GENown schema in the Genesis database participating in the data exchanges which are part of the 18 major BAPD processes. The number of the applications impacted by the implementation of the Consolidated Customer Databases dictates having a thought‐through migration plan and effective governance ensuring that the plan is followed.

The benefits of creating and approving the migration plan include:

Migration plan is the basis for planning (including budgeting)

Single common vision of the path to the desired target state

Ability to measure the progress of moving to the target state

Effective use of the resources

4.2.3 Recommendation 1‐3 ‐ Implement Master Data Management (MDM) and high‐ volume Data Integration solutions

It is recommended that Core Customer Information be managed in the Master Data Management

(MDM) solution. Core Customer Information (e.g., name, address, SSN, date of birth, etc) is described in the section 7.3.3.2. PBGC needs to select the MDM solution. It is also recommended that PBGC select and employ the high‐throughput Data Integration solution capable of interoperating with the MDM.

Analysis of the CRUD matrix (section 8.16) and business analysis (section 6.2.4) demonstrated that the

Core Customer Information is routinely updated – entirely, or piece by piece ‐ from different business processes based on the sometimes imperfect or unverified information which is often obtained from unrelated sources. Business analysis of the data acquisition phase during plan trusteeship confirmed that the data obtained is incomplete and unreliable due to a number of factors within and outside of

PBGC control. Thus PBGC relies on subsequent phases to fill in the gaps or correct the information before it can be used in plan valuation or benefit administration. Such an approach to improving the data quality of the customer information will likely not change and the business will need a formal and standard mechanism of versioning, controlling and approving changes to the Core Customer

Information.

The concept of the Consolidated Customer Databases includes the mediating data services which encapsulate details of physical implementation of the customer information and allow consumers of the customer information to access it. In such architecture, a Data Integration solution is needed to provide a mechanism for COTS, warehouse, and reporting applications to obtain and update high volume of the customer information. It is absolutely essential that the updates made via the Data Integration solution be monitored and processed via the same verification mechanisms as stand‐alone update requests.

Introduction of the MDM and the high‐volume Data Integration solutions will provide the following key benefits:

Capturing the change requests

Creating an audit trail of the information updates as it the approved change is applied

Automation of the update approval decisions based on predefined rules

Supporting the data steward’s manual decision making

Exposing the Core Customer Information via data services and the selected Data Integration solution

Ability to realize benefits of the Consolidated Customer Databases with COTS (like Business

Intelligence platform or the COTS alternatives considered for the Participant Information

Management System)

Please consult Figure 4, High‐level Transition Sequence Diagram, for the information on dependencies and precedence that may determine when this recommendation may be acted upon.

4.2.4 Recommendation 1‐4 ‐ De‐duplicate, consolidate and provide access to Customer information from the Genesis and BFI databases as applications are migrated

PBGC is recommended to implement the MDM and Data Integration solutions and organize the customer information among the four data stores for Customer Core, Benefit, Payment and Payment

Fulfillment information, as described in full detail in the Section 4.2.3 above. It is recommended that

Core Customer Information be protected with the MDM solution services and there be no direct access to the data stores of Customer Benefit or Payment information.

PBGC should gradually transition to the target state by following the detailed migration plan developed according to recommendation 1‐2 above (please see section 4.2.2 for more details). As applications are migrated to use the new data services providing access to the Customer Core, Benefit and Payment information, old application databases must be modified to exclude the customer information and consolidate the remaining application‐specific data in a minimum number of the data stores necessary to meet the application’s non‐functional requirements.

At the same time, adding new consuming applications to the customer data services may introduce requirements that were not expected before. In such cases, a new version of the data services must be implemented within the release schedule of the new consuming application being migrated. Whenever a new version of a data service is implemented, it is recommended that data service implementation project take into consideration the high‐level requirements expected from the applications scheduled for migration in the coming 2 years.

It is also recommended that legacy database objects be considered for consolidation and de‐ duplication once the customer information is migrated to the Consolidated Customer Databases.

The expected outcome from this recommendation is to minimize the number of the duplicate replicas of the customer information and thus eliminate the cost of developing and maintaining synchronization and reconciliation interfaces. For example, customer information from the GENown and SpecOwn schemas and Genesis and BFI databases in general will blend into the Consolidated Customer Databases and there will be no need in two separate databases for the data remaining in them.

4.2.5 Recommendation 1‐5 ‐ Generate test data and re‐assess security controls for test data

It is recommended that PBGC data for the development and testing environments be derived from the production data sets with the privacy, security and other sensitive data elements replaced with the fake values to ensure confidentiality of the sensitive information.

Once the flow of the sensitive information from the production environment into the testing is eliminated, it is recommended that PBGC reassess the security controls currently employed in the pre‐ production environments for data confidentiality protection.

Benefits Administration applications made great progress in addressing and closing the Plan Of Actions and Milestones (POAM) in the beginning of 2009. Nevertheless the only active POAM for the MyPBA application at the time of writing this recommendation was based on the finding that production data is copied to the production data in test environment.

The expected outcomes of this recommendation are:

Protection of customer PII from unauthorized disclosure

Improved productivity without sacrificing data security

Wider impact of the data quality activities performed in production environment

4.2.6 Recommendation 1‐6 ‐ Establish data quality maintenance processes for all Customer information

It is recommended that PBGC establish and follow the data quality maintenance processes4 to achieve and maintain high quality of the customer information while migrating the applications to the

Consolidated Customer Databases and after the migration activities are finished. The processes established must add the formal structure, sustainability and direction of the data quality activities on the customer information and fully utilize the data quality capabilities of the MDM and other data quality solutions available in PBGC (Trillium products, Address Validation Service (AVS), Bulk AVS, etc.)

These processes should also have the success measuring component to monitor the improvement in overall data quality and to coordinate future activities based on the performance results. PBGC should consider for reuse the conversion, monitoring and data profiling processes used as the basis of the pilot data quality initiative in 2005‐2007.

Business and data analysis performed as part of this segment effort highlighted the significance of the reliable customer information for almost all of the Benefits Administration processes. These analysis results along with the results5 of the data quality audit of the BAPD databases performed by EA in 2005 and 2007 underline the need in establishing coordinated, sustainable and persistent processes for maintaining the quality of the customer information.

Having the two pilot audits performed on the same area of data (GENown schema of the Genesis database) also allows comparing the results of data quality monitoring performed in different years.

Monitoring results show that the number of records in GENown with invalid or abbreviated customer name grew 17% between 2005 (71,023 records) and 2007 (83,044 records)6 despite the data clean‐up initiatives BAPD (called IOD in 2005) has done.

The expected benefits of this recommendation are:

Establishing the focus areas and validation rules for use in preparation of the existing Customer information for implementation of the MDM solution (prerequisite to MDM implementation)

4 EA Data Quality audit effort produced several processes which can be found in PBGC portal at:

1_47/http;/pbgcportal2.prod.ent.pbgc.gov;11930/collab/do/document/overview?projID=3904&folderID=96759

5 Results of the previous Data Audit are available in PBGC portal at http://pbgcportal.prod.ent.pbgc.gov:80/portal/server.pt/gateway/PTARGS_32_0_345_0_- 1_47/http;/pbgcportal2.prod.ent.pbgc.gov;11930/collab/do/document/overview?projID=3904&folderID=96759

6 GENown Data Quality Monitoring. Baseline audit report, 2007 (most recent audit) in PBGC portal at http://pbgcportal.prod.ent.pbgc.gov/portal/server.pt/gateway/PTARGS_32_0_345_0_- 1_47/http;/pbgcportal2.prod.ent.pbgc.gov;11930/collab/do/document/overview?projID=3904&documentID=96945

Ability to monitor the data areas in scope, plan data quality improvement or remediation efforts

Ability to define and monitor the progress and success of the efforts

Ability to monitor the scope, depth and complexity of the data quality profiling and monitoring

Consistent and effective use of the available data quality products for automation of the data quality activities

4.3 Improvement Area #2 – Benefits Administration System Boundary

Approach

OMB Circular A‐11 requires that agencies consider at least three viable alternatives in addition to the current state of the capital asset before the investment into the capital asset can be approved.

Historically, PBGC OMB 300 submissions for the IT assets (hardware and software) were prepared by combining the input from the OIT project managers who are responsible for managing DME and O&M projects on specific systems. As the result, up until the BAPD Alternatives Analysis effort which started in

October 2009, analysis and planning efforts were scoped based on the functionality being performed by the system intended for enhancement or replacement. This approach did not fully explore and employ possibilities of reuse and potential savings coming out of consideration of alternatives which cover chunks of functionality spanning the boundaries of the existing systems. Such new approach to the scoping of planning efforts will address the following key findings:

Previous analysis efforts focused on a single application produced silo‐oriented results

Redundancy and unnecessary costs due to less than optimal functionality allocation among

CRM, MyPBA and Spectrum

The following sections contain recommendations which will ensure proper scope of the future planning and analysis efforts.

4.3.1 Recommendation 2‐1 – Include entire scope of the Benefits Administration and enterprise impacts in consideration of future alternatives

It is recommended that PBGC include the entire scope of the Benefits Administration and enterprise impacts in consideration of future alternatives. In particular, future analysis and planning efforts must consider the required capabilities of the following target state systems:

Payment Fulfillment systems (Benefit Payment System and Benefit Disbursement System) alternatives:

o Complete commercial outsourcing, Treasury Payments o in‐sourcing (e.g., use of CFS as Benefit Payment System) o another paying agent.

Participant Information Management alternatives:

o Custom‐developed application, o Siebel Retirement/Pension Management, o Oracle HR and Advanced Benefits.

Letter Generation alternatives:

o Custom‐built application and services, o outsourcing of the Letter Generation and Letter Fulfillment services.

MDM solution for the Core Customer Information alternatives:

o Oracle Customer Hub, o Siperian Multidomain MDM Hub, o IBM InfoSphere

High‐volume Data Integration solution alternatives:

o Oracle Warehouse Builder, o Oracle Data Integrator EE.

Secure Online Portal alternatives:

o custom developed application, o Oracle iSupport module of eBusiness Suite, o Oracle Web Center portal‐based solution.

The Benefits Administration Core Team developed and approved the target state of the Benefits

Administration segment. The target state is formulated as a set of the capabilities that Benefits

Administration business processes need. It is intentionally vendor‐agnostic to remain flexible in case of the replacement of the underlying technology. In addition to being vendor‐agnostic, Benefits

Administration target state services and applications are defined independent from the current system implementation. Thus, the implementation projects need product selection recommendations before the target state solutions can be implemented.

The expected benefits of this recommendation are:

Holistic view will provide analysis‐based justification of expected savings in these areas

(includes compliance)

IT investments will transform IT assets in accordance with the target architecture

Provides product selection recommendations necessary for budgetary and other types of planning

4.3.2 Recommendation 2‐2 – Consolidate redundant system functionality

It is recommended that PBGC consider data and functionality overlap and opportunities for cost reduction among the Benefits Administration and Determination segments systems. In particular, it is recommended that PBGC

Examine opportunities for system consolidation and elimination of redundant functionality implementations among CRM, MyPBA and Spectrum.

Examine opportunities for a system to support both BA and BD functions.

This recommendation will address the narrowness of the previous application‐centric approach and allow for consideration of the end‐to‐end processes which are in scope of the Benefits Administration and Determination segments. The following are the expected benefits from implementation of this recommendation:

MyPBA currently allows participants and other payees to perform via Internet a subset of operations available in CRM. This presents a potential opportunity for reduction of the number of independent systems and complexity of the environments and data reconciliations

As the Data Analysis shows, Benefits Administration and Determination segment processes share a significant portion of common information. Currently these segments use separate applications and manual or partially automated data synchronization and reconciliation procedures. Considering the functions of both segments in a single analysis effort will allow for assessment of the large COTS packages handling the defined benefits pension plans as a solution for the entire BA and BD segments.

4.4 Improvement Area #3 – Letter generation processes and supporting IT solutions

Early in the Segment Architecture, problems related to letters were identified. In Fiscal 2009, PBGC sent

931,340 letters, or more than 3,700 letters per day. Due to the sheer volume, problems with letters can have widespread detrimental effects, including diminished customer satisfaction, high call volume and unnecessary appeals.

Business and Technical analysis revealed the following specific challenges:

Inconsistent and misleading letters caused by inadequately defined and supported letter template selection process lead to letters that impact customer service and add to the call volume and number of erroneous appeals

Some letter template texts are not well written

Letter template text is not always well organized to deliver an actionable message to the recipient

Too many customized letters issued considering the fact that PBGC’s approach is to use templates for all scenarios

Template selection issues/insufficient IT support for template selection considering the number of templates available. No automation for choosing a template out of over 500 letter templates

(approximately 250 in English and 250 in Spanish)

Inadequate process of updating the instructions or training on template selection

Inadequate knowledge management effort around operational manual, help files and training materials

Electronic communication mechanisms are severely underutilized

Letter generation capability of eALG has bugs and needs to be improved to be a corporate‐wide service (e.g., eALG minor release was necessary to add PAS as a consumer)

A recent GAO report found that 25% of correspondence to Appeals division was requests for explanation of benefits and changes in personal information. Only 29% of correspondence was actually docketed as appeals

The following recommendations address the challenges listed above.

4.4.1 Recommendation 3‐1 – Develop detailed business rules outside of the system to aid users in selecting the correct letter template and merge data validation rules

PBGC should develop detailed business rules outside of the system to aid users in selecting the correct letter template and merge data validation rules. Aiding users in the selection process will reduce the number of letter customizations, limiting the number of errors and shortening request processing times.

OPSS recognizes the need in more methodical procedure and guidance for template selection. This is an action that can be completed in the relatively short term to produce higher quality correspondence to customers, leading to reduced call volume.

These business rules can later be implemented into the Letter Generation System to provide increased automatic letter generation based on business processes, and to aid users in identifying the correct, relevant letter where human intervention is required.

4.4.2 Recommendation 3‐2 – Enhance existing eALG capabilities

It is recommended that PBGC enhance existing eALG capabilities to in the short term. In particular, PBGC should enable an audit trail of the reviews and approvals of letter template customizations and the customized letters.

This particular enhancement to eALG will improve the quality of letters by providing quality measurements and allowing approval audit records as the foundation for accountability.

4.4.3 Recommendation 3‐3 – Implement Letter/Message Generation System (LGS) capabilities as enterprise‐wide services

Because letters or electronic messages are not unique to Benefits Administration, PBGC should implement Letter/Message Generation System (LGS) capabilities and expose them as enterprise‐wide services. Specifically:

a. Implement Enterprise Letter Fulfillment service, Enterprise Message Generation service, and an Enterprise Message Preparation solution

b. Utilize the detailed business rules in the Enterprise Message Preparation to aid users in identifying the correct, relevant template where manual template selection is required

c. Use the Enterprise Message Generation service for automated letter generation from other systems based on their business processes

d. Enable email, Secure Messaging Center and fax as supported communication channels

Enabling email, Secure Messaging Center and fax as communication channels (in addition to the regular paper letters) will allow PBGC to utilize electronic means of communication, thereby increasing efficiency and reducing costs and impact on the environment related to paper correspondence.

4.4.4 Recommendation 3‐4 – Promote use of pbgc.gov and customer self‐service on all customer correspondence (letter templates, checks, etc.)

Segment Analysis revealed that electronic communication mechanisms are severely underutilized (see

Section 6.2.1.2 for specific instances).

Currently, most correspondence sent to customers directs the customers to contact PBGC via telephone or postal mail. There is usually no reference made to the opportunity to obtain information or interact with PBGC via the website or online portal.

It is recommended that PBGC promote use of pbgc.gov and customer self‐service on all customer correspondence, including all letter templates and checks. Doing so will lead to a more favorable distribution between different channels of communication, increased self‐service, increased efficiency and reduced costs of interacting with customers.

4.5 Improvement Area #4 – Customer Interaction Tracking and Telephony

Support

The following recommendations are related to customer interaction tracking and telephony support:

4.5.1 Recommendation 4‐1 – Implement support for capturing and…