ADVICE AND SUPPORT TO SET OUT THE REQUIREMENTS FOR A COMPONENTISED CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

Description

Summary of the work A discovery exercise is needed to be undertaken to set out the requirements for CMS taking a componentised and structured approach to content development, management and publication that aligns to the structured approach that ONS is taking to data. Latest start date Monday 25 October 2021 Why the Work is Being Done The current content management system (CMS) takes content created in Word, publishing it as html pages to the ONS website and involves a lot of manual process to develop and publish including manually sharing files, hand-building pages of content with the same elements and building charts that have already been built by a different team in a different tool. There is no facility within the existing CMS to re-use content or bring together content across multiple themes. This work supports more efficient development and publication of statistical analysis - radical and ambitious in its plans to overhaul the way we create and manage our analysis. It would provide a sustainable and scalable model, once the CMS has been developed, aligning to the ONS strategic objectives. · Kick off to understand user needs · Business process and capability mapping · Content audit (raw data and summary document/report; presentation to steering groups (SG)) · Development of a content and channel strategy (document(s); presentation and endorsement by SG) · CMS requirements (document; presentation and endorsement by SG) · Prototypes proposals for buy/build solutions (report for discussion/decision at SG) · Handover and implementation plan, including a consideration of business change by 31/03/22 Problem to Be Solved Discovery · Engagement with ONS team involving introductory presentations · Business process and capability mapping setting out best practice and efficient analytical content development process. Process artefacts to be developed alongside. · A content audit, accounting for all content components at a granular level, data, charts, visualisations, the National Statistical blog and the relationships between them. Format likely Excel. · Fortnightly reporting. Artefacts/reports · Development of a content model for future content development, inc; content types, attributes and relationships, based on the findings from the audit. Alignment with relevant ONS taxonomies essential. · Development of content and channel strategy including information architecture and related metadata model · Recommendations - design of a future (componentised/structured) CMS to align to the structured data repository, in a report, co-developed with ONS teams, including requirements and documented user needs for new CMS, and approach to federated content management, review and approval through associated workflow tool. Approach · Engagement, buy-in, support from business areas and content teams throughout the process, endorsement of the recommendations and outputs · Consideration of the business change needs Who Are the Users We are seeking a commercial partner to work with ONS colleagues to set out the requirements for a componentised content management system, taking a structured approach to content development, management and publication. A discovery exercise is needed to set out the requirements (user needs) for a new system by a commercial partner with specialist expertise in componentised content and content/data/information operations and structured, componentised content management systems (e.g. DITA), working alongside ONS content experts. This work will: · set out to clearly identify the current constraints and blockers within the existing service and their impact on the users of the service. · set out the right tooling for efficiencies in the content lifecycle/publishing process · articulate the scope through the development of a channel strategy for ONS · understand how the content deployed through ONS CMS differs (if at all) from GDS GOV.UK content and CMS deployment Existing Team Existing team · Technical Leads · Developers (front/back/full stack) · Business Analysts · User Research · Product Owner · Service Owner · Data Visualisation Specialists · Content Editors · Publishing Officers · Delivery · Data Architects · Social Media · Solution Architects · Deputy Director and the Senior Management Team · Statisticians Current Phase Discovery Skills & Experience • An example of a contract successfully completed involving a significant scale content model at a granular (componentised) level (national audience, multiple data sources) completed in the last 3 years • Example of contract successfully completed using componentised content management systems (e.g. DITA) and the relevant content lifecycle approach, information architecture and related data and metadata model for maximum efficiency. • Example of contract successfully completed with experience in developing strategy for delivery of content using a componentised content management system (e.g. DITA), across a large-scale organisation with a national audience. • Experience of capability to undertake Content Management Transformation at scale, moving towards an Information (content and data) Ops model • Experience of running a discovery process to review of AS-IS capabilities, approaches to successfully transform them using modern practises/solutions. Example of contract successfully completed. • Example of contract successfully completed with experience in developing strategy for delivery of content using a componentised content management system, working with existing and future partners to deploy content • Previous experience of setting out the user needs and business requirements for a componentised content management system. Work Location Attendance working at Titchfield or Newport on an as when basis. In accordance COVID-19 rules. Working Arrangments Expenses must be agreed in advance on a case-by-case basis inline with the ONS Travel and subsistence policy. Security Clearance BPSS as a minimum Some roles may require SC Clearance (TBC) No. of Suppliers to Evaluate 3 Proposal Criteria • Please confirm your Methodology for delivering the requirements for a componentised content management system (aligned to ONS structured data approach), taking a structured approach to content development, management and publication. • Confirmation that you will meet the deadline for completion of the contract in accordance with Milestone/Deliverable in "Why the work is being done" • Provision of a Gantt Chart (or similar) to illustrate your programme for delivery, including confirmation of dates for completion Milestone/Deliverables • Explanation of how the method proposed to the Discovery will bring a broad set of challenging stakeholders towards a common agreement (needs and solutions). • Explanation of how the proposed method will be accurate in determining a strategy to deliver the transformational outcomes envisaged. • Explanation of the involvement and accountabilities of ONS. • Please illustrate how the approach will support our ‘Statistics for the Public Good’ strategy- https://uksa.statisticsauthority.gov.uk/statistics-for-the-public-good/ • How will you ensure that the scope includes reference to all of our corporate personas in our aim to reach an inclusive audience Cultural Fit Criteria • How will the resources put forward by the supplier ensure that they communicate effectively to other team members, and AUTHORITY as appropriate: • Please describe how the resource will report effectively up the management chain within the AUTHORITY; • Please describe how the resource will deliver specialist technical information to an experienced technical end-user; and • Please describe how the resource will deliver specialist technical information to an end user assuming that the end user has no technical knowledge. Payment Approach Fixed price Evaluation Weighting Technical competence 70% Cultural fit 10% Price 20% Questions from Suppliers 1. What is the allocated budget for this project? As DOS has provided an optional field for budget, ONS has decided to refrain from providing a budget or indicative costs for this requirement. 2. 1)Please confirm if there are any incumbent suppliers for this service.2)Please confirm the budget for this work.3)Please confirm the expected contract length/timeframe for this work. 1) There are no incumbent suppliers for this service as this is a new requirement.2) As DOS has provided an optional field for budget, ONS has decided to refrain from providing a budget or indicative costs for this requirement3) As stated in the published requirement the contract length/timeframe is expected to be approx. 22 weeks - from 25/10/2021-31/03/2022. 3. Is the 30th September deadline for submission of the initial questionnaire response? Yes, the deadline for this submission is Thursday 30 September 2021 at 11:59pm GMT at which point applications will close. 4. What is the process and the timescales for proposal submission and selection following the shortlisting post 30th September? Post September 30th ONS will conduct a shortlisting exercise where submissions will be evaluated and moderated. Moderation of shortlisting is expected to be week commencing 4th of October, with feedback and issue of ITT by end of the same week. The proposal submission deadline will be 5 working days from the issue of the ITT. 5. Supplier has asked:What content formats are required? (both source and delivery) ONS are unsure of the question and would like to obtain further information.Please can you respond to the below question:Is the supplier asking: What formats the content needs to be in as part of any content/publishing workflow through the CMS and onto the web, and what content we then want the outputted material to be in on the website?Please respond to: PU.Projects@ons.gov.ukONS will endeavor to publish a response on this portal on receipt of this clarification, before close down. 6. What number and types of systems are involved in content operations currently, especially the current CMS? Publishing on the ONS website is managed through: Sharepoint - used for publishing requests, workflow and sharing static files - Word docs, XLS, PDFs - between output areas and a centralised publishing team. In-house CMS - publishing team takes receipt of static files and information provided via Sharepoint with necessary "metadata" and then build pages in the CMS, using markdown. Beyond the ONS website there are different CMSes. e.g. Wordpress is used for most of the blog pages under the ONS/UK Stats Authority umbrella and some UKSA brand sites too. 7. What data sources do you currently have that will form part of the structured content operation? It is not clear if "data" in this context means statistical data. The vast majority of data that is published on the ONS website for download is essentially a series of static .XLS or .CSV files which are provided to a centralised publishing team which then attach them to HTML pages fo publication. 8. Will the project include conversion of existing content to the new model? Or will ONS want a tool, so that they can convert the content themselves? No. The work will set out the recommendations for how content is created, managed (including any approaches to conversion of existing content that might be necessary) as part of a model for future content development, inc; content types, attributes and relationships, based on the findings from the audit. 9. Do you need experience in DITA ? DITA is provided as an example of a suitable technology to support componentised content management. Specific experience in DITA is not necessary although we would like to see experience with content management systems that manage componentised, modular content and associated taxonomies and schemas, and allow for re-use. 10. Any specific reason why evidence of last 3 years is needed ? We are looking for recent examples using modern technologies and therefore we have set a 3 year window for examples 11. Can you indicate how many stakeholders and separate departments you would expect us to consult with in the discovery phase? This is a programme with a wide impact at ONS and there will be a large number of stakeholders and ONS divisions. To manage the discovery phase effectively, we would establish a working group, with respresentation from the relevant statistical production areas, content and data design teams, technical and taxonomy teams. 12. How many word documents are you currently managing to drive the current content operations and web content? We currently "convert" approx 1,500 Word documents to HTML pages per year using Markdown inside a bespoke CMS. 13. Apart from Word what other types of content does your process need to consume? We want to move away from Word documents as the basis for the content production process. Other content types include - Tables, charts, visualisations and data explorer tools, dashboards, interactive maps and other geographical tools. We also publish data in spreadsheets. Specifically, CSV, XLSX, Markdown, JSON, and GeoJSON (or other geographic formats). 14. Do you have a current information model? What do you mean by information model? We have a common structure/fields for all page types. 15. How do the data and content interact? We are looking for the ability for a publisher to query a datastore to build tables, charts, maps, dashboards, interactives and configure pre-canned spreadsheet downloads. Data behind these visual elements must also be made available. There is also the potential to configure dynamic content from data (e.g. robojournalism)Any data point used in the production of content should be linked to the dataset to enable further interrogation by the user Metadata provision needs to be considered. 16. What content formats are required? (both source and delivery) Tables, charts, visualisations and data explorer tools, dashboards, interactive maps and other geographical tools. We also publish data in spreadsheets. Specifically, CSV, XLSX, Markdown, JSON, and GeoJSON (or other geographic formats). 17. Do you have an established Taxonomy or metadata structure and is this publicly available? The ONS has a taxonomy built into the site which helps support the information architecture for products that are delivered to the website that aid user navigation. There are elements of metadata that are provided throughout the site such as discovery metadata, reference metadata and structural metadata. All these are publishable and can be access via the public website once they are published.