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GCN Home > 08/16/04 issue

An inside view: how to build a business case

New initiatives for federal IT investments face a rigorous process of planning and justification to obtain approval by the Office of Management and Budget. Here are some steps for making the case to OMB for funding for a “ground zero” project, from Jim Kendrick, president of the P2C2 Group Inc. of Kensington, Md., based on his experience in helping agencies prepare Exhibit 300 business cases.

Start with the agency’s performance goals. Your IT project needs to solve a big agency problem or achieve dramatic program results.

Define your strategy for business case develpment Typically, the business case for a new project will require between three and eight months of preparation. Your strategy for developing the Exhibit 300 and supporting business- case documents should address all of the requirements of the Office of Management and Budget’s Circular A-11, Section 300.

Identify and involve stakeholders. A major new initiative generally requires broad support and a change management strategy. Involve line managers wherever appropriate, identify other stakeholders, and determine a way to keep them involved or informed. Keep your briefings well-structured. Establish credibility by conducting professional-quality background research and planning.

Document your baselines. You will need to document your current business requirements, workflow, problems, risks, costs and performance metrics. Such a baseline will be used to estimate how much of an improvement your proposed initiative is likely to achieve. Identify project results and requirements. A high-level requirements document should specify general business and IT capabilities necessary to meet agency and stakeholders’ requirements. But the specifications should not be so narrow that they rule out potentially attractive alternatives.

Explore outside-the-box solutions. The best option for a new investment could be to redefine your project or to outsource the project to another agency or to a commercial source. Don’t simply think about updating your legacy solution to a new version of the same system.

Start early on security and privacy issues. You want to be able to state specific dates for your privacy impact assessment, project risk management plan and system security plan. You also will need to assess information-security requirements in sufficient detail to estimate costs for security, including technical and other controls, the certification and accreditation process, and ongoing security management.

Consider OMB’s scoring system. You must fully address 10 criteria and OMB will score your project on each one. See Circular A-11.