AT A GLANCE

CLIENT: Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

SERVICES: User Access and Experience

SYSTEM: BDS Directory Manager

CHALLENGE: Streamline identity management for joiners, movers and leavers.

OUTCOMES: Automated processes have led to significant time savings and improved account accuracy, full visibility of all staff working within the Trust including non-substantive staff and enhanced collaboration between IT and HR.

CHALLENGE

In 2017, Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (BTH) concluded that they needed an effective identity management system, as they were relying on monthly reports from the ESR team. At this time, there were around 15,000 user accounts so a significant amount of information to maintain manually. These suffered from data quality issues including:

• Duplicate accounts: The Trust faced frequent problems with duplicate accounts, especially with common names. This made it difficult to manage identities accurately.
• Incorrect account closures: The ESR reports included terminated assignments rather than terminating individuals, leading to accounts being closed incorrectly.
• Evidence for compliance: It was challenging to provide evidence for timely account closures, which was necessary for compliance submissions.

Integration with existing systems also required improvement, for example:

• The process of linking ESR records to Active Directory records was complex due to the poor data quality in both systems.
• Managing accounts for non-ESR individuals required additional input sources and third-party products.

Overall, the existing process was inefficient and couldn't ensure timely account management. Any identity management solution would require changes to internal processes, particularly in how assignment change forms were handled by Payroll and HR. In addition, any solution was seen as IT-driven however it was clear that it would require significant collaboration with HR to ensure data accuracy in ESR. This led to a change in the culture and significant investment in stakeholder buy-in to ensure any changes to the system would be well received and therefore successful.

SOLUTION AND PROCESS

The Trust had an existing relationship with Cloud21, which manages the North West Active Directory forest in which the Trust domain resides. It was this relationship that facilitated the introduction of BDS Directory Manager, the solution designed for the NHS to manage identity data from multiple sources to automate the handling of starters, movers and leavers. It provides rich integration with ESR and Active Directory, NHSmail and Office 365 and is highly extensible to permit integration with other accessible systems.

There were three key implementation steps.

1. Linking ESR and Active Directory: A significant part of the implementation involved linking ESR records to Active Directory records, which required addressing data quality issues.
2. Automating Processes: The implementation included automating the creation, updating, and termination of accounts, ensuring timely and accurate account management.
3. Collaboration with HR: Over time, the implementation required closer collaboration with HR to improve data accuracy in ESR and streamline processes.

Following the implementation of the Directory Manager core service, the Trust worked with Cloud21 to establish the new Digital Directory module which enables many more systems to provide identity data to Directory Manager. The transition to the Digital Directory further streamlined account management and improved data quality.

Having established the Digital Directory, the Trust worked with Cloud21 to integrate third-party products into the application to manage non-employed staff and other identity management needs. This has included integration with the Trust’s Position-Based Access Control (PBAC) database for automating the management of security group membership within Active Directory. It has also involved integrating with PAC Access Central, the Trust’s door access system, permitting door access to be controlled automatically based on staff roles.

OUTCOMES

The realisation that a better way to manage user accounts and the subsequent implementation of Directory Manager was the catalyst for a consolidated Digital Identity department being created within the Trust. Most Trusts share the responsibilities between the IT and HR departments but by creating a new department, with BDS Directory Manager at its core, this resulted in several improvements:

• Automated processes: The Trust now has an end-to-end automated process for creating, updating, and terminating accounts, ensuring timely and accurate account management. This automation of processes has led to significant time savings and improved account accuracy.
• Improved data quality: The transition to the Digital Directory streamlined account management and improved data quality. Better quality data means that BTH now has full visibility of all staff working within the Trust including non-substantive. This in turn means that it's easy to see all the accounts associated with a user and when these should be modified, something which historically has proved problematic.
• Enhanced collaboration: The implementation fostered better collaboration between IT and HR, leading to improved data accuracy in ESR and more efficient processes.

The success of BDS Directory Manager at BTH has led to discussions about expanding the Digital Identity function across Lancashire as part of the ICS, with Directory Manager playing a key role.

Overall, the implementation of BDS Directory Manager has been a transformative process for Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, addressing key challenges and leading to significant improvements in identity management.

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