Analysis of IT Governance Failures in Queensland Health Payroll System

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Information technology- Governance for the
organization
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Introduction
The assignment is based on the IT governance framework. This is helpful in the development of
the governance and theories of change management. This report will cover the solutions that are
going to help to avoid the shortcomings and difficulties of the IT governance framework. The
report is based on the case study of the Queensland Health Payroll project. The report includes
significant failures in this scenario. This will also cover the implementation of the IT
Governance standard As ISO/IEC 38500:2016. This report will show how the implementation of
these principles helps to improve project governance success.
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Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Significant Governance failures......................................................................................................4
Principles of the ISO/IEC 3800: 2016 in the case scenario.............................................................5
Consideration of how the standard's principles could be applied effectively in such a situation to
produce better governance outcomes:.............................................................................................6
Responsibilities of the CEO as well as other management staff:....................................................7
Final recommendation concerning the suitability and feasibility of applying this governance
standard............................................................................................................................................8
Conclusion:......................................................................................................................................9
References......................................................................................................................................10
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Significant Governance failures
The given case study of Queensland Health payroll project has various failures. The Queensland
government faced a lot of challenges in the process of modernization of the payroll systems. This
caused damaged careers and political reputations. Following are some common issues that
caused IT governance failures.
As given in the case study that in the year 2002, the government of Queensland approved the SSI
(Shared Service Initiative) that is a single system for payroll that applied to all the departments.
This caused various issues in governance as all the department have access to the payroll system,
it will become difficult to monitor and determine the permission and access controls of the
departments. This does not follow the strategy principle. The Payroll system did not use the
information technology to create the payroll system for all the departments.
In the year 2007, the former executive of IBM recommended project outsourcing. This also
caused some governance to relationship issues. It occurred because the governance of the
outsider becomes difficult to manage. In this, it did not follow the responsibility, as the payroll
system also has to give authority to the third party in order to perform required actions.
In the year 2008, due to the improper management of the payroll system, the project cost raised.
This causes the governance issue as the system was not following the proper guidelines.
In the year 2010, the rostering system and health payroll system cause mistakes in the payslips of
workers. This caused issue in governance as the proper strategy does not follow by the payroll
system. The government of Queensland should use information technology to make a proper
strategy.
In the year 2012, many clerks required manual calculation and issue of the payslips for the
workers of 80,000 Queensland Health. This increased public criticism. This also caused issues
in governance as the manual working has a lot of issues and these are difficult to monitor. Thus it
does not understand human behavior, because to do such manual task is difficult for a human.
The payroll system should use information technology to manage this task automatically or with
minimum human intervention.
In the year 2013, the final report is out.
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Principles of the ISO/IEC 3800: 2016 in the case scenario
This is a standard that is helpful to monitor, direct and evaluate the Information technology in the
Queensland Health Payroll project. There are six principles of the It governance model that are
responsibility, strategy, acquisition, performance, conformance, and human behavior.
1. The first principle of this governance model states that the groups and individual should
accept and understand the duties. The persons who have the responsibility should also have
the authority to do the actions. In the year 2007, it was suggested by the former IBM
executive of IBM to outsource the project. In this case, the third party should provide all the
authorities to do the required actions.
2. The business strategy of the organization must consider the potential future and current IT
capabilities. The plans should also be aligned with the organization needs and objectives. In
the year 2002, due to a lack of proper strategy to go live, the rostering system and Health
payroll system caused issues in the workers’ payslips.
3. There should balance between the opportunities, benefits, risks, and cost. This also offers
transparency in decision making. In the year 2002, the Queensland government does not
follow the acquisition principle. There is a lack of transparent decision making due to the
single payroll system. The government of Queensland did not consider the risk, cost, and
opportunities.
4. Use of information technology should be done in such a way that it can support the business
and quality of the service to achieve the requirements of the business. The Health payroll
system did not use Information technology properly to manage the system. Thus, it did not
follow the fourth principle of the model.
5. The information technology sue should comply with the required regulations and legislations.
The mandatory practices and policies should be properly implemented and defined. In the
year 2012, the payroll system faced issues because it was not complying with the regulations
and legislations and faced the increase in criticism by the public.
6. The policies, decisions, and practices should follow the Human behavior that should consider
the requirement of people involved in the project. In the year 2012, the Queensland
government did not understand the requirement of humans involved in the project. For the
clerks, it was difficult to calculate the payment and issue the payslip manually. This caused
an increase in the total cost (Juiz & Colomo-Palacios, 2019).
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Consideration of how the standard's principles could be applied effectively in
such a situation to produce better governance outcomes:
The principles should be applied effectively and efficiently in such a situation to produce better
governance outcomes in which the directors, CEO, and management play a vital role which is
described as follows:
Role of the Directors of the firm:
 CEO selection: The directors are responsible for the selection of the board of the directors in
order to make small decisions without involving any senior management. The CEO
implements the managerial decisions which are made by the different users. The different
managerial decisions should be taken as well as implemented by the CEO.
 Approving the different strategies: the different strategies are implemented by the directors in
order to improvise the functionality of the firm. The directors approve the decisions which
are been made by the managers in order to improvise the working functionalities of the
organization.
 Financial Focus on Organization: the financial focus is necessary in maintaining the economy
of the organization in order to analyze the different financial problems which could be faced
by the organization and finding the different managerial solutions of those problems in order
to maintain the financial position of the firm in the market.
 Capital allocation: the capital has been allocated by the directors in order to perform the
different tasks and in order to maintain the financial position as well as improvise the market
position of the firm by implementing the new technologies and growing the office premises.
 Director Nominations: The board of the directors, as well as the committee members, are also
nominated by the directors in order to make the several decisions for the betterment of the
firm in order to nominate the directors to check the performance of the different employees
of the firm.
 Look after the compliance issues: the compliance issues which are faced by the firms are
directly looked after by the director of the firm in order to nominate the issues and the legal
issues which should be faced by the firm. The director directly makes different decisions
related to compliance issues.
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Responsibilities of the CEO as well as other management staff:
 Perform business operations smoothly: the business operations after the implementation of
the standard principles. The CEO, as well as the management of the company, manages the
different business operations in order to maintain the growth of the business and making
different strategies in taking the full use of the technology.
 Risk identification and management: the CEO, as well as the management, identifies the
emerging risks on the firm In order to manage the risks as well as protecting the firm from
the different risks by making the managerial decision (van-der-Haven, 2016).
 Making annual plans: the annual plans should be managed by the management and CEO in
order to make the organization properly functioning and for achieving a better position in the
market.
 Setting the Board structure: the board structure has been set up by the management staff and
the CEO in order to manage the overall functioning of the firm and improvising the proper
structure of the firm.
 Deciding the board committee structure: the board committee structure has been decided by
the CEO in order to properly function so that the firm can achieve its desired goals and
maintain the position in the market.
 Regular auditing: the management staff audits the work done by the employees in order to
know the different problems faced by the employees in working so that they can improvise
the working environment and solve the problems of the employees for the proper functioning
of the firm.
 These operations are performed by the directors as well as the CEO and managerial staff in
order to provide the desired results after implementing the standard principles for the
achievement of the desired governance outcomes for the organization by implementing the
different technologies in maintaining the work done by the employees.
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Final recommendation concerning the suitability and feasibility of applying
this governance standard
The IT Queensland Payroll system is governed by the different people who are the director, CEO
as well as the managerial staff of the firm. The suitability of applying the governance standards
in an IT company is as follows:
The suitability and feasibility governance of the company has been done with the help of three
types of analysis which are:
PESTEL Analysis: the PESTEL analysis is used to find out the different forces which are acting
externally with the firm in order to maintain the social, political, technological. Legal as well as
the environmental factors of the firm which are much more helpful for the organization in
achieving a better position for the firm. The PESTEL analysis is also used to identify whether the
government policies which are implemented are feasible or not.
SWOT Analysis: the SWOT analysis is used by the management staff in order to analyze the
strengths, weaknesses, threats as well as the opportunities with the help of the acting forces of
the firm. The SWOT analysis facilitates the weakness as well as the risk analysis of the firm and
provides the solutions to improvise functionality of the firm even in the worst situations.
Five forces of the Porter: this analysis is done in order to reduce the pressure situations of the
firm so that the firm can survive in the market facing the competition. The five forces are used
for the competition survival of the organization to maintain a better position in the market.
The feasibility study: the feasibility study should also be done in the above analysis in order to
perform the feasibility study each and every aspect whether it is economical, financial, legal
should be look after by the management in order to check that whether the governance policies
implemented in the IT companies are feasible whether it is economically, legally, and technically
for the proper functioning of the organization so that the different efforts done in order to achieve
the desired goals should be much more effectively and efficiently applicable.
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Conclusion:
The case study of Queensland Health Payroll project has potential issues while implementing the
It governance. The principles of AS ISO/ IEC 38500: 2016 has the potential to overcome the
issues. The principles of this framework can be helpful to improve the scenario and provide
satisfactory results. With the help of this model, governance of IT becomes easy. There are
different failures in the payroll system of Queensland which caused issues in IT governance.
Some of the issues are the improper strategy, lack of use of information technology, poor
alignment with the regulations and legislation, etc. The 6 principles can improve the situation by
using information technology properly.
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References
Eldridge, S. M., Chan, C. L., Campbell, M. J., Bond, C. M., Hopewell, S., Thabane, L., &
Lancaster, G. A. (2016). CONSORT 2010 statement: extension to randomised pilot and
feasibility trials. Pilot and feasibility studies, 2(1), 64.
Vigneau, L., Humphreys, M., & Moon, J. (2015). How do firms comply with international
sustainability standards? Processes and consequences of adopting the global reporting initiative.
Journal of Business Ethics, 131(2), 469-486.
Sindhu, S., Nehra, V., & Luthra, S. (2017). Investigation of feasibility study of solar farms
deployment using hybrid AHP-TOPSIS analysis: Case study of India. Renewable and
Sustainable Energy Reviews, 73, 496-511.
Juiz, C., & Colomo-Palacios, R. (2019). Cascading ISO/IEC 38500 based Balanced Score Cards
to improve board accountability. Procedia Computer Science, 138(19), 417-424. doi:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.procs.2018.10.059
van-der-Haven, D. (2016). ISO/IEC 38500 - An Introduction. Retrieved 16 August 2019, from
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/isoiec-38500-introduction-dolf-van-der-haven
Ali, S., & Green, P. (2007). IT governance mechanisms in public sector organisations: An
Australian context. Journal of Global Information Management (JGIM), 15(4), 41-63.
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