NCJ Number
211995
Date Published
November 2005
Length
94 pages
Annotation
This guide provides practical information to law enforcement personnel in small and rural police agencies on the integration of new information technology (IT) systems into agency operations.
Abstract
The guide consists of four parts that reflect the major components of any IT installation and operation: preliminary project planning, creating a project plan, acquiring the technology, and implementing and maintaining the technology. Three chapters address preliminary project planning. A chapter on "determining the need" discusses a preliminary scoping exercise, how to conduct a needs analysis, and grant compliance. A chapter on "looking within" focuses on assessments of available personnel and available financing. The third chapter presents alternatives to consider during project planning. The guide's section on creating a project plan consists of one chapter that describes project plan components. These components include goals and objectives, project scope definition, budget, initial risk assessment, assumptions about the project, constraints, a timeline, participants' roles and responsibilities, issue management, a communications plan, and approvals. A chapter on "acquiring the technology" focuses on procurement and contracting. It first considers whether it is necessary to buy the technology. This is followed by discussions of the bidding process, choosing a procurement approach, creating a bid document, functional specifications, evaluating and selecting a vendor, and the negotiation process. Two chapters deal with the implementation and maintenance of the IT system. The chapter on implementation considers what to expect during implementation, direct training versus "train-the-trainer," how to keep vendors involved in the task to completion, and acceptance testing. The second chapter, entitled "keeping it all together," discusses system maintenance and how to handle version upgrades.