Monitor and Evaluate the POC

Martin was glad he had assigned some of his staff to different stakeholders. The feedback was often gathered daily, sometimes hourly, on how the technologies were performing. These extra resources gave Martin additional breathing room to spend time with some of the stakeholders himself, and personally follow up on emails of concern sent to him. He also had his staff collect and summarize the audit logs at the end of the POC.

Jason was a whirlwind of activity. He tried to keep up with his digital signature project and keep his fellow project managers working with the biometric system. Jason's problems stemmed from the lack of time he and his colleagues really had to use the system. Most of the day was spent in meetings or on the phone. When they were at their desks, time was precious, and the unfamiliar biometric system was slowing them down; some were disabling the system, or avoiding it altogether.

The Methodology

Once the POC is deployed, it needs to be tended. This monitoring should include the following:

• Spend "quality time" with each group ” It is important to make all stakeholders feel that they are being listened to and heard . This means having both formal and informal meetings and communications. Also, when out and about, listen for the hallway talk on how things are going. This can provide additional feedback that is not being passed through the POC group.

• Make sure needs are being heard and met ” Spend time talking to the actual users of the biometric system. Calling and emailing is good for gathering general impressions on how things are going. Desk visits with face-to-face communication can give context to comments made on the phone or through email. Ask the user how he/she likes the system. Watch how the user uses the biometric system or, more importantly, see if the system has been deactivated or ignored.

• Be available as much as possible to troubleshoot and answer questions ” Small problems and misconceptions can grow quickly. It is always easier to deal with a small grass fire than a raging inferno! There is only one opportunity to make a good first impression . Once that opportunity has been lost and a bad taste has been left in the mouth of the user, it is twice as hard to win the user back.

• Use the audit logs to gather additional empirical evidence of how the POC is going ” Use the information presented in Chapter 4 to help understand the patterns being seen.

Monitoring and evaluating the POC can give first-hand data for making critical decisions.