Our Practice Areas

Contact Center and Business Optimization

In partnership with our clients VWI works to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of business operations by designing and implementing innovative models and strategies to help clients deliver a consistent, high-quality customer experience. Read More

Strategic Planning

Our strategic planning process uses mission analysis, SWOT and program planning techniques to generate high-level road-maps setting a direction for the enterprise and/or its supporting IT capabilities.

Portfolio Management (CPIC/ITIM)

The portfolio process begins with programmatic activities to define broad responses and assign resource ceilings to meet the needs defined in the Strategic Plan. The CPIC (Analyze, Select, Control, Evaluate) process then ensures that proposed investme meet those needs and are well thought out, cost-effective, and technically sound; and that once approved they are carried out as intended. We have supported elaborate approaches for larger investments (such as those covered under DODI 5000.02 and Exhibit 300), and much lighter approaches for those that are smaller and less risky (since these are not always the same thing). This practice also includes Project Management and System Engineering activities, and our staff members hold certifications as PgMP, PMP and DAWIA PM Level III.

Enterprise Architecture

VWI has seen many agencies go through an EA process for years with few tangible results. Building from the industry best-practice premise of “just enough architecture”, we have refined our approach to permit a client to start experiencing useful capabilities from its architectural efforts within a few months rather than years. Since the vast majority of our clients are likely to be in the public sector, we use what has already been refined at great public expense into the FEA, BEA and DODAF. Expert handling of these known tools yields results quicker, better and cheaper than reinventing the wheel by the hour, and also helps you to integrate what you are doing with the architecture efforts in other agencies.

Strategic Performance Management

Performance Management has been in place in the Federal government since the 1980s and remains an elusive target. Without an integrated governance process such as VWI offers, organizations are faced with the impossibility of retrofitting a performance management process onto an undefined strategy or implementation plan. Our method ties the strategic plans to sound measurement practice and implements it through clear executive-level reporting. Whether those reports are delivered using MS-Office documents or an automated dashboard is not important, what is important is that they are received, read, and acted on.

Integrated Governance

Governance is a mysterious term with a fairly simple meaning. It means the decision-making process. Specifically, we help the client organization determine what gets decided, by whom, how and when; how those decisions are to be recorded and published; and how to make sure that those decisions were carried out. Once you get past the fancy name, there is nothing hard about this process. What is hard, is shifting the culture to allow the process to happen. Our staff has helped dozens of clients cross that threshold. Our process also focuses on the need to integrate all of the relevant considerations in the decision process so that decisions made at the executive level are completely informed at the time of decision and are not later undermined by a veto at the staff unit level.

Solutions Domain

Our Integrated Management practice is valid in any functional or technical domain. Still, experience with the solution space does tend to yield better results faster. VWI and its staff has extensive experience in the development of EA, CPIC [PMO] and governance programs in many settings (private and public sector, large and small).

Integrated Delivery Process

VWI executes its engagements using the three-step delivery. model shown in the figure at right. These steps integrate the four disciplines.

• Step 1: High-level architectural analysis to generate useful decision-support materials. This allows the introduction of governance and integrated management to prove its value quickly. In later cycles the EA can be refined.
• Step 2: The high-level analysis shapes the governance, capital planning, program management and budgeting processes surrounding the investments needed to bring the future state into reality.
• Step 3: For new or highly complex businesses, we would undertake customization of the reference models to make them reflect the organization’s goals and needs. Step 3 then cycles back to Step 1 for refinement or re-consideration of the architecture and investment portfolio in view of evolving requirements over time.