1 USEPA 28 th Annual National Conference on Managing Environmental Quality Systems San Antonio, Texas May 12, 2009

2 Overview Background Overview of new EPA Quality Policy CIO Approaches to align EPA Office operations w/new Q policy Identifying OEI’s products and services Identifying applicable policies and procedures Capturing desired major quality features Quality System toolbox Interactive mapping Conclusion

3 Background EPA’s traditional Quality System has focused on data and data quality. Several forces have contributed to a broadening of EPA’s perspective on quality: 2002 Information Quality Guidelines Rise of Internet-based information products Science Policy Council dialogue This has resulted in the development and issuance of a new EPA Quality Policy (CIO ).

4 Overview of new EPA Quality Policy CIO Issued October Previous Quality System scope (per ): Collection/evaluation/use of environmental data Design/construction/operation of environmental technology New Quality System scope: Agency products and services developed for external distribution or dissemination. Each EPA organization will need to revisit its Quality System to reflect the new policy. This presentation summarizes what OEI is doing to get a head start.

5 Approaches to align EPA Office operations w/new Q policy OEI’s Quality System has always been unique Data collection is a small part of OEI’s mission. OEI’s mission involves a wide range of information products and services. Thus OEI is in a good position to get started on aligning with the new policy.

6 Identifying OEI’s products and services Based on a series of interviews with OEI managers: What are your products/services? What are the applicable policies and procedures? Who are your customers and what are their expectations? How do you translate those expectations into specific quality attributes? Analysis of interview results produced a set of categories for products/services as well as quality attributes.

OEI Product/Service Categories Infrastructure: Shared IT services Shared data services Technical and security infrastructure Information Products Data/information systems Science/data analysis Publications Program Operations National program leadership/management Administration of Agency and Federal programs 7

8 Identifying applicable policies and procedures CIO policies: We created a spreadsheet mapping the applicability of the suite of Agency IT/IM policies to our list of OEI products and services. Other policies: We also mapped other resources that may be helpful: Federal government requirements and recommendations, e.g.: Federal Enterprise Architecture Program Consolidated Reference Model Document NIST Information System Security Requirements Information Management: Information Assurance (Army Regulation 25-2) National/international standards and guidelines, e.g.: Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) Control Objectives for Information and Related Technology (COBIT) Software Engineering – Guidelines for the application of ISO 9001:2000 to computer software (ISO/IEC 90003:2004)

9 Capturing desired major quality features Functionality Access, accessibility Utility, usability Consistency, uniformity, integratability, interoperability, stability Sufficiency Accuracy, uniqueness, reliability, currency Completeness, representativeness Compliance, conformance

Capturing desired major quality features (cont.) Efficiency Ease of use, agility Cost effectiveness Timeliness Customer Service Communication Competence Credibility Responsiveness 10

Quality System Toolbox Quality Plan QMPs QAPPs Product/Service Quality Plan Administrative Quality Plan Quality Targets Understanding customer expectations Quality feature measurements QA Review Form (extramural actions) Performance/acceptance criteria 11

Quality System Toolbox (cont.) Quality Preparedness Training Technical approach or process map Policies, procedures, guidance, standards Quality Assessment QA Surveillance Plans Data Quality Assessment Quality audits/assessments Peer review Product/predissemination review Internal or customer feedback Continuous Improvement Corrective/preventive actions Process enhancement 12

13 Interactive mapping We created a prototype web-based tool that combines: Products/services for each OEI Office Applicable quality attributes Relevant policies and procedures A toolbox of relevant quality tools Designed so that managers can readily drill down to the information they need

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15 Conclusion This is a work in progress. The graded approach applies! Some of the tools are yet to be developed. This was designed for OEI, but the basic approach may be applicable to other Agency organizations.

16 Jeffrey Worthington - EPA Kevin Hull – Neptune and Co