UNESCO Portal Strategy

UNESCO Portal Strategy

UNESCO Portal Deployment Strategy 2007

  1. Background

While the UNESCO website ( has existed in a variety of forms since 1994, the federation of approach and content into a single coherent portal was begun in 2002. A first version of the UNESCO portal was launched in 2003, and the portal coordination group was established the following year whereby defining a common vision and goals for the new, unified portal.

Lead by the Bureau of Public Information in close collaboration with DIT, sector web teams and participants from the field network, the “Portal Tuesday” meetings created the vision and logical framework for the UNESCO Portal Guidelines ( A work in progress, the guidelines contain standards on the editorial, technical and management components of the portal.

Portal Development Milestones:

2002 First version of the Portal launched; Central Web team created in BPI

2003 First unified portal homepage launched: 32nd General Conference

2004 Definition of portal vision & establishment of operational working group

2005Establishment of Portal Guidelines and Portal Tuesday meetings.

2006Launch of UNESCO Portal in 6 languages: 33rd General Conference:

2007Finalisation of Gartner Portal Platform study

2007Completion of portal browsing system: 34th General Conference

  1. UNESCO Portal Platform Study

In order to attain a truly interactive portal, a quantum leap is required to deploy a unified, portal platform. The reflection on this new portal platform began with a study by Gartner Group in September 2006as part of the UNESCO Knowledge Portal project. This study analyzed UNESCO’s current portal technical infrastructure and benchmarked it with current market solutions. It also aimed to provide high-level advice on the platform needed to support portal content and services in the medium term (2008-2012).

The results of this study suggest that UNESCO must implement a combination of many integrated tools in order to provide an “enterprise” platform for the portal services (see Annex I for definitions).Gartner recommended that UNESCO begin the process of documenting the portal functional needs into a detailed Request for Proposal (RFP), which would take up to one year to produce and cost around $400,000. This RFP would then lead to a subsequent contract that would actually build the platform itself. This investment and way to proceed is for the time being unaffordable with the available financial resources.

Gartner also provided a short list of products and providers that could respond to the medium and long term needs of the portal. Two of these products already formed part of UNESCO’s technical infrastructure: SAP(Finance and Human Resources) and Microsoft Sharepoint. The logical starting point for constructing a new platform should be the UNESCO Intranet: the basic building block of all the UNESCO Secretariat’s data and information.

Sharepoint has been used in pilot projects over the last two years, and has responded well to the functional needs for shared workspaces. For this reason, it was decided to implement Sharepoint as the base for the Intranet and Extranet environment for the Portal. A subsequent analysis needs to be taken in order to further develop the technical architecture that will comprise a fully integrated Intranet, Extranet and Internet platform.

As per Gartner recommendations, UNESCO needs to deploy a technical architecture for its portal. It has been seean as essential tofollow an enterprise model, thus creating an Enterprise Portal Platform (EPP)that will:

  • provide a single, integrated platform for management of Intranet, Extranet, and Internet applications across the Organization
  • create an environment that adapts to the needs of each user, in their respective roles.
  • develop an architecture that combines the reliability and functionality based on open standards.
  1. Implementation Strategy – Short term (June – December 2007)

A simultaneous approach has been chosen to proceed forward whereby two tasks are to be completed in parallel:

  1. The Enterprise Portal Platform (EPP) study should be completed with full functional requirements for the Intranet, Internet and Extranet environments and all related services.
  1. A series of Sharepoint pilot projects will be implemented by the DIT portal team, comprised of staff members of BPI and DIT, by the end of 2007. Intranet, Internet and Extranet functionalities of Sharepoint will be explored and tested.

1. Enterprise Portal Platform (EPP)

1.1Portal Functional Architecture

First, auser-based approach should define in detail the key portal functions for the Intranet, Internet and Extranet environments:

  • Workflow
  • Content Management
  • Calendar of Events
  • Multimedia (Video, Webcast, Podcasts…)
  • Contact Management & User Profiling
  • Mailing, Distribution and Newsletters
  • Communities of Practice, Forums, Discussion Groups
  • Shared Workspaces, Document Management, Wiki, Blogs
  • Business Applications Interface (HRM, Finance, sister2…)
  • Search Engine
  • User Interface and Accessibility
  • Statistical Analysis

This technology independent study will help to complete the Portal vision and clarify portal functions in short and medium-term scenarios according to the present and future evolution of technology.

Implementation: 2 days seminar with high level internet analyst involving the community of web workers (e.g. see presentation of Jeff Cole from Web4Dev, or Gartner expert) plus 1 week consultant with a portal architect.

Output: Update logical framework for the portal development and consolidate vision and functions for short and medium term. These documents will be integrated into the portal guidelines and provide the basis for the Technical Architecture.

1.2Portal Technical Architecture

In the framework of the UNESCO Knowledge Portal, hardware servers have been bought and installed in order to house the necessary infrastructure for Intranet/Extranet.

Based on the functional needs of the portal, a detailed technical systems plan must be defined, updating previous portal technical studies provided by Aduneo and indicate how current technology can respond to our needs.

Implementation: 4 weeks consultancy with high level portal architect.

Output: Enterprise Portal Platform high-level architecture, implementation plan and recommendations.

1.3Portal Guidelines

All chapters of the UNESCO Portal Guidelines need to be further developed and completed in order to respond to the growing functional needs of the portal. Following are details of what will be done by end of 2007:

Definition and Vision:

The review of the portal functional architecture will enlarge and sharpen the scope and vision of the portal. The output from point 1.2will expand the vision and existing logframe.

Audience:

Both qualitative and quantitative user tests on the Intranet and Internet environments will be implemented by the end of 2007. These results will contribute to the short and medium-term strategy and form part of the guidelines.

Content Structure:

Content structure is comprised of the information objects (KOs) and the portal structure. In light of the pilot projects, some objects will be revised, new ones added and maybe some deleted. In any case the fields of each will need to be reviewed and revised. The portal structure will also be created for the Intranet and Extranet environments.

Editorial Guidelines:

New editorial challenges will be presented by the inclusion of Intranet and Extranet. Currently the guidelines from the Internet content provider training provide a solid base, but these will be enhanced with the new functions from the pilot projects.

User Interface:

A thorough update of the UBIF will be begun or completed in 2007, the results of this should spur a project to update the common CSS.

Technical Architecture & Support:

Policies: Specific policies reflecting decisions about rules and standards. This shall include policies related to file naming conventions, registration of application catalogue, creation of template library, code sharing, security policies related to external access and deployment of third party plug-ins, and rules regarding approval and audit process prior to release.

Support Plan: Identify appropriate infrastructure (IT) resources to provide operational support for the system and create an effective support system with proper channels of escalation for end users of the Portal environments.

Technical Governance: Current portal applications need common database naming conventions and a central catalogue of applications to improve navigation, tracking and application ownership (and responsibility). Common field naming services and a centralized repository for code are essential for efficient and complex application development and maintenance of services. Improved oversight can better guide users to the proper environments and tools. A strong governance plan is essential to ensure that a portal delivers worthwhile content to its users in an effective way.

Benefits of Good Governance are numerous:

Avoid portal, team site, and content "sprawl" by defining a content and site review process.

Consistently provide a high quality user experience by ensuring that the governance plan is followed.

Establish clear decision making authority and escalation procedures so that policy violations are dealt with and conflicts are resolved on a timely basis.

Ensure that the portal strategy is aligned with business objectives so that it continuously delivers business value.

Training:

Training Plan:Identify various training requirements and the modes and methods of training for various target groups along with the dates if applicable / available. New modules will need to be added for the Intranet, and perhaps a Writing for the Web II (advanced module).

Management:

Create Procedures: Instructions describing how to execute processes, including, adding content, removing content and adding metadata attributes to the corporate taxonomy. Addition of new sites, tools and projects will also be documented.

Team Structure:Clearly enhance existing structures such as portal coordination and operational working groups in order to continue proper management of the Portal environment along with specific roles and responsibilities of each team.

Update Roles and Responsibilities:Inventory specific documentation describing how each employee as an individual or as a member of a particular team is responsible for ensuring success of the portal content.

Communication Plan: Plan detailing methods and frequency of communication within the portal implementation team as well as from the team to the organization.

Implementation: 4 weeks consultancy to draft and format Guidelines and update the website. 4 to 6 weeks consulting to planUser Testing and Training initiatives.

Output: New collaborative workspace for web-workers created for the duration of the EPP project. Guidelines website will be integrated with the space and updated near the end of the phase 2.2 (Transition of pilot projects in production).

  1. Sharepoint Pilot Projects

The second thrust of the implementation strategy, a series of Sharepoint pilot projects have been created torespond to the urgent needs of sectors and field offices. This phase will drive the creation of the new Intranet and Extranet platform for the portal, and test the Internet capabilities of Sharepoint.

Based on sector priorities, seven functionalities have been identified and shall be executed as Pilot Projects:

  • Correspondence Management
  • Collaborative Workspace
  • Communities of Practice (CoP)
  • Workflow Management
  • Human Resource Management
  • File Sharing and Content Management
  • Event Management

2.1Define User Requirements

The user requirements gathering phase will be led by small workgroups with participants from all sectors invited (in collaboration with DIT and BPI)whowilldefine the functional requirements for each application and participate in the development, testing and acceptance. Once tested, the application will be made available for all sectors to use. Objectives for each pilot summarized as follows:

  1. Correspondence Management

Leverage the existing work done in correspondence management and to create common blueprint for the entire organization based on common templates, workflows and policies of access to different types of users.

  1. Collaborative Workspace

Study the existing way of sharing and interacting with various entities and draw a prototype for a collaborative workspace for the entire organization

  1. Communities of Practice (CoP)

Study the existing community of practices developed by CI sector and the Communities of Practice Guidelines (developed by the UKP team) and adapt to common framework. One major aspect is also to address profiling related to CoP membership.

  1. Workflow Management
    Identify the areas appropriate for standardization and illustrates the potential interoperability scenarios which may be supported through the use of common standards. Define, where appropriate, the applicability of existing standards to workflow management systems and their integration with other standard IT services.

Understand the current process/workflows and to provide and define the concepts, terminology, and general structure of a workflow management system, its major functional components and the interfaces and information interchange flows between them.

  1. Human Resource Management

Provide an understanding of SharePoint and SAP Employee Self Service and how the two relate to each other in the overall framework or blueprint

  1. File Sharing and Content Management

Explore the File Sharing and Content Management module of SharePoint and define if it responds to the needs of UNESCO.

  1. Event Management:

The UNESCO Calendar of Events (ICE) will be tested on Sharepoint in order to complete a full integrated test of publishing the same data (on events) in Intranet and the Internet. Using this calendar will also allow the integration of selected events into the Communication Plan for the Organization.

Implementation: 4 weeks consultancy with Sharepoint systems analyst and architect.

Output: 3 workshops (intranet, extranet and internet) with user groups to collect requirements. Detailed user requirements document for the 7 pilot projects.

2.2Transition Pilots into production environment

The goal of this phase is to assess the strengths and challenges of the pilotprojects and see how they fit into the functional and technical architecture of the EPP.

The challenge is to balance the trade-off between a standard implementation and a customized one. Standard implementations are faster and less expensive while custom implementations can provide a closer match to the business process.

Based on the pilot projects,successful elements will pass into production and form part of theSharepoint Blueprint. While implementing the blueprint, scalability and reusability will be focused on, keeping in mind the fact that we would like to use this framework for all our Applications and sites. Components that do not fit into the framework will be built and integrated specifically for these applications.

Implementation: 12 weeks consultancy with systems architect and Sharepoint developers.

Output: Seven pilot applications developed, tested and accepted by pilot users.

2.3Deploy Sharepoint Blueprint

The Requirements gathered earlier as well as lessons learned from the transition of pilot projects will be used to create the SharePoint Blueprint and will be deployed and configured for future deployment of applications.

The blueprint will be a comprehensive document that outlines the overall vision, taxonomy and metadata (site structure, content structure and organization) as well as the technical architecture of the servers and the SharePoint out-of-box functionality.

The blueprint will clarify:

  • Scope of the framework
  • State Assumptions and constraints of the framework
  • Enumerate Architectural Challenges
  • Provide Solution Overview
  • Define Deployment Planning
  • Assess Risks

Implementation: 4 weeks of consulting with sytems architect and Sharepoint analyst.

Output: Complete Sharepoint Blueprint ready for use in production

  1. Conclusion and next steps

This document was prepared jointly by the Bureau of Public Information (BPI) and Department of Informations (DIT). The implementation strategy will kickoff on the 27th of June, when the first in a series of three workshops that will involve sectors and field office coordination in the deployment of six Sharepoint pilot projects. In July, another workshop will be organized to reflect on the vision and framework for the portal in the short and medium-term will also involve the same participants to assure the collaborative nature of this strategy. (See Annex II for Implementation Plan timing)

Annex I : Definitions

Definition of key concepts

  • Portal: Intranet, Extranet and Internet environments together comprise the UNESCO portal. Information is channelled through each environment and content is selectively published at each level. UNESCO’s culture of knowledge management uses the portal to identify, share, transfer, and apply it’s knowledge.
  • Intranet: The intranet is the UNESCO Secretariat’s internal network where staff members share data and publish information. Both a physical and virtual environment, the Intranet can be accessed from UNESCO offices around the world, and remotely through secured access.
  • Extranet: The extranet environment is where content from the UNESCO Secretariat’s Intranet is shared with UNESCO partners and networks. These secured workspaces (often called Communities of Practice) are hosted by the Secretariat, and workgroups can be comprised of a combination of UNESCO staff members and external participants.
  • Internet: The internet is where information on UNESCO programme and activities are available to the public. Content from the UNESCO Intranet and Extranet spaces can be selected for publication on the Internet for viewing by the general public.
  • Enterprise Portal Platform (EPP): The technical architecture to support portal functions. Enterprise systems are solid (high availability for users), modular, scalable and integrated.Separate environments for testing and production are highly recommended.
  • Sharepoint Blueprint: The Sharepoint blueprint is a comprehensive document that outlines that regulates site structure, content structure and organization as well as the technical architecture of the servers and the SharePoint out-of-box functionality. The blueprint is used for all new application developments.

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DraftVersion 1.5 – 06/07/2007

Annex II - Implementation Plan, Timing and Budget

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