VDH is transforming and updating the Department’s core administrative systems and processes to increase efficiencies and modernize the Department. The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a significant pressure on the VDH’s outdated administrative processes and systems. These outdated processes and systems rely on manual workarounds and have created challenges to VDH’s ability to effectively react and respond to the pandemic.

VDH will improve operational efficiencies and effectiveness over the next three years through updates in business systems, IT Service Management (ITSM), IT Asset management (ITAM), Product Suite, Financial and Accounting systems, and the introduction of Robotic Process Automation, as appropriate. These modernized systems will enable new capabilities and increase productivity and decrease manual processes, thus mitigating errors and increasing VDH’s readiness to respond to future public health emergencies.

Over the last three months, VDH has initiated the procurement process for a service request solution and has assessed the current processes and opportunities for ITSM, ITAM, and security incident requests as the initial focus areas for service request platform. As part of VDH’s efforts to automate where possible, a Robotic Process Automation (RPA) project is underway to identify manual processes that are good candidates for automation. Additionally, the team has developed an RPA solution called ROT (Redundant, Obsolete, Trivial) Bot to remove electronic files to free up and reduce costs for the shared drives.

These activities are planned to continue into the next quarter, with an expected focus of designing future state processes and preparing for the implementation of the service request solution; further developing the vision and roadmap for VDH’s service management; and further refining the overall initiative roadmap, project selection, and sequencing. The Administrative Systems Initiative is on track to successfully meet the objectives within the three-year ARPA SLFRF funding window.