March 28 2017

AGENDA:

ACTION ITEMS:

ATTENDANCE: 

New attendees today! We did introductions of each person at the start of the call (watch video recording below).

Brian Taliesin, Chris George, Christine Lenihan, Gaurav Bhattacharya, Jake Watson, Josh Zamor, Kyle Duarte, Nuran Adris Mallya, Parambir S Gill, Sam Im, Brandon Bowersox-Johnson, Tenly Show, Shiyu Jin, Ashraf Islam

NOTES: 

Software Development Update

• Brandon Bowersox-Johnson provided a quick update. See summary in agenda above. 
• No questions from the attendees.

Reporting and Analytics

• Brian Taliesin introduced the topic and the key questions to address (see agenda above).
• "Are these the key users for reports?"The group provided feedback on the personas, especially the Technical Administrator. We updated the Reporting and Analytics wiki page based on committee input.
• "Outline what is the acceptable base skill set..."This was discussed during the persona conversation and the wiki was revised.
• "Discuss and review the key features and report types needed at each level." We briefly discussed dashboards and the other types identified, but did not reach any conclusions. This is an area the Committee could address further.
• "Every implementation will require ongoing support..." We did not begin discussion of this.

New Feature Request from Malawi

• Brandon Bowersox-Johnson provided a quick summary of the feature request and the context.
• Ashraf Islam: This feature does have global applicability. The horizontal scrolling of this proposed table may be excessive. In Tanzania, staff would be reviewing 20-30 facilities' requisitions at once. (We briefly confirmed that the Product column at the left would always be visible.)
• Jake Watson: The implementation team can deal with the layout design to avoid scrolling. Looking at the big picture, there are additional core requirements that need definition and need to be addressed for this feature set to be acceptable. Examples include budget feature, and issues when a product has different prices over time (some stock was acquired at once price, while other stock was acquired at a different price). There are lots of needs around this: budgeting, rationing product to fit a budget, having different price schedules.
• Ashraf Islam: In Tanzania, the budgets are tracked in Epicore. OpenLMIS is not intended to be a financial app. It should be the ERP's job to track finances. The ERP should expose an API to make snapshot budget balances available so those could be viewed at the time of requisition review/approvals. We need to consider outside tools as the budget tools as we consider how OpenLMIS should fit in.
• Would there be a notice to the facility that the quantity they requested was adjusted at a higher level during approvals? Brandon answered: Currently, OpenLMIS 3 can send an email notification to the facility users who initiate requisitions in OpenLMIS to notify them when a requisition from their facility and program is approved or rejected. The notifications do not explicitly say a special message when the quantity is reduced. But hopefully that email encourages them to open the software and see if there are any changes or comments. That is the current status of OpenLMIS 3, and adding a special message would be a future feature for the roadmap, if desired.
• Jake Watson: There is a concern about reducing the approved quantity to fit the district budget. When that happens, do we lose the data and the visibility about what the facility really needed? Ideally, there would be a way to report on this—to make it visible and transparent that a facility's request was cut because someone at a district approval level needed to meet a budget. Maybe OpenLMIS could build in "policies" to help address or programmatically enforce this.
• Ashraf Islam: Right now OpenLMIS 3 does not connect with Stock Management. When the district approver is reviewing and adjusting requisition approved quantities, it is possible that they would adjust it to fit a budget but they might still be setting quantities for dispensing that are not actually available at the warehouse. Once there is a connection with Stock Management, it would be important for this kind of screen to also help the user know as they change quantities whether those quantities are available at the warehouse. You cannot dispense more than is available!
• Other meeting attendees also spoke up to say that this feature does have some global applicability and value.
• What is the next step to determine if this becomes a core feature, and would it be added in time for Malawi? Brandon answered that the Product Owner, Mary Jo, will review the committee's feedback from today's meeting and help determine if this becomes a priority or where it falls. Today's meeting is about gathering input from the Product Committee on this matter, not making a final decision.

Stock Management

• Shiyu Jin provided an update and used screen sharing to give a quick review of the User Interface for the new Stock Management functionality coming in OpenLMIS 3.1.
• Ashraf Islam: Is there a way to make an adjustment while doing inventory? Basically, if the inventory finds a difference (we expected 200 units but only find 10 units), the user needs to record why. There are SOPs that may require the clerk doing inventory to also record the reason to explain any change in balance. For large discrepancies, there may be an investigation process that is triggered. 
  • Brandon described that currently the UI does not allow users to record adjustments and reasons while conducting a physical inventory. This came up in some of the conversations among developers, but Brandon is not sure if the BA research identified this as a need or priority. For now it's not included in scope.
• We did not get to discuss Question #6 (mentioned on the agenda).

RECORDING

Video: OpenLMIS Product Committee-20170328 1241-1.arf (download the WebEx video player here)

ADDITIONAL READING: