Feb 11, 2020

Monthly OpenLMIS Governance Committee Call. This meeting includes members of the governance committee, as well as anyone else interested in participating. 

Time

  • 7:00 - 8:00 AM PST - Seattle
  • 10:00 AM to 12:00 PM EST - New York, DC
  • 3:00 PM CET - Geneva, Copenhagen (4PM during daylight saving time of the year)
  • 5:00 PM EAT - Dar (6PM during daylight saving time of the year)

Call Details


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Meeting ID: 377 281 719
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Action items for next call   

Action Items from Feb Governance

  • (carried over from Dec) Area we need to keep talking about: how do we keep growing our sales channels? 
  • (carried over from Dec) We need to articulate language around getting existing implementations to pay into the core: Carl suggests having 'support contracts' built into our proposals; any unused of that retainer rolls into core software support. This could be palatable for countries because they are getting something out of it. Ashraf suggests we automatically entitled to future upgrades without paying anything extra

Notes


Topic

Who

Notes

Chat Captures

Introductions and Call opening (5 min)

  • Notes from January Governance call

January Notes

Carl Leitner 

Welcome

Review agenda and objectives for this call



Opportunity Check-In 

(5 minutes)

Rebecca Alban (Unlicensed) , Ashraf, and maybe others

Discuss recent opportunities:

Swaziland eLMIS- RFP Approved_RFP_eLMIS CMS_eSwatini_2020.pdf

-JSI/Ashraf: estimated timeframe was 3 months, which did not seem likely. Not successful to find suitable partner. Didn't seem worth the investment for only 3 months. Ashraf provided feedback to them why the timeframe seemed unrealistic. Thus no submission was made.

Uzbekistan vLMIS-  https://www.ungm.org/Public/Notice/100565

  • Outcome: timeframe was extended, a proposal was prepared with: VillageReach, SolDevelo, and an Uzbeki company called DataSite, formed a consortium with JSI. The proposal is compelling and fulfilled almost all requirements
  • Annual maintenance fund of 25k was incorporated into the budget for this proposal. This is something we are aiming to formalize for current/future implementations. 
  • 25k would go to whoever is providing support; 25k for each year was budgeted
  • Carl: Where did this figure come from? is that maintenance for the implementation or for the core software?
  • Ashraf: Came from the Joburg workshop; rooted in Resonance research. We need to confirm what our messaging is . Is it an 'upgrade fee'? or is annual fee accurate? We could talk about it as a retainer fee for helpdesk support. As long as we can say its helpdesk support from community, can give TA for how to upgrade to new versions. not a surcharge but actual services are included. We might be hearing from Uzbekistan again soon (within the month). It could be helpful to have some language ready when they come with questions. **Urgency to get some language set up for the next few weeks
  • Brandon: This is one of the workstreams that the stewards have in our plans. We have to determine what pricing structure makes sense. Need to draft an SLA to tell people what they get for these services

other implementation opportunities/leads to share?


Response/feedback from our Sustainability Webinar

(5-10 minutes)

Rebecca Alban (Unlicensed)

Feedback from our webinar generated some public discourse; good points, mixed tones–feedback/thoughts from this group?

This article on ICTworks was one response; frustration with situation and 'if OpenLMIS can't crack this nut, then none of us can': https://www.ictworks.org/openlmis-open-source-software/#.XkEsWWhKg2w 

Carl: The article was intentionally provocative; our current option is a great option; unfortunate that our work was undercut in this portrayal. We will be coming out with an article that won't be a direct response. Direct response could provoke repeat-behavior. Part of the purpose of the article might have been to shame USAID

Wes: Disappointing that there will not be a direct response 

Dan: Another article from Harvard had similar comments re: DHIS2

Josh: Could have a simple response without getting into the weeds; saying this is not unique to OpenLMIS

Gaurav: maybe not a direct reply to ICTWorks. Its important for MoH to ask how sustainability is planned for. We need to have a company response for the country level. An understanding of questions we will be asked; and how we will respond as a community. Nobody at the ministries will see our responses–we need to be able to make a case to ministries. To know what we will be asking them to do, and know what we are asking them to do

→justification/new language; create materials to explain our plan

→anticipate questions around the 25k  maintenance fee, for example

→1 year Roadmap for Transition/Handover process, something that we can publicize 

Brandon: commented on ICT works page and DIAL

Ashraf: it might have been the way we portrayed our work

LB; Lets try to stay positive. We are on the right track with public/private partnership

Kelly: Its helpful to make sure we are speaking from the same voice; as per the business model contributed by Resonance is not an 'either or' scenario. The 25k is a small sliver of the total cost. Some significant shifts are needed to how we are funded

Join the conversation: DIAL OSC's online forum has a lively discussion, we encourage your participation!

https://hub.osc.dial.community/t/digital-square-january-webinar-global-good-sustainability/989

Webinar slides and recording available here

GDHF meeting on Feb 27th is another opportunity to continue the conversation


Partnership Working Group:  First meeting recap and TOR

(10 minutes)

Notes from first partnership working group meeting are here (semi private wiki page)

Working Group had our first meeting to clarify our mode of working and finalize our TOR for the coming months; will meet every 2 weeks

-In first meeting decided on recruitment strategy; create and circulate an EOI to make sure we are casting a wide enough net (don't want to limit to just tech/health companies)

-Goal: Make final recommendations to for governance committee vote by Nov 2020

-Shortlisting of partners and interviews/scoring of partners will happen iteratively throughout the year. At a minimum will thoroughly evaluate 3 partners.

Overview of Working Group TOR and key milestones

Next steps for working group:

  • Adapt interview guide and score card to use for assess potential partners (this month), will share these drafts for discussion at next governance meeting
  • contribute/comment on document outlining handover partnership terms/wants/needs; 
  • finalize draft EOI 

Request: comments or feedback on Working Group TOR by Friday Feb 14th (Rebecca Alban (Unlicensed)  circulated over discourse)


Overview of proposed sustainability activities for 2020-21

(10-15 minutes)

Rebecca Alban (Unlicensed)

The basics: A proposal to BMGF submitted this week to fund OpenLMIS activities throughout our next phase while we select a partner, and transition activities. This includes funding for ongoing product/community maintenance as well

Timeline: Proposal was for 24 months but this might be shortened. We proposed an Exploratory Phase (up to 12 months) that ends when a Handover Partner is chosen and all agreements/MOUs are in place to conduct the handover.

In the subsequent Handover Phase (up to 12 months) we anticipate ramping down all donor-funded stewardship and transferring responsibility for it to the Handover Partner. VR role shifts to monitoring and supporting during this phase.

Key results expected:

Roles & Responsibilities:

-OpenLMIS stewards- continue to manage community and product; push forward sustainability initiatives; be the leaders and 'doers' in our sustainability workstreams

1) Partnership Working Group (led by stewards with heavy community participation)- to vet and select partner

2) Value of Data workstream -understand the value of OpenLMIS data, company willingness to pay for it, country willingness to share or sell it

3) Establish Annual Maintenance Fund-coordinate with donors, and current implementations to establish fund; document the sponsorship model;  establish funding mechanism; establish transparent maintenance prioritization (for those paying in)

-External support: Kim and others from Resonance will provide advice and guidance

Questions/Comments/Suggestions:

none

-
AOB?


Conferences and Meetings

Conferences provide the community the opportunity for OpenLMIS members to speak or represent the OpenLMIS software and community in public forum.



All

Upcoming Conferences for 2020 (let's add them here!)

There is interest in a Digital Square maintained Calendar of Events. So we might eventually link with that calendar in the future

  • Question: Will there be another Global Health Supply Chain summit this year? 

  • ICT4D - The Global Digital Development Conference  
    • April 21-23, 2020 Training Day: April 24. Abuja, Nigeria 
    • https://www.ict4dconference.org/
    • **I heard DIAL is doing a sustainability-related event here. Anyone have details?

Opportunities documentation

Definitions to use shared terminology:

  • Implementation opportunity: an opportunity for an implementation or deployment of the OpenLMIS software.  Usually this is done at a national or sub-national level within a ministry of health. This can also include feature work which would be done within the implementation and contributed back to the global codebase.
  • Community opportunity: a funding opportunity to support an organization or individual to work directly on the global codebase and/or administrate the community processes. This may include funding specific features on the community roadmap.

Country implementation opportunities:

  • This Trello table is being updated on an ongoing basis; to help the core team to track and manage implementation opportunities, but also provides a detailed snapshot of the scope and status of current implementation opportunities for stakeholders.

Community Opportunities:

  • New Trello table! Similar to the above table, this tool is being used by the stewards to track our exploring of new product opportunities and partnerships

Study Tours:

  • Study Tours wiki page tracks applications received, study tours completed, and other key milestones related to OpenLMIS Study Tours



AOB


Community and Product Updates
Product Updates
Community Updates




ATTENDANCE: 



RECORDING AND CHAT TRANSCRIPT   

Meeting Recording:
https://zoom.us/rec/share/_OsqMbTq5GxLe4nQ4nrwBIAMXYTGT6a82ycYrKcEyUbVq-ugPY3myccTH_424jWB 




ADDITIONAL READING












OpenLMIS: the global initiative for powerful LMIS software