Safal Partners has completed a number of successful projects with Houston Independent School District, the seventh largest district in the country.

PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT DASHBOARDS PROJECT
Designed a data dashboard for ISD central office & school principals to assess school performance.

After defining metrics for measuring the performance of its central office and the elementary, middle and high schools, the District experienced difficulties in actually implementing the assessments against the metrics because the supporting data resided in multiple, disparate applications in a variety of places creating huge challenges for executing on an otherwise solid framework of assessment. HISD contracted Safal to design a single dashboard pulling together disparate data to provide a one-stop snapshot of key performance indicators (KPIs) to central office managers and school principals for assessing the office and schools against the newly defined metrics. Key accomplishments: (1) Safal built on the mock-up format of the metrics system, analyzed and sourced the data required, and designed the dashboards to present a meaningful snapshot of key performance indicators (KPIs) to central office managers and school principals for assessing the office and schools against the newly defined metrics system; (2) Created the model and working prototype for a performance management dashboards that pulled data from the following applications including Chancery (the student assessment system, PeopleSoft (the HR system for teachers), SAP (financials), VIPS (volunteers), Access databases (research and accountability data) and a couple of smaller homegrown systems.

TEACHER APPRAISAL PROJECT
Designed & developed custom web-based teacher appraisal tool.

The Houston Independent School District (HISD), the 7th largest in the United States, recently launched the Effective Teachers Initiative (ETI), a multi-year program devoted to the goal of having an effective teacher in every HISD classroom. HISD hired Safal Partners to lead the development of its definitive tool for customized teacher appraisal and development, allowing principals and appraisers to implement the revised teacher evaluation system at HISD. After a failed pilot under the leadership of another contractor and after growing discontent among key stakeholders with “mandated” technology initiatives, HISD charged Safal with turning things around, gaining the buy-in of key stakeholder interests and managing the organizational change required to bring processes and human capital in alignment with the Effective Teachers Initiative, and ultimately, the implementation of Safal’s custom teacher appraisal solution. Key accomplishments include: (1) Designed and developed a web-based custom application based on an exhaustive process of requirements gathering and integrated it with HISD’s internal IT systems; (2) Managed and aligned key stakeholders resulting in a solution that met requirements across departments (3) Changed the end-user experience from frustration with mandates to excitement and anticipation about the Safal application, calling it “nifty” and a “God-send.” (4) Delivered the product on time and within budget.

TEACHER DEVELOPMENT SPECIALIST PROJECT
Designed & developed “professional development” module for teachers.

Based on the success of the Teacher Appraisal project completed by Safal for HISD, a separate department within the Human Resources Department, the Office of Professional Development, sourced Safal to develop, maintain and support a follow-on application as an extension of the functionality of the teacher appraisal tool. This was the “Professional Development” module to be used by teacher development specialists to log interactions with teachers, provide teacher development feedback, and identify which development strategies were most effective. Key accomplishments: (1) Defined and gathered requirements for the follow-on “professional development” module for teacher development specialist users (2) Completed application design and development, on time and within budget.

PEOPLESOFT UPGRADE PROJECT
Led project management for enterprise-wide migration to new ERP solution.

HISD is undertaking a major, enterprise-wide, multi-million dollar initiative to migrate the organization to the next generation release of[PeopleSoft software. HISD hired Safal not only to lead the project management for the enterprise-wide upgrade, but also to reengineer business processes across four business units, several hundred users in the Central Office and thousands of users across ~10 districts. Key accomplishments: (1) Forged connections and aligned the cross-organizational nature of the PeopleSoft upgrade effort (e.g., HR, Technology, Finance and Academic departments); (2) Provided portfolio management across 30+ other projects currently being delivered by the IT organization; (3) Completed requirements assessment across all stakeholders from the Chiefs of Technology and HR to end-users; (4) Implemented a framework for documentation and change management, ensuring broad socialization of the decisions, design and risks while providing evergreen scope management; (5) Cultivated strong buy-in at all levels for the project’s objectives and inculcated an environment of trust while adhering to strategic and district wide policies by employing a variety of tools including status reporting.

TALENT RECRUITMENT SYSTEM PROJECT
Developed plan for upgrading & replacing legacy HR technology system with new talent recruitment system.

HISD’s HR department hires thousands of teachers annually, but a key stumbling block to hiring the best teachers was the district’s inadequate legacy technology systems for recruitment. The district was using HISD Jobs, a homegrown system developed over 10 years ago to support the HR department that was failing to meet its needs. HISD hired Safal Partners to lead the process for upgrading and replacing the district’s legacy HR technology system, which was described as “completely non-functional.” Key accomplishments: (1) Gathered requirements to replace the legacy system; (2) Documented and mapped out process flows for hiring principals, teachers and central office employees; (3) Researched the market to originate and evaluate options for upgrades to recruitment system; and (4) Drafted the formal request for proposal to source vendors to purchase recruiting software.