Egovernance.ie is a new online information management application which manages and provides corporate governance of all commercial and non-commerical State sponsored bodies under the aegis of a particular Department. State bodies, including the subsidiaries of such bodies, are required in the conduct of their operations to adopt this Code of Practice and, in accordance with the Framework, to confirm to the relevant Minister that this has been done. These procedures relate both to internal practices and external relations with the Government, the relevant Minister, the Minister for Finance and their Departments.

Policy Context

Corporate Governance in the State-sponsored Bodies is underpinned by the provisions of the "Code of Practice for the Governance of State Bodies" published by the Department of Finance in October 2001. The Corporate Governance Unit is responsible for oversight of matters related to the governance of the commercial and non-commercial State-sponsored Bodies under the aegis of the Department. It provides an advisory and support role to line divisions and the Management Committee, as well as co-ordinating the Department's response to matters arising in this regard. The Unit also has responsibility for all matters relating to remuneration and appointments of the Chief Executives of the State Bodies, and for remuneration of Chairpersons and members of the Boards. In addition the Unit acts as the Progress Verification Group in regard to the implementation of the Change and Modernisation agenda of "Sustaining Progress" in the non-commercial State-sponsored Bodies under the aegis of the Department As the sole shareholder or owner, the Department has ownership responsibility on behalf of the State to the people. For each of the sectors, the Government sets out the policy to be followed. The State Sponsored Boards must implement this policy and the Department ensures that they are doing so in a fairs and transparent manner, within the terms of their legislation. The relevant Regulatory body also monitors this. The Minister for Finance has overall responsibility for determining the remuneration and conditions of Chairpersons, Board members and Chief Executives of the State-sponsored Bodies under the aegis of the Department. The Corporate Governance Unit, with the relevant line divisions, administers matters in relation to these aspects in close consultation with the Bodies themselves. Details of the remuneration of Board Members and Chief Executives are published in the annual reports of each Body and can be accessed on their individual websites.

Description of target users and groups

State board administration staff and members (e.g. over 400 members within DCMNR aegis) Corporate Governance Unit within a Department The specified Minister within a Department The General Public The Media [who have an interest in State Bodies Board memberships, appoinments and vacancies] Other Irish Government Offices

Description of the way to implement the initiative

Within this project we followed the PRINCE 2 methodology during which we followed the below: -Established terms of reference at the start of a project -Used a defined structure for delegation, authority and communication -Divided the project into manageable stages for more accurate planning -Ensured resource commitment from management is part of any approval to proceed -Provided regular but brief management reports -Kept meetings with management and stakeholders to a minimum but at the vital points in the project. Multi-channel issues: Egovernance is a web based application where users can access the system through their Intranet or Internet by simply following a link. We are currently addressing multi browser usage. The next release is scheduled for the beginning of July which will include this. The beauty of the way eGovernance.ie is designed is that there is no need for any other channel.

Main results, benefits and impacts

Currently we have 400 State Board members within the eGovernance system. It is administered by approximately 60 company secretaries and administrators. Egovernance.ie offers other direct impacts by allowing for faster, more accurate information retrieval to the general public. It is sustainable and becuase of the way it is designed and overseen, only 1 member of staff in the parent Department is needed to oversee it. The bulk of the updating work is distributed out to company secretaries and administrators. An additional knock-on benefit is that other Department staff who previously would have been involved in manually producing the flow of board information now no longer have to do any work in this process but instead have full access to all the up-to-date information regarding the state body with which they are dealing. Innovation: The eGovernance system provides the following for users: 1. Web Based Application: Users can access this system through their Intranet or Internet by simply following a link to the system 2. Thin client: No need for installations or rolling out patches or updates 3. Provided a defined and streamlined workflow 4. eGovernance.ie has identified a Unified Approach to Corporate Governance 5. Cross Departmental Information Sharing 6. System availability 7. Inputting and updating of data developed out of Board Administrators and Company Secretaries 8. Security and profiles 9. Improved reporting facilities 10. Eliminate manual activities 11. Tracking and traceability 12. Searching and Data management 13. Improve on data reliability and up to date information 14. Future reduction of workflow for CGU staff 15. Simple ease of use combined with a useful Help system means very little training and in many cases none. 16. Instead of waiting for Public or Media to come and request information on State Board memberships under the Freedom of Information [FOI] legislation, this system puts all the information out on the Internet free of charge for everyone to access. This will reduce FOI requests and save time for other staff in the Departments.

Return on investment

Return on investment: Not applicable / Not available

Track record of sharing

Other Government Departments have expressed interest in using this corporate governance tool. eGovernance.ie has been enhanced to do this. The Government Department [Department of An Taoiseach] which has responsibility for implementing the eGovernment Initiative and the Information Society in Irish Government and in Ireland generally, have specifically included eGovernance.ie in their recent reports and are keen to seek other Departments involvement. In addition, Mr Noel Dempsey, Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources is actively promoting the take-up of this facility by other Departments - reference his speech at the launch of the system at http://www.dcmnr.gov.ie/Corporate+Units/Virtual+Press+Room/Speeches/Lau… and http://www.dcmnr.gov.ie/Press+Releases/Dempsey+Launches+New+Website+to+…€“+www.eGovernance.ie.htm

Lessons learnt

1. Communication was a vital part of the project - communication with the Corporate Governance Unit, IT department and also with the pilot group which consisted of State Board Members. 2. It was extremely important for is to get initial “Buy-in” from all relevant stakeholders which we did from the outset of the project. 3. The phased approach was used to deliver functionality to the user in a shorter period of time and to get the basis for the application right from the start. This proved to work extremely well for the project. This phased approach also meant that it was possible to ensure that the data contained in eGovernance.ie was fully complete at the time of its launch. Scope: Local (city or municipality), National, Regional (sub-national)