ESPRIT Programme 7.1 
Technologies for Business Processes 
Best Business Practice Pilots

ELEKTRA - ELectrical Enterprise Knowledge for TRansforming Applications

Project No. 22927 

Objectives

 The ELEKTRA project mainly aimed at tailoring and applying the EKD method to change management problems within Public Power Corporation (PPC) of Greece and Vattenfall AB of Sweden and to generalise best business practices for dissemination and application to other companies in the ESI sector.

 To this end, the project aimed to meet the following objectives:

From this point of view, ELEKTRA was not primarily focusing on reforming work itself, neither suggesting any particular re-engineering scheme. Instead, it was targeted to managing change problems in a pilot level by arming user companies in the ESI sector with appropriate modelling mechanisms, so that change agents can make informed opinions about the most appropriate route to reform and restructuring.

A brief overview of the approach to meeting objectives

Tackling the problems involved due to the complexity of operations in the utilities and aiming to arrive at implementable results the following activities were involved :

This work has been carried out within a project definition phase ELKD partly funded by the EU and partly funded by the proposers of the ELEKTRA project. The proposers are: two user companies (PPC and Vattenfall); one IT integrator company (SINGULAR); one IT consulting company (KPA); and the three developers of the EKD-CMM method (UMIST, KTH and University PARIS1).

The official ELEKTRA web site is located at : http://www.singular.gr/elektra/default.htm
 

Achieved results

As stated by the reviewers during the final review, the consortium achieved its objectives. The results of the project are the following :

Industrial results

Scientific results

Contribution from the C.R.I., University of Paris 1

During the first period of the project, the University of Paris 1 has contributed to :

(a) the training of the user companies to the EKD method and
(b) the definition of a set of EKD models describing the current state of the PPC distribution (see the ATHENA deliverable).

During the second period, the University of Paris 1 has been driving sessions of co-operative work for :

(a) defining PPC requirements for change,
(b) generating a set of alternative scenaria implementing these requirements (see the DEMETRA deliverable) and,
(c) evaluating the alternative scenaria (see the ERMES deliverable).

During the last period of the project, the University Paris 1 has led several meetings with PPC for the definition and the validation of the ESI knowledge base that includes a set of patterns dedicated to the management of change in the Distribution (see the MOLIERE and NEWTON deliverables). The patterns evaluation has been performed by several domain experts, they were asked to grade each pattern according to a set of criteria and associated metrics.
 

The scientific work carried out during the ELEKTRA project was performed in a close collaboration between the three Universities. However, the University of Paris 1 played a key role in the following activities :

1- During the project, an important need was felt for guiding the application of the EKD-CMM. To this end, University of Paris 1 has proposed a conceptual framework for representing method engineering knowledge [Rolland 1999a, Rolland 2000a]. This work led to the definition of a Web based tool, the Electronic Guide Book, that is currently accessible (02/2000) at :

http://crinfo.univ-paris1.fr/EKD-CMMRoadMap/index.html

This tool, developed by the University of Paris 1, provides a set of structured guidelines for organising the use of the EKD-CMM [Barrios 1999, Nurcan 1999a, Nurcan 1999b].

2- Based on the analysis of the current state of a company and the requirements and goals for change, a set of alternative scenaria were defined for each user company. To this end,  the consortium used the “Goal Deployment approach” defined by the University of Paris 1 [Nurcan 1999a]. This approach proposes a systematic way for generating alternative scenaria for change based on the study of the impacts of the requirements for change on the current goals and processes of the company.

3- In order to disseminate the experiences and knowledge from ELEKTRA to other ESI companies, a pattern approach has been selected. The University of Paris 1 has proposed a pattern language dedicated to the management of change [Rolland 1998d, Rolland 1999b] that has been used for the definition of the ESI knowledge base. Along with the pattern language, a pattern definition method has also been defined aiming at organising the discovery and successive refinement of the patterns [Rolland 2000b].
 

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The Consortium

The entire ethos of the project is user led. The leading role of PPC and Vattenfall ensure that the approach to be followed, in technical as well as management terms, will be dedicated to meeting the needs of the two companies specifically and the ESI sector generally. The collaboration of PPC and Vattenfall is critical to the success of this project since they both bring problems, needs and competencies that are complementary to each other. SINGULAR provides the IT and consultancy infrastructure which will facilitate more timely exploitation of the project results. The three associated partners, UMIST, KTH and PARIS 1, as the developers of the structured method to change management, are responsible for transferring this technology to the participating companies and tailoring the approach to the ESI sector.
 
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Staff (C.R.I., University Paris 1)

Colette Rolland
Georges Grosz
Selmin Nurcan
Farida Semmak
Judith Barrios
Christophe Gnaho

Documents produced by CRI, University of Paris 1 - Sorbonne

Contributions to ELEKTRA deliverables Additional documents produced by the project participants

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References

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