We’ve got the KnowHow

So what is KnowHow? If you are not familiar with this name you may have known of it under its previous title, the Documentation Programme which was featured in the last edition of Exchange. In that article, Tony Smith, Head of Customer Experience for Documentation, highlighted the importance of easy access to accurate information to support customers in their drive to grow their business.

Now Tony explains how KnowHow came about. “We realised that the name Documentation Programme really did not fully encompass the breadth and scope of the programme. KnowHow was selected as the new name as it neatly encompasses the ethos of the overall programme and is a much stronger identity as we develop for the future”.

“KnowHow is all about making life easier for our customers and their suppliers by enhancing the information provided by Openreach”. he continues.

“Our aim is to provide customers with the rapid access to accurate product information that they need and I am pleased to say that the goal is now one step closer with the agreement of a joint vision for the portal and the information it contains”

The Openreach KnowHow programme completed its initial requirements gathering Phase on 25th September 2009. The requirements for the programme have been created and agreed with industry through a number of workshops and have now been base-lined and placed under change control.

This step signifies a true understanding by all parties of the industry needs and provides a commitment from Openreach to deliver the portal and information solutions against a clear set of customer requirements. These base-lined requirements represent a joint vision for the direction of the programme and officially signal the start of the design and build phase.

Tony is really pleased with the progress. “Participation from all sides throughout the first phase has been excellent and will continue to be invaluable as we transition into this next phase of the programme. Within this phase the requirements will be turned into solutions and eventually deployed to replace the current portal and information sets. The programme has already embarked on reaching out to a number of groups within Openreach to ensure maximum reuse of material created in the interim period while we build the new portal to realise the full potential of KnowHow”.

Building on the great success of the framework phase with close collaboration between stakeholders, we envisage the next stage will continue to require input and feedback from both industry and Openreach representatives. This will include workshops; a review of deliverables on the collaboration site and conference calls, but the overall intention is to allow stakeholders to provide feedback in the easiest way possible.

We are already working with representatives from many of our customers but if you would like to get more involved in the programme providing views on how the documentation and portal might be shaped in the future, we would really appreciate your input. A full list of future workshops and their intended audiences will be available on request from our programme team via our email -

documentation.project@openreach.co.uk.

Currently only those CP representatives who have previously expressed an interest to participate in the industry forum will automatically receive invitations to the proposed workshops.

For those of you who would prefer to be kept informed of progress rather than join the workshops, further updates on the progress of this programme will be issued via industry briefings on a monthly basis.