ACS RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING (RPL) FORM - 2019

IMPORTANT NOTICE:

This document is required to be completed for all Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) applications and
uploaded as a PDF document(converted from word) to the application form. Please note scanned
versions will not be accepted.

Please refer to the ACS Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) Instruction document which provides
detailed information in order to complete this form.

Applicant Name ASHMITHA SEKARAN

Applicant Email Address [email protected]
Applicant Date of Birth 15/03/1986

Please complete the following 2 sections:

1. Section 1 - The Key Areas of Knowledge
2. Section 2 - RPL Project Reports

SECTION 1 – KEY AREAS OF KNOWLEDGE

In the following expandable typing areas, explain how you have acquired your in-depth knowledge in
these topic areas through your professional experience.

Please refer to the ACS Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) Instruction document for more detail

Essential Core ICT Area of Knowledge:

Topic:
ICT Problem Solving
Sub Topics:
Processes to understand problems
Modelling Methods
How have you acquired this knowledge in your working environment? Illustrate your depth of knowledge.
Process to understand problems
From the software design and implementation perspective when a problem is identified following
actions are taken

 Production incident is raised

 Change request is initiated
 New project request is placed

When I analyse the production incidents I follow the following process to approach the problem.
 Explain the incident(problem)
 Analyse the incident
 List down the solutions
 Analyse the solutions listed
 Selection of the best possible solution

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 1

  Implementation of the solution
 Corrective action for future

I would like to take example of a project, which I worked in trade application in banking domain. In
banking sector, the production problems are mostly critical. I would like to show an example of a
production incident where the outstanding balance of a particular customer was not able to
reconcile. Usually all the account balances of every customer must be reconciled with the general
ledger accounts of finance application

1. When I define the incident, first I verified whether this is the only particular customer
impacted and the impact on BAU process. (BAU – Daily business process that are mandatory
for the operations to continue). After checking, I define the incident as impact to financial
state of a particular customer only. Reconciliation process from the trade application
perspective is that all the general ledger balances must tally with general ledger balances of
finance application for every day. This is to check the credit cleanliness of all the customers
of trade application.
2. As part of analysis, I also did a check on whether there were any previous incidents reported
on this. I then started analysis from programming and predefined parameter set up
perspective what has caused the issue. Upon checking, I found that there was no issue in the
trade application and all the details have been sent out correctly. I then communicated the
findings to the finance application. It was then identified from finance application that this
was due to the incorrect mapping of general ledger account on their side.
Result of analysis: New general ledger account was introduced newly for both trade and
finance application. The impacted customer was authorized to perform new type of
transaction that is discounting the acceptance of discrepancies in the import bills. New set
up for this general ledger account needs to be done in both the application to support the
new transaction type. Testing successfully done in both SIT and UAT environments. Finance
application user missed to enter one of the parameters while doing the setup that has
caused the issue.
3. I then list down what are the possible ways to correct the balances of the customer. One way
to manually correct the balance of the customer upon receiving the necessary approval from
higher management. Second approach is resending the balances file from trade application
after finance application has corrected the parameter set up.
4. Upon analysing the two possible solutions,instead of doing manual adjustment suggested
approach is to resend the balances file. Every day by 8 am the system needs to be up and
running. Since the issue was reported by 12 am, there was enough work around time to fix
the issue.
5. By 2 am, Finance team users fixed the parameter set up on their end, using the contingency
menu from the trade application hence, the file was resent and report was extracted. I
verified the balances in the report and it was successfully able to reconcile. However, this
issue was tagged as severity 1.
6. As a corrective action for future, I suggested change in the process of new GL parameter set
up which is to avoid the manual set up and have automated job for the parameter set up.
New change request was initiated to implement the new design.

Modelling Methods

Using modelling methods for problem solving is very important in any software industry. There is a
need to solve the problems quickly and efficiently. By optimising the solution process, we can just get
to the root cause of the problem more quickly and work on ensuring that it does not recur. There are
various modelling methods used in software industry for problem solving like cause and effect
analysis, Risk analysis, Brain storming, Root cause analysis and six-sigma methodology.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 2

Cause and effect analysis: Every problem has a distinct cause. Root cause analysis helps us to
approach the root cause of the problem. Fish bone diagram helps us in diagnosing cause and sub
causes of problem.
Risk analysis: is used to identify the factors that may affect the success of proposed solution or
project.
Brainstorming: These formal meetings help us to identify different ways of approaching a problem
and discuss on various different solutions.
Six Sigma DMAIC: The process of define, measure, analyse, improve and control helps us to identify
cause of the problem solving but also for continues improvement.

I have used six-sigma approach in problem solving which has helped us in bringing better
improvements in the software solutions. We implemented Global E-banking project for the trade
application that was only backend earlier. After the implementation of the project, users will be able
to place transactions in front end instead of requesting for the same in backend. For example, when a
customer request for
letter of credit he will be able to do it online which will be interpreted to back end automatically and
corresponding credit or debit advices are generated for the successful transaction.

There was issue reported that there were no advices generated for the transactions performed from
a particular time

 This case I first define the scope of the problem. We have jobs running all day around
which will be ready to receive the incoming transaction from the online interface. I
identified that the online interface handlers for the advices was down.
 I then measured the intensity of the problem. I understood that this problem was
because the incoming data queue was full and there was no storage for the next
transaction that bought the job down. I also identified that this could happen for other
jobs also as many jobs are reading the incoming queues.
 Upon performing analysis, I implemented a new job that will clear the data queues
when they get full. When the jobs are bought up every day for business the new job will
read the queues and automatically clear them when they are full.
 The solution that was implemented was a part of the process improvement because
there might have been other production instances that could happen because of the
same issue. We also proposed increasing the message size that queues could hold.
 As part of controlling the process improvement which I have implemented. I wanted to
make sure that there are no further issues rising because of the change in the design. I
implemented job auto check program that runs before the business processes are up
every day. The function of this job is to check whether all online job are active if any job
is down this would create auto alert to production support teams so that the issue is
resolved before the business is impacted
 I have also performed root cause analysis before closing the defects raised in Quality
control tool. Updating of RCA details is mandatory before closing the defects.

General ICT Area of Knowledge:

Topic:
Technology Building
Sub topics:
Human Factors
Programming
How have you acquired this knowledge in your working environment? Illustrate your depth of knowledge.
Human Factors

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 3

Human factors play important role in technology building. Human interference needs to be taken into
account in every phase of building like technology architecture, requirements management, software
development phase, project management, implementation phase and user acceptance testing.
In my experience, I have understood how human factors can affect any software development life
cycle.

Few examples:

 Affecting software development market by being a customer

 Influencing development process by being a developer
 Also dealing with any project performance and success as a manager

Human factors affect all the phases in software development life cycle. In any project estimation,
human factors are always considered. I do estimation in such a way that it considers the skill set of
the planned resource for the project. Routines that are more complexare always assigned to senior
resources, as the number of man days utilized will be lesser. I have used several tools that help in
estimation.

I have been part of requirements phase that involves discussion and understanding of the
requirements clearly. Clients/customers are key participants in this phase. In my role as business
analyst, I have understood the importance of understanding the requirements. Any negligence from
the human factors might disturb the whole purpose of the project. During the design, phase the focus
in on the user or customer perspective while the implementation phase focuses more on the
developer role.

For any project, which involves graphical user interface design, the user intervention is very critical as
they are the end users of the application. I have worked in many projects like online screen designing,
addition of fields in the online screen which involves user intervention

 I have written the technical specifications document for one of the project which is
introducing new facility for the users to discount one of the amounts by the own bank. Here
the users will be prompted to enter two particular values after they enter the amount
whether they need to apply for discounting or not. If the value is “D” then the discounting
logic and calculations are applied else the other allowed input is “N”. The screen also has
validation not to accept other values apart from “D” or “N”.
 Another project – user request to see the credit information of customers using two
different applications in the daily report and an online enquiry screen. We have always
customized the reports and online screen according to the user needs.
Programming
Programming is one of the important phases of SDLC life cycle. This stage translates the design into
codes, which is tested and implemented to make the project achievable in real time.
I have been into programming for at least 10 years in my whole experience in the software industry.
I have been trained in mainframes and AS400 for six months. I have achieved proficiency in
programming languages like COBOL, COBOL400, JCL, CL, and RPG.
I have also worked with database management like DB2and IMS. I have obtained knowledge in open
systems, C++ in my work experience. I am always interested to learn the new programming languages
according to the changing technology world.

A developer must be flexible to work with any programming languages. Sometimes management may
decide to switch between programming languages depending on the cost of development and
maintenance. It is always healthier to allocate more time to develop and unit test modules as this will
reduce rework and the cost spent in maintenance phase.
In my work experience as a developer I would like to highlight below points which I consider as very

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 4

important in programming stage:

 Understand the technical design specification before translating it into coding language. Any
deviation might cause failure in achieving the required modification in any existing
functionality or development of new functionality.
 Documenting unit test cause and results. Test causes must cover both positive and negative
test causes.
 Version control is very important in any development tool as this might help in implementing
appropriate changes to the stages like SIT, UAT, and Prod.
 Coding standards are very essential to follow to readability and easy understanding for
developer who visit the code in future.
 It is always important to follow structured programming flow, which has defined entry, and
exit for any program developed. Programmers must always controlled execution of any logic
that needs to run “N” numbers of times depending on any condition.
 Performance tuning is one of the key concept while programming because when the job runs
in production it should not consume more resources and also delay execution of the other
jobs.
 When any code changes are done, it is always important to add comments and the
modification log in the beginning of the codes to keep tract of the changes.
 Code review checklist must be maintained which will be updated by the reviewer of the
code. It is very important to have code review meetings and validation of unit test results
before implementation of code to next stages.
 Zero defects must be goal of any developer. Programming quality must be ensured in any
stage of programming.

Following structured programming techniques (object-oriented programming) is always

recommended. Others key important aspects in programming are change control management
(separate team which manages codes which are implemented to production), Documentation
controls, modification controls

After the installation of the changes and handing over to the client, the product will now be under
maintenance process. Changes raised during the maintenance phase are mostly addresses as change
requests. During the change request, we don’t have the technical design document. So far,
developers it is very important to understand the existing code and make necessary changes without
impacting the existing functionality. In this case, regression testing is very important as we need to
test the existing functionality as well.

SECTION 2 - RPL PROJECT REPORTS

The purpose of these reports is to enable you to demonstrate your command and implementation of
the Areas of Knowledge described in Section 1 of this application.

Please refer to the ACS Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) Instruction document for more detail

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 5

 Project Summary:

Project Name Start Date End Date

Project 1 New audit trail report for FMF transactions Apr 2020 September 2020
Project 2 Excess Monitoring for trade August 2016 October 2016

Project 1: New audit trail report for FMF transactions

1. Project Summary

1.1. Identification
Client’s Company United Overseas Bank
Name
Business Address UOB Plaza, Raffles Place, Singapore 04864

Contact Numbers Tel: 0065 6222 2121

Web Address www.uobgroup.com

Email Address [email protected]

Nature of project Change Request
Location of project Singapore
Name of your Optimum Solutions Pte Ltd
employer

1.2. Duration

From To
Total project duration April 2020 Oct2020
Your involvement April 2020 Oct 2020

1.3. Resources

Number
Your team size 25
Total project team size 4

1.4. Personal Involvement

Please list the phases of the project in which you were personally involved

Start Completion Phase Description

Apr 2020 May2020 Estimates, Design approval and functional specifications
Jun 2020 Jul2020 Technical specifications and Build
July 2020 Aug2020 SIT and UAT
Aug 2020 Sep2020 Installation

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 6

 1.5. Describe your role(s) and responsibilities in the project.

My Roles and responsibilities in the change request:

1. Functional specification:
a. Responsible to analyse and define detailed functional specifications based on the functional and
non-functional requirements document.
b. Collaborate with functional business analyst to clarify the functional and non-functional
requirements.
2. Technical requirements:
a. Responsible to create technical design.
b. Ensure technical design adheres to architectural roadmap, development practises and security
requirements.
c. Collaborate with developers and infrastructure teams to clarify functional specification and
technical design during build, test and deployment phase.
d. Collaborate with production support to establish IT operations procedures and documents as part
of tech design.
3. Testing and scope management:
a. Clarify test findings escalated by Test manager and classify the findings accordingly.
b. Perform impact assessment and estimation for project change request.

2. Business Opportunity or Problem

2.1. Describe the business opportunity or problem(s) this project addressed.

FITAS (Finance of International Trade Automated System) is a system used by International Trade
Finance. FITAS handles many products like Import, Export, Account payable/Receivable, guarantees
and payments. It is very important for a trade system to validate the transaction details. Auditing of
the transactions are necessary to check the credibility of the transactions.

FITAS interfaces all the details of a transaction to FMF (Firco Name Matching filter system). This
system validates the applicant and beneficiary names with the addresses and returns the results to
FITAS. Users can approve the transactions only when the results are “No Hit” which means FMF found
no discrepancies with transaction details.

Users requested for an on-request menu where they will be able to get a report of the transaction
details sent to FMF by keying in the transaction reference number. Requirements as part of this
change request was to build an on-request report menu that can be used to generate a report of all
past and current records of a particular transaction interfaced to FMF system. This report was to be
routed to the common report portal from where the users can download the same.

3. Solution

3.1. Discuss your contribution to the solution, project or engagement.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 7

 I prepared the Impact Analysis and Cost Quotation document and Functional specifications document
for this change request.

I included costs for the development of modules for the creation of new FMF audit report, which
included all details of the transaction interfaced during the online transaction. I covered the report set
up required for new audit report. I also interacted with the FMF system on the behaviour of the
response from FMF and how they could be handled. Cost estimates included Project management,
Analysis, Design and documentation, development, SIT, UAT, Implementation, Pre & Post
implementation support.

I prepared the functional specifications document, which clearly described all functional changes for
this change request. I clearly included the layout of the new report and the difference in the report
layouts according to the product types. I included the sample design of the new screen that will be
developed for the users to have a clear understanding. I listed the user parameter set up required for
this change.I included the technical design architecture in the FS.

I arranged for FS walkthrough with users and provided clear overview of the requirement and changes
required. I clarified the testing related issues with the testing team and responsible for the defects
raised by testing team.I was also involved in other phases of the project including implementation and
post implementation support.

3.2. Describe any design or problem solving methods you used on this project.

I followed object-oriented approach to come up with the design.

a. Find the elements

b. Organize the elements
c. Describe how the elements interact
d. Define behaviour of the elements
e. Define internal of the elements

Firstly,I identified the components to be developed for this new functionality. I organized the
impacted areas according to the order in which they were executed in the current business process.
Secondly, I identified the dependencies between the components. For example, when I implemented
the screens for the new report layout it was very crucial that I first implement the files defined for this
layout. Thirdly, I defined the functionality of the impacted components. Users could generate report
only for those transactions that were approved already. Finally, I identified other modules impacted
indirectly because of the changes. I also verified that the current BAU is not affected by the addition of
this change. Thus, I used the approach of finding, organizing, describing and defining in my solution
approach.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 8

 3.3. List the major deliverables of the project that you were responsible for or contributed to.

Below are the major deliverables that I contributed or responsible for:

Impact Analysis and Cost Quotation:
I was responsible for the IACQ (Impact Analysis and Cost Quotation) document. I included cost
estimates for Project Management, Analysis design and documentation, Development, SIT, UAT,
Implementation, Pre and Post implementation support. The IACQ document included brief
explanation on key areas affected, assumptions and scope of change.
Functional Specifications document:
I was responsible for creating FSD (Functional Specifications Document). FSD document included
areas like scope of change, all functional requirements with respect to BRD (business requirements
document), Screen and report layout changes and testing requirements. I included the technical
architecture of the modules impacted. I also added the high-level technical design of the change.
Development Packages:
Development packages delivered as part of the change request included all objects that were
changed or created newly for this change. I was responsible for reviewing the overall changes. I
reviewed changes for online screen, jobs, program changes and files. I uploaded the code review
checklist to the share point, which ensures coding standards are followed strictly.
Production implementation plan:
I prepared the production implementation plan, including sending instructions to the change
management team, verifying the objects implemented to production, checking all necessary jobs are
scheduled and verifying report profile set up.

4. Results

4.1. Was your solution implemented? If so, describe the role, if any, you had in the
implementation.

Yes, my solution was implemented.

I was the main point of contact during implementation activities and my roles during the
implementation were:
 Prepare implementation plan and share with users.
 Prepare work plan for the checkpoints on implementation day.
 Prepare change request implementation tickets for the change management team to
implement the solution.
 Perform code review of the objects to be implemented to production.
 Upload documents related to SIT and UAT testing to SharePoint.
 Verify necessary job scheduling requests are already submitted.
 Submit requests for creating new report profiles and requesting access for the same.
 Provide support on implementation day by sending implementation instructions to change
management team and verify if the objects are successfully implemented to production.
 Confirm with users if they are able to successfully generate the reports after implementation.
 Provide post implementation support.

4.2. Assess the overall success or failure of the project.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 9

 The implemented solution to the change was a huge success. Users were able to extract the reports
for transactions interfaced to FMF and the extracted reports were used for Audit process. The viewing
of the reports were restricted for a particular user group profile so that the audit reports can be
viewed by authorized users only. The audit reports were very crucial in helping to track the
compliance of the transactions. The implemented solution plays an important role in fighting financial
crime.

4.3. Lessons Learned

In retrospect, what you might have done differently on this project?

The audit report, which was created for this change request, was on request basis. I would
recommend it to be generated automatically on daily basis for all the transactions, which were
interfaced to FMF system. The reports can be directly retrieved from the report system even if FITAS
was down. I would have also added alert messages whenever a transaction has an erroneous hit. Hese
two approaches would have significantly reduces manual work by users.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 10

 Project 2: Excess Monitoring of Trade

5. Project Summary

5.1. Identification

Client’s Company United Overseas Bank

Name
Business Address UOB Plaza, Raffles Place, Singapore 04864

Contact Numbers Tel: 0065 6222 2121

Web Address www.uobgroup.com

Email Address [email protected]

Nature of project Change Request
Location of project Singapore
Name of your Optimum Solutions Pte Ltd
employer

5.2. Duration

From To
Total project duration Aug 2016 Oct 2016
Your involvement Aug 2016 Oct 2016

5.3. Resources

Number
Your team size 25
Total project team size 4

5.4. Personal Involvement

Please list the phases of the project in which you were personally involved

Start Completion Phase Description

Mar 2017 Apr 2017 Estimates, Design approval and functional specifications
May 2017 Jun 2017 Technical specifications and Build
Aug 2017 Sep 2017 SIT and UAT
Oct 2017 Oct 2017 Installation

5.5. Describe your role(s) and responsibilities in the project.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 11

 I was involved in all the phases of this Change Request. I prepared and received approvals for the
estimates and the impact analysis. Estimates included analysis & design, development, SIT, UAT
support, and implementation. I did the impact analysis to identify file changes, changes to the online
functions, batch functions, user/parameter set up required, reports, and interfaces impacted.
I presented the planned design approach for the project to the Design review committee and
received approval to proceed with the further stages to implement the project.
I prepared the functional specs document, which highlights sections like background, scope,
assumptions and constraints, functional requirements, report changes, user interventions and
testing approach.
Under functional requirements, I have detailed the changes needed for both batch and online
functions. In the User intervention section, I provided the areas requiring user attention. I also
provided the prerequisite set up for the production implementation.
I also did walkthrough of my FSD to the users according to the scope of my project to receive sign
off for the FS. I received the sign off within the scheduled date provided by management. I also
coordinated with other interfaces on the receiving and sending of the files to my application to
identify all the upstream and downstream impacts.
I also prepared the tech spec and shared the same with the development team. I assisted the
development team by reviewing the changes and supported SIT and UAT testing. I also prepared the
implementation checklist and was first point of contact during the implementation.

6. Business Opportunity or Problem

6.1. Describe the business opportunity or problem(s) this project addressed.

The business objective of this change was to facilitate the users to get the holistic view of the
customer’s account status in both factoring and trade systems.
Currently factoring and trade are two separate systems in bank with same customers linked by
customer CIF number. When a customer performs a transaction more than the approved limit or
available funds, credit report is printed which is then manually verified by higher level of users. After
they sign the report, next higher level of users login to the system to approve the transaction. The
credit report printed here shows only the status of customer in one particular system at a time.
For example, trade user can see the status of the customers only in trade system. Factoring user can
see the status of the customers only in factoring system. After the implementation of the project,
users should be able to see the status of the customers in both the system.
The main key objective of this Change Request is to have a holistic view of the customer’s account
across various products. Account management becomes more efficient and effective minimising loss
on Bank’s exposure.

7. Solution

7.1. Discuss your contribution to the solution, project or engagement.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 12

 Below are the list of contributions which I have done for this change request:

1. Design Review Committee Presentation:

a. Present the planned design approach for the project to the Design Review Committee and
receive approval.
b. Prepare the effort estimate, which involves effort for functional design specs, technical specs,
coding and development, SIT ad UAT and project installation.

2. Preparation of Functional Specifications:

a. Prepare the functional specifications document, which highlights sections like background,
scope, assumptions and constraints, functional requirements, report changes, user
interactions and testing approach.
b. Include the changes on both batch and online functions.
c. Include the user parameter set up for switching on/off the changes of this CR.
d. Walkthrough FSD to users and receive sign off from respective application owners.

3. Technical specifications and review

a. Prepare the technical specs, which involves detailing of all impacted programs and testing
approach.
b. Review the code changes and provide support for testing in both SIT and UAT.
c. Prepare the implementation checklist, provide support for implementation and post Go Live.

7.2. Describe any design or problem solving methods you used on this project.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 13

 I used below problem solving methods for this project:

Production incident or change request is initiated when a problem is identified. This also depends on
the stage the problem occurred and the nature of the problem.
Explain the problem:
Understand the nature and scope of the problem and the purpose of the change request. Customer
might have different balances in both factoring and trade. Available limits of the customer must be
verified before the transactions can be approved. This check must be done in both the applications
(Factoring and trade).Currently trade users can only check the credit status of the customer in trade
application and factoring users can only check in factoring application. This is a limitation.
Analyse the problem:
Analyse the list of areas affected by the limitation. Offering sheet, online enquiry, allowing approval
of transactionswere the affected areas. Offering sheet is printed for every transaction that is
registered and created in trade to give the approval managers a view of the credit status of the
customer in trade. There is also an online screen where the customer code is entered and the liability
information of that customer in trade in shown. Another impacted area is approval of the
transactions. When a transaction is created for a customer by a user (maker), it needs to be approved
by another user (approver). After creation if the customer exceeds approved limit in trade then the
manager must sign the offering sheet of the customer upon checking the balances upon which the
transaction is approved. The fix was to be applied in all these areas to show appropriate information
from the other application (factoring) also.
Come up with the best possible solution:
Upon analysing various possible solutions, I then came up with the approach of sharing the credit
application between both the applications through interface file during the batch processing in the
End of Day. After receiving the interface file from factoring application, trade application processes
the file and loads into internal database. Now trade application has the credit information of the
customers from factoring application. This will be shown in the offering sheet along with the credit
information of customer in trade. The enquiry screen was also enhanced to show the information
from factoring application. Therefore, when managers check the approval transactions, they can now
see the customer’s liability info from both the applications in the offering sheet.
Implementation of the solution:
Factoring application is available in three countries. The change request was implemented in all the
three countries but initially switched on for Singapore. Jobs were scheduled in these countries to
share the interface file during the End of day processing. Both the applications will trigger out
conditions so that the processing jobs will be triggeredautomatically upon receiving the files.

7.3. List the major deliverables of the project that you were responsible for or contributed to.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 14

 Following are the major deliverables for this change request:
Presentation to the design review team: Firs major deliverable is the presentation for the design
committee. I prepared the presentation and presented the same to the requestor of the change
request. I included the following key points in the presentation:
 List of countries impacted by this change
 Briefing about any changes in the existing functionality
 List of reports impacted
 Any upstream or downstream impact
Impact Analysis and estimates:
Estimates for Project Management, Analysis & Design, Development, SIT, UAT Support, and
Implementation. Identification of file changes, changes to the online functions, Batch functions,
user/parameter set up required, Reports and impacted, interfaces impacted were included.

Functional Specifications Document:

I prepared the FSD document and received approval from users to proceed with the changes. I listed
down the scope of enhancement of this change request, which includes switching on/off the changes
of this CR. Changes in the current End of Day batch process of approving transactions in trade
application. Enhancement in the offering sheet that is printed whenever the customer performs a
transaction more than the approved limit. The offering sheet will now show available limits for the
customer not only in trade application but also in factoring application. This gives higher-level
manager to sign the sheet, which means the transaction for the user can be approved. Changes in the
liability enquiry screen which previously liability enquiry screen shows only the credit information of
the customer in trade application. After the implementation of the changes, liability enquiry screen
will also show the credit info of the customer in factoring application. Establish connect direct
between two interfaces to share the End of Day file.

Technical specifications document:

I prepared the technical specifications document, which involves briefing on the technical changes. I
included the interface file specifications. I also included the list of batch and online changes. I then
elaborated on the changes in the current end of day batch processing.

Build & promotion of code to SIT and UAT environment:

Programming languages used for the development of codes for this Change Request were COBOL400
and CL. The task with the list of objects was initially implemented to SIT. Upon completion of 100% of
SIT, the objects were moved for UAT testing. Users provided UAT sign off after completing the testing.

Source compare sign off:

I did source compare for the existing objects that were impacted for this Change Request between
production and UAT. I received signature from the project manager for the source compare listing and
submitted the source compare listing to the Change Management team for them to verify.

8. Results

8.1. Was your solution implemented? If so, describe the role, if any, you had in the
implementation.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 15

 Yes, the implementation was successful. The change management tool, which was used for this
project, was ALDON. I reviewed the list of objects to be implemented to ensure that only the changes
that were related to this Change Request were moved to production.
I did source compare for the existing objects, which were impacted for this Change Request between
production and UAT. I submitted the source compare listing to the Change Management team for
them to verify.
I then prepared the implementation checklist. Implementation was planned on Saturday and the users
were requested to login by 10 am for verification of the results. The plan was to implement the
changes of this Change Request before user login.
Important points that were covered in the checklist:
 Ensure that previous day’s End of Day successfully completed.
 Post End of Day backup of previous day is successfully completed. This is to ensure that if
there is any impact after the implementation of the CR, back up can be used for recovery.
 Bring down all servers before implementation of the objects
 Instruct CCM for the implementation of the objects
 Inform users to set up parameter table and to switch ON the features for the
implementation of the CR.
 Bring up servers after objects are implemented
 Users will check existing BAU activities
 Users check functions implemented for this change request

8.2. Assess the overall success or failure of the project.

From my point of view, I would rate this project as a success. The whole purpose of the project was
achieved after the implementation. Users were already able to see the credit liability information of
both trade and factoring application. There were zero post implementation defects and all the
scheduled jobs runs successfully after the end of day. There were no job failures reported. There was
no impact in the existing BAU process after the changes of this project were implemented.

8.3. Lessons Learned

In retrospect, what you might have done differently on this project?

The interface file is shared between the applications after the end of day processing. The drawback in
this approach is that the information that is shared is used only the next day. Hence, the credit
information shown is not for the current day. I would like to change this aspect of the project. The
information retrieval between both the applications should have been intraday. There could be MQ
connectivity between the applications and the data can be shared online through MQ. Since the
project budget could not facilitate the online sharing of the feed it was done by batch.

ACS | RECOGNITION OF PRIOR LEARNING APPLICATIONFORM2019 Page 16