In his report of 6 March 2006 entitled "Investing in the United Nations: for a stronger Organization worldwide", the Secretary-General proposed "to replace the Integrated Management Information System (IMIS), Galaxy and other stand-alone information and communications technology (ICT) management support systems with a fully integrated global system supporting the full range of management functions" (A/60/692 and Corr.1, proposal 10).
An ad hoc arrangement, drawing on the limited budgetary discretion approved by the General Assembly in section III of its resolution A/RES/60/283 was used to put in place an interim small core team of 16 staff. For the first half of 2008, such authority was utilized to meet initial resource requirements for a dedicated project team, the continuation of ongoing preparatory project activities and ensuring progress on major foundational tasks related to fundamentally modernizing the way the UN carries out its day-to-day work, by streamlining and simplifying processes.
The first major activity was the identification of user needs as functional requirements. Representative staff from Headquarters, offices away from Headquarters, regional commissions and field missions contributed to the extensive requirements-gathering and analysis of current practice. The areas covered included requirements for cost accounting, IPSAS, recruitment, procurement and associated management reporting. The detailed functional requirements were completed in December 2007.
Work was then undertaken to refine the scope in conjunction with stakeholder determination of high-level business process re-engineering and the desired system architecture. The results enabled the continued progression of software acquisition activities. Experiences of other United Nations agencies that had already implemented ERP systems served as important reference points for these preparatory activities of the Secretariat.
Late in 2008, over 1,000 staff members, from D-2s to interns, as well as military and police officers, and staff from peacekeeping duty stations and Offices Away from Headquarters (OAHs) participated in a contest to select a name for the Organization's administrative reform initiative. Umoja, meaning "unity" in Swahili, was selected by staff vote and endorsed by the Steering Committee in January of 2009.
Following the adoption of resolution 63/262 by the General Assembly, provisions for a full-time project team, Governance and budget were put in place. Throughout the early part of 2009, the team partnered with Subject Matters Experts to complete a critical review of the current policies, procedures and processes with the goal of identifying key areas where changes are required. Opportunities for implementing international best practices were identified so that work on high-level business process re-engineering could proceed in the latter half of 2009. This work produced agreement on a framework to guide the detailed process design and configuration work. Baseline indicators were established in all business areas to serve as the basis for reporting overall progress to the General Assembly.
During this period, a comprehensive business case was developed for Umoja as the basis for the first progress report of the Secretary-General (A/64/380) submitted to the General Assembly in October 2009. The report, which was positively received by the ACABQ, detailed the funding required and anticipated benefits to be derived from Umoja's implementation. Endorsement by the ACABQ (A/64/7/Add.9) and General Assembly (A/RES/64/243) demonstrates the commitment of the Member States to the Secretary-General's vision for transforming the organization. In resolution 64/243, the General Assembly also endorsed the "pilot first" implementation strategy recommended by the Secretary-General.
