The Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (SKL)

Solution

Various solutions were evaluated and NetIQ provided the best ft for SKL, as Joakim Ganse, Partner at B-IQ, explains: “We looked at SKL’s vision of leveraging digital channels and social collaboration and found that it mapped very neatly onto our vision of the digital world we all operate in. The Micro Focus (now OpenText) solutions are platform-neutral and the flexibility in pricing and licensing convinced us it was the right solution for SKL.”

OpenText NetIQ Identity Manager and OpenText NetIQ Access Manager were configured to provide the same functionality as the previous solution initially, but designed so that usage could easily be expanded. The new solution was implemented by application, most of which are web-based. HR was one of the first user groups with NetIQ Identity Manager used to complete all the user attributes which NetIQ Access Manager requires to determine user access levels.

Some of the external user audiences are now also included in the new identity and access solution. Healthcare workers access the SKL system on a monthly basis to conduct analysis on healthcare-specific statistics, such as waiting times in ERs; waiting times for an operation, etc. HR professionals conduct their own analysis based on statistics from their peers. These user groups gain access to the SKL system through an OTP (One Time Password) module provided in OpenText NetIQ Advanced Authentication. As they don’t access the system daily, the risk of losing their password is high and an OTP policy works well for these audiences. As part of their log-in process, a password is emailed to them. Healthcare professionals often cannot use their mobile phones in the workplace and so email is more efficient than SMS in this particular user group. Up to 5,000 users access the SKL system periodically in this way.

We looked at SKL’s vision of leveraging digital channels and social collaboration and found that it mapped very neatly onto our vision of the digital world we all operate in.

Passwords for internal users are managed through OpenText NetIQ Self Service Password Reset with password synchronization from NetIQ Identity Manager to NetIQ Access Manager. Although functional right now, the roll-out is phased and once this is complete it will save much time in manual helpdesk password resets.

Results

Even in its early stages, the project is already paying dividends, as observed by Sandström: “The solution is so much more flexible. We can add new features really easily and quickly. We used to depend on our HR department to disable user accounts. There was only one way to do this and the account would be gone forever. We now have the option to manage this through either HR or an IT administrator and can choose to put an account on hold or delete it.”

Ganse adds: “Maintenance was a big issue and this has really been simplified with the new system. We designed it very well so that it will be easy to maintain and achieve efficiencies.”

Sandström concludes: “We feel ready for the future with our solution and appreciate that Micro Focus (now OpenText) took the time to understand our requirements, both now and in the future, and worked with us to find the best and most cost-effective solution for us.”