Information Technology based e-Governance tools have been changing the lives drastically in India. Even before that, it brings unimaginable innovative comfort to the administration in order to strengthen the public service delivery mechanism. Buzz around “change management” is noisier than the actual change that has been envisioned. Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration went under the same upheavals in introducing more systematic methodology in managing its inventory and supply chain. An institute, which has been ham-handed due to old-fashioned management system, was found in a dire need of radical changes in its inventory management and supply chain. Implementation of e-Office in the institute inspired the much needed change in managing the inventories.

It was conceived that Manual Process of managing the stores should make a way for modern and commodious computerized system. LBSNAA prepared a comprehensive technical plan to implement the “change”. Following are the prerequisites required for driving this change:

REQUIREMENTS • Software should be based on client-server technology • User/Employee can view the availability of the items in store, so that, s/he can demand a particular item if available, ensuring transparency in working of stores & supply. • The working of the software should follow demand and supply model wherein a user/employee makes a requisition containing the required items which goes to the stores & supply section and then finally the officials of S&S issue those items demanded by the employee. • User Interface must be as simple and effective that virtually there is no training required at both ends (User end and Administration end).

SOLUTION In order to make the interface as simple and comfortable as possible and to keep employees/users at ease in operating, a study was carried out to figure the requirements of the end-user by visiting employees. We also studied the old manual system of the stores and supply section to simplify the process of migration from old system to the new one. After completing the above process, we designed the prototype of the desired system according to the requirements studied. In this prototype, we provided the very interactive and self-explanatory interface to the user. An interactive list of the items with the detailed information about the items availability along with the coloured indicators were provided to the users to enable quick and easy requisitions. This widget (front-end) is written in the popular JavaScript framework called jquery and the background processes are handled using the Dot Net Framework.

Login Screen

WEB INTERFACE OF THE SOFTWARE After successful login user will get the interface according to his/her role.

FEATURES It was well understood that interface of this web based solution has to be simple and user friendly in order to oblige to the skills and caliber of the employees. Therefore, users need not to punch the name of the items in this interface. Instead, all the items are available in a widget, where users can search or filter according to item’s category and simply type the quantity of a particular item to add that item to the requisition. Colour indicators and details about the items improve the interactivity between the user and the system. In addition, a draft facility is provided to the user to make it more convenient for the user to request items with large number or recurring items. User can view the status of his/her requisition any time. A user can send the requisition to the higher authorities for approval.

Requisition Interface

At the admin/stores end, they will get a list of all requisitions made by the users. The facility of partial issuance of items is provided to the stores personnel to make the process simple flexible so that the non-available items can be kept pending for later issuing. An Excel like keyboard navigation feature and inline editing is added to the delivery interface to speed up the working of issued items process.

Received Requisitions

SCOPE One of the major works to be done is the Dead Stock Module. For this QR code or BAR codes for the items are being considered. We are also considering the Database portability so that the system administrator can select the database as per his/her convenience. Also, there is a big scope for improvement and we are expecting the valuable suggestions from experts and the users.

Issue Interface