About Term 2

Staff & Rights

Term 2 of the HIFIS 4 Implementation Masterclass is all thinking about what your staff (or, as we will begin to call them, users) will be doing in HIFIS 4 on a day-to-day basis. What will they be entering in? What data will they need to be able to access? What tasks will they need to complete? How will they be using the software?

This phase is critical in making sure that your staff will be able to do their work as efficiently and seamlessly as possible. We're going to think through how users will interact with and experience HIFIS 4, and assign them rights so that they can complete their assigned tasks.

If you're familiar with the concept of the System Development Life Cycle, we're going to be covering the third phase - Design - in this course. If you're not familiar with the concept, take a look at the diagram below. At a really high level, it shows you what your path will be to HIFIS 4 implementation.

Target Audience

At the start of this course, we assume that you:

  • Have a designated HIFIS 4 Implementation Project Team with roles & responsibilities assigned

  • Have community buy-in from your Partner Agencies for this project

  • Have a mechanism by which you can solicit feedback from your Partner Agencies (i.e. HIFIS Advisory Group)

  • Have a good understanding of what your Partner Agencies do in HIFIS, what data they need to collect, and what they need to report out on

  • Have a server set up to host HIFIS, and a testing, sandbox, or development environment ready to use (if you don't, get on that ASAP because you will need it by the end of Term)

  • Do not have your legal agreements in place (i.e. data sharing agreements and consent), but have begun working on them and they're taking shape

  • Are at least 4 months from your planned launch date

Important Note

In order to succeed in this Term, it's strongly recommended that you have commitment from your HIFIS 4 Advisory Group to be available and responsive over the duration of this course

This may mean scheduling regular - even weekly - meetings for the near future. It may mean having a big HIFIS 4 workshop to hash things out.

Whatever the format will take, you're going to be having a lot of discussion as a community as you discuss how their staff will be using the software, who will be able to access each data point, and how some processes may need to change.

If your HIFIS Advisory Group is not currently in a position to be able to provide you with timely input, you will have difficulty staying on track this Term.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this course, you will:

  • Know what data you'll be collecting and sharing

  • Know what staff that will be using HIFIS 4

  • Have identified the roles these staff fulfill

  • Have identified what business functions (tasks) each of these roles need to complete

  • Understand how user rights work in HIFIS 4

  • Have a draft set of rights templates that allow staff of a particular role to complete the required business functions

  • Have created a set of dummy user accounts for the identified staff roles, and know how to set up real users

  • Be ready to begin user acceptance testing using your dummy user accounts

Course Curriculum

  • 1

    Week 1: Staff Roles

  • 2

    Staff Roles

    • What are Staff Roles?

    • Group Activity: Identifying Local Staff Roles
  • 3

    Week 2: Data Sharing & User Rights

  • 4

    Data Sharing in HIFIS 4

  • 5

    User Rights

    • What is a User Right?

    • The Five HIFIS 4 Rights

    • List and List Client Rights

    • Knowledge Check: User Rights
  • 6

    Access to Personal Information

    • Group Activity: Staff Roles and Personal Information
  • 7

    Weeks 3-5: Business Functions & HIFIS 4 Modules

  • 8

    Weeks 3-5: Shelters

  • 9

    Admissions Module

    • Admissions: Module Overview

    • Admissions: Data Fields

    • Admissions: Block Book-Out Feature

    • Admissions: Express Book-In Feature

    • Admissions: Bed Availability Feature

    • Admissions: Reservations Feature

    • Admissions: Data Sharing

    • Admissions: User Rights

    • Admissions: Tips & Tricks
  • 10

    Chores Module

    • Chores: Module Overview

    • Chores: Data Fields

    • Chores: Data Sharing

    • Chores: User Rights
  • 11

    Medication Dispensing Module

    • Medication Dispensing: Module Overview

    • Medication Dispensing: Data Fields

    • Medication Dispensing: Data Sharing

    • Medication Dispensing: User Rights
  • 12

    Weeks 3-5: Housing Case Management

  • 13

    Assessments Module(s)

    • Assessments: Module(s) Overview

    • Assessments: Data Fields

    • Assessments: Data Sharing

    • Assessments: User Rights

    • Assessments: Tips & Tricks
  • 14

    Case Management Module

    • Case Management: Module Overview

    • Case Management: Data Fields

    • Case Management: Sessions & Case Notes

    • Case Management: Session Comments and Session Appointments

    • Case Management: Data Sharing

    • Case Management: User Rights

    • Case Management: Tips & Tricks

  • 15

    Housing Placement Module

    • Housing Placement: Module Overview

    • Housing Placement: Data Fields

    • Housing Placement: The Housing Unit Inventory

    • Housing Placement: Data Sharing

    • Housing Placement: User Rights

    • Housing Placement: Tips & Tricks

  • 16

    Housing Loss Prevention Module

    • Housing Loss Prevention: Module Overview

    • Housing Loss Prevention: Data Fields

    • Housing Loss Prevention: Data Sharing

    • Housing Loss Prevention: User Rights

    • Housing Loss Prevention: Tips & Tricks

  • 17

    Weeks 3-5: Light Touch Services

  • 18

    Goods & Services Module

    • Goods & Services: Module Overiew

    • Goods & Services: Data Fields

    • Goods & Services: Express Goods & Services

    • Goods & Services: Data Sharing

    • Goods & Services: User Rights

    • Goods & Services: Tips & Tricks
  • 19

    Group Activities Module

    • Group Activities: Module Overview

    • Group Activities: Data Sharing

    • Group Activities: Data Fields

    • Group Activities: User Rights

    • Group Activities: Tips & Tricks
  • 20

    Food Banks Module

    • Food Banks: Module Overview

    • Food Banks: Data Fields

    • Food Banks: Data Sharing

    • Food Banks: User Rights
  • 21

    Week 6: Service Interruptions

  • 22

    Turn Aways Module

    • Turn-Aways: Module Overview

    • Turn-Aways: Data Fields

    • Turn-Aways: Data Sharing

    • Turn-Aways: User Rights

    • Turn-Aways: Tips & Tricks
  • 23

    Service Restrictions Module

    • Service Restrictions: Module Overview

    • Service Restrictions: Data Fields

    • Service Restrictions: Data Sharing

    • Service Restrictions: User Rights

    • Service Restrictions: Tips & Tricks
  • 24

    Incidents Module

    • Incidents: Module Overview

    • Incidents: Data Fields

    • Incidents: Data Sharing

    • Incidents: User Rights

    • Incidents: Tips & Tricks
  • 25

    Conflicts Module

    • Conflicts: Module Overview

    • Collection of Indirect Personal Information

    • Conflicts: Data Fields

    • Conflicts: Data Sharing

    • Conflicts: User Rights
  • 26

    Week 7: Housekeeping and Creative Solutions

  • 27

    Appointments Module

    • Appointments: Module Overview

    • Appointments: Data Fields

    • Appointments: User Rights

    • Appointments: Data Sharing

    • Appointments: Tips & Tricks
  • 28

    Calls & Visits Log Module

    • Calls & Visits: Module Overview

    • Calls & Visits: Data Fields

    • Calls & Visits: Data Sharing

    • Calls & Visits: User Rights
  • 29

    Storage Module

    • Storage: Module Overview

    • Storage: Data Fields

    • Storage: Data Sharing

    • Storage: User Rights
  • 30

    Waiting Lists Module

    • Waiting Lists: Module Overview

    • Waiting Lists: Data Fields

    • Waiting Lists: Data Sharing

    • Waiting Lists: User Rights
  • 31

    Square Peg, Round Hole

    • Square Peg, Round Hole

    • Drop-In Centres

    • Street Outreach

    • Shelter Diversion

    • Custom Tables
  • 32

    Week 8: User Testing & Feedback

  • 33

    Rights Templates

    • How to Configure Rights Templates

    • 2-8A Rights Templates

    • User Templates

  • 34

    User Accounts & Dummy Users

    • How to Create User Accounts

    • Dummy User Accounts
  • 35

    User Acceptance Testing

  • 36

    Bonus: Point in Time Counts

  • 37

    End of Term 2

    • Congratulations!

Instructor

HIFIS 4 Guru

Ali Ryder

Ali is Canada's - nay, the world's - leading expert on HIFIS 4. She is the owner, operator, and sole proprietor of ACRE Consulting, formed in 2016 to help communities understand and better make use of HIFIS 4. She's worked with dozens of communities on their HIFIS 4 projects, as well as partnering with the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness and Built for Zero Canada, Employment and Social Development Canada, and sits on the national HIFIS 4 Working Group.

FAQ

  • What's the schedule for this course?

    This course is primarily self-directed, so there's very little in terms of special scheduling needed. You don't need to block of specific dates and times.

  • What sort of time commitment is required for this course?

    We recommend that you dedicate some time each week to learning the course materials and completing the assignments, to stay on top of things. When you do this is up to you.

    Generally speaking, we don't expect you to spend more than 1-2 hours per week learning the course material. However, you will typically have assignments to do every week which often involve meeting with various partners, or reviewing or creating policies, or assessing your program requirements. These assignments can vary in difficulty and time required to complete, depending on where you're already at as a community. These assignments could take several hours and multiple meetings to complete! Keep in mind though that these are tasks that you would need to do anyway in order to launch HIFIS 4, so taking this course is not adding a lot of work to your workload, just organizing it for you.