Introduction to Capabilities and Standards

Owned by Devishree Nath (Unlicensed)
16-12-2020
3 min read

What are Capabilities?

The requirements to deliver Online and Video Consultation Solutions are grouped into Capabilities. Each Capability describes the business need at the highest level. For example, 'Video Consultations' describes the need for staff to be able to conduct secure live remote video Consultations with individual, or groups of Patients/Service Users/Proxies.

Capabilities will be used by:

  • NHS Digital to express the business needs during the procurement

  • NHS Digital for the initial assessment of Solutions for onboarding to the Buying Catalogue

  • Suppliers to categorise their products and to see market opportunities

  • Buyers to search for products that meet their needs

What are Epics and Acceptance Criteria?

Epics are individual high level business requirements and describe features relevant to the Capabilities they belong to. All Epics together define the full scope of a Capability.

The Acceptance Criteria associated with an Epic define the minimum expected functions a Supplier’s Solution must deliver and are test scenarios that will be used during Capability Assessment stage of Onboarding to establish whether a Supplier’s Solution meets the Epic or not. In order to pass any Epic, all associated Acceptance Criteria for that Epic must pass the assessment.

Epics are classified as either Must or May Epics and all Epics will be assessed during the Capability Assessment stage of Onboarding.

Must Epics

Must Epics are used to confirm during Capability Assessment stage of Onboarding that a Solution delivers a Capability at the highest level. A Supplier Solution needs to meet all Must Epics in order to Pass Capability Assessment for a Capability.

May Epics

All May Epics will be evaluated during the Capability Assessment Stage of On-boarding. These Epics are not mandatory, however they allow Suppliers to specify which features their Solution offers. Any May Epics that are assessed as met will be available to buyers to support them when comparing Solutions.

Each Epic has a unique identifier which allows for the identification of Epics in a consistent manner, e.g. ‘E00001’.

What are Standards?

Standards describe the technical or operating conditions required to achieve Catalogue Compliance.

Standards will be used by:

  • NHS Digital to express any technical and non-functional requirements

  • Suppliers to understand what is expected of them in order to be compliant and to onboard onto the Buying Catalogue

  • NHS Digital Solution Assurance to assess Supplier Solutions against in order to award compliance

  • Buyers to assess various Suppliers against each other (levels of compliance) for competitive procurements.

Capabilities and Standards Model

The Capabilities and Standards are structured in the model below.

  • There are a set of Overarching Standards that are applicable to all supplier Solutions e.g. Information Governance

  • There are Capabilities to describe the business needs at the highest level

  • There are also Interoperability Standards which contains elements specific to all and discreet Capabilities

 

 

See Capability and Standards Structure page for more detail on the structure and content of Capabilities and Standards

Do I have to build a solution that delivers all Capabilities?

Suppliers do not have to provide a Solution that delivers all Capabilities and are free to design and build Solutions that meet one or more of the Capabilities. By looking at the Capabilities, Suppliers can see where their product portfolio fits, either by making tweaks to existing Solutions where required or building new Solutions to expand the Capabilities that they provide for.