Universidad Católica Andrés Bello (UCAB)
SISPOA: turning institutional strategy into concrete, measurable, centralized action.
The challenge
Our client is a private university with multiple campuses and a complex organizational structure of vice-rectorates, deaneries, schools and departments. Operational planning, a hard requirement for accreditation and institutional governance, ran on spreadsheets, loose documents and email threads. That approach created four core problems: fragmented information, since every unit used its own formats and repositories; no institutional visibility, because leadership had no consolidated view of progress; slow approvals and missed deadlines, with initiatives expiring before anyone reported on them; and a strategic disconnect, because objectives never translated into measurable actions.
The solution
We built SISPOA, an annual operating plan tracking system: a unified strategic and operational planning platform, cloud-based and accessible from any browser or mobile device, covering the full institutional planning lifecycle. We designed it around each role in the institution. Unit directors formulate plans, assign co-managers, report progress and receive proactive alerts. Deans and vice-rectors review, approve, evaluate performance and monitor compliance across their areas. Planning staff define strategy, track overall progress, manage templates and produce consolidated reports. System administrators handle permissions, parameters and technical synchronization.
The result
The full planning cycle centralized, with loose documents and spreadsheets eliminated.
What we built
- Institutional planning with strategic pillars, objectives, challenges and performance indicators tied directly to day-to-day operations.
- Operating plan management with templates by period and plan type (academic, research, administrative, outreach), standardizing formats and institutional calendars.
- Detailed formulation at the unit level, with dates, owners, resources, methods and indicators, internal and external SWOT analysis, and reuse of prior-year plan structures.
- A three-level approval workflow (director, dean or vice-rector, and the planning office), with return-for-revision and an auditable trail of dates and comments.
- Periodic progress reporting with automatic calculation of completion percentages.
- Email alerts and notifications with anti-flooding controls, including early warnings for actions approaching their deadline.
- Performance indicators by percentage, quantity or average, with historical tracking for trend analysis.
- Performance evaluation using configurable criteria, weightings and scales.
- Consolidated reports filterable by campus, faculty or department and exportable to PDF.
- Organizational structure management, document management, planning guides with mandatory read receipts, and granular permissions with secure session controls.
Impact and results
- The full planning cycle centralized, with loose documents and spreadsheets eliminated.
- Complete traceability and audit history for every decision, approval and change.
- Significantly shorter formulation time thanks to built-in templates and guides.
- Proactive prevention of missed deadlines through timely automated alerts.
- Consolidated institutional visibility to support informed decisions by leadership.
- Guaranteed alignment between strategy and daily operations.
Technologies and integrations
- Daily synchronization with the Banner academic system on Oracle
- Single Sign-On with OAuth 2.0 and institutional credentials
- SMTP server and WebSockets for real-time communication
- Containerized cloud deployment with high availability and multiple environments
