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By Gennifer Biggs

If you have ever smacked down a phone receiver in frustration at the end of a call about a misplaced utility payment or a misfiled bill now overdue, you know how quickly snarled workflow processes can impact customer service. So imagine if you were a major public university struggling to keep track of every penny received from grants, awards, or other outside funding sources. In the case of one California university, a separate finance office handles all those monies, both receipt and disbursement. Until a few years ago, the office was operating using purely paper forms, from the receipt of notification through bill payments made on certain projects funded by particular grants or awards. You can imagine the opportunity for lost paperwork, misplaced files, and frustrated ‘customers' within the university community.

When a new manager arrived at the office, that all started to change. Having used electronic content management (ECM) and automated workflow in previous offices tasked with similar financial responsibilities, the manager started the process of auditing the finance office's existing workflow to determine how to improve customer service. But before that project got too far, the manager met CampusDocs' (an ECM solutions provider) marketing director during a trade show presentation. The company offered just the automated workflow solution the university's finance office needed, and CampusDocs quickly closed a deal to examine the office's workflow and develop a software and scanning solution to turn paper chaos into electronic efficiency.

"CampusDocs specializes in custom ECM solutions for higher education," explains Michelle Taft, VP of professional services for CampusDocs. The solutions provider actually debuted in 2001 as part of a larger company, but the higher education division became an independent entity a few years later.

Use ECM To Resolve Customer Service Complaints
In the case of this California university, the solutions provider worked with the finance office to evaluate its workflow, meeting with all the stakeholders to determine what problems the office faced and any questions or concerns the staff had about what would be a marked change in their day-to-day operations. "The biggest complaint the office heard was that it took too long — to pay students, vendors, bills, whatever — the whole process just took too long," explains Taft. The reasons why varied from lost documents to lack of visibility in the system to the pure slowness of the paper-based process, which literally had papers being carried from one checkpoint to another in the office. "The message was loud and clear — customer service was not in good shape," says Taft.

CampusDocs worked with the office staff to tweak its workflow so it better utilized the ECM solution, a process that can typically take up to a month. However, because CampusDocs specializes in higher education, Taft had worked on a similar installation several months earlier, so she had a blueprint for what might be needed by the new client. That background helped shorten the evaluation process to only a week. After making recommendations about the workflow process, CampusDocs installed a Kodak i65 scanner and Kofax Capture software (formerly Ascent Capture) along with CampusDocs' own ECM management solution, which is built on the EMC Documentum platform.

Taft explains that one of the biggest challenges wasn't technology related, but rather people oriented. "The challenge was that the manager was forward thinking and some of the staff weren't comfortable with the electronic environment versus the paper-based environment they were used to," says Taft. She adds that a willingness to involve the staff at each step of the process was key in alleviating some of the staff's anxiety. In fact, as a company, CampusDocs considers project managers not willing to involve the stakeholders — those who will use the system every day — a red flag. "We watch for that situation because we've found that when a manager wants to isolate the development of a system from the staff, the staff then doesn't know what to expect, and the project tends to be far more difficult," explains Taft. "We are very open about the need to involve the actual users from the very start; those people who work on the system everyday are key to a successful project." CampusDocs also tried to offset any anxiety about a move from paper to electronic document handling through training, typically spending a week with clients to ensure they are comfortable with the new system. Then, during the user test phase of the deployment, CampusDocs remains at the site to answer one-on-one questions.

With the new process in place, the finance office staff now scans each document the moment it arrives in the office, and that document then moves into the CampusDocs system, which initiates the fully automated workflow that is preconfigured by type of document. For example, a purchase order is scanned, and depending on the amount, it is routed to a certain person on the staff for handling. "Documents are sorted by amount, projects, kinds of documents, all those elements; then the workflow is automated from there," says Taft. Once in the network, the document can be viewed by anyone in the office — a huge improvement over the past system. "Before, when someone called to inquire after a document or a payment, there was no way to know where — on what desk — that document was located," says Taft. Now, if any staff member fields a call about a document, they can quickly search the system and provide a status report. Also, because the documents are electronic, the paperwork with missing information can be emailed to the appropriate project manager for remediation.

The ROI on this $18,000 project was less about money than service, says Taft. "They really were worried most about improving the process so they could provide better customer service." Now, nearly two years in, the office has added a second scanner — a Kodak multifunctional peripheral — and has nearly doubled its processing capacity. The office can also evaluate its workflow as the staff gets more proficient. "They can pull reports to show when information came in and how long it took to process it; they can even look at the personal level to see if one person is having a difficult time keeping up or can handle a greater load," explains Taft. That capability also allows the finance office to set expectations with its constituents in terms of how long certain actions should take, such as processing a purchase order. "It is much easier to manage their expectations if you can say, a PO should take, say, three days, and if you haven't heard by then, call us," says Taft.

SOURCE: Business Solutions Magazine