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Attendees were: John Dorrer, Arthur Davis, Jane Gilbert, Don Verrill, Louise Sidelinger, Nikki Jellison, Anita Oliver, Dawn Mealey, Cathy Singleton, Sue Bell, John Rioux, Crystal Cooley, Cheryl Bradford, Andy Drouin, Diana Olore, Dennis Corliss, Chris Boudreau, Bob Morlock, Joan Cook, Suzanne Thivierge, Bob Kelley, Kim Smith
Jane Gilbert reported that the Project Team (Jane, Arthur, John R., Kim) will report to Commissioner and Steering Committee (SC) on February 16 on the status of teams and on cost savings. All teams must provide to John R. the metrics and projected savings before February 11. The report must encompass dollar savings anticipated. Jane also stated that this doesn’t mean that we’re taking savings away. Once savings are identified, then a decision needs to be made on how those savings should be spent (serving additional clients, focusing on other work, booking savings, etc.) She also acknowledged that there is resistance to identifying funds because of fear of having funds taken away. Commissioner and the Steering Committee realize that we have choices that need to be made once savings are identified.
John Rioux, Arthur Davis, Jane Gilbert, Kim Smith to meet at 2:00 on Friday, Feb 11 on metrics and projected savings.
John Rioux – Data Manager – trying to create one storage mechanism for metrics, so that can be accessed by Project Team and other interested parties. John will be doing a presentation at end of meeting on modifications to current metrics.
Abbreviations:
CS Current State Value Stream Map
FS Future State Value Stream Map
SC Steering Committee
A/P & Procurement - 95% of CS complete, still refining. Metrics for CS still being refined, group hasn’t looked at. Meeting on Wed of next week. Concerns that there is no mechanism to guage cost to get from CS to FS. FS 95% mapped. Comfort – not quite there, holding off on what is needed. Savings have been identified, just looking at the projections for the first time this morning. Will have by Friday Feb 11. The team is looking at the PriceWaterhouseCoopers report – looking at report and listing all recommendations and where we are to date. Many of those recommendations have already been put in place. Also, looking at vendors with large number of invoices, Boise, i.e., to streamline using on-line services. Checking assumptions, talking with Audit & Controller’s Office. This type of detail will be in final report, even though not shown in FS.
Tax/Ben Combined Collections – Benefits CS and FS 100% mapped. Tax staff now joining the group. At least 20% of Combined Tax & Benefits Collection (FS) complete. Very low comfort with metrics. Looking for better understanding of metrics – need help. Meetings planned on Thursdays, Tax person only in area on that day. Getting people the right people together has been a problem. Only certain people know each step, such as how collections are made from certain sources.
Question - Pulled out two aspects of process – should we be looking at those pieces to get savings, then working towards entire process? Joan (sponsor) – yes, identify and implement pieces that can shorten the process, work towards entire process. Approx. 30% of process can be looked at right now for implementation and savings. Arthur – conflicted over where to go. Concern is that if we don’t look at the whole, we might miss the target. Used Direct Deposit team as an example – question was really how do we get people money, but team was chartered to clean up direct deposit, but that is only a portion of the process. Two pieces of process looked at are Repayment Agreement & Bankruptcy Lookup steps - $1M in savings. Time savings by centralizing some functions, changing forms.
Arthur – We are not looking for precision, these are ballparks. There is a lot of work to do in order to implement these changes, so teams shouldn’t get bogged down in trying to be precise.
Empowerment & Decision Making – presenting to SC on Wednesday Feb 3rd. Have FTE savings and potential cost savings in the millions of dollars. By making decisions closer to front-line and not bumping up to management. If we have right practices in place, standardized, decisions can be made at front-line and save time and provide better customer service.
Job Order/Job Match – The two teams are getting together on Feb 14 to discuss combining in to one VSM. As pilots, they have been a bit behind in metrics. Job Match (JM) – CS & FS 100% mapped. Nothing in Visio, using digital pics of maps. Worked with MEP to get some of the calcs. JM is a customer service, part of working with customer, so hard to ID how much time spent state-wide. JM only one little piece of work being done. Haven’t identified large savings, but customer satisfaction should increase dramatically. The changes will save time, so that staff can be more productive to work with what’s already overflowing. The Job Order (JO) process has identified some savings, still refining. CS 28 steps to FS 13 steps, 262 minutes down to 72 minutes. 30% savings in how long it takes a JO to go thru process. Involves centralizing function, of which details haven’t been worked out. Don’t know the cost of getting to centralization. Will try to work with John R. before Feb 11th.
SSA/VR Reimbursements – have just implemented a new process for collecting reimbursements, so CS is FS. Not much difference between two maps. Looking at number of claims & dollars reimbursed compared to a year ago. 30% increase of about $300K. Team is wrapping up. Jane asked for brief presentation to SC.
Arthur – We are not achieving perfection by completing this process! Today’s FS is tomorrow’s CS. Continuous improvement is necessary – so even processes that are nearing an end in this phase can still be improved!
VR Service Improvement – Boundaries of process are when a client comes off waiting list to when they achieve their VR goals. CS & FS 100% mapped. Metrics in process, need new VSM manager; current manager leaving Dept. Team doesn’t have info, need to get it from him. Good reason for having info centralized. Any savings need to go to people coming off the waiting list. The clients on the waiting list are not included in the inventory count of the CS.
WIN-202 & Publications – teams have pulled in people from peripherals of process – having discussions about better ways to do processes. Good foundation work of describing CS is happening. Cost savings not yet identified, still working to make sure have a solid foundation.
Publications – All DOL publications being looked at – having publications in offices gets info closest to customer and a better understanding of needs, while centralizing captures efficiencies. Trying to achieve balance between the two. 100% CS & FS mapped. High Non-value Added amount, went back to revisit. Feb 10th meeting with John Kirsch (MEP) to get clearer around metrics.
Question – does something need to be presented to SC prior to implementation? Yes, especially where Publications crosses so many offices.
WIN-202 – software invented here in Maine and is sold to other states. Now in competition with the State of Utah to serve states. US Bureau of Labor Statistics only interested in funding one system. How do we add more functionality while creating more efficiency? Looking at new modules to implement with little cost. Adding functionality to make product more appealing. CS 95% mapped, metrics still up in air. FS 95% mapped, metrics still working on. Looking for consistency – are we identifying savings to bottom-line or in efficiency savings? Getting comfortable still a concern.
OIP Job Jar – Data Manager now Bob Morlock (also sponsor). Prioritization an important issue – mapping entire process OIP goes through to prioritize.
CS complete, summary metrics complete. FS complete, and summary metrics complete. Issue determination through completion and implementation of process. Using SharePoint software for communication. Have Identified some savings – 680 minutes per issue @ $.58 = $400/issue. Still have to determine how many issue requests OIP receives each year. John R. also a team member, so has been working on metrics too. Hard to identify minutes, as some issues only take a few minutes, others involve complete rewrites. Trying to use 80% rule (80% of the time, this takes how long?), but still hard to identify. Feb 11th shouldn’t be an issue. Half of staff time savings involves beginning of process, and not having to send info up through chain of command.
A separate question that arose – are presentations to SC required before beginning Kaizens? No – schedule them as needed. Let Kim know when using outside facilitation.
Teams not represented: Fact-finding & Appeals, Website, Outreach & Education, R-20 Payment Processing.
Staff Time – this was not included on the measurement form currently being used. The form included Cycle Time, which measures the amount of time it takes to complete a step. Cycle time could include not only staff time, but also time inventory sits on someone’s desk or is in the mail. Savings in Cycle Time actual cost savings, which also a BTC goal.
Info for Staff Time box should include all the time associated with the process. If more than one person is working on the same step at the same time, the time for all individuals should be included. So if five people are working on the same step at the same time, the sum of the time spent by all five people should be reported in the Staff Time box. The five people should be listed in the box for “# of people doing this step at the same time”.
Teams are concerned about having to recalculate all metrics. The information does need to be refined, but how much work is required to do so is up to each team.
This is a learning, even for the BTC leadership. We are building the process as we go. We have a plan, and are revisiting that plan as more information comes to light. If you have any suggestions that would make this process better, please send them to Kim Smith.
Bob Morlock had created a spreadsheet to help calculate summarized data for the OIP Job Jar process. John is making some changes so that the spreadsheet can be used for all teams. This will not likely be available before Feb 11th.
Kim will schedule the next meeting for two weeks out.
The meeting adjourned at 12:15.