AGCCE is now AGCCP

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Cory Fleming | May 16, 2012

I'm at the Association of Government Contact Center Professionals' annual conference this week in St. Louis.  (AGCCE, now AGCCP, is a research partner of ICMA.) Whenever I come to conferences like this, it's a real learning experience.  The thing that struck me yesterday was the new and innovative ways that local governments are using 311 contact centers.  For example, Virginia Beach, VA, is starting to use their system for human services, and Minneapolis, MN, has been providing information on where citizens can go to get assistance to avoid foreclosure.  It's exciting to think about where this field will be heading in the next few years.

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My new journey: starting a 311 Contact Center

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Debra Russell | May 4, 2012

Recently, I switched jobs.  For 19 years, I was with the City of Hampton, first as a Program Director for the regional Foster Grandparent Program and then as Information Manager for the city’s 311 Call Center. 

I loved working at the 311 Call Center because no day was the same.  There were always challenges and new things to do or work on and that was fun to me.  Plus, it lead me to organizations like AGCCE and ICMA.

But when I heard that the City of Newport News, a neighboring city, was going to start a 311 Contact Center, I found myself dreaming of what it would be like in today’s environment to start a centralized contact center.  Today, there are more resources, with technology catching up to the phenomenon of a local government contact center and groups like AGCCE there to help jurisdictions get started.  Not to mention the wealth of resources that ICMA now has available, thanks to Cory Fleming, Senior Project Manager.

There are also less resources, thanks to the economic climate we have today.  Who would start a 311 Contact Center today when services are being cut and jobs lost?  Why would a locality decide to start a new initiative in the face of these challenges?

I was intrigued and excited, even if some thought it was a risky move on my part.  All of my past jobs have felt like I had taken flight off of a cliff, to hopefully soar with the clouds and not crash to the ground.  So far, I have not crashed, although I can’t say I haven’t suffered a few bruises now and again.

It is now May of 2012 and Newport News has hired me as their first employee of the new 311 Contact Center.  Follow me on my journey as I document the daunting process of starting a 311 Contact Center, where eventually all non emergency city services will be processed and where a huge city-wide knowledge base will be developed. 

It promises to be an exciting ride.

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Linking citizens to local government

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Cory Fleming | May 2, 2012

There were a number of great educational sessions at the spring meeting of the 311 Synergy Group (an ICMA Research Partner) in Dallas earlier this week.  One session focused on the business drivers for 311 and outlined some of the questions and concerns three local governments -- Garland, TX, Fort Worth, TX, and Arlington, TX -- were considering in deciding whether to move to a 311 system.  Bryan Bradford, Assistant City Manager, summed up a critical driver for his city...."311 is going to be that necessary link between citizens and local governments in the near future."

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Transparency vs. Privacy

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Cory Fleming | April 30, 2012

There was a very interesting discussion during yesterday's "Canadian 311-What's New Up North?" idea exchange at the CS Week 311 Synergy Group spring meeting.  The push for transparency continues to be a concern for many local governments.  The data collected by 311/CRM systems can be tremendously helpful in responding to that call for greater transparency and letting citizens know how their tax dollars are being spent.

At the same, the protection of private individual data and information in Canada is required by federal law.  Capturing personal data for pre-populating future service requests isn’t permitted.  In other words, Canadian 311 systems aren’t allowed to pull up Mrs. Smith’s personal information based on her last phone call.  This law means that the same data and information has to be captured and recaptured in subsequent calls.

However, the City of Toronto has developed a secure registration system, known as My Toronto that allows citizens to register their personal data and then opt in for services that they want, for example, a reminder notice of when their quarterly property tax is due. As local governments venture into the use of data analytics and business intellegence, programs like My Toronto may hold the answer to how to provide greater transparency while protecting personal privacy.

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Service Level Agreements (SLAs)

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Cory Fleming | April 26, 2012

Reprinted from the May 2012 Edition of Performance Measurement Insider:

Local government 311/CRM systems generate a wealth of data that are being used for performance measurement and management efforts.   One particularly helpful element is the use of service level agreement (SLAs).  SLAs reflect an agreement between the 311/CRM system and a service department that specifies the length of time it will take to fulfill a service request.  For an elections office, an SLA may involve sending out an absentee ballot within 24 hours of receiving a request.  For a code enforcement agency, it may assign an inspector to review the reported problem within one work week. 

SLAs are particularly helpful from a customer service perspective because they serve to manage citizen expectations.  If citizens know how long a given service request will take, they are less likely to repeatedly report the problem, taking up both their time and that of the service department in processing duplicate requests.  The goal of a SLA is to set a realistic timeframe for completing a service request.  While every community has to set its own goals, most work to achieve the desired SLA between 75% to 95% of the time. 

If service requests aren’t being responded to within the designated SLA timeframe, this becomes a flag for further investigation. In Minneapolis, the Regulatory Services department began looking at service requests for exterior nuisance complaints. The investigation showed that one out of four supervisor districts generated nearly 33 percent of all exterior nuisance service requests, whereas another of the four districts only generated about 16 percent.  Yet both districts had one supervisor and approximately the same number of support staff.   It was clear that a reallocation of resources needed to be considered in order to meet the department’s SLAs consistently throughout the city.

SLAs can of course, be adjusted depending on extenuating circumstances and varying workloads.  The SLA timeframe for picking up tree limbs will likely take longer after a major storm, and in northern climates, spring time always brings more potholes that need to be repaired.  But overriding goal of establishing SLAs is to achieve quality service delivery on a routine basis.

With local governments facing tough fiscal choices, the data collected through 311/CRM systems can enable local governments to better track performance and improve service delivery.  For more information on 311/CRM systems, check out www.icma.org/311 and www.icma.org/311assistance or e-mail Cory Fleming at cfleming@icma.org.

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Thinking about Communication Modes

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Cory Fleming | April 24, 2012

When I was a teen-ager, my father always used to say that if you’re talking on the phone for more than 10 minutes, you should just write a letter.  I laugh at that thought these days, because in order to stay in touch with my godson and nephew, I have to text them on their cell phones.  In sense, I am writing them a letter…on the phone.

My point here is that how we communicate with each other has changed greatly over the last few decades.   For local governments, the challenge is no longer just to determine what messages need to be communicated, but also to think about how these messages are being delivered.  The mix of communication modes that local governments chose to use to put information out as well as take information in is important.  Not only do local governments want to provide some degree of diversity in communicating with their constituents as part of their customer service as well as communication/public information goals, but they also need to consider the costs associated with those different communication modes.  Generally speaking, for example, services that can be moved online cost less to administer than those that require a staff person take the information face-to-face.

Local government 311/CRM systems have a role to play in helping community leaders think through what the ideal mix of communication modes being used should be.  Not only do 311/CRM systems provide critical data for understanding what services citizens are requesting, but most also track how those requests are being received and how long it takes to address those requests. 

Consider the list of common communication modes in use now:

• Walk-in traffic
• Phone calls
• Web chats
• E-mail
• Text
• Mobile applications
• Social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc)
• Phone self-service
• Web self-service

In an ideal world, what percentage of citizen contacts is made using each of these communication modes in your local government?  What would be the ideal percentage for each mode?  Are there strategies your local governments can use to encourage citizens to use a more cost effective communications mode, such as web self-service or mobile applications?  What information can be pushed out to citizens through e-mail or social media so citizens don’t need to make a phone call?  While 311/CRM systems are primarily about improving local government customer service, they can also inform local government communication and information plans and provide a means for citizens to connect with their local government no matter which communication mode used.

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Mega Millions & Customer Service

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Cory Fleming | April 3, 2012

The recent lottery frenzy had a lot of people daydreaming about various"what ifs" scenarios.  At the City of Greensboro [NC] Contact Center, the team of call agents weren't inmune to the temptation to buy a few lottery tickets.  But as  Mary Jutte, Contact Center Manager, reports the importance of local government customer service wasn't lost in the process.  According to Ms. Jutte, "My entire staff has gone together as a pool to buy lottery tickets for tonight's drawing.   It has been so interesting to listen to them fantasize about winning, and what they would do next -  started out dreaming about retiring, how they could spend the money, then to "Oh, no, we can't just walk out, who would do our job?".    I'm so proud of them that they think that way!"

That's dedication to excellence in local government customer service!  :-)

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Customer Service & Citizen Engagement

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Cory Fleming | March 30, 2012

In March, I did my first test run of a new local government customer service workshop that will be offered next fall at the 2012 ICMA Annual Conference in Phoenix.  My sincere thanks goes to the employees of the City of Gardiner, Maine, for allowing me to try out the program with them and for giving me some great suggestions and ideas for improving the workshop.

Preparing for this workshop has gotten me again thinking about what I consider to be the strong link between customer service and citizen engagement.  I believe a strong focus on providing excellent customer service helps build trust between citizens and their local government which is a requirement for effective citizen engagement.  

Excellence in local government customer service is defined by the experience a citizen has when he/she interacts with local government employees for whatever purpose.  And that experience is largely driven by a person’s emotional response. If citizens are treated with respect, listened to, and heard when they bring their concerns and problems to their local government, they will leave city hall or the county courthouse feeling as though they accomplished something.  But if citizens are met with local government employees who can’t take the time to listen, don’t offer assistance, or make suggestions about what options are available, the citizen’s reaction will likely be something along the lines of “Why did I bother?”

Citizen engagement is all about actively bringing residents into the public discussions and decision making processes that impact a community’s quality of life.  In fact, good government by definition requires active citizen engagement.  But if a citizen’s experience with local government on a day-to-day basis (customer service) isn’t positive, why in the world would he/she want to engage in a public discussion of larger policy issues (citizen engagement)?  If we want to actively engage citizens in local government and the greater community, then I believe we must start by striving to provide excellent customer service each and every time a local government employee interacts with a citizen because that is how trust and confidence are built over time.

So, how does all this tie into 311/CRM systems? The primary purpose of a 311/CRM system is improved customer service. These systems provide a front door to local government and make it easy for citizens to connect.  311/CRM system help ensure that all citizens have equal access to local government services and citizens can trust that if they took the time to make a phone call or submit a request online, the local government will take care of the matter.  311/CRM systems represent excellence in local government customer service. 

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The 311/CRM Universe

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Cory Fleming | March 19, 2012

There is no central registry where local governments can report their use of a 311 or CRM system, so we don't have an exact count of how many centralized customer service systems exist in North America.  But I've been digging through some data sources recently to try and get a better sense of what the 311/CRM universe looks like.  I've reviewed a new ICMA survey on e-government practices, the Dispatch Monthly website, and the membership base of two ICMA's research partners--the 311 Synergy Group and the AGCCE--and have come up with some interesting numbers.

It appears that there are roughly 280 311 or CRM systems in the U.S. (265 systems) and Canada (15 systems).  The largest city with a 311/CRM system is New York City with a population over 8 million, and the smallest appears to be Bethel, Alaska with a population of 6,080. (Remember we're relying on self-reporting mechanisms, so we still may not have a complete picture of all the systems that exist.) There are 7 joint city-county systems, 28 county systems, and 245 city systems.  California has the greatest number systems in place with 41; Texas comes in second with 31 systems.

We've known for some time that majority of the largest cities in the U.S. were covered by a 311/CRM system, but it's surprising how many smaller local governments have seen the benefit of implementing a CRM system.   83 jurisdictions with a population under 50,000 reported having a CRM system in place.

In the past, the expense associated with implementing a 311/CRM system has held some smaller communities back from looking into implementation.  But based on these statistics, it would seem that 311/CRM systems are moving to small and mid-sized jurisdictions all across North America.  As is so often the case with technology, the cost of implementing a 311/CRM system has come down in recent years, and new Software as a Service (SaaS) applications promise to bring the technology to more jurisdictions without the necessity of purchasing new hardware and software that will become obsolete over time. 

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Broken Windows

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Cory Fleming | March 9, 2012

James Q. Wilson, a political science scholar and a pioneer in the community policing movement, died last week.  One of his best known articles was an Atlantic Monthly piece, co-authored with George L. Kelling,  that outlined the “Broken Windows” theory of criminology. Wilson’s theories focused on the premise that tending to the little things in a neighborhood—i.e., broken windows—helped prevent more serious crime.  In his research, Wilson found that disorder in a neighborhood often served as a precursor to crime.  Many police departments around the country responded by incorporating Wilson’s community policing theories in their programs and saw crime rates plummet as a result.

So, what’s the connection between community policing and 311/CRM systems?  Namely this, that 311/CRM systems allow local governments to collect trending data--for example, abandoned cars, building and other code violations, graffiti, damaged street lighting, and loitering to name a few “broken windows” if you will--and then track those call types by neighborhood.  These types of data provide early indicators that a neighborhood may need help, and allows local government service departments to work in conjunction with the police department to collectively to address problems before a neighborhood goes seriously downhill.

Planning for one such effort is underway in the City of Philadelphia.  The Honorable Michael Nutter, Mayor, has declared that one of his administration’s five strategic priorities for the city is for Philadelphia to become one of the safest cities in America.  And a key strategy for achieving this goal?  Philly311 plans to take over more of the City’s non-emergency calls and provide new data reports by neighborhood for this very purpose.  I think Professor Wilson would be impressed at the contributions 311/CRM systems are making.

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Data Analytics & Citizen Engagment

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Cory Fleming | March 6, 2012

I’ve been spending some time lately researching trends in IT for an essay I’m writing on the role of local government data and information systems in producing community change.  One of things that hits me time and time again is the mass amounts of data that are being produced these days. Local governments are no exception to the rule, having traditionally collected large amounts of data from their residents.  We are the keepers of records for the community.  And I believe that getting the maximum value from all these data requires a fundamental shift in thinking, a move from considering  the “I” in IT to be“information” to instead be “innovation.”  

Local governments have traditionally shied away from doing much with the vast amounts of data they collect due to privacy and security concerns.  And certainly we are seeing public backlash to Google’s new privacy policy that allows the company to track user activities on all the company’s various websites and then consolidate that information to better market products to consumers.  It can sometimes feel a bit like “Big Brother” is watching us.

But understanding the needs and wants of constituents is vital to providing good service delivery.  We all strive for greater citizen engagement in our daily work and struggle with how to encourage that public involvement in our decision-making processes.  Using data analytics—the study of large sets of raw data to gather critical business intelligence—can potentially serve as another form of citizen engagement.

Consider, for example, the types of data collected by a local government 311/CRM system. When people take the time to call, text, of e-mail about something, it is important to them. Those data can tell us what services citizens are contacting their local government about and where those calls are coming from in the community among other things.    Among the more popular reports produced by 311/CRM systems:

• Number and types of information requests
• Number and types of service requests
• Time taken to complete service requests
• Percentage of service requests completed within a targeted timeframe
• Geographic location of service requests
• Trends in citizen requests over time

These types of data can be used to help improve local government performance and make better budgeting and resource allocation decisions.  It’s not the same thing as having a constituent participating in a public hearing telling you what he or she wants, but the analysis of local government data can still shed light on what’s important to the public.

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A chance to learn about 311

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Debra Russell | February 27, 2012

Several years ago, I was searching for some sort of training that would be relevant to 311 Call Centers.  I had taken previous training for call center managers but it was geared toward the private sector.  When I brought up issues I was having in our government contact center, the others in the class looked at me like I was an alien from another planet.  And I couldn’t relate to their emphasis on sales and profits. 

That is why I was thrilled to find AGCCE, the Association of Government Contact Center Employees.  I attended my first conference in 2007 and found local government contact center employees who had faced the same challenges that I was facing.  It was a goldmine of information and all for an extremely low price.

Better yet, sessions were relevant for those who already had started contact centers as well as those who were just starting them.  Because of the low cost, I had even met government managers whose jurisdictions were just in the “thinking” stage of starting a centralized contact center.

This year, in addition to hearing from experts on how to launch a new contact center, topics will include:

Managing customer perspectives

Keeping the lines of communication open with city or county departments

Introduction to Open 311

Controlling the massive amount of information coming into your contact center

And you will learn about the Knowledge Network, ICMA’s online community for local government professionals, in partnership with the Alliance for Innovation and the School of Public Affairs at Arizona State University.  The network covers all facets of local government and encourages new partners, such as local governments, organizations or associations affiliated with local government, to join in the conversation.  Sharing takes place without boundaries, and this allows governments to improve processes and get new perspectives. 

The network is organized by topic, group, documents or blogs and is a wonderful source of information and for sharing successes and new ideas.  Cory Fleming, AGCCE Research Partner and Senior Project Manager with ICMA and Greg Stopka, Central Regional Director for the Alliance of Innovation, will share the many benefits of the network at the AGCCE conference.

This year’s conference will be held in St. Louis, Missouri May 15 – May 17 and attendees can benefit from all the sessions above as well as a visit to the St. Louis contact center, the Citizens Service Bureau and a visit to the Missouri United Way 2-1-1 center.  The cost is an unbelievable $200 for non-members and includes most meals (join AGCCE and save $50).  Attendees will stay at the Drury Plaza Hotel at the Arch for $94 a night.

Register at www.regonline.com/agcceconference2012 and find out more about AGCCE at http://governmentcallcenter.org/ .

Look forward to seeing you in St. Louis May 15 – May 17!

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311/CRM and Community Readiness Assessments

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Cory Fleming | February 15, 2012

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The Future of 311/CRM?

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Cory Fleming | February 2, 2012

A colleague recently asked me, given all the new local government apps coming out now, if 311/CRM systems might be on their way to becoming obsolete.  Below is my response:

Based on reading I’ve been doing lately, I wouldn’t agree with that assessment.  Right now, only about 20-30% of the population that owns a  cell phone has a smartphone.  And of those, it’s an even smaller percentage who have some type of application to submit service requests.   I think apps expand the universe and help more young people engage with their local government, but I don’t see apps as a replacement for phone calls.  On this issue, I always go back to the fact that Los Alamos County, NM -- where 85% of the population as a PhD and Internet service is in 95% of the homes -- received 44% of its citizen contacts via walk-in traffic.  I’ve also interviewed a few local government managers about their apps lately and they aren’t really looking to grow the number of requests received via that technology. Their goal is simply to be accessible via a variety of communication channels.

What I do see happening is that 311/CRM contact centers will likely serve multiple purposes in the future; they can’t just be about customer service any more, though that will remain a primary purpose.  But I’m seeing these systems and the data they generate being used for: 

•          Customer service

•          Citizen engagement

•          Performance measurement and management

•          Budgeting and resource allocation

•          Disaster response and recovery

•          Community and economic development

I think many service departments tend to focus on the delivery of their services or programs without giving much thought to the larger picture of what is happening in their community. One of the benefits of a centralized 311/CRM system is that they help break down departmental silos.  Studying 311/CRM data across departments can provide early indicators (code violations, abandoned cars, graffiti, street lights out, etc.) that a neighborhood is in trouble.  Then the PD, Code Enforcement, Public Works, Community Development, etc. can come together to address issues in those neighborhoods.  If service departments essentially "do their own thing," a jurisdiction will miss out on important opportunities for realizing return on investment, cost savings, and improved efficiencies.

The Decemeber issue of PM featured an article on using 311/CRM data to drive reengineering business processes in three communities.   The successes these communities are having is where I see 311/CRM systems headed.

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