Athens-Clarke County Sets the Groundwork for Success in Service Request Management
The Athens-Clarke County Unified Government (ACCGov) is a consolidated city-county 70 miles northeast of downtown Atlanta. Home to the University of Georgia, Athens-Clarke County is geographically the smallest of Georgia’s counties, but with a population of almost 130,000, it is the sixth most populous city in the state.
As part of its mission to provide high-quality services and responsible stewardship of the community’s resources, ACCGov took on an initiative last year to begin organizing and standardizing internal processes around resident service requests. As part of that initiative, ACCGov turned to Comcate and its customer relationship management (CRM) solution for its ability to consolidate service departments into a single solution, better track resident requests, and begin collecting data to inform decision making in the future.
“A Lot of Emails Flying Around”
Before implementing a CRM, ACCGov mostly utilized email to communicate about and track resident service requests. The Communications Department handles requests from social media, phone calls, or the agency’s general email account. ACCGov’s 10 elected commissioners also send service requests through the Clerk’s Office or Manager’s Office on behalf of their constituents. In both instances, internal staff would use email to pass the request on to the correct department and follow-up on its progress.
“We found there were a lot of emails flying around,” said Jeff Montgomery, Communications Director for ACCgov. “You'd have to go back and see, ‘Did I send this? What was the last resolution on this? Who was copied on this?’”
Searching for a CRM
To improve request routing and tracking, ACCGov set out to find a CRM solution. At the top of their priority list was a system that was intuitive for both staff and residents to use, with GIS components and reporting capabilities. Several of the agency’s departments use Cityworks for work orders, so a solution that could integrate with the popular asset and work order management system was also necessary.
After evaluating seven or eight options, Athens-Clarke County eventually chose Comcate.
“We liked the cleanliness of the interface,” said Montgomery. “To create a new service request is very quick, particularly on an admin side, which was where we knew we were going to be starting at first.”
The ability to customize components of the workflow on their own was also a big selling point. “We don't have to go back to Comcate for every little thing. Once we were trained on the system, there's a lot of power that we have to make decisions, even with the integration with Cityworks. We can change categories, we can change people, we can update the emails that go out to staff at different stages.”
A Phased Approach to Request Management
Down the road, ACCGov plans to utilize the public-facing features of the CRM to collect requests from residents and directly route them to the correct department, but is approaching that end goal with a phased approach. Currently, ACCGov is focused on internal operations and ensuring every department is comfortable with the software and utilizing it correctly.
“Right now, we just want to make sure staff are getting familiar with it, that they're using it, and also, frankly, that they didn't get overwhelmed with a new system and suddenly get hundreds of emails about requests that they really didn't have the capacity to deal with,” said Montgomery. “So, we wanted to take it in a sort of a measured process.”
As part of this initial phase, the Communications Department is taking a structured approach to change management and has been working on additional training materials, both in video and written format, for staff users. The plan is to bring users together later this year for sessions where they can identify breakdowns in the current processes and develop ways to improve workflows to make the experience as seamless as possible for internal users.
Setting the Groundwork for Success in Reporting
A major focus for ACCGov during this phase is ensuring that all departments are utilizing the CRM correctly to set the agency up for success in future reporting. This involves educating staff on not just how to use the software, but establishing and enforcing standard operating procedures, such as the appropriate time to close out a ticket or encouraging departments that receive calls directly from the public to enter the service request into the system on their own.
Ensuring comprehensive, accurate collection of data will set the groundwork for ACCGov to leverage that data in the future to make strategic decisions.
“Where we really see it coming into play is getting a sense of the kinds of issues we’re hearing about, as well as where we’re hearing about these issues,” said Montgomery. “But the focus right now is to collectively make sure we're gathering all the information in one place, and that's been the biggest step we've been working on so far.”
Looking to the Future: Next Steps for Athens-Clarke County
Ultimately, ACCGov wants to utilize the CRM to gather requests from the public and automatically route them to the correct department. “The end goal, ultimately, is that these service requests are going to the people directly who can address them the quickest,” said Mongtomery. “And that will, I think, very much improve the efficiency of addressing service issues.”
The next step for ACCGov in reaching that end goal is likely to share the submissions portal with the commissioners. This would allow the commissioners to submit service requests on their own, as well as check the status of their requests, without going through other offices. “That’s our next step that we think will happen later this summer,” said Montgomery. “We are interested to see how that goes as we continue to cut out those middlemen.”
While the agency is still working through its phased approach, the initial experience with a CRM has already been positive. “I think it has tremendously helped us keep track of things better, allow more people to access the data that needed to be accessed, and also to cut down on emails across the board,” said Montgomery.
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