Lean Process Improvement: Creating the Business Case for Reorganization

DeKalb County has experienced escalated billing and customer service concerns over the past several years. To assist with identified gaps in providing ‘best in class customer service’ to constituents DeKalb County underwent an assessment to determine the root cause of the escalations and perception. Initial benchmark data revealed organizational gaps, including the separation of meter reading from the billing unit, in addition to a lack of metrics and performance tracking.The DeKalb County Board of Commissioners agreed with the critical needs presented by the assessment team, the Executive branch and the Department of Finance. This resulted in a vendor being on-boarded in November 2014 and their successful engagement of establishing performance metrics and redesigning of the integrated voice recognition (IVR) system.While these items would assist with the global vision and long term sustainability of the organization, it did not rectify operational gaps nor address immediate needs. The meter reading work-flow did not allow for transparency to external customers and created difficulty in accountability for the management team. There was an absence of internal and external collections efforts and the various internal teams often operated in silos with little or no cross training. The DeKalb County water customers experienced conflicting and inconsistent information, processes and procedures.Starting in October 2014, the Department of Finance utilized various lean process improvement tools to improve operation and customer trust without reorganizing the department. The use of the tools including project charters and the DMAIC (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve and Control) cycle producing successful accomplishments that built the case for reorganization to a meter-to-cash utility model.