Crowdsourcing. and Other Performance Improvement Ideas. John Polk Xerox Child Support Solutions October 21, 2013

Transcription

1 Crowdsourcing and Other Performance Improvement Ideas John Polk Xerox Child Support Solutions October 21, 2013

2 Discussion Topics The State of the Program Opportunities for Change Crowdsourcing Cloud based opportunities Data driven child support Blue Ocean Thinking Group exercise

3 Where Do We Stand? Since PRWORA, many program efficiencies have been realized through automation & outsourcing. Outsourcing SDUs and New Hire Reports Improvements to Statewide systems Document imaging, FIDM, and FPLS BUT for 5 years the program has stalled Late 1990s and early 2000 growth rates have slowed from 10-12% per year to 1 to 2% per year.

4 Here Is What We Know In 2012, collections grew 1.5% BUT 15 states actually went backwards In 5 years (2008 to 2012) collections grew only 4.2% AND 20 states are collecting less today than 2008! If you remove the Texas and Florida collections from the last 5 years there is no growth in nationwide collections. If we believe there is unmet child support need in this nation then we should all be disturbed by these statistics

5 A Few Other Data Points In 5 years the total number of new child support orders for current support has increased only 1% Over the same 5 years the number of child support FTEs have been reduced by 6,162 or 10% nationwide And cost effectiveness has increased $.39 for an overall improvement of 8% The data suggests that the program has become labor bound an increase of results is only possible with a linear increase in FTE

6 A Few Graphs to Illustrate the Point

7 Collections for 19 Years $30,000,000,000 $25,000,000,000 Collections are Flat for 4 Years $20,000,000,000 $15,000,000,000 $10,000,000,000 $5,000,000,000 $-

8 Growth % Has Slowed to <2% $30,000,000, % $25,000,000, % 12.00% $20,000,000, % $15,000,000, % 6.00% $10,000,000, % $5,000,000, % 0.00% $ % National % Change From Prior Log. (% Change From Prior)

9 AND, There Is No New Money It went to health care

10 Where Does This Data Leave Us? Collections potential The low hanging fruit is gone already picked The next increment of collections growth is very hard to reach Year over Year change will be 1% to 2% Effectiveness Cost effectiveness range is wide from $1.71 to $12.05 a 5-to-1 difference top to bottom (but Texas is $11.11) Collections per FTE ranges from $255k to $1.1m per year If every FTE collected $1.1m the total would exceed $59b in collections What else does the data tell us? Achievement of current goals is not growing the program Performance is wide ranging between States Significant new investment in the program is unlikely The overall trend in performance is less than +2% per year Labor is declining and the efficiency of each unit of labor is declining as well

11 If we agree that program performance is flat, what can we do about it? OPPORTUNITIES FOR CHANGE

12 One Idea for Change CROWDSOURCING

13 Definition of Crowdsourcing Google Definition The practice of obtaining needed services, ideas, or content by soliciting contributions from a large group of people, and especially from an online community, rather than from traditional employees or suppliers. The general concept is to combine the efforts of crowds of volunteers or part-time workers, where each one could contribute a small portion, which adds into a relatively large or significant result. Project Definition for CS Using a web-based collaboration tool, current SDU staff in 16 locations research and perfect employer data then reach out on a national basis to convert the method of payment from paper remittance to electronic remittance.

14 An Easy Example The Wedding Photographer At the wedding and reception very few still shots are taken mostly video The photographer breaks up the video into frames and sends these to his crowd over the web whose members select the best frames The most selected frames are assumed to be the best and the photographer sends these back to the crowd and asks them to select the most interesting part of the frame by click/drag The photographer again picks the highest votes for each selection. The crowd has assisted him in selecting the best video snippets to be converted to still photographs for the wedding book.

15 Elements of a Crowdsourcing Pilot Project Hypothesis Automated tools Data Crowd concept Staffing the crowd Incentivizing the team Focus on the greater good

16 Hypothesis We can increase electronic payments by working together as a national team. Concept of greater good allows employer to be treated as a single entity, not on a state-by-state basis. Probability of success is increased by one person dealing with one employer at an aggregated, national level. One person, one employer yields the highest probability of successful conversion to electronic payments.

17 Pilot Project Design Pilot Period: 2/25 4/19 Target 6 SDU states: FL, OH, TX, MD, NJ, LA 2106 employer candidates identified and loaded into portal 254 candidates researched (name, phone, # of payments to Xerox) 140 targets actively being worked by an Outreach staff Pilot goals 6 mid-sized or large employers per Outreach FTE Total of 18 employers each to be converted to EFT

18 Project Mechanics Combine existing employer data from multiple States in a web-based tool Sort employers that still remit with checks by most checks to least per year (low hanging fruit) 16 employees, working virtually in 7 different locations convert employers to electronic remittance Research first, then outreach to the employer Greater good concept assist employer regardless of State where employees are located Incentivize staff for achieving project goals for conversion

19 Project Mechanics Web Tool D

20 Project Mechanics -- Research Worker selects first employer on the list (previous slide) Using the image snippet, records employer name and address, and other contact information Uses Internet and other tools to collect best contact data Turns the employer over to outreach worker Staff are paid bonus for the number of research items completed

21 Project Mechanics -- Outreach Part of the worker s task is to identify all the States the employer sends payments to and to assist the employer in converting Greater good concept convert the whole employer regardless of the number of payments that will go to States other than worker s

22 Results as of May 16 Category Employers Contacted about Electronic Remittance Number 600+ (30% of target) Monthly Payments Converted So Far 13,167 Total Annual Payments Converted 158,004 Monthly Payments in the Process of Conversion Total Annual Number of Payments in Process 1,489 17,868 Actual # FTE Involved 5

23 Conclusions from Pilot Experience 158k annual payments converted from paper to electronic about equal to a month of mail payments in Illinois Combinations of existing processes, people and technology produce new synergies Employers respond well to being treated as a whole People do not have to be together to work together Consolidated effort can reap big rewards

24 Lessons Learned Did not work as well with volunteer staff as expected Even if dispersed, the crowd must be dedicated because of learning curve Need team leader and daily scrum style meeting to keep remote team members focused and energized Processes that were separated can probably be combined without a loss of efficiency

25 Other Opportunities We are going to have a group exercise in a few minutes but before we do that let us show you a few other ideas that have merit. To change the present we have to imagine a different future than the one before us today

26 When Change was Needed Do you think they saw the future? The IBM 286 and the Modern PC 286 ran at 8MHz and used a 30 Mb hard drive Modern PC 3+GHz and 600 Gb hard drive 375 times faster and 200 times more storage IBM PC ~ $3500 and the PC of today ~ $600 iphone and the IBM 3490 Disk Drive iphone 5 has up to 64 GB of storage & costs $199 IBM 3490 disk drive had 22 GB and cost $90k $4,090 vs. $3.10 per GB -- reduction of 1300%! To change the present we have to imagine a different future than the one before us today.

27 Another Idea Virtualization of Work Trend is toward cloud-based applications Best examples now are backup and disaster recovery (e.g. - Carbonite is $59/year) The Virtual Desktop computer is coming (Office365) The virtual worker can perform work from anywhere even from home

28 Another Example Imaging in the Cloud Images captured locally are processed in a hosted application where image perfection and character recognition occurs Data entry staff use a web-based application to correct mis-read characters Images are stored in a web-accessible image archive No local hardware or software are required except PCs Low cost/high value opportunity AND, you can do the work from HOME

29 But There Are Barriers to Change Data Sharing & Operational Barriers IRS Publication 1075 In State data, equipment and staff residence preferences and laws Loss of touch and feel Fear of loss of control Worry about sustainability Back up Disaster Recovery Business Recovery To find our way to a new future these issues must be addressed

30 Imagining a Different Future Creating a Blue Ocean in Child Support

31 Red Oceans & Blue Oceans Hint Crowdsourcing is a Blue Ocean Idea Red Ocean Convergence High similarity Declining $ utility Incremental growth of <5% Entropy Blue Ocean Divergence from the usual & customary New ideas abound Change is quantum Areas of low cost & high value Game changing

32 A Red Ocean Example The Child Support Program Today

33 Blue Ocean Synergy

34 A Final Word Many people believe program improvement is to be found in changing the external variables: Customer behavior Mobile applications Customer portals If you believe the data, you know that changing the external is not working Real change comes from within the program how we do work and how we imagine a different kind of future

35 Group Exercise CROWDSOURCING

36 Exercise How can we use crowdsourcing to increase the number of cases that have a successful outcome? Success = a right sized order that pays Task 1 on the 3x5 card quickly write down one idea where crowdsourcing would help your office/county/state get better orders (5 minutes). Task 2 Join the group indicated on your card 1, 2 or 3 (10 minutes). Each person share their idea by reading it from the card Select a leader Vote on top 3 ideas Read your 3 ideas to the workshop audience. Task 3 Whole Group vote to get the top 3 ideas

37 Questions/Comments John Polk Xerox Child Support Solutions