STC Operational
Improvement Strategies
Dee Anna Hassanpour, Oregon
Juliane Barone, Ohio
Keith Goodwin, Minnesota
2015 STC Summit
Oregon’s STC Program
Operational Improvement Using Lean
2015 STC Summit
Overview of Oregon’s Program
• Program started in
1983
• Highest usage during
the Great Recession:
794 Plans
• Current number of
Plans: 187
• Current number of
Claimants: 729
• STC UI Paid Out in CT
2014: $1,435,352
• STC UI Paid Out YTD
2015: $1,981,215
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Oregon’s Pre-Lean Business Process
• Single Point of Excellence
• The SPE doing the work was a
Compliance Specialist 2 (higher
classification range than most
doing similar work)
• Almost 100% Paper Process
• Completely Manual Process
• Was Not Scalable
• No Reliable Way to Capture &
Report Data
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Oregon’s Pre-Lean Business Process (Cont’d)
• No Administrative Rules
• Communication Methods
Limited to USPS, Phone, and Fax
• Employers Reported High
Customer Satisfaction Because
of Single Point of Contact
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The Path to Operational Improvement
• Oregon Will Not Be Modernized Before Next
Recession
• Oregon’s UI Operating
System COBOL
Mainframe
• Oregon Received STC
Grant – Had To Find a
Way To Increase Usage
Without Impacting
Customer Experience
• No IT Resources Available
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Process Improvement Grant Overview
• Used Part of Grant to Fund FT
Project Manager
• Used Funds to Secure Lean Six
Sigma Vendor (CSG Government
Solutions)
• Will Use Remaining Funds to
Update Forms, Conduct Policy
Outreach, Develop Program
Rules
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Oregon’s Lean Six Sigma Experience
• Assembled Team of Managers, SMEs and CSG
Member
• Trained OED Team Members at Green Belt Level
• Used Toll Gate Process to Monitor Project
Process at Program Executive Level
• Team Proposed 11 Solutions; Executive Level
Approved 7 of the 11 Solutions
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Lean Six Sigma IMPROVE Solutions
• Develop written policies
• Standardize procedures to remove ad hoc
decisions
• Move the program to special programs unit
• Reduce paperwork by utilizing Peernet and
creating electronic files
• Establish objective standards
• Improve Work Share tools
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Lean Six Sigma IMPROVE Solutions (Cont’d)
• Reduce incomplete, illegible and errors on forms with
fillable .pdfs that contain required fields
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Lean Six Sigma Project Benefits
Direct Savings
• Standardize written
operating procedures to
remove ad hoc decisions
• Move program
• Reduce paperwork
• Fillable .pdf forms
• Establish performance
and program metrics
• Improve Work Share
Tools
Indirect Savings
• Cross
training/knowledge
exchange
• Equitable distribution
• Program Integrity
• Quality with agility
• Delighting the customer
• Teamwork with
responsibility
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Operational Improvement Strategies:
The SharedWork Ohio Experience
Juliane Barone, Esq.
Benefits Policy Administrator
Office of Unemployment Insurance Operations
Ohio Department of Job and Family Services
2015 STC Summit
Ohio: a Newcomer STC state
A brief history of the enactment of the SharedWork Ohio program
SharedWork Ohio law
(Ohio Revised Code
4141.50 – 4141.56) was
found to be in federal
conformity by the
Department of Labor.
Ohio’s benefit payment
system “OJI” completed
the initial phase of
automation of the
program.
The first employer
application was
processed by the
SharedWork Ohio Unit.
To date, 37 plans have
been approved by the
SharedWork Ohio
Unit.
November 2013 March 2014 July 2014 August 2014 March 2015 Nov 2015
Ohio was approved for two
grants (totaling $3.7 million) for
the automation of the
SharedWork Ohio program, as
well as SharedWork Ohio
promotion and enrollment
efforts.
The SharedWork
Ohio program
opened doors
for business.
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OJI completed full
automation of the
program.
Automating SharedWork Ohio in Two Phases
Partial Automation – Phase One
• Manual employer applications and
participating employee lists
• Manual employer-initiated claims
• Manual queue to track status of pending
applications
• Manual reporting
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Paper Employer Plan Application
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Employer Certification Portion of Plan Application
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Participating Employee List
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Manual Weekly Claim Filing
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Automating SharedWork Ohio in Two Phases, Continued…
Full Automation – Phase Two
• Real time employer and employee self-service web portal via the
Ohio Job Insurance (OJI) system.
• Features include:
Integrated SharedWork Ohio employer plan application;
The ability for employers to upload the participating employee list;
Employees are automatically associated to the SWO Plan;
Employer-initiated, employee-verified weekly SWO claims;
OJI automatically calculates and disburses proper prorated benefit.
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Automated Employer Plan Application
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Adding Participating Employees
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Automated Weekly Claim Filing
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SharedWork Ohio Automation Leverages
Existing UI Benefit Framework
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
SWO payments
Initial claim filing
Employer charging
Reporting
Issue-setting
Weekly/biweekly claim submissions
Automatic child support deductions and tax
withholding
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Lessons Learned
• Identify and get buy-in from key stakeholders not
only during the legislative process, but the IT
design process.
• Leverage resources from the entire agency to
support the STC program.
• Memorialize historical decisions, interpretations,
and workflows for future reference.
• Opt for automation.
• Find a balance between the priorities of
employer flexibility and compliance with law.
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SharedWork Ohio Utilization
• To date, Ohio has approved 37 employer plans
with over 1900 participating employees.
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Shared Work Programs
Minnesota Program
2015 STC Summit
The Overall UI Background - The Minnesota
Technical Delivery Model
• 2002 through 2007 major technology revisions
• Designed a unified technology system
including benefits/taxes and all special
programs
• Involved major change management efforts
• Shifted a lot of staff from backroom
operations to customer facing staff
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2005 THROUGH 2007
• 2005 - June 20 – Tax system goes on line – 3,000
calls a week from employers.
• 2007 - October 20 Integrated benefits system
goes on line. Long wait times for customers to
get to CSC staff – 47 minutes at times
• Testified before Legislature (legislative concerns)
• Within 3 months call wait times less than 1 min.
• 2008 – Great Recession Starts
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MINNESOTA UI OVERVIEW
• 50% of UI is seasonal every year
• Relatively high replacement rate – max WBA =$658
per year
• Online usage 90%
• The entire program is in same division – 3% of UI
transactions occur in WorkForce Centers
• We don’t chat - we don’t have virtual hold
• Phone wait times around 30 seconds
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Minnesota Shared Work Program
• Started in 1994
• Major UI automation across all portions of UI
Program included Special Programs as part of the
automation (this includes TRA, Shared Work, DUA,
etc.
• Easy to run special programs with automation
• But must be part of broader UI automation as
mentioned above
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2012 Federal Law added New Shared Work
Guidelines
• We made a few changes to meet those guidelines and
to obtain Federal funding for shared work payments
• Federal funding increased our Trust Fund
• Most of our technology already existed – needed a
few legal and technical tweaks.
• By time law passed in 2012 shared work in Minnesota
already significantly declined because of recession
recovery
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Shared Work Successful in Uncertain Economic
downturns – our experience
• Employers uncertain of what is transpiring
• Employers want to stabilize key workforce during
uncertainty
• Employers use shared work during that period of
uncertainty
• Employers quickly make tough decisions when
uncertainty gone
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Employer Awareness
•
•
•
•
We have had shared work program for 21 years.
UI Website has lots of shared work information
There are Q and A’s on the website
We have communication specialists that talk to
employer groups
• Dislocated workers mention shared work.
• Awareness is shown by rapid increase in recessionary
times
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The 2008 Great Recession – Our Experience
•
•
•
•
2008- week 30- 786 weekly shared requests
2009- week 30- 9,059 weekly shared requests
2010 – Week 30- 2,317 weekly shared requests
2011 – Week 30 – 922 weekly shared requests
• Needed systems that could handle shared work
expansion rapidly. Heavy use of Technology.
Minimal use of staff.
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Six General Steps
• The plan and participants – part automated - part
staff manual – web – Q/A and submission
• Plan approval – generally short – staff manual
• Plan upload and participant upload – mostly
technical
• Applicant opens account (reactivates) - technical
• Applicant requests benefits – technical
• Plan reports and follow-up – technical and staff
manual
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Share Work - The Initial Shared Work Approval
• Initial employer application -- obtained from web
• Employer must provide application and spreadsheet
of individuals
• Takes 5 to 10 minutes to review (staff review)
• Application and spreadsheet copied into system
• Technology checks list of individuals to see if SSN’s
match and time worked is correct, and owner signed
• System then recognizes approved shared work
applicant and the right questions are presented on
weekly requests
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Applicant must then open UI account
• 90% of all applications are done on line
• IVR and Customer Service do the other 10%
• Once account established (or reactivated), weekly
requests can be made
• Questions presented are shared work modified
• 90% of all weeks requested are on line
• 10% are by IVR
• Almost no state time spent on weekly requests
• We do not do paper.
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Weekly Reports on Shared Work Plans
• Computer reports to see if hours worked are
consistent with plan
• If hour deviations - which way deviating
• Shared work pay modified if actual hours deviated
• If too much deviation then questions with employer
– what is going on
• Always some tension between layoffs avoided and
plans that shift so much layoffs avoided are
undermined
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Staff to Manage
• .5 to 1 FTE’s whether we are in recession or not
• We can very quickly scale up without much staff
expansion
• Technology can handle 10 times increase in
usage very quickly
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Employer Perspective – Labor vs Finance
• Driver for shared work is retention of key staff during
uncertain economic time – the skilled labor
perspective
• However financial constrains dictate right sizing of
the work force as soon as uncertain time passes –
driven likely by retained fringe benefits at full cost
• Our experience - expands rapidly during incoming
recession but declines rapidly once employer figures
out its workforce needs.
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Employers need to understand full picture
• Voluntary employer decision
• Employer needs to know both benefits and financial
costs
• Balanced perspective must be presented and
understood
• Nice auxiliary UI program. Might affect 1% of job
loss during recession, in some states could reach a
couple percent during recession.
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